Part One - The Solitude of Suffering - Iselilja - Harry Potter (2024)

Chapter 1: An Introspective Night

Chapter Text

Harry Potter had spent the majority of this summer indoors. It was the hottest summer on record, according to the Muggle news. The use of hosepipes had been banned due to the drought so there was nothing but yellowing grass and shrivelled up flower beds left to tend to of the usually pristine gardens of Privet Drive. Thus, Harry's only chore out of doors had been struck from his list.

That didn’t mean that there were no chores at all, but he had finished today’s cleaning and had already been locked in for the night – three hours earlier than usual. He’d been planning an excursion to the old shoe factory and this night seemed as good as any. With nothing better to do, he passed the time carefully retrieving everything he needed for the trip from beneath a loose floorboard under his bed, as quietly as possible.

His aunt and uncle were watching television downstairs, directly below his bedroom. Harry listened intently, matching his movements to the noisiest parts of the programming. He couldn’t afford to be caught with the floorboard open. His uncle wouldn’t hesitate to have his books, notes and cloak stuffed back into the cupboard under the stairs, or worse – lit on fire.

The jingle signalling the start of the seven o’clock news could be heard through the floor and seconds later his uncle snarled something about a siesta. Harry quickly tugged a bundle of notes out with a rustle, hoping it went unheard.

About five hours to go before I can start on the locks, Harry thought as he carefully placed his notes along with a drawing of a runic array into an old rucksack. He’d been aching to retry his modified version of the “Mind-Brandishing-Array” ever since the graveyard, just to be sure.

A cheap camping light, a pair of good-grip gardening gloves and his size 3 silver knife were placed in the rucksack. With everything packed, he matched up the reattaching of the floorboard to the trumpeting music that intercut the opening jingle and the announcer’s first greeting. He put the rucksack in the junk-corner by the door, draping his invisibility cloak on top of it, and then lastly covered the pile with a huge old flannel shirt and some jeans. Now all he could do was wait.

He laid down on his bed on his stomach, listening to his uncle’s continuous snarly commentary on the news when a loud crack sounded from somewhere outside.

‘What in the world was that!’ said Uncle Vernon.

Harry heard footsteps as Aunt Petunia undoubtedly moved to the window to locate the offending party.

‘Must have been a car that backfired, but I can’t see whose’ she said.

‘Probably that Bernards in number seven, that tin can he keeps driving about in.’ snarled Uncle Vernon.

His relatives were obsessed with their neighbours. For Uncle Vernon this meant a one-sided competition of having the nicest, most expensive possessions, while Aunt Petunia judged their moral failings based on what she could see through their windows. Harry didn’t think the noise came from Bernards’ old Saab Diesel. It had sounded more like Apparating or Disapparating to him. Maybe there had been a witch or wizard watching the house?

That made sense. After what happened at the graveyard, it seemed likely that someone would be watching. Whether they were sent by Dumbledore or Voldemort, he didn’t know. Then again, could he be overreacting? Nobody had ever cared to look in on him during the previous summers, including the one after he killed a teacher with his bare hands. And there was no way to be sure Aunt Petunia was actually wrong about the noise. It could have been a car, or something breaking inside a neighbour’s house. Anyway, he had no intention of taking unnecessary chances. He’d have to be extra careful when sneaking out later.

***

Harry had been listening keenly for ten minutes, standing still with his rucksack on and shoes hung around his neck, laces tied together. His invisibility cloak was tucked in the front pocket of his hoodie. The house was silent except for the deep, choked snoring of both his uncle and cousin.

The battered alarm clock (Harry had secretly fixed it with “accidental” magic two summers ago, before that it had belonged to the heap of Dudley’s old junk in the corner of the room. Turns out, the ministry trace needs to recognize a cast spell to go off) showed it was twelve minutes to midnight. Harry started pushing a pulse of magic towards the topmost lock -a heavy padlock. It was the riskiest lock, as it clicked loudly, and had the farthest to fall when he dropped it.

With a minute's concentration, it fell to the carpeted floor with a loud thump. He stopped and listened patiently for signs of movement. Only when certain the Dursleys were all still asleep, did he continue on to the next lock. All three locks and the chain took sixteen minutes from start to finish. The real test would be locking himself back in when he returned.

He closed his bedroom door slowly, praying for Hedwig's empty cage not to rattle (it didn't), before carefully descending the stairs, avoiding the creaky step at the bottom. Once downstairs, he put on the cloak, but kept the shoes off as socks were quieter. The summer before starting his third year, he had tried putting the cloak on inside his room, which turned out to be a great mistake. He had stumbled on it while on the stairs, waking the whole household and earning him a beating it took a week to recover from.

The living room stretch was the easy part before the next hurdle – the sunroom door. He had personally oiled the hinges and locking mechanism thoroughly and knew it should open smoothly, but he could never quite trust the shoddy construction not to make some new, unexpected noise. Thankfully, this evening it slid open without a hitch and suddenly he found himself in the back garden. In the safety of the great outdoors, his heartrate finally slowed. He stopped to put on his shoes on blindly, keeping close to the house and out of view from the street in case a stray shoelace should peek out under the cloak.

Finally, he could get out of his crouch. Now begun the forty-five-minute trek to the factory, hopefully unseen by any potential witches or wizards hiding under invisibility cloaks in the bushes. He recast the weak “accidental” silencing charm on his feet before he stepped around a withered rosebush into number two’s garden. From there he slipped around the corner of their garage and onto the sidewalk of Daisy Street.

Once on the sidewalk, Harry felt like he could finally breathe freely. It was still uncomfortably hot outside, the air dry and oppressive, but he didn’t mind. Dudley had said something to his parents about it suddenly going cold while biking home with his friends earlier, but that breeze was nowhere to be found now. Halfway to the factory, the novelty of freedom was wearing off. The heat had turned stifling.

Harry considered taking off his hoodie, slightly regretting having let his um – habit – migrate from his thighs to his arms, but manoeuvring the hoodie off without removing the cloak first didn’t feel worth the effort. He could wait for the added safety of the factory wards.

Forty minutes later, he could see the dilapidated brick building peeking out from the young birch wood that had taken over the old factory yard. By then, sweat had all but plastered his clothes to his skin. Harry stopped as soon as he passed the ward line, shoving cloak and hoodie both into the rucksack and fetching the light. He had to shake it a few times, before a soft red light illuminated the path through the withered ferns before him. It was something Uncle Vernon had bought for hunting, claiming that the red light couldn’t be seen by deer. He had joined is drill-company’s hunting party once before quitting. Harry figured it had been too physically strenuous for his uncle, though he didn’t doubt his uncle had enjoyed shooting things. The light then ended up discarded in Dudley’s second bedroom.

Harry spent the next twenty minutes checking each runestone and walking the markings that together formed his warding of the place before climbing a ladder to hang the light under the rusty mezzanine. Stepping back down, he nearly jumped out of skin when he thought he saw a face peeking in at him through a partially smashed window. It turned out to be his own reflection.

He found the chalk safe and dry in a lunchbox by the door. Most of it he’d stolen from number eight’s children a year ago. He took out the drawing from the rucksack and began tracing the array onto the concrete floor using an oversized compass made from two sticks and some silver tape.

It was an array of his own making, using a mix of the “Mind-Brandishing-Array” from Gertrude Dimmel’s Runic Enchants & Glyphs of the Self that he’d found in the restricted section while researching methods for breathing under water in preparation for the second task, and the “Sequences for Diagnosis concerning Soul Sickness” from Victor Pressens’ Runes for Healers of the Mind, Body, and Soul. The latter was an advanced tome on healing runes Professor Babbling had recommended when he first became interested in souls after seeing Sirius almost lose his to dementors in his third year.

The most important thing he learned then, was how all living things housed three energies:

Body – The physical body of a being and all the chemical processes that kept it running.
Soul – The essence of an individual manifested as a tiny knot of strings that absorbs life experiences.
Mind – The stringy energy that connects the Body and Soul, moves magical energy, and ties the whole being together.

Mind can be removed from the body and be used as a resource. It’s continuously replenished, though the speed of regeneration varies from person to person and generally slows with age. Soul is a single unit every being is born with. It may change throughout life, but it does not grow. They both belong on the spiritual plane, and the art of necromancy is tied to manipulating them. Soul-magic may have brought him to the darker side of the library, but necromancy made him stay. In Harry’s opinion, it was the most interesting branch of Dark magic by a wide margin. Not that he’d ever acknowledge that out loud.

Hermione had spoken out against him diving into the more unsavoury Dark literature, of course, and so Harry had taken to hiding this research activities from her. She couldn’t possibly understand his motivations, and her refusal to even look at some of the darker texts meant that she hadn’t truly learned what Dark magic actually was. Ron thankfully, did not take Ancient Runes and had no interest in what Harry and Hermione were working at while he was busy making stuff up for Professor Trelawney. He never took Hermione’s word for it when she said Harry was dabbling, which Harry was grateful for.

There were few decisions in his life that he felt the rightness of the way the switch from divination to runes had. Hermione had dropped divination with him – Trelawney couldn’t teach them anything and the whole subject had been a massive waste of time – and Hermione had also been right about Ancient Runes. It was fascinating and had risen to become one of his favourite subjects in mere days – mostly because it was just so easy. He could see how magical energy moved through the sequences and arrays, and it admittedly felt good when Professor Babbling called him a prodigy.

The array finished, he picked the knife out of the rucksack and sat down at the centre of the circle. Aiming for the slight shape of a dark blood vessel in the crook of his right elbow, Harry jabbed the knife in. Blood streamed down to his fingers where he used it to draw a smaller circle in front of him all the while periodically twisting the knife to keep his body from closing the wound too quickly.

He could see the peach-pink and orange glow of magic attempting to heal his elbow. As soon as he could close the circle, he let it heal, leaving only a small white mark. While pouring magic into the array and his breath, he closed his eyes until he could feel the buzzing of soul tickle his throat. Opening his eyes again, he blew the soul-breath out into the small circle. The runes and circles were glowing white throughout the array and his soul formed a tiny white dot in the centre of the blood circle.

Diverting some energy to his fingertips, Harry prodded at it until it expanded to a floating ball of light green strings about the size of a basketball. Tiny golden sparks bounced between the threads, and there, top left section of the ball was a cluster of fuzzy, dark burgundy, almost black soul threads fused onto his own. He dropped his hand and tried pulling on it with his mind instead, elongating the treads and ripping at the seams. The action was painful, making him hunch over his knees. His reflection in the broken window sported increasingly intense red eyes. Harry gave the red yarn a contemptuous glare.

Ugh! It’s still there. Voldemort’s bloody soul.

Chapter 2: The Firey Pit of Little Whinging, Surrey

Chapter Text

The walk back to Privet Drive was uneventful. Thoughts of his involvement in Voldemort’s resurrection and his failures were whirring in circles in his head, never resolving into anything useful. The skin on his arms and thighs itched, and a slow sinking feeling had started in his chest. Why couldn’t he just have kept his mouth shut in that blasted graveyard? What on earth had compelled him to criticize the bloody Dark Lord’s rune-work?

Why didn’t the corrected array pull the fragment out of me and to the main soul as designed? What will Ron and Hermione think if they find out? Or Sirius? – Oh, who am I kidding, when they find out! Find out I’m a traitor. What if the ritual had failed had I only left it alone, then wouldn’t Voldemort either be dead now or still in that lump of a body?

He knew that last idea couldn’t be the case, the ritual would have gone ahead but worse… Voldemort would have been resurrected to some deformed being with just that sliver of soul left to him.

My meddling was probably the best thing that could have happened to Voldemort at that moment. …Not that he’ll ever know that, oh and isn’t that an arrogant thought. Perhaps he should have told Dumbledore about his involvement after all, then he’d at least be free of this guilt. Then I’d only be partially to blame for Cedric’s death, not all the deaths to come at Voldemort’s hands.

What would Dumbledore do if Harry told him everything? He had no idea.

He needed to distract himself, nothing good had ever come out of these thought spirals, but when they started, they were close to impossible to stop. Eventually, he adopted a bad habit that was the only reliable relief. He couldn’t indulge in that very moment, walking down Daisy Street. So, the spiral continued into its inescapable conclusions – thoughts Harry tried valiantly not to name and that he would never confess to having.

Turning the corner onto Privet Drive, he was exhausted. It had to be somewhere around three o’clock in the morning and his own mind had dragged him down into a black pit. He needed sleep. The bed was so close now, he could almost feel the tattered blanket and lumpy pillow against his cheek. The sunroom door slid open just as silently as when he left and he got into his room without issue, hanging the padlock carefully on the latch and stuffing his things back under the loose floorboard before tackling the locks again.

They would need to be locked in the opposite order of how they were opened, saving the most difficult lock for last. First lock clicked easily, second one too, but now he was dead on his feet, magic all but drained. Still the chain went on smoothly. Had Harry been a wiser, more patient boy, he would have stopped to take a break. However, his bed was calling out to him. Impatient and tired, he continued.

Just the padlock left now, he thought as he pushed just enough magic to the lock to levitate it above the latch while closing it. He could hear the latch click in place, but when he moved to levitate the lock into the slot, there was no juice left in his core for it. The padlock fell to the floor, apparently missing the carpet as an eardrum-piercing clank split the silence of night. The snoring stopped. Faint cursing and the sound of heavy footsteps. A door opened, more footsteps.

‘BOY! WHAT ARE YOU DOING SNEAKING ABOUT OUR HOUSE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT!’

Harry scrambled to get the rest of his belongings secure while his uncle worked the locks open. There wasn’t a chance in hell that he could fool Uncle Vernon by feigning sleep now. His bedroom door flew open, the light switched on revealing a purple-faced Vernon Dursley in his nightclothes and dressing gown.

Uncle Vernon grabbed Harry by his neck and shook him violently while spitting, ‘WHAT ARE YOU TRYING TO DO HUH? STEAL FROM US AGAIN? IS THAT WHERE YOU’RE PLANNING? HAVEN’T I TAUGHT YOU WELL ENOUGH TO NOT. TOUCH. OUR. THINGS HUH!?”

He let go of Harry, who slumped to the floor, trying to catch his breath.

‘ANSWER ME BOY!’ shouted Uncle Vernon, slapping the back of Harry’s head.

‘I’m sorry, I needed the bathroom- ‘Harry begun, but his uncle was having none of it.

‘BATHROOM YOU SAY! YOU DARE LIE NOW TOO? YOU WENT THIS EVENING. LYING STRAIGHT TO MY FACE! I’LL TEACH YOU…’ Uncle Vernon stormed off towards his and Aunt Petunia’s bedroom, muttering something along the lines of, ‘I’ll teach you… Disrespect... Under my roof... I’ll teach him, yes...’

Harry crawled to his bed and put his glasses on the nightstand. He stayed sitting on the floor, resting his chest against the frame and dropping his head on the bare mattress, resigning himself to what was about to happen. He didn’t have to wait long before his uncle returned, and Harry heard the distinct clinking of a belt buckle. He didn’t look up as he habitually pulled his ugly, oversized t-shirt over his head, not taking it off completely but keeping it around both his arms and shoulders. Bowing so his chin almost touched his chest and retreating into his head, he felt the first blow.

***

Harry woke the next morning still draped over the edge of his bed, knees on the floor and his crumpled old t-shirt under his head. The lash marks had mostly healed magically during the night, but some blood had pooled in his arse-crack and soaked into his underwear. The skin on his back felt stretched and ached dully. His clothes were crusty with dried blood, dirt and sweat. Most of all, he wanted to take a shower, but he knew he wouldn’t be allowed one that day or the next. No food either. Familiar feelings of misery crept upon him from the back of his mind, along with the itchy feeling. He let himself wallow in it for a while, no energy to start the day just yet.

Finally, he got up, changed into a clean set of underwear, pyjama bottoms, and t-shirt, and laid down on his side in his bed, folding the lumpy pillow in half and stuffing it under his head with his blanket. He pushed the itchy feeling and the ache in his back away as best he could, letting his imagination take every available braincell. The abysmal existence of Privet Drive melted away, giving way to fantasies of Quidditch and feasts in the great hall, of free periods with Ron and Hermione, of the rune lab in the Come-and-Go-room, of well-fitting clothes, a Victorian house filled with chintz, and true healing rest.

The next two days passed mostly through purposeful unconsciousness. Harry had spent enough of his life locked away alone in a dark cupboard to develop a knack for vivid daydreaming, and with the aid of one of Aunt Petunia’s discarded self-help books, a talent for lucid dreaming too. With a bit of effort, he could stave off the nightmares and disappear into a world of complete control at will. Last night however, his dreams were something else entirely.

That didn’t even feel like my dream, he thought as he put on his socks.

The dream had been of a corridor of black tile and a door he couldn’t reach, but he couldn’t remember any details. His scar had been prickling strangely when he woke up, and he’d been sweating as if it was a nightmare, but Harry couldn’t remember anything unpleasant happening in it. It was puzzling. His thoughts were interrupted by the alarm clock announcing it was six thirty in the morning with a couple of sad beeps. Aunt Petunia was in the bathroom next door, and Harry had a feeling he would be let out today, at least briefly. The room had started to smell quite a bit, and he needed to empty the piss bottles. A couple of minutes later, the locks clicked, and Aunt Petunia’s horsy face peeked through the door, contorted in a disgusted grimace.

‘Clean this up! And take a shower, you stink!’ she said sharply, lip curling. ‘Then get breakfast ready,’ She continued to order as she went down the stairs.

Harry grabbed a fresh change of clothes, his shampoo, bar of soap and his “kit” from the closet. The itch had reached new hights last night, turning to proper pain, but he’d been too worn down to scratch it. Doing it in the bathroom made it easier to clean up afterwards anyway.

He grabbed the piss bottles from the corner by the window and made for the bathroom. Locking the door behind him, he felt some of the latent fear that was a constant part of his life at Privet Drive, ease up. He was the one locking them out.

First, he tried to use “accidental magic” to vanish the content of the piss bottles, mostly to use up the stored magical energy. If he didn’t, cuts would heal almost as soon as they were made and provide no relief at all. After eight (failed) attempts he poured the wee into the toilet and rinsed out the bottles in the sink. Magic stores were close to empty. It was a welcome, hollow burning sensation in the pit of his stomach. It made the skin itch turn unbearable in anticipation.

Undressing felt like peeling off dried glue. Harry scrunched his nose up at the smell as he shoved the clothes into the hamper – Aunt Petunia was definitely going to give him a hard time for the state of those. For a brief moment, his own reflection caught his eyes – a gaunt, long face, ashy complexion, bright green eyes, and a scar shaped like a lightning bolt cutting through his left brow.

He wondered how much weight he’d lost this summer. He couldn't check. The Dursleys hadn’t owned a working bathroom scale for months after Uncle Vernon ignored the weight limit on the last one. He twisted around, trying to get a look at the state of his back. Raised scars were criss-crossing over it, rounding off along his rib cage down by his waist. His spine popped a few times as he stretched. Harry’s body had a somewhat dented shape because of an injury to his ribs that wasn’t set right and healed awkwardly. His arms were covered from shoulder to wrists by neat, white scars. The runes he’d branded on himself last winter stood out on his collarbones, which were protruding a bit.

No doubt Mrs. Weasley would blow her top if she ever saw him like this. She had been complaining about his weight every summer since he first met Ron. Should he try to fix the rib? He wouldn’t be wearing ill-fitting rags forever; a more fitted shirt and that dent could easily show through.
He pulled himself out of his musings and away from his reflection. The surface of his skin was demanding release from its tension. He picked a new razorblade out of the “kit”, turned the shower on, and got in.

He sat down cross-legged in the middle of the shower, letting the spray massage the back of his neck and picked a blank spot just below the elbow on his left arm. Without hesitating, he pulled the blade swiftly through the skin once, and then once more on top of the first, creating one deep, but clean cut. It gaped, exposing the thin layer of fat beneath the surface and bleeding steadily. The relief was instantaneous.

He let his head tilt back and enjoyed how his mind went quiet for a few minutes. A low, humming euphoria spread through him, making him feel weightless as he serenely watched the blood run, mixing with the water. The sting of the cut cleared away the foggy, awful emotions and the sinking feeling vanished.

This is why I do this, insane or not, it works! he thought, savouring the blissful sensations of what he’d just done along with the warm water washing away the built-up grime.

A minute passed in peace before a buzzing spread in his veins. Magic stores were bouncing back, and the tell-tale peachy glow of self-healing begun to bloom around the cut. Mesmerized as always, he watched the cut close, feeling woozy, but calm. Once the cut was another white line among a hundred like it, Harry got up and quickly finished the shower.

When he arrived downstairs, Aunt Petunia was making herself a cup of tea. She drank it in silence at the kitchen island, observing Harry with a hawk-like stare while he fetched the paper and then set about making breakfast. Uncle Vernon came down half an hour later and Harry set his breakfast and coffee down on the table in front of him robotically. His uncle made a gruff noise that was the closest thing the man knew to a polite “thank you”.

‘Apparently it is going to be slightly cooler today” said Uncle Vernon lightly to Aunt Petunia, who was craning her long neck to peek through the window to see Mr. Number Five leave for work. When his wife didn't answer, he frowned at the paper, and said sourly, ‘Whatever that means when we live on the surface of the sun.’

A chink came from the hall and Harry put the laundry basket down to go pick up the post. The pile held two bills, a card from some colleague of Uncle Vernon’s and- his heart made a little jump - a letter with his name on it. Just his name, no address or stamp. An owl had probably dropped it through like so many had done when delivering his first Hogwarts letter - an ordeal seared into his memory, and that he felt he had learned from, to say the least.

He stealthily stuffed his letter in his pocket and returned to the kitchen with the rest, wordlessly handing it to Uncle Vernon. Before the summer, he told Ron and Hermione about the “Owl Ban”, backed up by threats to Hedwig's life, regardless of which owl carried the letter. Now, he expected to get a couple of Muggle letters from Hermione and nothing from Ron. Hermione had sent a letter a week for the first two weeks, and then nothing.

They don’t care as strongly for you as you do for them, or as they do for each other, you’re the third wheel – just accept it, commented the notoriously unhelpful voice in his mind.

As soon as he finished washing up, Aunt Petunia shooed him back to his bedroom and locked the door behind him. Laying on the bed, he listened for her to return downstairs before opening his letter.

Hi Harry!

We’re coming to get you on Sunday! I don’t know what they are planning to do about your Muggles, but it won’t be the same as last time, I promise! Hermione’s here too, she’s missed you a lot, can’t wait till you get here.

Sorry, but I can’t really say much more. We’ll talk when you get here!

Ron

P.S: Hedwig says hi, she misses you too.

Reading it sent a trickle of longing for his friends though his heart. It was an emotion he regularly tried to squash. If he allowed himself to think about his friends as much as he wanted to, time would slow to a grinding halt, and he’d spend every waking moment driving himself insane with yearning. It had happened before.

He re-read the letter, looking hard at the reassurance that it wouldn’t be like last time.

Nobody wants a repeat of last time Harry thought bitterly.

Last time Arthur Weasley had destroyed the Dursleys' fancy fake fireplace, and the twins had tricked Dudley into eating a piece of candy that made his tongue grow four feet long. If this year’s rescue mission were anything even close to last time, Harry was going to get a hold of Ron and strangle him.

Harry spent the next four days locked in his room, mostly laying on his bed with his mind far away. If he kept quiet and nothing unforeseen happened, Uncle Vernon should not find cause for another round of lessons before it was time to leave. He ended up sleeping during the day and trying to study during the night. Only one of his textbooks could fit under the floorboard at a time with the cloak and parchment in there, and so Harry tried to swap them for the next in line whenever he finished an assignment - and he had an opportunity to sneak into the cupboard. This week, it was the potions textbook and a two-foot essay on moonstones he’d been postponing for far too long.

Overall, the four days were miserable. The foreign dreams of corridors and doors continued, supressing his own nightmares of the graveyard, and even disrupting some carefully planned lucid dreaming. The last night at Little Whinging for this summer, Harry awoke after this particular dream at four o’clock in the morning, frustrated thoughts of the dream whirring in his mind.

It has to be Voldemort’s dream. Why else would the scar prickle? I do have a piece of his soul after all, there should be Mind-strings attached to it too… Maybe I can find them… And do what, exactly? How could he stop this?

Not for the first time, Harry wished he had someone to ask for advise on this, a parent of sorts who also wouldn’t throw a fit knowing what he had been doing with the soul research. There was Sirius. But even if he could theoretically tell his friends or Sirius, there was still the practical inconvenience of Uncle Vernon’s “Owl Ban”. He knew some threats had been made by Dumbledore to Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon, and they had only served to worsen the situation.

After his third year, Harry had tried to scare them into giving him more freedoms by claiming that his “mass murderer godfather” would descend upon them if they didn’t comply. That had backfired spectacularly. His uncle hadn’t believed a word of what he said and the act of making threats had earned him a very painful round. No, he had to rely on himself alone in this.

With a little determination, Harry focused his attention inwards, searching for the fuzzy static quality of Voldemort’s soul shard and any pieces of Mind that could constitute a possible connection between the two of them.

It was kind of like looking for the nerve path to control the tiny muscle behind your ear, the one you feel twitching if there’s a sharp noise from exactly the right angle. After an hour or so of this strange meditation, he was confident he had found the connection. Now what?

He could try following the strings towards Voldemort’s mind, but that seemed dangerous. Maybe he could send an image or a memory down it instead?

Something bad, something that makes him feel powerless and afraid, like I did in the graveyard… Well, Harry thought if there was one thing he had in abundance, it was bad memories.

The tricky part was choosing one. Anything containing the man himself was obviously out of the question and so were most recent memories – he didn’t want to accidentally disclose something Voldemort really ought not to know.

You mean commit more treason? Commented a voice in his mind. He ignored it.

Embarrassing things weren’t an option either, even though many of his most scarring memories involved public humiliation. Something from childhood perhaps? He had a plethora of memories from his life in Little Whinging that ticked all the right boxes.

That will more or less give him my current address, he started thinking, then he realized that Voldemort almost certainly knew where he was.

In the end, he opted for the memory of his fifth birthday, it was the first time he could remember receiving lashes from his uncle. It was also the first of many times his left shoulder was dislocated. He decided to include some of his spotty memories of the days after, too.

He had spent them locked in the cupboard, no food, no light, only being let out to use the bathroom after hours of pleading… getting slapped on the side of his face on way out of his cupboard every time… He prepared as he would any lucid dreaming session while he also grabbed on to the connection, and when ready, started playing the memory from the beginning, feeling it flow downstream.

Welcome to hell, Tom.

Chapter 3: The Auror Guard

Chapter Text

The next day, Harry awoke to a crystal-clear head and an almost jolly mood. He was finally going back home, back to the wizarding world, to his friends, to Sirius and the Weasley family – to safety, his mind added importantly.

Dumbledore had on several occasions told Harry that the Dursleys' were the safest place for him, that the blood relation with his aunt meant that the house was warded against… enemies? Witches and wizards with ill intent? He didn’t know exactly, but he did know there were wards around the property. He could feel the magic just at the edge of the lot.

What he didn’t understand was how it was supposed to protect him when he left the property. How could Dumbledore think that the blood wards extended to his primary school, for example?

This question had grated on him off and on for the better part of two years and lead to his first long walks to the abandoned industrial sites in the north the summer before this one. That quest had later been followed by journeys to the grey stone church in the south and tagged out motorway bridge to the west (he had yet to go east), all the while feeling for magic in the air. He hadn’t been able to feel any tendrils of magic in the air or ground outside of number four’s lot perimeter so far.

I could use some information on blood wards, but I think the Hogwarts library will classify that as Dark Magic and my pass to the restricted section expired at the end of last term… Not that there are that many dark books there anyway… What I actually need is an unsupervised trip to Knockturn Alley… He shook his head with that last thought.

He could imagine the Weasleys' reactions if they found him creeping about Knockturn’s Antique Bookshops and second-hand markets with his hood up, browsing for instructions on blood magic. He had to admit, the looks of outrage he imagined on their faces were quite funny.

It wasn’t like he could go to Knockturn Alley and just- shop any time soon. He’d been reliant on others to chase away the amassing public whenever he went to Diagon Alley in the past. Or at least he had been harder to spot before more recent photographs of him were printed in the Prophet during the Triwizard Tournament. Now he’d get swamped the second he stepped out of the Floo. No – acquiring information on blood magic would have to wait, but he could experiment.

With a small burst of energy from the conclusion to his musings, he got up, dressed, and pulled out a fraying Muggle notebook and chewed down pencil from the desk drawer. Diving under his bed he fished out a thin compendium of runic symbols and energy tables and got to work. The next few hours were spent hunched over his rune work. First when the rustling of the cat flap broke his concentration, did he appreciate that he’d lost track of time. His rescue from Privet Drive was just an hour and a half away.

‘We’re going out!’ barked Uncle Vernon through the door.

Aunt Petunia was shoving a piece of bread, a bruised apple, and a bottle of water through the cat flap. He could see several gold rings and bracelets adorning her bony fingers and wrists as she pushed the things through.

‘Don’t you dare try anything while we’re away! If you as much as attempt anything funny, or steal something, I’ll know! Mark my words, boy! Understood?!’ threatened Uncle Vernon.

‘Yes, sir’ answered Harry curtly as he picked the food off the floor. He had long since deduced that saying as little as possible to his uncle while staying painfully polite was the wisest course of action.

Returning to the desk, he ate his dinner and listened to the bustle of all three Dursleys leaving the house, apparently in their full finery. Once certain they were gone, he unlocked his door (without the need for stealth, this took 30 seconds). He had an hour to shower, change, pack, and leave everything looking pristinely untouched. Prioritizing packing, he gathered everything on his desk and under the loose floorboard in his rucksack and went downstairs to bust the rest of his belongings out of its prison under the stairs.

Forty-five minutes later, he was freshly showered and changed. All packed and ready, he sat at the kitchen table, slowly eating some ancient, stale chocolate-covered orange biscuits he’d found at the very back of the snack-shelf that no one would miss. The glass door to the hall open, he had a clear view of the entrance from where he sat waiting.

School trunk, Firebolt and the empty owl cage stood neatly in front of the cupboard door (discouraging any peeking into the cupboard itself by any nosy Weasleys. It still said “Harrys Rom” in crayon on the back of one of the steps in there).

He’d cleaned up his room as well as he managed and locked all the locks again. How long would it take the Dursleys to notice he’d gone? ...A mystery like those on television where a person vanishes from within a locked room - in their house… They’ll lose their minds, he smiled.

In his mind’s eye he could see them spending the next week or two believing he’d become invisible or learned to teleport about their house, and that he could reappear any moment to terrorize them. The image made him snicker to himself.

His chewing must have drowned out the noise of people arriving outside, because the sudden loud click of the front door magically unlocking startled him. A strange blue orb was glowing through the frosted glass in the door, which opened to reveal a hunched over human figure with some wispy hair scattered about its head.

‘Professor Moody?’ Harry said uncertainly. The blue orb turned out to be the man’s eye, whirring madly around in its socket. He was wearing a gritty, worn traveling cloak and carrying his gnarly oaken staff. Behind him came several more people in varying types of wizarding dress, filing patiently into the hall.

‘I don’t know so much about “Professor”,’ Moody growled, ‘never got to do much teaching, did I? You ready to go? These yours?’ he gestured towards the stuff by the cupboard.

‘Yep, that’s mine. I’m ready’ said Harry, suddenly feeling nervous. Last time he saw Moody, he was laying on the bottom of a magically enlarged suitcase in his long johns while a Death Eater had been shaving his head to use for Polyjuice potion.

‘H-how do I know it’s you?’ Harry asked suspiciously, slowly reaching for the wand in his pocket.

A sudden fear of being laughed at flashed through him the second the words left his mouth, but to his relief, Moody just harked approvingly. ‘Smart boy. You can’t, because you don’t know me, do you?’ he said, studying Harry intensely with the electric blue eye.

‘It’s him, Harry,’ said a thin hoarse voice behind Moody.

‘Professor Lupin?’

The owner of the voice craned his neck around Moody’s shoulder to see Harry’s face. He looked tired and a bit sickly, his robes in an even worse state than when Harry saw him last. Still, Lupin smiled broadly at him. Moody seemingly took the hint that he was blocking traffic into the hallway and limped heavily on into the kitchen. Lupin followed, and behind him came a witch and two wizards Harry had never seen before. The witch was young with violently purple hair and dark friendly eyes set in a pale, heart shaped face.

‘He’s a bit smaller than I thought he’d be,’ she said in a cheery voice.

‘Hey!’ said Harry with fake outrage, he didn’t think she really meant to offend him.

Behind her, a tall black wizard raised his hand in a greeting, same did the small, older wizard beside him.

‘Potter raised a good question. Are you sure it’s him, Lupin? It’d be a nice lookout if we bring back some Death Eater impersonating him. We ought to ask something only the real Potter would know. Unless anyone brought any Veritaserum?’ Moody growled.

‘Harry, what form does your Patronus take?’ Lupin asked.

Harry suddenly got the insane urge to answer wrongly on purpose – a lot of people knew what form his Patronus took, he did cast it in front of the entire school when Malfoy and his goons pretended to be dementors.

‘Why are you asking a question so many people know the answer to?’ he asked back, fully expecting to be punished for his nerve in some way.

Instead, Moody barked a laugh, ‘Try again, Lupin!’

‘Alright, the day you first came to see me in my office, what creature was in the tank beside us?’ Lupin asked with raised eyebrows.

‘A grindylow’ answered Harry with a small smile. It’d seem like he’d made a good impression on Moody, at least.

‘That’s him, Mad-Eye,’ said Lupin.

The next few minutes, Harry was introduced to the purple haired witch, Nymphadora (‘Don’t call me Nymphadora! Call me Tonks!) Tonks, who Harry learned had sent the Dursleys a Muggle letter saying they’d won some lawn competition to lure them away. The tall black wizard was Kingsley Shacklebolt, the auror currently heading the Sirius-manhunt, leading it on a wild goose-chase. The small wizard was Eliphas Dodge, a long-standing friend of Dumbledore’s.

Moody was apparently responsible for keeping the “mission” to its time schedule, and so they waited a few moments in his aunt’s kitchen. It turned out the journey was to be made on brooms, and they weren’t going to the Burrow, but nobody would tell him where they actually were going.

Tonks commented on the Dursleys' cleanliness, while Dodge murmured something about an oozing black aura upstairs that he hoped was temporary. The comment reminded Harry of Trelawney’s ramblings about death and misfortune, so he quickly tuned out whatever else Dodge had to say about auras.

When time neared, everybody gathered in the back garden. Tonks helped Harry strap his luggage to his broom when he felt a tap on the top of his head, followed by a cold slithering feeling running down his body.

‘What was that?’ asked Harry nervously, and he turned to see Moody with his wand drawn, normal eye fixed on him and the magical one watching the sky.

‘Disillusionment charm.' Replied Moody. 'I heard you have an invisibility cloak, but this is more practical for flying.’

Looking down on his hands, Harry seemed to see right through them, or… more like they’d taken the same colour and texture as the grass below, like a human chameleon.

‘That’s the first signal!’ said Lupin sharply, pointing at the sky where a few bright red wand sparks were scattered among the stars.

They all mounted their brooms at Moody’s command. The second signal came in the form of green wand sparks, and they were off. The flight was interesting, to say the least. Moody had the helm and commanded evasive manoeuvres and detours (that Tonks protested loudly), mostly to keep them from being spotted by Muggles, but sometimes to outsmart some threat that only Moody perceived.

It felt outright fantastic to fly again, and he had at multiple points felt the urge to dive out of formation, away from the party and speed off into the night and disappear. It’s not like they’d be able to catch him if he did. Flying away was a reoccurring fantasy for him, but a fantasy was all it was. He had no place to go, and such a stunt would likely just complicate his life further.

Freeing as flying was, however, it was also very cold, and Harry regretted not putting on warmer clothes – especially gloves. His fingers felt frozen to the broom handle. Thankfully, Tonks had managed to temper Moody’s most outrageously paranoid urges, sparing them of both a trip through the heavy clouds and doubling back a few miles.

The landing site was a little brown patch of grass forming a small square amidst rows of Victorian town houses. There was a faint smell of rubbish from overfilled bins outside most of the houses. Some had smashed windows and missing rooftiles, but all looked lived in with blue TV-light filtering out through curtains in many a window.

He could imagine this had once been a prestigious address in its Victorian glory days. Ornate but dirty gas streetlamps were littered between the modern electric ones, the wrought iron fences in front of the houses were of the tall and posh kind, and the street was wide with cobblestones peeking out from under the asphalt by the gutters.

Harry thought it all a bit sad. He quite liked older buildings, filled with lavish décor and charming personal items – it was the complete opposite of everything the Dursleys liked. Aunt Petunia hated dirt with a passion and so she favoured easy-to-clean plastic surfaces and smooth modern furniture, while Uncle Vernon disliked nick-nacks and anything brightly coloured or eye-catching.The resulting compromise made Privet Drive a dull box in beiges, pastels and creams with fake plants and plain laminate furniture with only a few family photos and empty vases arranged stiffly on display.

‘Where are we?’ asked Harry.

Lupin answered simply, ‘In a minute.’

Tonks helped him untie his trunk from his broom while Moody was pulling something that looked like a cigarette lighter out of his cloak pocket. He clicked it and then with a pop, the nearest streetlamp went out. A few clicks later and the square was dark apart from the moon and the blue glow of the windows. Moody must have seen the questioning looks from Harry and Tonks.

‘Borrowed it from Dumbledore,’ growled Moody. ‘That’ll take care of any Muggles looking out the window, see? Now come on, quick.’ They made their way across the square and into the street where he was handed a piece of parchment by Moody. ‘Here,’ he muttered, pointing his dimly lit wand at the parchment in Harry’s hand. It said:

“The headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix may be found at number twelve, Grimmauld Place, London.”

Chapter 4: A House in Order

Chapter Text

Looking up, he found number eleven and thirteen, but not number twelve.

‘Hold on, where…’ but the second he had thought of number twelve, it materialized between its neighbours. It was just as neglected as the other houses, if not more.

The façade was covered in a dense layer of road-grime, ash, and dust. Narrow, mossy, slate steps led up to a black door adorned with a knocker in the shape of an uroboros in scratched and faded brass. An iron lantern with dusty, green lead glass hung dark and unused above the entrance. They all gathered on the steps and Moody unlocked the door with a single tap of his wand. Lupin ushered everyone inside, pushing Harry in first and insisting they’d be quiet.The dark hall smelled of the sorry state of the house; damp and rotting sweet. The others were speaking in hushed voices behind him, and Moody lifted the Disillusionment charm from Harry in the darkness of the hall.

‘Stay still everyone, I’ll get the lights’ whispered Moody.

Old, gas wall lamps slowly glowed up a dim light with a slight hiss and sputter, illuminating the hall around them. They were standing on a faded but elaborately patterned silver rug atop a scratched, dark wood floor.

Harry took a couple of steps forwards, taking in the faded splendour. Brilliant arsenic-green wallpaper was peeling in the corners. Portraits of sleeping, old wizards in gilded frames clad the walls, obscured by grime. Grey dust clung to ornate ebony furniture and a cobwebbed, eight-armed gas chandelier hung from the ceiling. Each arm of the chandelier was shaped as a serpent winding around bells of Vaseline glass, which gave a slight green tinge to its light.

This place would have been absolutely beautiful if someone had cared for it, thought Harry morosely, but all the snake imagery he’d seen so far warned him not to voice this opinion out loud.

The house had obviously belonged to someone of the darker inclinations originally. There was even a quiet streaming of Dark magic within the walls and floors, occasionally giving off invisible energy spikes that made the Vaseline glass flash a vivid green where it hit. His gawking at the green sparkles was forcefully interrupted by being pulled into one of Mrs. Weasley’s crushing hugs

‘Lovely to see you, Harry!’ She held him at an arm’s length, looking him over. ‘You’re looking peaky, you’ll need feeding up, but you’ll have to wait a bit for dinner, the Order is meeting now.’ Harry opened his mouth to start a question, but she stopped him. ‘Adults only! Ron is upstairs with Hermione, they’ll explain everything, come on – I’ll show you,’ she half whispered, gesturing him to follow her.

Harry grabbed his trunk and hauled it sluggishly up the stairs after her. She stopped two floors up, waiting for Harry to catch up with his cumbersome luggage. His shoulders were aching with the exertion and his left leg spasmed annoyingly.

‘Here, the door on the right. I’ll call you when it’s time for dinner.’ With that said, she hurried back downstairs.

Harry hardly had a second to take in the room he entered before he was enveloped in a cloud of bushy, brown hair.

‘HARRY! When did you get here? Are you alright? Nobody’s heard anything from you all summer!’ Hermione had tackled him, pinning his arms to his sides.

Behind her, Ron was beaming at him by one of the iron framed beds. Harry pressed a finger into his thigh. He wasn’t dreaming. In the far corner was large wardrobe, on top of which he could see Hedwig’s yellow eyes peering down at him while Pigwidgeon was zooming excitedly around their heads.

‘I’m fine, really’ said Harry into Hermione’s hair. They broke apart and Harry closed the door behind him.

‘Thank you for taking care of Hedwig, Ron… with the um – with my uncle… just didn’t want to risk it, you know,’ he wasn’t quite sure how to say this without revealing too much.

When he had sent Hedwig to Ron for safekeeping, it hadn’t occurred to him that he never actually asked Ron if he could do him this favour, nor had he known how long Hedwig would have to stay. The guilt of possibly getting his best friend into trouble or adding another drain on the pockets of the already poor Weasley family had been eating at him. Pets were a luxury, and he had made it as clear as possible that they should put her to work. If not for anything than to alleviate her boredom. Hedwig may be a docile, loving bird with him, but he knew her well enough to know just how temperamental she could get… especially when cooped up inside for long periods at a time.

‘No problem, mate! We can’t let them out to hunt – Dumbledore’s orders, don’t want too many owls flapping around headquarters.’

Harry frowned, then made a waving gesture towards Hedwig. She eyed Pigwidgeon irately for a second, then dove down from the wardrobe to land on Harry’s shoulder.

‘Have you been good?’ Harry asked her, scratching under the feathers behind her head. She gave him a lidded, pleased stare and puffed up her neck feathers. ‘She hasn’t been pecking at you?' He asked Ron. 'She really hates being trapped inside.’

Her talons were digging into his shoulder. With a light tap of his finger to the back of her legs, she flew off again.

Ron gave him something in between a shrug and a shake of his head with an easy smile, ‘Hedwig’s been taking it loads better than Pig.’

He gave his own owl Pigwidgeon a tired look. The bird hadn’t calmed down a smidgeon and was twittering loudly while doing loops a few inches below the ceiling.

Ignoring the over-eager bird, Harry asked the question he’d been wanting to ask for hours now, ‘What is the Order of the Phoenix, anyway?’

‘It’s a secret society Dumbledore founded to fight You-Know-Who the last time’ said Hermione moving to sit on Ron’s bed.

One of Mrs. Weasley’s homemade quilts had been put on it. The sharp shades of orange and yellow got an almost neon-light quality to them against the muted blues and greys of the room. Ron sat down beside her, while Harry pushed his trunk into the corner and went to sit on the neatly made bed on the opposite wall from Ron’s.

‘Dumbledore called them all back after… after you…’ continued Ron, apparently not sure how comfortable Harry was with talking about the graveyard, he trailed off instead.

An uncomfortable silence spread when Harry didn’t ask anything else or volunteer to talk about the graveyard. Ron was right, he really didn’t want to talk about the graveyard, and he was content with pretending it was only the trauma of it that made him feel that way. In truth, Harry’s reluctance to talk stemmed mostly from the fear of accidentally slipping, outing his treason.

A cold feeling spread in his chest – and even though he had been yearning for his friends for six solid weeks – he was hit with a sudden desire to be alone. Ron and Hermione shared a look. If Harry didn’t say something soon, they’d start asking him questions of their own – many he probably didn’t want to answer, and he much preferred avoiding the questions all together over lying to them.

‘So, uh – how long have you been here? What have you been doing?’ Harry ventured stiffly.

Hermione’s shoulders seemed to drop a bit in relief. ‘Mum, Dad, Fred, George and I have been here a month now,’ said Ron with a shrug. The corner of his mouth twitched.

‘I got here two weeks ago, and we’ve mostly been cleaning,’ said Hermione, explaining Ron’s displeasure.

‘-and trying to get some clue on what the order is doing,’ added Ron. ‘Fred and George have invented Extendable Ears, see, they’re really useful.’

‘Extendable- What?’ Asked Harry, glad of the direction the conversation was going.

Ron went on to explain the ongoing war between his mother and twin brothers over their inventions, and the access to information on the Order’s doings. Then they went on to all they had managed to glean from overhearing conversations and nagging at the Order members most sympathetic to their plight (Bill and Sirius) for crumbs of information.

Hermione listed the members they’d seen so far (that they knew the names of) and from there conversation evolved into a discussion of Snape’s role, then on to the amount of aurors (‘D’you think Snape’s nervous in a room full of aurors?’ joked Ron) and from there on to the problems with the ministry (‘Oh, Harry! Haven’t you gotten any news? Don’t you get the Prophet?’ said Hermione at one of Harrys more inane questions).

From there, the conversation moved to Fudge, and that Percy had been promoted to be one of Fudges underlings, when a couple of loud CRACKs broke through the room followed by a matching pair of expletives from Ron. Fred and George had materialized out of thin air between the beds.

‘Thought we heard words spoken about the world’s biggest git.’ Said Fred with a grim face.

‘You both passed your Apparition tests, I see,’ said Harry. Both of them grinned at that.

‘With flying colours,’ said George proudly.

An argument Harry sensed had become a recurring thing broke out about the necessity of Apparating between rooms in the same building. He declined to participate in the bickering, but it got him wondering why the wards didn’t prevent Apparition. It seemed like such a remarkably basic security measure to skimp on.

The door opened, and the freckled face of Ginny poked through the opening, ‘Mum says dinner’s ready in a minute.’

‘Alright, we’re coming’ said Fred plainly.

‘-oh, and don’t mention Percy to Mum.’ Warned George, the others nodded.

‘What, why not?’ Harry looked back and forth between their frowning faces.

‘Because Dad will break whatever he’s holding, and Mum will start crying.’ said Fred.

‘It’s been awful,’ said Ginny sadly and stepped into the room. She sat beside Harry on the bed, crossing her legs.

‘What’s happened?’ asked Harry, and so he was told the tale of the massive row between Percy and his parents.

Apparently, Percy had forsaken his family in favour of Fudge and the ministry. He’d called them traitors, that they were fools to trust Dumbledore and that Mr. Weasley’s lack of ambition was the cause of their family’s poverty (Harry secretly conceded that Percy may have a point there). Harry was surprised to hear that his name had come up in this too, because Percy believed the Prophet.

Confused again, he had to ask (even though he didn’t want to know): ‘What’d the Prophet say about me?’

‘Don’t you read the Prophet, Harry?’ said Ginny teasingly, giving him a light shove with her shoulder.

‘No owls at the Dursleys’.’ said Harry simply.

Ginny tilted her head, ‘Why not? How are the Muggles stopping you-‘

‘Never you mind.’ Interrupted Harry a little louder and harsher than intended. A strained pause bloomed in his voice’s wake. ‘Shall we go eat?’ He said, breaking the tension.

They all marched down to the kitchen. On the way, Hermione explained in a low voice how Harry had become a running joke in the Prophet, and he didn’t find it the least bit surprising.

On their way to the kitchen, Harry got a rude introduction to the portrait of Walburga Black and the absolute mayhem she could bring to the otherwise tranquil hall. The meeting was dissolving into hushed goodbyes in the hall when something set her off. A battle to regain peace began, with Lupin and Mrs. Weasley frantically trying to draw a curtain over the old woman’s likeness and stunning the other portraits. Their general was Sirius.

‘Harry!’ Sirius stopped to give Harry a one-armed hug before returning to the fray, shouting the woman into a shock that allowed them to close the drapes over her. ‘I see you’ve met my mother,’ he said once silence was restored to the hall.

Sirius told him more about the house on the way to the kitchen. He'd inherited it and offered it to the Order. Maddeningly, his mother’s portrait was charmed to the wall, otherwise it would have been the first thing to be thrown out.

‘I can try to create a dissipation field around it with a runic array,’ Harry offered when he heard the conundrum. He had tried his hands on them before, hoping to make Muggle CD-players operable at Hogwarts. His interest in the experiments had since fizzled out.

‘Really? You can create dissipation fields?’ said Sirius with raised eyebrows, ‘Hermione said you had a thing for Ancient Runes, but she didn’t say you’re that good.’
He gave Harry one of those shakes of the shoulders that were a manly substitute for more affectionate gestures. Harry felt his face heat up a little at the compliment.

They went through a “hidden” servant’s door at the back of the hall which opened to a narrow, dark staircase, which landed in an equally dank corridor. The rough-hewn oaken door to the left of the landing was held open by a thick wedge. Inside was a cavernous kitchen.

It had a rough stone wall on one side with a huge open hearth, a smaller fireplace at what would be a house-elf’s waist height and a similarly low baking oven door. The other walls were rendered with peeling lime plaster, and there was furniture for both elves and men. Most of the floor space was taken by a long wooden table with eighteen mismatched wooden chairs along the sides and a single chair at the end that was piled high with something that looked like rags.

Mr. Weasley and Bill were sitting with their heads together by the rags, deep in conversation. Mrs. Weasley was clearing off parchment rolls, wine bottles and glassware from the table, and occasionally turning to check the contents of a huge iron pot with a ladle stirring on its own on the range.

‘Well, it would be great if you could try. It would save us a lot of grief if I could throw her out…’ Sirius said when he sat down. He grabbed one of the wine bottles, holding it up to the light.

‘What now?’ said Mrs. Weasley sharply.

Mr. Weasley and Bill broke off their conversation.

‘Oh, Harry might have a solution to the problem with my dear mother out there! He thinks he could make a dissipation field around her to break her Permanent sticking charm,’ said Sirius cheerily, pouring himself a glass of wine. The prospect of getting rid of the portrait must have lifted his spirits.

Mrs. Weasley’s face softened a bit, but didn't relax entirely. She eyed Sirius with some suspicion and Harry got the distinct feeling there was some bad blood there he should be careful not to stir.

‘Well, that would be wonderful, Harry! I’ll find you some chalk tomorrow,’ she said sweetly.

Mr. Weasley and Bill both came over to greet him politely. The kitchen was steadily filling up with people while appetizing odors were wafting out from the pot. Mrs. Weasley shanghaied some of her children into helping her set the table (an effort which turned to chaos when Fred and George tried to use magic for the simplest of jobs), while Sirius introduced Harry to the pile of rags, which turned out to be a grubby little wizard called Mundungus.

‘Had a good summer so far?’ said Sirius, who had now been joined by Crookshanks, which made it look like Sirius had a furry orange cushion in his lap.

Harry gave him a flat glare, ‘No, it’s been lousy.’

‘Same as mine then,’ said Sirus bitterly, twirling his wine glass.

‘Really? Haven’t you been, you know – fighting Voldemort?’ said Harry, a joint flinch ran through several of the others.

Sirius remained still, frowning bitterly.‘No, I’ve been stuck inside for a month and a half.’

Same as me then Harry thought, a little cheered by the fact that he wasn't alone in his experiences. Sure it's the same, just without the punishments and starvation a small snarky voice added in his head, dousing his mood again.

He let Sirius complain about his summer for a bit, and then reciprocated it with some extremely watered-down complaints of his own. Their summers were remarkably similar, at least superficially. Sirius’ main occupation had also been cleaning and reading. They came to a lull in the converstaion, which Mundungus used to grab Sirius’ attention about some silverware stamped with the Black family crest, which Sirius didn’t seem to mind pawning off. In fact, Sirius seemed content with having the house completely gutted. Harry conceded that the motto “Always Pure” had to be one of the more distasteful wizarding family mottos he’d heard. He could only hope Sirius didn't sell the amazingly interesting hallway chandelier.

Mrs. Weasley cut through the conversations, ‘Dinner is served! Let’s eat!’

Silence fell over the table as everyone tucked into the meal. Harry served himself sparingly and ate slowly, taking a break whenever nausea threatened and drinking small sips of water. He had a multitude of different excuses on the ready for his strange way of eating, should he need it. Thankfully, nobody seemed to have noticed. And if they did, they chose not to remark on it.

As people finished eating, conversation bubbled up again. Tonks was entertaining Hermione and Ginny by changing the shape of her nose, an ability Sirius helpfully explained was hereditary, and that it was called being a “Metamorphmagus”. Mrs. Weasley spoke of the cleaning plans for the coming days, the highlights of which were Doxy infested curtains and a possible Boggart in a desk drawer. Bill, Mr. Weasley and Lupin had an engaging debate about magical creatures’ alignment in the war to come, and Mundungus was telling Fred, George, and Ron a story so funny they were all stifled with laughter. Harry kept quiet, content with just watching them all for a while.

Mrs. Weasley served pudding, a rhubarb crumble that Harry managed four bites of. He picked at the rest with his spoon, pretending to take bites now and then, avoiding Mrs. Weasley’s watchful eyes.

‘Nearly time for bed, I think,’ she announced with a yawn as the last slice vanished from the pie tin.

‘Not just yet, Molly,’ said Sirius, pushing away his empty plate and turning to look at Harry. ‘You know, I’m surprised at you. I thought the first thing you’d do when you got here would be to ask questions about Voldemort.’

The atmosphere in the room cooled in seconds. The relaxed chatter disappeared and was replaced by a tense silence. Harry could feel their eyes on him. What on earth was he going to say to this?

‘Um – I thought you’d all tell me everything important and that the truly serious stuff would show up on the Muggle news as well… so I just guessed… that nothing has happened yet?’ said Harry, keen on ending this exchange as soon as politely possible.

‘Well, we better tell you the important things then, you must have some questions,’ said Sirius with a rogue smile.

Mrs. Weasley on the other hand, puffed up. ‘And how would you pick the important things then, Sirius? He is not to be involved in Order business, he’s too young,’ she said with narrowed eyes, which Sirius answered with a shrug.

‘Who says you have to be in the Order to ask questions? I’d say Harry’s got a right to know what’s been happen- ‘

‘Hang on!’ Interrupted George loudly.

An outrage sparked among the Weasley children, yelling arguments over each other, but Mrs. Weasley paid them no mind, her eyes fixed at Sirius.

‘It’s not down to you to decide what’s good for Harry! You haven’t forgotten what Dumbledore said, I suppose?’ said Mrs. Weasley dangerously.

‘Which bit?’ Sirius asked politely, but with the air of someone gearing up for a fight.

This is escalating, Harry thought bitterly, wanting nothing more than to evaporate off his chair and seep away into the cracks in the ceiling.

‘The bit about not telling Harry more than he needs to know,’ said Mrs. Weasley.

A flash of anger surged through him at those last three words. How does Dumbledore, or anyone for that matter, decide what Harry needs to know? Because every effort the headmaster had made to curate Harry’s knowledge of Voldemort’s plans in the past had been counterproductive at best. He calmed down again just as quickly, remembering that it was impossible for anyone to determine what he needed to know, since they had no clue how much he already knew, because he hadn’t told them the truth. A familiar itch spread through his skin at the thought. Around him, the row had carried on into the edges of yelling.

‘He’s not James, Sirius!’ said Mrs. Weasley loudly, her face pink and both palms on the table.

‘I’m perfectly clear who he is, thanks, Molly.’ Said Sirius coldly. Harry felt his shoulders rising. He desperately wanted to leave – then it struck him: This isn’t Privet Drive. He could leave.

Determinedly, he stood up. ‘Forget it. I’m going to bed.’

A stunned silence filled the room. He made his way out, purposefully not looking at anyone’s faces. The quiet sustained its tension as Harry jogged up the narrow stairs to the hidden door. As soon as he closed the door behind him, he heard arguing resume in the kitchen, though now in hushed voices. He closed his eyes, trying to gather all his whirring thoughts and wrench them back under control.

Let them squabble all they’d like; You don’t want to hear it anyway, a tart voice mumbled in his head.

The problem now was that his abrupt departure might have come off as suspicious in some way. That was a particularly itchy thought. Taking a few deep breaths, he opened his eyes to stare blankly at the dim, green glow of the hall again. He needed something to take his mind off… well, his mind. Sadly, there were few ways to accomplish that here.

Above him, stray morsel of magic shot the chandelier and intensifying the green glow for a moment. Maybe he could trace the wards? Find the nexus of all the magic routed through the walls? This was the opportune moment in any case, with everybody else held up in the kitchen.

Running his hand along the wall as he walked, he followed the main vein of Dark magic up the stairs, past the shrivelled old house-elf heads and dirty portraits. It continued up another flight, past a huge black urn holding a bushel of dead, brown ferns, and then another, to a landing where only a single gas lamp worked. The Dark magic looked to be flowing into the first door on the left. He reached for the handle-

‘What is young Master wanting here?’ a deep croaking voice asked.

Harry jumped and turned around, first finding nothing, then noticing a short, wrinkly creature wearing a dirty tea towel as a loincloth. The house-elf had a snout like nose and was looking at him sourly, mouth tapering down into a deep, crooked frown.

This must be the elf Kreacher Sirius talked about, thought Harry.

‘I wanted to check on the wards. Fred and George have been Apparating around the house.’ Harry said with a confidence he didn’t feel.

The suspicious glare on Kreacher’s pig-like face melted away to something akin to mild surprise. He padded past Harry on flat, bare feet, raised his hand and waved it in a slow arch over the door. A series of soft clicks could be heard from within the door frame, and it swung open with a creak.

Kreacher continued into the room, which was slowly firing up its gas lamps. ‘Follow Kreacher,’ he croaked in his bullfrog voice, and Harry obeyed.

It was a library. Dark wooden shelves with serpents carved into the uprights stood floor to ceiling along two walls, the window wall had a desk and a glass cabinet filled with a variety of strange items. The final wall had a large chest of drawers with a dull mirror above it, and a chaise lounge with a small table and a lamp. The walls had deep purple wallpaper and the ceiling painted black with small gold stars arranged into constellations.

Kreacher directed him towards the mirror. When Harry stepped towards it, the shiny quality seemed to fade away, leaving a chalky black surface, and after a couple of blinks, symbols appeared.

This is a core array for the house, they stacked everything together as one, he understood after getting an overview. There were shifts and breaks in the flow through them, and some circles seemed to have faded almost completely.

‘These are really struggling,' he murmured, mostly to himself, but also a bit to Kreacher’s benefit, ‘are there any enchanting tools here, Kreacher?’ he asked the elf.

Kreacher pointed to one of the drawers with a bow. It sprung open to reveal a box of chalk, a box of charcoal, compasses of different sizes, a few paint brushes, three small knives including a bloodletting knife, and something Harry knew was called a “Necromancer’s stylus” which was a tool for carving enchantments into skin. He had read about them but never seen one of in real life. It looked a bit like the punch-needles used by shoemakers. Picking up a piece of chalk and a compass, he got to work.

About an hour later, Sirius found him. ‘There you are! We’ve been looking all over for you,’ he said in a hoarse voice. ‘How did you get in here? I thought my father locked this place up tight…wouldn’t even let my mother in.’

‘Kreacher let me in when I told him I wanted to repair the wards,’ Harry said plainly, trying to give the impression that this wasn’t a big deal at all, and also distracting Sirius from the book on blood-wards he had in his hand. He’d found an alternative to Knockturn Alley, and right now he had a reasonable excuse to use it. If he played this right, he could make off with it without anyone knowing.

‘And are you? Repairing the wards, I mean? This is pretty Dark stuff, pup.’ Sirius looked warily at him.

‘Yes. It’ll be faster if you help me though. Only a blood relative of the original enchanter can rekindle this ward,’ Harry pointed to a faded brown circle and repeating five-symbol sequence, ‘and since I’m not, I was planning to circumvent that with a function sequence…’ he trailed off when he saw Sirius’ confused expression.

Nobody wants to listen to you go off about runes, a chastising little voice reminded him, sounding a lot like Ron.

Harry resumed drawing while slowly slipping the book into the kangaroo pocket on his hoodie. ‘It’s complicated.’

‘Okay, so what do you need me for?’ said Sirius with an exhale, apparently deciding to humour him.

Harry put the chalk down and crossed the room to one of the glass cabinets and fetched a crystal bowl from it. ‘Mind scourgifying this?’

Sirius did as he was asked. Harry got the bloodletting knife from the drawer and held it out to Sirius, who in return gave him a dark look.

‘Really?’

‘Really.’ Deadpanned Harry.

Sirius took the knife, sat down on the chaise lounge with the bowl in his lap and scowled at it. Then, with a shrug, he set to filling it with blood, hissing a bit as he stabbed his arm with the knife.

‘What else have you been doing to those wards? -Uh, in plain English, please,’ he said, purposefully not looking into the bowl.

‘Er, I’ve redrawn everything that had crumbled away with time…like this one, preventing Apparition within the house,’ said Harry pointing at the offending text.

‘Hah! Molly will be very pleased, I’m sure.’ Declared Sirius sunnily.

‘And I’ve added catch-lines to the ones with poor range, um, that’s those here,’ Harry pointed to the lines sticking out from a couple of the circles like sunrays on a child’s drawing, ‘they help the array fetch more magic from its source and surroundings. Without them, the notice-me-not here, and the fire ward here, wouldn’t cover the roof.’

Harry moved to rummage in the tool drawer.

‘And the one we’re working on now, what does it do?’ asked Sirius with a tight-lipped smile.

‘It’s the friend-and-foe one. It helps the other wards distinguish between friends and enemies.’ Replied Harry.

Sirius raised his eyebrows at that. ‘Huh! That is worth a bit of blood actually,’ he said lightly, ‘I never bothered to learn any of this stuff. My parents disowned me and honestly, I never thought I’d be back here… I really hate this house.’ He let out a long, grudging sigh.

‘That looks enough,’ said Harry, gesturing to the bowl with the paintbrush in his hand.

Sirius healed himself with a small swish of his wand and handed Harry the bowl.

‘You know, you probably should leave this library alone until we’ve had time to go through it…My father wasn’t just into the Dark arts, but the Black arts. Necromancy, Blood-binding…the worst magic, really.’ Said Sirius as he stepped over to watch Harry paint on the wall with his blood.

‘I don’t think the room will let me back in after I close the door,’ lied Harry. He’d changed the enchantments on the door the minute he found the book on blood-wards. ‘Not that I think there’s anything here I’d want to read anyway, can’t see any books on Quidditch,’ continued Harry with a smile to make a little light of it.

Honestly, he didn’t see any good reasons for banning books, regardless of subjects. The Muggles had tried banning books of different kinds for centuries, and it typically resulted in the opposite of the intended effect. Thankfully, Sirius seemed content with his answer.

‘About earlier…’ Sirius begun hesitantly. A sinking feeling went through Harry. ‘Molly and I found some common ground eventually… Please just ask the questions you do have, and we’ll just… figure out when not to answer… Remus thinks it should be your choice how involved you get, and both Arthur and I agree with him.’

The itching feeling had intensified, and Harry absentmindedly scratched his forearms. What would be a good, reasonable, non-suspicious question to have?

When Harry didn’t say anything, Sirius continued, ‘But you were kind of right, there hasn’t been any overt killings or disappearances. It seems like Voldemort is laying low, for now.’

So he kept his promise then. Good! Harry thought, giving his arm a rough scratch through the sleeve of his hoodie. He should stop before the gesture drew attention to his arm.

‘Then what is he up to, do you know?’ said Harry.

Sirius smiled and begun talking.

‘We’re trying to gather intel, but the Ministry is making it difficult.’ Said Sirius.

‘I’ve been told Fudge lost the plot.’

‘Oh, he has.' Nodded Sirius 'He’s afraid Dumbledore might be after his job and accepting that Voldemort is back means he will have to respond. Fudge has only ever had power in peacetimes, he has no idea how to mobilize forces against Voldemort. It’s so much more comfortable to convince himself Dumbledore is lying to destabilize him.’

‘I’m sure Voldemort can’t believe his luck.’ Said Harry darkly.

He could picture it now. The handsome face sneering condescendingly down at his morning newspaper while the Death Eaters stealthily wormed their way into key Ministry positions right under Fudge’s nose.

Sirius snorted. ‘At least it shouldn’t affect our efforts with the creatures. They don’t care about the Ministry anyhow or read the papers.’

‘Really? Not even the werewolves and nymphs?’ Asked Harry with genuine curiosity. Lupin was just a normal person with a small, monthly problem. Surely, most werewolves cared at least a little?

‘No, Harry, they largely don’t. Remus is a remarkably tame specimen. Most live secluded from wizardkind.’

‘But then… Why join Voldemort?’ Balked Harry.

Sirius shook his head and said, ‘I don’t know what he’s promising them. Or if he is appealing to them at all. He may be using force. We will know more, once our outreach efforts get a little further along.’

Harry didn’t have any more questions after that. To him, it sounded like the Order knew and did very little apart from keeping their ears open at their respective workplaces and then talk about it in meetings later. He didn’t say anything of the sort to Sirius, of course.

***

Harry didn’t get to bed before one in the morning that night. Dead tired, he collapsed on the bed without changing. He planned to take a shower in the morning. Beside him, Ron snored softly. Too tired to even attempt to school his mind, his consciousness was soon wrapped in a dream of corridors and doors. It didn’t last long before the prickly scar combined with the discomfort of sleeping fully clothed in jeans and a hoodie, woke him up.

Alright, you bastard, he thought as he went to his trunk, searching his mind for the perfect memory to send in return. He found and pulled on his pyjamas in the dark, not caring if it went on inside-out and got back into bed.

A memory leapt to mind. It was from the first year Aunt Petunia made him cook for them independently enough to be held responsible for the quality of the resulting food. One time when he was about seven, he burned the milk he was heating in a casserole because he hadn’t been able to stir while also minding the sugar melting for caramel.

Aunt Petunia had asked him to hold out his hands, then she picked up the ladle from the liquid caramel and poured a scoop of searing hot liquid sugar into his palms. She then shoved him into the cupboard, taking the light bulb with her, and leaving him there in the dark until morning. He’d spent the night licking the sugar off his burned hands. It was the best thing he’d tasted in his life.

Chapter 5: Dark Wizard Undercover

Chapter Text

Harry woke disoriented and groggy to George shaking him.

'Mum says get up, your breakfast is in the kitchen and then she needs us in the drawing room, there are loads more Doxys than she thought and she's found a nest of dead puffskeins under the sofa.' He listlessly informed them.

Ron was already sitting up, rubbing his eyes. As he dragged himself out of bed, Harry noticed something strange:
His trunk was gone.

Or, more precisely, it had been shoved under the bed. His nightstand had a glass of water on it which he couldn’t recall placing there, and his shoes had been cleaned and placed by the foot of the bed. Brain moving slowly through its morning fog, it took him a minute to figure out that it was Kreacher who had been here in the night.

Opening the wardrobe confirmed it. His clothes had been folded or hung neatly in the wardrobe. Nothing had been done for Ron. If it hadn’t been so weird, Harry would’ve thought it hilarious. He figured it might be best to pretend he’d done it himself if anybody asked. Half an hour later, Harry and Ron entered the first-floor drawing room, mustering for the first daunting cleaning task of the day.

The room had olive green walls and numerous dirty tapestries. Dulled, brown leather sofas stood around an ornate flame-birch coffee table in front of an iron grate fireplace. The far wall had flame-birch glass cabinets, and a matching flame-birch writing desk. A chest of drawers stood by the wall opposite the seating area, also flame-birch. The windows had long olive-green velvet curtains that all buzzed softly, like they were concealing a swarm of bees. They joined the others by the curtains.

‘Cover your faces and grab a bottle,’ said Mrs. Weasley, pointing to two bottles of black liquid standing on a spindly-legged table, ‘It’s Doxycide. I’ve never seen an infestation this bad – what has that house-elf been doing these last ten years- ‘

Hermione’s face was half concealed by a tea towel, but it didn’t hide the reproachful look she sent Mrs. Weasley. Harry knew she hadn’t given up on S.P.E.W yet. ‘Kreacher is really old and-‘

‘You’d be surprised what Kreacher can do if he wants to, Hermione.’ Sirius had just entered the room, carrying what must be food for Buckbeak and the owls. He confirmed Harry’s assumption and added, ‘I’ve been keeping Buckbeak in my mother’s bedroom… Anyway, I was hoping to steal Harry away to try that dissipation field thing on my mother’s portrait’.

Mrs. Weasley wholeheartedly agreed that dealing with the portrait took precedence, and as if to hammer the point in, a bell clanged downstairs, followed by the same cacophony of wails and screams as the first time Harry had met the late Mrs. Black.

‘I keep telling them not to ring the doorbell!’ said Sirius and hurried downstairs, Harry in tow.

After restoring order in the hall, Sirius went to fetch chalk while Harry retrieved his booklet of reference tables. The work took most of the morning. Dissipation fields weren’t exactly easy to build, and the larger they got, the more unstable they were - the portrait was life-sized.
He also had to be mindful of the backing surface and the duration of dissipation. The field removes magic from its interior to the edges and out, primarily transforming the energy into heat. One wrong move, and he’d light the house on fire.

A few minutes after midday, the array was complete, ready for activation. Sirius summoned the de-doxying party, who had just finished their siege on the curtains, to come witness his mum’s downfall. Sirius had stunned the portrait into a temporary state of tranquillity and placed a couple of cushions placed underneath it. They were aiming to get rid of it before it realized it had been removed from the wall.

The five present Weasleys, Sirius and Hermione quietly arranged themselves in a half circle behind Harry as if getting readying for a group photo.

‘Okay, let’s hope this works,’ said Harry with a bracing exhale.

Moving to the wall, he fed just enough energy to the outer circle to start the array. It glowed orange, like lit cigarettes in the dark. Stepping back, he could feel the heat of the spell dissipating hit his face. It made a loud, electric fizzing noise like a tesla coil charging up, while the rune-glow intensified to white. The portrait abruptly slid off the wall and onto the cushions with a dull thud.

The array went dark. Harry turned around grinning to witness the silent celebration happening behind him. Sirius was beaming at him, and Ginny, Fred and George were doing a little dance to imaginary music. Mrs. Weasley had folded her hands in front of her face, giving him a proud look. The only one who wasn’t visibly pleased was Hermione. Sirius levitated the portrait through the servants’ door and down the corridor into a dank cellar room, where it was promptly burned to a crisp.

Lunch turned into a bit of a party. Lupin, Mundungus and Kingsley joined them in the kitchen, and Sirius eagerly told them of Harry’s grand deed in the hall. Hermione kept sending him sharp looks, and so Harry clung to Sirius through lunch, discouraging her from voicing whatever beratement she was bottling up.

After lunch, they headed back into the first-floor drawing room to tackle the contents of the glass-fronted cabinets. Sirius stayed behind, needing to attend to the absolutely hysterical house-elf bawling in front of the empty patch of wall in the hall. When Sirius came to assist them half an hour later, they had only gotten through one shelf in one of the three cabinets. It was a finnicky type of job that required a lot of concentration. Many of the items on the shelves were outright hostile.

Sirius got bitten by a snuffbox that turned out to contain Wartcap powder. A silver instrument that looked like a many-legged set of tweezers scurried up Harry’s arm to attack him when he picked it up (Sirius smashed it with a book) and they found a music box that made everyone curiously drowsy until Ginny had the good sense to slam the lid shut.

They found a heavy gold locket that nobody could open, but when Ron handed it to Harry to toss in the rubbish sack, Harry felt an eerily familiar, almost pleasant static coming off it. He discretely pocketed it to examine later. Stealing (probably) harmless rubbish wasn’t a big deal. The twins had been nabbing things for their joke-product development all day, including the snuffbox.

The majority of the things in the cabinet went straight into the rubbish bag that day, including a box of seals and an Order of Merlin, First Class for “Special services to the ministry” in Sirius’ father’s name, that Sirius contemptuously claimed his father had bought. Personally, Harry thought that if that was true, his contempt should be directed at the corrupt officials doing the awarding, not his father, but it was very clear from Sirius’ face that arguing this viewpoint would not be welcomed. Harry often got the impression from pureblood wizards that they didn’t quite understand that there could be systemic causes for their problems, and not everything could be blamed on the bad nature of wizards of certain kinds, or even dumber than that, blood.

It felt a bit like the medieval societies Harry had learned about in primary school, where nobody could possibly fathom a future for human life different from their present. Muggles in the past thought calamities like wars, plagues, and famines were unstoppable forces of nature in solely God’s control and that certain people were chosen by God to rule over others. Thus, the decisions of their rulers were just the normal functions of the universe.

The same went for witches and wizards who believed in blood hierarchy, or the more moderate belief that political power should follow magical power and that magical prowess and wisdom were strictly inherited traits. In their minds some families held the fitness for certain jobs in their blood, and so the son would always be the best choice to take over after fathers, regardless of who else applied. All who had been brought up in the wizarding tradition seemed to believe these things to some degree. It was a spectrum, and everyone was on it.

It’s just the way things are, Ron often said, loudly over Harry and Hermione’s frustrated enquiries.

They finished cleaning the cabinets right before dinner. Harry came down to the meal late. He’d been asking Sirius about the largest tapestry, which displayed the Black family tree back six centuries, and Sirius had been talking about his family with more than a moderate amount of disdain.

With nowhere but beside her to sit, Hermione finally got to interrogate him about the dissipation field over dinner.

‘I don't recall Professor Babbling teaching us rituals that dark.’ She said scornfully, chin raised expectantly, ‘where did you find it?’

‘Can’t remember,’ lied Harry annoyedly while serving himself boiled potatoes, ‘It’s not like I copied it out of a book, Hermione.’

Her face hardened while a deepening shade of red rushed in from her temples. Hermione was a brilliant student with a great memory and understanding of the material, but she wasn’t very creative. Everything she did came directly from a source, as opposed Harry’s tendency to author arrays based on intuition and perception of magic. It came as easy as flying, and it wasn’t always possible for him to explain to her how he did things, thus, Harry’s methods frustrated her to no end.

He didn’t mention that the array he used was a loose adaption of one he’d found in Gertrude Dimmel’s Runic Enchants & Glyphs of the Self. Hermione didn’t know about that book. It additionally contained such cheerful enchantments as one for bestowing oneself with bones made of quartz through an excruciatingly painful ritual, or one that made cannibalism less unpleasant for your body. In short, he had no desire to tell her about that book.

‘It’s really dangerous magic, Harry!’ She cried, intensifying her frantic cutting of tough meat with her unserrated butterknife.

‘Not really. Only when you put people in them.’ He argued.

Hermione raised her eyebrows at that, grinding teeth to a near audible level. ‘What? These are used on people?’ she said with outrage.

‘They’re used for prisoners and stuff, to contain powerful people,’ Ron cut in informatively, ‘But they’re usually made by Unspeakables and it’s all very secret how they do it. I think the one you made’s brilliant. Dead useful.’

‘Thanks, mate.’ Harry said, sincerely grateful for the backup.

Hermione huffed. ‘But isn’t that torture? I mean, won’t it drain the person’s core and cause mana-burns?’ she asked Ron, who for once finished chewing before answering.

‘Erm, kind of?’ said Ron, pouring himself a glass of water, ‘I mean, it’s not pleasant to be a squib for a few hours, and yeah, it will drain the core, but there’s no magic in the air inside the field to burn you, is it?’

He turned his head to Harry, who confirmed his views, ‘Right. It isn’t. All the ambient magical energy gets drawn to the edges and out too, not just active sources and enchantments.’

Hermione’s face softened a little.

‘Besides, I don’t think it is possible for the field to drain the core completely. Cores keep producing magic at an even pace... But if they starve the person too, maybe?’ Harry shrugged. It was an interesting question, ‘I suppose it depends on the amount of power used to jump-start the array.’

Theoretically, you could deplete a core completely and keep it so if the starting surge of the array drained everything at once, and then maintained a sink more efficient than the person’s regeneration…

‘That sounds sensible. And they are really small, so it can’t be practical to keep anyone in them for long…’ Said Hermione thoughtfully. ‘Anyway, are you both finished with the essays for Professor Snape now?’

Harry shook his head, grudgingly accepting the conversation’s bleak turn into the subject of homework.

After dinner, Mrs. Weasley put together a small gathering over dessert (Pistachio Ice-cream and chocolate biscuits) to give Harry his birthday gifts that he missed due to the “Owl Ban” at the Dursleys’. Most gifts were candy (and "candy" in the case of the twins), while Hermione gave him a new brass compass. By the time Sirius brought out the wine, the locket burned in Harry’s pocket, and he was longing for a moment alone.

He excused himself with the need to use the bathroom, and once safely solitaire, he took out the locket and held it up under a howling, old gas lamp. It had an ornate, spindly “S” on the front encrusted in emeralds. It appeared to be real gold.
Its front lid was slightly scratched, and the casing was obviously hand-cast while the chain was a newer, machine wrought kind. The magic seeping from it prickled his hands a bit. It had a fuzzy, tingling feel to it that Harry associated with Voldemort’s soul. It didn’t feel hostile, but more like it was slowly stirring to life.

This had to be another soul piece, like that diary had been, there was no question about it. But that meant that it probably was the most dangerous artifact in this entire house – and he’d have to hide it. If found, it would be binned, and then lost forever, making Voldemort essentially immortal. Well, more immortal than he already was. It likely contained a “memory” the way the diary had, and so it shouldn’t be given any chances to possess anybody.

He couldn’t keep it in his trunk. While here, Kreacher would likely find it and hide it. Harry had never tried producing a ward that could keep elves out. And even if he did ward the trunk, it was a temporary solution. With Dumbledore convinced a war was coming, their belongings would likely be searched again, as they had when Sirius escaped from Azkaban. But they wouldn’t be strip-searched, and Harry was confident Voldemort’s soul could pass through Filch’s Probity-Probe.

He'd keep it on his person for now and borrow the Necromancer’s stylus in the library to ward his own mind against possession – another useful set of runes from Dimmel’s. The locket could still affect him if it had Mind, but a proper intrusion into Harry’s mind would be impossible. Hanging the locket on around his neck, and stuffing it under his clothes, he went back to his impromptu late birthday party.

***

Mrs. Weasley kept them working hard over the next week. Or, 'Working us like ruddy house-elves,' as Ron often complained.

The drawing room took four days to decontaminate until only the (potential) Boggart in the writing desk remained. After that, they went room-by-room, cleaning out everything from yellowed family photos in silver frames to ancient silk dress-robes. Kreacher, having gotten past the initial shock of losing Walburga Black’s portrait, followed them everywhere, attempting to rescue various items from the bin. Harry had taken to secretly helping him, mostly because it was fun being the lone person in the house to earn the elf’s respect, but also because Harry liked a lot of the things Sirius wanted to toss.

By the end of the week, they’d encountered spiders the size of cats, a grandfather clock that shot bolts at passers-by, and a murderous old ghoul lurking in a toilet. It felt like they were waging war on the house, and Harry was a poor, reluctant draftee working sanitary, determined to help the wounded on both sides. So far, he’d managed to save a set of silver ritual knives, a set of Vaseline glass dessert bowls and serving dishes, a set of playing dice carved from semi-precious gemstones, a tray of real tortoiseshell combs and brushes, and several jars of ritual salts with gold lids. The house and its oddities were growing on him, and for the first time in his life, he found he wouldn’t mind a longer summer holiday if it meant staying here.

They were prioritizing the ground- and first floors, but Harry worried about the library regardless. He had modified the wards to admit no one but him, banking on Sirius not wanting to go back there and subsequently finding out. But if Mrs. Weasley targeted the room for cleaning, he’d be busted. All he could do was hope she found the wards too difficult to be worth taking on when she did.

Kreacher could probably still get in if he wanted, and also clear the way for Sirius if commanded to. But Harry had a hunch the elf would demand some very specific orders to do so. He had taken to Harry in a way that was honestly a little disconcerting.

He frequently found new things Kreacher had done for him without asking, like brushing down all his woollen robes and cloaks, cleaning up after Hedwig and even leaving him small bowls of fruit or other light meal alternatives (something Harry was dearly grateful for. Mrs. Weasley’s hearty, stodgy meals tasted well, but were taking their toll on his system). Kreacher even lied straight to Lupin’s face about Harry’s whereabouts once, which he overheard when exiting the library one evening.

The book on Blood-warding he’d found there the first night had proved to be both interesting and useful, making him long for a few undisturbed hours when he could properly search the shelves. Harry would never claim to be studious. He found most schoolwork to be a chore. But his interest in specific topics for the sake of personal projects was something entirely different. He could read for hours on matters that he found engaging or helped him advance a project, and that library held potential reference material in abundance. For now.

Whenever he managed to sneak off to the library, he focused on quickly nabbing what he thought he’d need in the future. Time was short, even with Kreacher on his side. It was simply impossible to disappear unnoticed for long in such a crowded house. At the end of the holidays, his trunk hid six (quite dark) books and the Necromancer’s stylus.

The locket hadn’t manifested anything beyond what that felt like a faint heartbeat, and now that he’d clumsily added a few sequences to his skin in the bathroom mirror, it shouldn’t be able to get into his head.

Mrs. Weasley zealously kept them out of earshot whenever Order business was discussed (Extendable ears and human ones), which thankfully meant there was a lot less talk of Voldemort than Harry feared when he first got here. He knew the locket would be harder to bear if the Order had expected him to participate.

He was still sleeping badly. Dreams of corridors and doors were streaming through to him from Voldemort’s mind. Harry paid him back in kind with a dream of his own every time. He’d decided to send the memories in as much of a chronological order as practical, and that currently meant dreams from his sixth year on earth.

It felt like a game of sorts, and for the first time in a long while, he was having fun. The war of Grimmauld Place was entertaining, his sabotaging efforts felt thrilling and playful rather than stressful and serious. He’d even started to look forward to sending dreams to Voldemort.

Not all was well. Negative, intrusive thoughts plagued his waking hours. Secrets and treasons piling up, giving him jolts of guilt whenever his thoughts strayed where they shouldn’t go. He felt like his daily mood defaulted to angry, which turned into misery whenever that anger found an unsuspecting victim. This amplified his need to be alone, which when unfulfilled agitated him further.

His skin had an almost constant itch to it now, and the sinking feeling came frequently, but none of it had turned painful and he’d so far resisted “scratching”. Considering the coincidental increase in self-hatred, his restraint felt like quite the achievement. Sometimes, he even pondered the possibility of quitting altogether. All-in-all Harry thought he was handling things rather well.

***

The booklists arrived exceptionally late, on the very last day of the holidays. It contained only two new books, one for charms and one for Defence Against the Dark Arts. What took Harry aback was that Ron had been made prefect. Fred and George had entered their room minutes ago to discuss the trouble Dumbledore had finding a new Defence Against the Dark Art teacher when Ron had found the badge in his envelope.

‘What’s up with you Ron?’ asked Fred when Ron’s brain seemed to stall mid-conversation.

Ron didn’t answer. He was standing slack-jawed and abnormally still, gaping at his letter.

‘What’s the matter?’ said Fred impatiently, moving around Ron to see what he was looking at.

‘Prefect?’ he said, starring incredulously at Ron's letter.

‘Prefect?’ George leapt forwards and snatched Ron's envelope out of his hand and turned it upside-down.

Harry saw the scarlet and gold badge drop into George’s palm.

‘No way,’ said George.

‘There must have been a mistake,’ added Fred, snapping the letter from Ron’s hands, and checking its authenticity against the light like a Tesco cashier with a dubiously crisp fifty-quid note.

‘No one in their right mind would make Ron a Prefect,’ said George, both twins turned their heads to Harry.

‘We thought it you were a cert.’ said Fred in a tone suggesting Harry had somehow managed to wiggle himself out of a well-deserved punishment.

‘Yeah - We thought Dumbledore was bound to pick you!’ said George indignantly, and well – Harry agreed.

Sure, he wasn’t the one with the best grades of his year, but they were better than Ron’s. But then he recalled that Prefects were supposed to be role models for the younger years. Trustworthy and responsible, and honestly neither of them fit that bill. Still, he expected the badge to go to him over Ron any day. Was it arrogant to think that? And well, now that he thought about it, why not Dean?

‘I know why he didn’t pick me,’ said Harry flatly, ‘I’ve caused to much trouble. What I don’t understand is why they didn’t pick Dean Thomas. He’s got better marks than us and no real detention record…I mean, not that I’m not happy for you, mate… But ehh…’ Harry trailed off, uncertain how to finish this gracefully with Ron’s shocked eyes on him, face turning slightly green.

Fred and George both nodded. ‘Prefect…Ickle Ronnie, Prefect’ said Fred with a small sneer.

‘Ohh, Mum’s going to be revolting,’ groaned George.

He was right, Mrs. Weasley lost her mind. Harry tried his best to be happy for his friend, especially after Ron got to choose a reward for making Prefect, and decided he wanted a broom (he landed on asking for a new Cleansweep).

Harry tried to talk himself out of his souring mood. Ron may have qualities Dumbledore values that you didn’t recognize in him. He’s more open and honest than you are, and he’s friends with everyone in your year. Really friends, not that facsimile of an acquaintanceship you have with Lavender, Parvati and even Dean and Seamus. He’s a warmer person, and better liked – get over yourself.

It didn’t help. No matter how much he tried to reason with himself, he couldn’t shake the feeling that Ron’s Prefect status was wholly undeserved. Hermione’s badge had been about as surprising as the sun setting in the evenings, and inarguably well-earned.

Mrs. Weasley organized a “Congratulations New Prefects!”-party after returning from Diagon Alley, and Harry kept his mouth shut though most of it. Kingsley, Mundungus, Lupin, and to Mrs. Weasley’s delight - Moody joined them. She now finally got a conformation that the (probably) Boggart indeed was a Boggart.

Harry had stupidly looked at the ceiling together with Moody, (who had trained his magical eye towards the desk), as if he too could see the Boggart, something which Ginny found very funny. So, presently, he felt like crawling under the table and burrow under the floor. He turned away from her, listening in on the other conversations around the table.

The twins had their heads together with Mundungus, haggling in hushed voices over controlled potions ingredients for their joke-products. Harry briefly wondered how Mrs. Weasley would take it if she found out he’d given them his Triwizard Tournament winnings, but pushed the thought away. She’d likely strangle him.

‘…Why didn’t Dumbledore make Harry a Prefect?’ Kingsley’s words to Lupin cut through Harry’s attentive listening to Fred’s bid on powdered dragon claws.

‘He’ll have had his reasons,’ replied Lupin easily.

‘But it would’ve shown confidence in him. It’s what I’d’ve done,’ persisted Kingsley, ‘specially with the Daily Prophet having a go at him every few days…’

Harry forced his facial expression as neutral as he could manage, looking at nothing in particular and pretending he heard nothing. He wished he was in bed. His hands kept absentmindedly drifting to the locket, and he eventually found he had to sit on them to stop. Either his misery showed on his face, or perhaps Moody just wanted to get away from Ron’s serenades about his Cleansweep. The result was the same.

‘You alright, Potter?’ grunted Moody, clapping him hard on Harry’s most frequently dislocated shoulder. It throbbed dully.

‘Yeah, fine,’ lied Harry through gritted teeth.

Moody took a swig from his hip flask, his magical eye staying on Harry through his skull as he tipped his head back. ‘Come here, I’ve got something that might interest you,’ he said, fishing out an old, tattered wizarding photograph from his robes.

It was the original Order of the Phoenix. Moody went through it, pointing to and naming each of the sepia wizards and witches, recounting the grim fates of many of them. His parents were there, Sirius…Mrs. Weasley’s brothers…

All people, be they dead or alive, you betrayed in that graveyard, a snide voice reminded him.

He had to get out of here. Making up a half-arsed fib about forgetting to pack something, he left the table.

On the way to the bedroom, he came across Mrs. Weasley trying valiantly to expel the Boggart. It wasn’t going well. Harry couldn’t help but stare at it cycled between the corpses of all her family members. Ron, then Mr. Weasley, then Fred, then Ginny, then Bill, then – to Harry’s astonishment – himself. The outright bizarre sight of his own dead body on the floor snapped him out of the hypnosis.

‘Mrs. Weasley, just get out of here!’ shouted Harry, staring at his own dead body with fascination, ‘Let someone else-‘

‘What’s going on?’

Lupin had come running, followed by Sirius and Moody limping in last. Lupin looked from Harry to dead Harry and got the picture. He swiftly took Mrs. Weasley’s place and dealt with his moon-Boggart effortlessly.

Harry watched the scene unsure of what to do with himself. Mrs. Weasley was still sobbing, and Lupin took to comforting her, while Sirius stared at the spot where Harry’s fake body had been. Harry could feel Moody’s eye(s) on him and realized that the blue one had probably followed him all the way up here.

‘Harry, I’m so sorry. What must you think of me?’ said Mrs. Weasley with a sniff, ‘Not even being able to get rid of a boggart…’

‘Don’t be stupid’ said Harry, pressing forth a smile and pushing his right thumb into his left palm behind his back – I’m not dreaming this.

‘I’m just s-s-so worried,’ she said, crying again, ‘Half the f-family is in the Order, it’ll b-b-be a miracle if we all com through this…and P-Percy… W-what if something dreadful happens and we’ve never m-made up? O-or what if Arthur and I get killed, who’s g-g-going to look after Ron and Ginny?’

‘Molly, that’s enough,’ said Lupin, gripping her shoulder reassuringly. ‘This isn’t like last time. The Order is better prepared, we’ve got a head start, we know what Voldemort’s up to-‘

Harry had to supress a snort in gallows-humour. If it was one thing he’d learned since he got here, it was that the Order knew very little of Voldemort’s plans. They don’t know what he’s like now.

Guilt suddenly ate at his heartstrings and he had an absurd impulse to blurt the truth at them. Feeling increasingly uncomfortable and worried about his own impulsivity, Harry tried to extract himself from the situation unnoticed. Mrs. Weasley reached the conclusion that she was being silly, wiping her face with a handkerchief Sirius had conjured out of the air. Harry didn’t think she was being irrational, but he hadn’t a clue what he should say to her to express that.

Backing out of the room slowly, he left Mrs. Weasley to be consoled in peace. As he continued upstairs, Harry thought of the people in the tattered old photograph bravely facing down a terrorist cell of strong, radicalized witches and wizards led by a man slowly losing his mind.
He idly raised his hand to rest over the locket as he walked. It buzzed calmingly.

Chapter 6: June 24th, 1995 - The Resurrection

Chapter Text

Wormtail checked the ropes securing Harry to the gravestone thoroughly. Harry couldn’t move an inch below his neck or above his knees. The black piece of cloth Wormtail had stuck in his mouth was soaking up every drop of saliva he could produce, making his tongue feel like it was clad in sandpaper.

He was fairly certain the leg he’d broken in the maze had now set wrongly and healed crooked. It felt clunky and numb, but at least it didn’t hurt now. He’d get used to it eventually. If he survived this.

The bundle on the ground squirmed, while Wormtail scurried out of Harry’s view. He returned a moment later, slowly levitating a huge, cast-iron cauldron onto a haphazardly stacked pile of wood a few feet from the bundle. It was large enough to fully submerge an adult and filled with a clear potion that sloshed around menacingly when it landed on the logs.

Rune sequences etched in thick, heat-resistant chalk caught Harry’s attention. Two thick bands ran the circumference of the cauldron. One around the rim and another on the ¾-line. Sequences were written both above and below each band, together forming two stacked arrays.

Under the cauldron, Wormtail clumsily lit a fire with his wand. The damp wood smoked aromatically, popping and crackling as flames grew, illuminating the runes more clearly. The array stack was connected by simple, thin, vertical lines following the curve of the cauldron. The top array added potency and direction to the potion for the construction of “Man”, with the flip side providing a clarity function and directing to the array below, but there was something - off – about the right-side-up sequence on the bottom array.

The rune-spell had a necromantic sequence as a base, but used runes that symbolized resurrections of animals, not humans. The same function stated that both the “water” and “Soul present” would provide information for the “Body”. The flip side held the binding of “Body” and “Soul”, but again, animal symbolism would make that bond very unstable. Worst of all, the necromancy did not consistently follow the Rule of Nines…

Harry summarized the results in his head. In short, the array will help the potion produce a body in the shape of a man, using information from the potion itself and “Soul”, binding them together, but all through a zoological lens? Whose work was this? Wormtail? Voldemort? Couldn’t they see the contradiction of asking for a recreation of an “existing” human body using EhwaR’s as leading runes in the sequences?

He recognized some repeaters in the sequences that hinted towards Vera Moerk’s Runes of Yore as a reference source, and the line-work reminded him of a diagram in the Thorstein Langemann-scrolls, just without catchlines. But none of those texts had anything on necromancy…

This semi-shoddy rune work was really picking Harry’s brain. He followed the energy flow around as far as he could see, and found breaks and skips, sequences that wouldn’t trigger and poor conductibility… It wasn’t directly amateurish, per se, but not the Mastry level he expected of Lord Voldemort. Or was it Harry that was merely suffering from a lack of oxygen? Could you get a stroke from being squeezed by ropes?

The surface of the potion had begun to bubble and spark. Harry read the runes over again and again, finding the same problems every single time. He counted and re-counted every symbol and sequence in the necromantic parts. Sometimes, he only got to seven, not nine.

And then, as he read the necromancy again, its ultimate purpose sunk in fully. They were actually planning to use that miniscule sliver of Voldemort’s soul in the bundle as information for the body – and that sliver was either the same size or smaller than the one in his scar.

He had seen it with his own eyes, sticking to the side of his complete soul like a barnacle – less than three percent of the size of his own. This was going to end in disaster – Mind follows the Soul… A lord Voldemort with a deformed body and hallucinations on top of his existing lunacy…
Harry felt panic rising into his throat. He had to stop this, or at least fix the ritual. But wouldn’t that be helping Voldemort?

His thoughts stalled, conflicted. Which was worse? A murderous tyrant completely off his rocker or a murderous tyrant with his marbles intact?

The answer was obvious. Moreover, disfigurement was even more likely than insanity based on the runes on the cauldron. Harry knew by personal experience how constant pain can alter one’s state of mind, and how considerably more aggressive it could make someone.

But what if you’re wrong? What if letting this happen will kill Voldemort? Or simply be a dud and Voldemort stays being that thing? A voice that sounded a lot like Ron’s asked in his head.

Harry read the runes again. A seed of doubt lingered. There was a chance the Ron-voice had a point. But it was small. Still not entirely certain, he made his call. Intervening was the right thing to do.

He concentrated on his “Accidental magic” as others called it – which could very much be controlled, Harry had found – directing it to the gag, hoping to levitate it gently out of his mouth. Instead it ejected at force. Thankfully, Wormtail was too flustered to notice the gag blowing onto the grass behind him.

The cold voice of Voldemort in the bundle were calling on Wormtail to hurry.

‘It is ready, Master,’ said Wormtail in a weak voice.

Harry’s mind was racing, he needed to spin this in a way they’d agree to without revealing what he knew about Voldemort’s soul. And, without getting maimed in the process. Though, on second thought, he had nothing to lose – they were going to kill him anyway.

‘Wait!’ shouted Harry.

‘Gag him, worthless fool!’ the cold voice commanded Wormtail, who muttered apologies and moved to obey.

‘There’s a mistake in your array!’ Harry tried in an almost sing-song tone.

‘Lord Voldemort does not make mistakes, boy,’ said the cold voice.

‘Then why is there an EhwaR opening a sequence for a human resurrection ritual? It’s a contradiction! The body’s going to be fragile and unstable,’ said Harry tauntingly.

‘Silence!’ Shrieked the bundle.

Harry wasn’t giving up yet. This was his death-day - why not go out with a bang?

‘I mean, the Odal-loop there is great - if you want really long toenails. Else I recommend closing it with a Tyr and then actually follow the Necromantic Rule of Nines.’ He berated the bundle. The Dark Lord should know better, after all.

For a heartbeat or three, the creature didn’t answer. Wormtail had stopped midway to re-gagging Harry, eyes flickering insecurely between him and Voldemort. It suddenly dawned on Harry that most fourteen-year-olds hadn’t the foggiest idea what the Rule of Nines was.

Ultimately, Voldemort seemed to accept the oddity, screeching icily, ‘Quiet! Foolish child, the Rule of Nines is adhered to-‘

‘No, it’s not, look! After the second draw-sequence on this side…’

If Wormtail got anything out of the Ancient Runes discussion that followed between Harry and bundle-Voldemort, he didn’t show it. Their argument continued to increasingly technical and theoretical grounds. Insults became less and less frequent from the bundle, and the discussion took on an academic and calm nature. After a while, Harry began to think that Voldemort had started to trust his judgement and skill in rune-work – at least a little. He took a leap of faith.

‘Just let me do it myself, please? The Rat can keep his wand on me the entire time, you’ll check my work afterwards anyway and if you don’t agree with it, you can always revert it back to this-’ -mess, Harry added in his head.

The bundle went quiet for a few seconds.

‘As you wish,’ it said to Harry’s great surprise, ‘Wormtail, untie him and give him the chalk. He shall be well behaved.’

Wormtail did as he was asked without question, extinguishing the flames, and cooling the cauldron with a quick spell as Harry got to his feet.

As he drew on the cauldron, small doubts began bubbling up to the surface of his thoughts again. Are you sure this the right thing to do? Are all these additions necessary? Are you sure this isn’t solely benefitting Voldemort and Voldemort alone? He concentrated on his work, reading the runes out in his head to drown out his worries.

This is treason… Just let the ritual fail, you’ll die anyway... Sabotage it now that you have the chance, if you get caught, you die – if you don’t, you die… Why are you working so hard on this? This is treason… Harry reassured himself with that more people would die later if the ritual created a Voldemort that was worse. It didn’t help much.

Fifteen minutes later, Harry had corrected the existing lines and added a true necromantic line that would draw in all “Soul” of the kind added to the potion, from the entire range of the array, which included all available “Planes”, mortal world - and limbo. If this worked, not only would the soul-fragment Harry had dispatched to limbo with a basilisk tooth in his second year be reunited with the main one, resulting in a more stable “Mind”, but the fragment in Harry’s scar might be drawn out as well.

To increase his chances, Harry added eight catchlines into the grass with charred logs from the fire, each seven paces long. He added arms to them, single-pace diagonal lines like the fledging on an arrow, increasing range to two kilometres or so on the mortal plane, and well into limbo.
On top of that, Harry planned to channel every drop in his core into the ritual – feed it well at peak activation and ensure its success. It would probably be his last act of magic on earth - why not make it spectacular.

He did a final tally at the end. Twelve sequences in the formation “Body”, Nine in the resurrection and binding of “Soul”, Eight energy inlets, Seven steps in length, Six arms on each. Good. Satisfied with the numerology, he stepped away from the array.

‘All done.’ Said Harry, voice shaking only a little bit.

Wormtail didn’t bother forcing Harry all the way back to the tombstone this time. Instead, he shoved Harry to his knees and bound his hands behind his back and his ankles together with two quick spells.

Wormtail proceeded to carry the bundle in a slow circle around the cauldron for Voldemort to read the work on it. Harry caught a glimpse of the deformed thing in the sea of black cloth. Scaly, bone white and skeletal thin, with sunken red eyes slitted like a cats’ eyes. It was horrifyingly ugly.

Time crawled to a halt and Harry held his breath. Adrenaline from earlier was running out, and Harry could feel the aches and pains of the maze (and a life of hurt, really) deep in his bones. The mis-healed leg felt swollen, the Achromantula bite itched and stung. Voldemort must have said something of an approval to Wormtail that Harry didn’t hear, because suddenly, the flames roared back to life. The runes glowed a deep purple and the sparking on the surface of the potion resumed.

The potion cooked for another few seconds, before Wormtail shook the misshapen creature out of the bundle of cloth and into the cauldron. He then turned his wand to the base of the grave Harry had been tied to earlier. The one that said, “Tom Riddle, 1904-1944”.

‘Bones of the father, unknowingly given, you will renew your son!’ said Wormtail shakingly, summoning pieces of bone and dust from the grave and adding it to the cauldron. He produced a long, gleaming dagger from a pocket in his robes. ‘Flesh of the servant, willingly given, you will – revive – your master...’ said Wormail, lip quivering.

He held his arm over the cauldron, dagger under his wrist and with an upwards swoop of the dagger, cut his own hand clean off. He howled in pain; the hand fell into the potion with a viscid plop. Face contorting into a biting grimace, he wobbled over to where Harry was sitting, stump to his chest and dagger brandished like a sword in his remaining hand. He stepped behind Harry, who had slumped down in the grass, knees bent to the side.

He harshly rolled up Harry’s left sleeve. ‘B-blood of the enemy, forcibly taken, you will resurrect your foe.’ Stuttered Wormtail, and Harry felt the pain of the knife as Wormtail clumsily cut into his skin.

Immediately, his arm heated up and the peachy light of healing glowed in his periphery, no doubt healing the tail end of the cut as Wormtail was making it.

‘P-please stop…O-or I’ll-’ he stammered at Harry.

‘I can’t. I can’t control it,’ replied Harry impatiently.

They were running out of time. Half-finished rituals were notoriously unpredictable.

‘Try stabbing. Twist it in at the elbow,’ Harry suggested, hoping Wormtail would heed his advice and get this over with quickly.

He felt a much sharper pain in the nook of his elbow, and a cool trickle of blood down his arm. Behind him Wormtail fiddled a bit, and a slight pressure told Harry he was collecting the blood.

Thirty seconds later, Wormtail hobbled over to the cauldron again, tipping the phial of Harry’s blood in. With his job finished, Wormtail buckled over and fell to the ground. He sobbed loudly, clutching the stump to his chest, which was bleeding profusely.

Upon addition of the last ingredient, the potion produced an intensifying, blinding white light, with sparks spitting from the surface. Suddenly, the sparking and bubbling stopped and instead, white smoke started billowing from its surface that stung in Harry's eyes and smelled like petrol. He fought to keep his watering eyes open as the reaction escalated and the runes glowed evenly into their apex.

The array activated in full, Harry sucked in a deep, steeling breath and then, with immense effort, he fed every sliver of magical energy he had into the closest catchline. It burned on the way out, almost like his blood had been replaced with lava. Healing throughout his body stopped cold and pain spread from his abdomen and into his back at kidney-height, seizing the muscles and forcing him to arch backwards.

The runes were getting progressively brighter and the catchlines were emitting growing curtains of purple light, like auroras dancing an inch off the ground. As Harry pushed out the last of what his magical core had to offer, his catchline burst into small, purplish-red flames, eating into the surrounding vegetation. The spasms in his back ceased while magical exhaustion was drawing at his consciousness and black spots dotted his vision. His skin had begun stinging as the void under his sternum grew, signalling the arrival of nasty, blistering mana-burns.

Then came the real pain.

Excruciating pain radiating from the scar on his forehead and into his body. In seconds, it had fully consumed him. His brain no longer interpreted signals from his senses apart from searing agony. It was a pure anguish so complete that no thoughts could form. Harry had no clue how long it lasted before he fainted.

When he came to, the smoke was clearing. The cauldron had melted away. Standing in its place was a tall, pale, naked man with dark hair and his back to Harry. He wasn't muscular, nor too heavy or too thin, but healthy, and his skin hadn't a single mole, mark or scar that Harry could see. He was taking deep, deliberate breaths, examining his hands, and running his fingers though his hair and over his face, familiarizing himself with his own features.

Wormtail was wailing and rolling in the damp grass a few feet away, somewhat louder than before. The naked man ceased his exploration of his new body and walked slowly and unsteadily towards Wormtail, who for a long second went quiet with anticipation. But the man simply picked a bone-white wand out of Wormtail’s robe pocket and wordlessly conjured himself some plain black robes, leaving Wormtail to resume his suffering without a care. Finally, the man turned to face Harry.

He was every bit as beautiful as Harry remembered him to be. Though then it had been a mirage of him as a boy of sixteen, stepping out of a Diary. Now he looked to be in his forties or early fifties. Slim, straight nose rounding at the tip, flawless skin, lips with a sharp cupid’s bow, hair falling in elegant waves to his chin and a pair of sultry, wine-red eyes under dark lashes. He reminded Harry of old-timey filmstars, but with messier hair. Nothing like the gaunt, almost snake-faced “most recent photograph” of the Voldemort of the first war he’d seen in the book Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts, or the very snake-faced visage that had stuck out the back of Professor Quirrell’s head.

Struggling to stay conscious, Harry let his head flop back down to the ground. At some point, he had fallen over and was now laying on his side in the slick, mossy grass. Mana-burns were stinging on the exposed skin on his face and arms. There was a gross trickling sensation in his ears, and a metallic flavour in his mouth made him suspect he might have bitten his tongue.

Apart from Wormtail’s crying, the graveyard was deathly silent. Voldemort was looking around, still a bit ungraceful and awkward in his movements, when Harry heard a low noise that sounded like something heavy was being dragged through the grass.

‘Master! You’ve returned to yourself!’ a hiss sounded from behind him.

A huge, green snake slithered into his view towards Voldemort - Nagini, his mind supplied.

Voldemort took a couple of small, wobbly steps towards her. Harry noticed he was still barefoot.

‘Yes, the ritual is complete. I am back to who I was thirteen years ago’, Voldemort hissed to Nagini.

She raised her head a few inches off the grass, taking in her master’s face, flickering her tongue out to taste the air around him. ‘You are more yourself now than I have ever seen, Master,’ she hissed back happily.

‘Hm…’ he turned to look at Harry with a thoughtful expression.

Voldemort paced around for a minute or so, ignoring Wormtail’s woeful sobs, Nagini following him with her head. Harry slowly regained his wits as his magical core restored itself and the lingering sting in his scar dulled. Energy returning, he managed to push himself upright, sitting on the side of his thigh. His head was swimming, and he had to hang forward for a moment before straightening his back. He wasn't dead yet. Now, he desperately needed a plan.

If he could just get his hands to his free… He could try burning the rope with magic, but it would be hard to achieve without the smoke attracting attention…

Suddenly, Voldemort stopped pacing and shifted his calculating gaze to the ground. He frowned at the catchlines. They were a stark black against the deep green moss and grass. Seven had started to fade, while the one closest to Harry had small orange embers dotting it, letting off thin streams of grey smoke.

Voldemort gave Harry a disbelieving look. ‘You added power, Harry?’ he asked hoarsely in a baffled but smiling tone, voice rough from its newness.

Harry wasn’t looking at him, but at the distracting sight of Nagini, who had slithered up behind her master, examining him with beady, yellow eyes.

‘Yeah, you see – I have a parasite,’ hissed Harry sharply, only realizing it had come out in parseltongue after the words left his mouth.

He snapped his mouth shut and whipped his head up to look at Voldemort, who was staring back at him with unveiled shock on his face; wide eyed and slack-jawed.

Voldemort quickly composed himself, the shock turning to anger. He grabbed Harry by the collar.

‘What do you mean?’ he said, giving Harry a dizzying shake. ‘Answer!’ he demanded with another shake, voice smoothing out a bit.

When Harry still said nothing, Voldemort switched to tipping Harry backwards, trying to establish eye contact. It was useless. His head was spinning, too heavy for his neck and his vision was blurry. The motion was making him nauseous.

‘Give me your arm, Wormtail,’ Voldemort said flatly, giving up on Harry’s vacant eyes.

Wormtail was still weeping on the ground a few metres away. Voldemort abruptly retracted his hands from Harry’s collar. With nothing to support his weight, Harry crumpled.

‘Oh, thank you… thank you lord…’ cried Wormtail, holding out his stump as Voldemort approached him.

Harry blinked the two into focus and attempted to adjust his glasses with his shoulder. They were barely hanging onto his face.
Mercifully, the dizziness and nausea were subsiding, now that nobody was shaking him.

Voldemort let out an amused puff of air through his nose, and said scornfully, ‘The other arm, Wormtail.’

Wormtail grimaced and cried, but held his arm out all the same. Voldemort reached forward and took the healthy arm by the elbow, pushing the robes up and revealing an angrily inflamed, red mark in the shape of a skull and serpent. He pressed a long, pale finger to it – Wormtail cried out in pain.

Voldemort removed his finger from the mark, which had turned jet black. ‘Now, I wonder how many will come…’ he whispered, looking around the graveyard.

For a while, nothing happened. Voldemort returned to his pacing, Nagini at his heals. He occasionally glanced at Harry, who was staring wearily at the towering mansion on the hill a few hundred meters away. The gardens were well kept, with square hedges and neatly maintained paths through the flower beds. The house, in contrast, was crumbling and covered in ivy. He had seen it before…

‘My father’s house,’ said Voldemort, stopping to stand beside Harry. ‘I killed him. Him and his parents when I was sixteen. The Muggles tried to pin it on the caretaker, can you believe it?’

Harry didn’t understand why Voldemort was telling him this. Was he trying to brag? To intimidate him? Or was this some bizarre attempt at small talk?

‘I get why you did it’, said Harry tiredly, eyes still on the mansion. ‘If I found out my father was alive and well, living in that huge mansion…safe in the countryside… while I grew up in an orphanage… in London during the Muggle war… I don’t know… I’d probably have done the same.’

Harry purposefully did not look up, but he could feel Voldemort’s stare burning on the side of his face.

The next heartbeat, several loud CRACKs split the silence. Between the graves, behind the yew tree, in the shadows of the memorial obelisks, wizards were Apparating. Nagini slithered away towards Cedric’s body and Voldemort took a few steps backwards in Wormtail’s direction, who muffled his sobbing somewhat with his good arm. The Death Eaters approached with caution; wands raised as though expecting a trick. They were forming a circle around them, but leaving gaps as if they were reserving spots for more people.

Voldemort calmly observed the hooded figures and semi-raised wands closing in, surrounding him. ‘Welcome. I understand very few of you ever knew my true face… but I think, some of you remember…’ he said quietly, scanning the masked faces.

Some of the Death Eaters lowered their wands. Others turned to glance at each other for guidance.

A short, hunched wizard in dense, woollen robes spoke. ‘It’s him, fools!’ the man barked, his voice gruff, like he’d been smoking a pack of cigarettes a day for decades.

Harry guessed he must be one of the older Death Eaters. The rest of the Death Eaters hesitantly lowered their wands. Harry scooted backwards on his arse until he leant against Tom Riddle Sr.’s tombstone again. He felt less exposed this way, and with his hands hidden, perhaps he could try to singe the ropes a little. Make them just brittle enough to break.

‘Ah, so we are still united under the Dark Mark, then.’ Voldemort said with finality.

A pregnant pause followed, as Voldemort took a slow spin around – studying every pair of eyes in turn. Harry kept expecting Voldemort to snap at them. To do something Dark Lord-like...like casting a Crucio at someone – hell, casting a Crucio at him.

‘Whyever did none of you try to find me? Did you believe me dead?’ Voldemort asked rhetorically. A hint of a threat loomed in his tone and an unnerved shiver went through the men of the circle.
‘I smell guilt.’ He stated with a sneer and a pause, leaving the Death Eaters to stew.

One of the men suddenly flung himself forward to Voldemort’s feet, snivelling, ‘Master! Forgive me!’

Voldemort looked down on him with an expression of severe distaste.

‘Forgive all of us, Master!’ the man shrieked. ‘Maste-‘

‘Get up, Avery’ said Voldemort softly, ‘You want forgiveness? Then prove yourself worthy through the fight for our cause – our true cause. I have not forgotten how your taste for play with Muggles hampered our advances. Forgiveness is in reach, should you turn a fresh page…’

This caused some tense shuffling in the Death Eater ranks.

Voldemort raised his chin and continued, ‘In fact, I do owe you all – an apology of my own.’

This took every man in the graveyard aback. Even Wormtail went quiet, backing into his spot in the ring, stump tucked into his armpit. They all watched expectantly for an increasingly tense moment before Voldemort spoke again.

‘The last ten years before my – unwilling departure – from you all, I experimented with the means of achieving immortality. I confess, it consumed me. I lost my perspective, my eye on the cause – and my judgement weakened. Many of you suffered undue punishments at my hands during those years. Many of you became disillusioned with me when our methods turned forceful. I admit, I lead us astray-’ He spoke slowly, as if weighing his words carefully between every phrase.

‘ – please forgive me.’ He finished.

The graveyard remained in stunned silence. Nobody was stupid enough to speak.

‘Now, this means our methods will be of a more productive nature from now on, in line with our original tenants.’ A few heads bobbed with subtle, agreeing nods, ‘and I promise you this: I have no desire to spill any magical blood unnecessarily,-’
If he meant what Harry thought he meant with that emphasis, either the blood-purists were in trouble, or Voldemort himself was.
‘-nor have I reserved patience with any among us who still seek to subdue the public purely through violence. Disobedience of this order is treason.’

‘I will no longer cater to barbaric tastes or allow bloodthirst to draw unwanted attention towards us. My previous lenience towards these practices hindered our progress, but as I said almost thirty years ago now, I vow once again – I will not interfere in whatever political pursuits you take after our victory.’ This seemed to cheer the crowd again, but Harry was confused. Wouldn’t Voldemort be the supreme leader after that victory? What point was there to have “political pursuits” then?

Harry gawked at Voldemort, mystified.

‘-But the next to take up arms against Muggles for sport will be hanged like one.’ Voldemort finished with a syrupy smile on his face, as if just declaring they’d all get a little snack if they behaved.

The statement took Harry completely unawares, sending him reeling. What on earth was all that about? A realization hit him that he knew absolutely nothing about what Voldemort’s cause actually was. He’d always just assumed it was about blood-purity and nothing else, but now that he thought about it, that made no sense either. The man himself was living proof blood-purity was nonsense.

Even worse – Harry understood that he knew nothing of how Wizarding was ruled, apart from the fact that there was a Minister. What was the political scene like? He had always perceived the ministry as corrupt, riddled with nepotism and enforcing archaic laws and regulations in a square, compassionless manner. Harry thought that was what traditional blood-purists wanted. After all, Lucius Malfoy seemed very comfortable with today’s government.

‘Anything to add, Goyle?’ Voldemort sent a dry glare at the pudgy man who had dared to clear his throat at the wrong moment.

Goyle shook his head humbly.

‘No? Anyone else?’ Voldemort tilted his head. There was a frantic shaking of heads, making their hoods rustle. ‘No. Good to know there is a semblance of loyalty left among the Death Eaters. After all, you did answer the call. Some did not…’

Voldemort’s eyes moved over the empty spots between Death Eaters. ‘One loyal servant is at Hogwarts at my bidding, the other…’ he turned to look at Wormtail, ‘…returned to me out of fear of his old friends. Not loyalty to me or the cause. You deserve this pain, Wormtail. You know that don’t you?’ He asked in his sweet, condescending voice.

Nagini had come back and was slithering through a gap in the ring between Wormtail and an equally short, masked Death Eater. Wormtail nodded with eyes squeezed shut with tears.

‘Yet, you have helped me return to my body.’ Said Voldemort coolly, ‘and so a reward is due none the less.’

He raised his pale wand, whirling out a silvery liquid that hung weightlessly in the air and then formed itself into the shape of a human hand, bright and smooth, it floated to Wormtail’s arm and attached itself seamlessly to the stump.

Wormtail stopped sobbing instantly. He Lifted his arm in front of his face, admiring his new hand. It looked like a gleaming silver glove. ‘My lord…’ he breathed, ‘thank you…. It’s beautiful… thank you…’

Voldemort turned away from the awestruck Wormtail.

‘Um, if I may, my lord… We’re all dying to know how you achieved this… this miracle… of returning to us’ said Lucius Malfoy, bowing his head.

Voldemort studied him for a second before replying, ‘Ah, but some secrets have to stay secret, I’m afraid. But what I can say is that the blood sacrifice of Lily Potter was what vanquished me, and it will trouble me no more. It was old magic, and I foolishly dismissed it. Harry here has graciously aided in my resurrection – before, I could not touch him, but now, by taking his blood, the ancient magic is no issue at all.’

Harry got the feeling Voldemort had no intentions of explaining the ritual to them, but he had somehow managed to hint to Harry’s involvement disguised as his intended role in the original (bad) ritual. Lying without lying. It was almost impressive.

Considering the case of his own resurrection closed, Voldemort started talking about his measly existence as bodiless. ‘I was reduced to a bodyless wraith, living by possessing animals and eventually humans. I had to work my way upwards slowly…’

Nagini was coiling herself behind him protectively. The Death Eaters were captivated.

They’re distracted, Harry thought.

If he was going to try to free his hands, he should do it now… But what about after that? His wand was maybe twenty meters away by Cedric’s body. The cup was even further away. Summoning it or the cup to him with raw magic would be quite a challenge, but not impossible… He would have to wait until he had all his magical strength at his disposal.

As carefully as he could manage, he focused the intent of fire to his fingertips, burning the ropes just a little before clamping his fingers down to extinguish it before anyone noticed. Feeling the rope surface with it fingers, it felt charred. He tried it again. Meanwhile, Voldemort finished his digression about living conditions when he was a wraith.

‘Three years ago, I was set back by Harry Potter, using his mother’s blood-magic to murder my servant, who I possessed at the time.’ Said Voldemort.

Harry wanted to protest, to say it was an accident – but that wasn’t strictly true, was it? Harry had known from touching Quirrell’s hands that it burned him, and then he deliberately put his hands to the man’s face… Voldemort was right. Harry had murdered someone with intent at eleven years old.

Harry burned the ropes some more. The slow approach was paying off. So far, no one had noticed. There was a difference between using a spell wandlessly and using pure magic wandlessly. The first option involved manipulation of magic into controlled, fixed patterns – it produced a reliable, traceable, consistent result – a wandless incendio would require a lot of power and would light the ropes on fire. The second meant trying to control an indeterminate flow of magic and form it into something useful, like children do when they perform “accidental magic” – small morsels of power could be dished out at a time, but the results would be patchy, and the process slow and difficult. Mr. Weasley had once told him that a wand was necessary to control magic and that “accidental magic” couldn’t be used on purpose – But Harry had been relying on it for years at the Dursleys’.

‘So, of course, it was not due to any extraordinary feat of the boy,' scoffed Voldemort, a tiny, crooked smile on his lips, 'I wanted to use the elixir of life produced by the philosopher’s stone to fuel my resurrection, but I had yet to learn from my dismissal of the ancient magic the boy had, and my thinking was erratic and confused by my reduced state – and thus I sent my servant in harm’s way and ensured my own failure. After again being expelled from a human body and returned to a wraith, I waited in the forms of snakes, until found by a follower capable of aiding me in creating a resurrection ritual – Wormtail, and this year, Barty Crouch Jr. rejoined me after a decade of imprisonment.’

The Death Eaters were still, taking in their lord’s tale. Harry half-listened while he tried to silently twist the ropes into fraying. He had been expecting to be blamed more for thwarting Lord Voldemort’s efforts – but then, he’d been eleven. He wasn’t as arrogant as to believe it was his decisions that truly stopped Voldemort from getting the stone.

Hold on! Thought Harry. Did he say Barty Crouch Jr.? Mr. Crouch’s son that died in Azkaban?

‘I have been trying to get to Harry here, in order to break the blood-spell, but how?' mused Voldemort aloud, 'for he has been better protected than I think even he knows, in ways devised by Dumbledore and by the lingering Ancient Magic of blood-sacrifice. When he’s not at Hogwarts under Dumbledore’s direct protection, he’s protected under the care of his relations.’

Harry couldn’t help it. He was hit by an insane urge to laugh – he managed to disguise it as a hark and a cough, but supressing the smile was nigh impossible. A couple of the Death Eaters shot him curious looks, but Voldemort carried on undisturbed.

‘Bertha Jorkins’s information on the upcoming Triwizard Tournament solved our troubles. We stationed Barty Crouch at Hogwarts, disguised as a teacher Dumbledore trusted, to ensure Harry was entered into the tournament under the name of a fourth school – guaranteeing his selection as champion. Crouch has been helping him be the first to reach the cup. You see the cup was meant to be a portkey ferrying the winner back to start, then someone would take it back for it to be available for the runner up and so on. All Barty had to do, was to change the destination– sending him here.’ Voldemort smiled a sickly-sweet smile, letting the Death Eaters murmur for a bit, before speaking again.

Harry had the feeling Voldemort was adding detail to this part of the tale to distract from the measly amount he provided on his resurrection. The last thread in the rope crumbled away – his hands were technically free…Now he had to wait.

‘Now you know, Lucius. Let’s see…’ Voldemort had changed his tone, this time more commanding, ‘Dolohov, Runcorn, Avery, Crabbe, Goyle and MacNair, start on gathering the unmarked that may be of use – don’t bother with the ones who’ve gone to trials or hearings.’

The six wizards bowed with a ‘Yes, my lord’ in unison, and then Disapparated. Nagini moved to sniff the spots the men left.

‘Malfoy, Nott the Younger, Yaxley and Flint, I need the current listings and proposals, seat-holders, heirs, and representatives. I expect you to let me know if anything needs urgent attention. Thank you, you are dismissed.’ Voldemort said with a lazy wave of his hand. The named men repeated the gesture of the six before them, -‘Oh, and Lucius, please take Wormtail with you.’

Lucius bowed again, shooting Wormtail a sour look, ‘Come along, Wormtail,’ he spat, grabbing Wormtail’s shoulder before reluctantly Disapparating them away.

They were left with three. The old one, the shortest one and one with very shiny shoes.

Voldemort turned to the one with shiny shoes, ‘I need you back before anyone realizes you’ve been gone. Do keep me informed.’

The man bowed, but said nothing, then he too Disapparated. Now there were two.

The short one reached under the glimmering seashell-mask down by the jawline and pulled it and the hood off in one sweeping motion. Surprisingly, the face underneath belonged to a white-haired woman in her fifties or sixties maybe. It was hard to tell with witches and wizards – a lot of them seemed to stagnate, looking the same from forty though ninety before aging normally into their hundred-and-twenties and onwards. Her face reminded him of someone, but he couldn’t put his finger on who.

She had hooded eyes and a button nose set in a slim, oval face. Peculiarly, her irises were a strong, rosy pink. Her smile was cold and smarmy.

‘It’s good to see you again, my Lord,’ she said in a deep and smooth voice.

The old man followed her lead, removing his wooden mask. He had a wide jaw, eyes so dark they looked black, and long, chestnut brown hair streaked with silver pulled into a low ponytail. Harry deduced this to be Nott the Elder. None of them seemed bothered by the giant snake moving between them towards Harry.

‘Indeed,’ rasped Nott. ‘And I mean it. Thought we’d lost you for a while. And I’m not talking about just the last thirteen years, mind you.’ Nott clapped his hand on Voldemort’s shoulder, looking him over. ‘It’s like none of it ever happened… How...?’ he said astonishedly, the woman hummed in agreement.

These must be his actual friends – Harry thought – The ones who’d been with him from the beginning (who were still alive).

‘Hatchling,’ hissed Nagini softly, raising her head to get Harry’s attention. ‘Do you speak?’

‘Yes. I speak.’ Harry hissed back, taking a quick glance at Nagini then resumed staring at the humans.

Voldemort might not have meant to, but his eyes flew to Harry, and Nott seemed to take that as some sort of answer to the riddle. Now all three were looking at him with varying degrees of curiosity.

He needed them to move, just a few feet, to give him a clear line of sight to his wand and the portkey. But first, Harry had to decide what to summon – wand or portkey? Wand meant he could more easily summon the portkey afterwards, but the element of surprise lost at the first summoning meant he’d probably be killed before it landed… However, the portkey was bigger and heavier, the risk of failure was greater and then he’d be caught without wand or portkey…

‘Are you hurt, hatchling? You taste of fire.’ Nagini hissed, tongue flicking at his face and knees.

Harry shook out of his life-and-death-conundrum. 'I’m OK, Nagini. There was a fire here earlier remember?’ said Harry, trying valiantly not to stutter on the harder notes of the language.

Nagini didn’t answer. Suddenly conscious of the humans watching them, Harry looked at his knees.

‘I see your problem.’ Said Nott quietly to Voldemort, who quickly waved his wand in a large “S” through the air between Harry and the three of them.

After that, their voices were muffled, like he was hearing them through a thick duvet.

Harry sighed. They were still standing in the path between him and salvation. He looked at their faces for a while as they talked. The woman’s strange eyes, sharp and intelligent… Nott’s sallow complexion and deep wrinkles around his mouth and eyes…Voldemort’s unfairly handsome features… Harry thought about the boy in the diary and how his twelve-year-old self had found it so hard to believe the boy was a liar…Simply because of his alluring appearance.

‘How old are you, Nagini’ Harry asked the snake, mostly to pass the time and keep him busy.

Idly waiting was giving him adrenaline-swings, manifesting as suddenly spiking heartrates, followed by a cold feeling when it went back down. He needed to keep his wits about him, ready for the opportune moment to strike.

‘I hatched four years ago – I am not yet fully grown,’ Nagini hissed cheerily.

Oh, wow – Harry thought – She’s going to grow into a real monster. Fair Voldemort and his snake….

'Why do you call him “Master”?’ Harry asked.

‘Because Garlic-Human called him Master.’ Stated Nagini innocently.

Harry’s thoughts hitched, looking into her shining, lidless eyes. Garlic-Human… Did she mean Quirrell?

He decided to just ask, ‘how did you come to know Quirrell (Garlic-Human)?’

‘He was to purchase a Dragon egg when I heard Master whisper to my mother. Metal-Human was talking to Quirrell, so he didn’t see me escape the nest box. My siblings were not so brave.’ She explained as she slid closer, lifting her head off the ground.

‘Metal-Human sold pets?’

Harry had always wondered to the source of Hagrid’s dangerous menagerie. Someone must be supplying him, but the wizarding world was small. Wouldn’t a shady pet merchant be caught at once if he sold something as illegal and conspicuous as Dragon eggs?

‘No, Metal-Human killed things and put them in jars, then sold those jars,’ clarified Nagini.

Oh, that made sense. Potion’s ingredients were largely unregulated. Compared to live animals at least.

'But then how did they take you from Metal-Human?' asked Harry.

‘Master told me Quirrell argued a lot to get the Dragon egg alive. He said I was stolen.’ She replied and pulled herself in defensively, coiling herself closely in front of Harry and resting her head on a thick stack of coils, tongue darting out occasionally.

‘Do you know what happened to your siblings?’Questioned Harry with genuine wonder, not sure if snakes cared for their kin.

‘Metal-Man killed them, I think. I only escaped because Master told me to crawl into Quirrell’s boot and Mother agreed I should.’ She curled in even tighter, shrinking to a ball.

‘So, Quirrell and your Master saved you from Metal-Man?’

‘Yes. I love Master. Quirrell is dead.’ Hissed Nagini matter-of-factly, as if Quirrell meant less to her than the boot she’d hid in.

‘I know. I killed Quirrell.’ Confessed Harry, uncertain if he expected her to get angry or not.

‘Why?’ Nagini tipped her head up with her question, showing the silvery underside of her chin.

‘He attacked me. I was very little.’ Explained Harry vaguely.

‘He attacked a hatchling too? Like Metal-Man?’

‘Yes. But I don’t think he was going to put me in a jar.’ Replied Harry, trying hard not to smile at her juvenile phrasing. But then again, if she was the species of snake he guessed she was, then she was hardly more than a toddler.

If Voldemort could hear them through the muffling-spell, he didn’t show it. Harry wondered if they were discussing his fate… But was there anything to discuss? Voldemort was planning to kill him no matter what, right?

The muddled human conversation stopped after a few minutes. Nagini slid over to Voldemort, and then further away out of Harry’s field of vision. Nott and the woman stepped a few paces aside stiffly, as if they were guards at a Muggle concert – prohibited from dancing along.

Finally – Harry thought. Making a split-second decision, he concentrated what magical energy he had into a pulling force targeting his wand some fifteen meters away while at the same time pushing a wandless incendio into the bindings around his ankles. He caught his wand in the air with a thin clapping sound and then ran for his life.

Simple, dumb shock must have earned him a head start.

‘STOP HIM!’ he heard Voldemort shout after a split-second delay.

Spells were cast after him, some he heard coming and dodged, others zoomed past him as he ran. He jumped over something purple, then narrowly ducked a green, whooshing one that launched his heart into his throat.

He desperately tried to channel enough magic to summon the cup, but it was slow going and closing the gap made it easier. So, ignoring the pain in his legs and the burning in his lungs, he ran. Blood was rushing in his ears.

There was merely a handful of meters between him and Cedric when a spell hit him, causing a sharp, immediate, and painful seizing of the muscles which lasted only a second. He stumbled, barely collecting his legs under himself in time to keep from falling. Thankfully, he recovered quickly. What the bloody hell was that?

He ducked under one purple spell, but then ran straight into another one. This spell was pain. Only pain, almost as strong as the pain of the ritual – like white-hot knives, stabbing and burning - seared through him. He fell to the ground, writhing and screaming. The air in his lungs burned, and the scream lost its sound. He tried to pull himself up on his knees, to get away. To make it stop. It ended as abruptly as it begun.

Harry scurried his knees under him and crawled a foot and a half to crouch behind a tombstone. That must’ve been the Cruciatus Curse, he thought. His brain had no suggestions for what the previous hit had been. Cedric’s dead, blue eyes starring him right in the face, just a few feet away.
I’m sorry…

‘Harry, don’t be silly – no need to make this any harder for yourself,’ Voldemort called loudly in a honeyed voice, ‘come back here, this is useless.’

He sounded mildly entertained, like Harry was a dog that’d ran off with its owner’s shoe. The rasping of half an hour ago was long gone from his vocal cords.

‘You are going to kill me, aren’t you!?’ shouted Harry piercingly.

‘Well - yes,’ said Voldemort, kind of apologetically and with a subtle humoristic edge too. An unspoken and unheard sarcastic ‘sorry,’ hung in the air. ‘You should meet your death with dignity, don’t you agree?’ returned Voldemort. Harry could hear a little more amusem*nt in his voice and the soft padding of his bare feet on the ground.

‘Imperio!’

Harry barely had time to turn his head before the spell-light filled his eyes. He hadn’t seen that Voldemort had circled around to get an angle on him – the spell caught him unawares, and Harry felt once again the suspicious sensation of his mind being wiped of all thought. Floating… not a worry in the world… It felt wholly alien. This wasn’t his mind.

‘Come back and stand before the Dark Lord’…a voice suggested tantalizingly, as if it was the best idea to ever grace his brain. A darker, stronger voice crept up from the back of his mind, joined by the sinking feeling of doom in his chest – Don’t listen to it… It is too good to be true… ‘…Come Harry,’…’Stand before the Dark Lord’…

‘I WON’T!’

Harry’s shout echoed out over the graveyard. The spell ended, leaving behind a quiet vacuum. Harry dove around behind a larger tombstone, further away from his goal. For several long seconds, Harry listened hard. Voldemort said nothing. Did nothing. He heard no footsteps. His magic core was slowly refilling its stores. It would soon be enough to summon the cup. But what about Cedric? Could he get to Cedric without getting killed? He needed to locate Voldemort.

‘I shouldn’t have helped you!’ Called Harry out into the misty graveyard, hoping for an answer like a sonar bouncing off a ship's hull.

‘You are right, you shouldn’t.’

Voldemort’s voice was soft and calm and way, way too close!

Harry scrambled away from the gravestone, twisting around to see the tall figure of Lord Voldemort shadowing him. His face was unreadable. Harry’s heart lodged itself in his throat, racing to a thousand beats per minute. He raised his wand as he crawled backwards, ready to counter whatever Voldemort threw at him – defend himself to the last - then stopped.

Voldemort’s wand-hand was hanging limply at his side. There was no anger left in the red eyes. Instead, the man looked terribly conflicted. His free hand twitched insecurely at his side. It was such an absurdly human compulsive motion, Harry struggled to process what he was seeing.

‘I must be losing my mind again…’ Voldemort said under his breath with a long, slow blink and a miniscule shake of his head.

Harry stared at him, equally terrified and bewildered.

‘Go.’ Said Voldemort quietly.

‘What?’ Blurted Harry, not believing his ears. Mere minutes had passed since the same man said he intended to kill him. He had tortured Harry for running away, what -

‘Just go. Go! Before I change my mind.’

Voldemort’s expression looked pained and didn’t meet Harry’s eyes, instead looking over his head in the direction of the cup. Springing out of his daze, Harry’s brain spun into frantic action. He darted to his feet and ran the last eight steps to Cedric, crashing to his knees beside the body and picking up a cold hand. He squeezed it, pointing his wand to the blue shimmer a few metres away.

‘Accio Cup!’

The glowing cup flew of the ground as if propelled by an invisible spring, and into Harry’s half-open, outstretched wand-hand. The feeling of a hook yanking behind his navel told him it had worked. The world whirred around him, a windy, loud blur as he and Cedric sped away. They were going back… back to Hogwarts…

Voldemort had let him go.

Chapter 7: Prefects, Paupers and Politicians

Chapter Text

The departure from Grimmauld Place was an exercise in patience while navigating complete and utter chaos. Six clunky Hogwarts trunks, three animal cages (including their complaining inhabitants), four brooms and six smaller school bags all needed to be packed, transported to the hall and their owners prepared for departure. And they were just so many people.

And dog. Sirius had insisted on joining them in the shape of “Snuffles”, the ludicrously large, shaggy, black dog that was his Animagus form.

To Mrs. Weasley’s great frustration, Mr. Weasley was currently on Fudge’s blacklist, barred from enjoying any of the ministry amenities, like the cars (Not that Harry understood how Mrs. Weasley imagined they would send those cars to a Fidelius’ed house anyway). So, they walked to Kings Cross with a full entourage of Aurors. It was all fine by Harry, who enjoyed getting to stretch his legs and spend some time outdoors after two months without much daylight. He wasn’t alone in that.

Sirius took full advantage of his role as the family dog, running ahead and between their legs, sniffing everything and soaking up as much sunshine as possible while covered in thick, black fur.

Once on the train, Fred and George left to catch up with Lee Jordan, Ron and Hermione went to join the other prefects, while Ginny and Harry found Neville alone at the back of the train. At Ginny’s behest, they joined an eccentric girl Harry had never met before named Luna Lovegood, who had a compartment all to herself. She was nice.

They talked about Neville’s frankly disgusting plant (Mimbulus Mimbletonia), and swapped chocolate frog cards until Ron and Hermione came by an hour later with news on who had been chosen as the other houses’ fifth-year prefects. Malfoy was among them, of course, to their collective annoyance.

Luna introduced them to the insane magazine her father was the editor of, called the Quibbler, which had an hilarious article about Sirius secretly being the lead singer of a popular wizard glam-rock band. Harry bought a copy off of her made a mental note of sending it to Sirius later. All was well until Malfoy showed up with his goons, nose in the air and smirking – Not that Harry didn’t expect it, but it would’ve been nice if he didn’t show his pointy face for once.

‘How does it feel to be second-best to Weasley, Potter?’ Malfoy asked, leering while puffing his chest out to display a gleaming, polished Prefect badge.

‘Shut up, Malfoy,’ said Hermione.

‘I seemed to have touched a nerve,’ said Malfoy greasily.

Harry sighed, exasperated, as a headache began boiling in his brain. ‘Don’t worry about it, Hermione. Apparently, Malfoy made Prefect and his father still doesn’t love him,’ he said in a tauntingly fake, sympathetic voice, shifting away from Malfoy to face Neville and Hermione, ‘and he tires so hard.’

Ron snigg*red.

‘Don’t you dare talk about my father, Potter!’ Snarled Malfoy, discarding the pretentious façade.

‘Or what? You’ll tell him I was mean to you in your next letter?’ Goaded Harry. A small hiss escaped from Ron. 'What are you going to do, huh, Malfoy?'

Malfoy jutted his chin up, 'careful, Potter, or you'll get detention-'

'For what? What school rule am I breaking by talking to my friends about how your father doesn't love you?' Asked Harry nonchalantly. 'I mean, it's true.'

Come on, Draco, pull your wand. Do it! The locket felt hot and happy, mirroring Harry’s quickening heartrate with a tiny hammering of its own. Harry ignored the cursed jewellery, focusing on maintaining eye-contact with Malfoy while concentrating on the git’s right hand in his periphery.

Malfoy’s face went from pinkish to red, and as expected, his right hand plunged into his pocket, pulling out his wand. Quick as a frog’s tongue, Harry snatched it. Malfoy stared wide-eyed, seemingly too slow-brained to register what had happened. Harry held the wand up between his hands, exserting pressure on the middle. It wasn’t a bendy wand. He could feel the wood strain under the force.

‘Don’t!’ Malfoy yelled in fright, reaching out for it, eyes big with terror.

‘Harry!’ Cried Hermione, taking hold of his arm.

‘Scared Malfoy?’ Said Harry confidently, before holding the wand out to him handle first. Ron let out a small laugh.

‘f*ck you, Potter!’ Malfoy spat, snatched his wand back and stormed off, Crabbe and Goyle in tow.

Still snickering, Ron closed the compartment door behind them.

‘Oh, why did you do that, Harry?’ said Hermione, ‘you know, you don’t have to fall for it. He just wants to get a rise out of you and now he-‘

‘And today he didn’t.’ interrupted Harry agitatedly. ‘And even though he’s got more power, he won’t be taking any points from me with you two here anyway. He knows he’ll lose the badge if he abuses it in front of other Prefects.’

‘Yeah! If he ties anything, he’ll regret it!’ Said Ron proudly.

Hermione shot them both aggravated looks, crossing her arms.The locket’s tiny heartbeat was ticking excitedly against his chest. Harry lifted a hand to placate it, rubbing as if soothing a burst of heartburn.

‘It worked, didn’t it?’ He said impatiently, slumping into the corner of the backrest and wall. The locket was calming down, returning to its normal, faint fuzz.

Ron was still grinning gleefully,‘I think it was brilliant, mate. Did you see his face?’

The rest of the train ride passed uneventfully. Getting off the train was, as usual, a messy affair – made even more unruly with all the pets. Ron and Hermione were supposed to supervise the younger students disembarking, and Harry was left with Pigwidgeon and Crookshanks in addition to Hedwig. Thankfully, Luna offered to carry Pigwidgeon’s rattling cage (the owl was practically vibrating with excitement) and Ginny took over responsibility for the hissing wicker-carrier containing Crookshanks. Stepping off into the chilly evening hair, Harry quickly noticed something was missing – Hagrid.

Instead, it was Professor Grubbly-Plank, a stone-faced woman that had subbed for Hagrid before, who was swinging the lantern through the twilight.

It’s probably nothing. He’ll be back… Harry told himself, but he couldn’t help the feeling of doom dropping through his chest again and he kept looking for Hagrid in spite of himself. Standing there with his neck stretched, he noticed he was getting more pointed looks than usual.

Right! The Daily Prophet pronounced me an attention-seeking, mentally unstable, possibly violent, lying demon-boy! Harry thought sarcastically. - A lot of those things are true though, just not the way the Prophet is saying, another part of his mind added darkly.

Eventually, he gave up the search and joined Luna and Neville as they walked off the cobbled platform and trudged up the dirt road to the self-driving stagecoaches that would carry them to the castle. Only, they weren’t self-driving anymore.

Skeletal horses, furless with black skin, batlike wings and white, pupilless eyes were pulling the carriages in pairs. Harry stopped and starred at the creatures. Ron and Hermione had caught up to them and were looking to get their unruly pets back from Ginny and Luna. Harry couldn’t take his eyes of the “horses”. The other students didn’t seem to notice anything different, dashing past them as if the creatures weren’t there at all.

Maybe they aren’t, murmured a small voice in his head.

‘What are those things you’d reckon?’ he asked Ron, gesturing towards the odd horses.

‘What things?’

‘Those horse-‘

Ron got distracted by Luna handing him Pigwidgeon.

‘You were saying, Harry?’ he said, turning his attention back. Hermione and Ginny were getting in a carriage.

‘I was saying, what are those horse things?’ said Harry, nodding at the horses again. Ron looked at him blankly.

‘What horse things?’ he asked, puzzled.

‘The ones pulling the carriages!’ said Harry impatiently.

They were almost close enough to touch them, while the creatures were flipping their ears at them and whipping long, white tails over their backs. Harry felt like they were staring straight into his soul with their disquieting, glassy, white eyes.

Ron scrunched his eyebrows. ‘What are you talking about?’ he said perplexedly, eyes scanning the horses with seemingly no result.

Harry concluded that either Ron couldn’t see them, or they weren’t really there – in any case it would be fruitless to try to make him see them. He got an odd sense of déjà vu from when he was the only one hearing a bloody basilisk sliding around Hogwarts’ pipes.

‘Shall we get in, then?’ said Ron worriedly.

‘Yeah,’ said Harry. ‘Yeah, go on …’

‘It’s alright,’ said Luna’s floaty voice beside him, ‘you’re not going mad. I can see them too.’

‘Really?’ Harry said, a little relieved.

Luna seemed strange, but not like she was hallucinating – and two people sharing the same hallucination wasn’t very likely.

Then again, if Harry was having a psychosis, he was probably hallucinating both the creatures and this exchange with Luna. An itchy thought, adding weight to the ominous sinking feeling. Perhaps Luna was a figment of his imagination…

Stop it! He berated himself, turning his attention back to the creatures.

‘Yep, I’ve been able to see them since my first day here. They’ve always drawn the carriages. Don’t worry, you’re just as sane as I am.’

I doubt that Luna – I doubt that very much, he thought scratching his bicep as they got into the carriage.

***

The new sorting hat song was twice as long as normal and contained a few phrases Harry thought a bit on the nose, while others were blatantly untrue. He tuned out most of the sorting itself, clapping on autopilot when the others did. With the others sufficiently preoccupied, he let a hand escape its prison in his pocket and drift to the drumming heartbeat hanging over his sternum.

He wanted to ask a teacher about the horses. If Luna was to be believed, they were supposed to be there, but then why hadn’t he seen them before now? The obvious choice to ask had been Hagrid, but he wasn’t at the staff table, and his hut had seemed uninhabited when they passed it on the way through the gates.

With the feast served in its usual grandeur, Harry, Ron, and Hermione discussed the new song with Nearly Headless Nick, who could remember this happening a couple of times in the past.

‘How can it know if the school is in danger if it’s a hat?’ Ron asked Nick sensibly.

‘I have no idea,’ said Nearly Headless Nick. ‘Of course, it lives up in Dumbledore’s office, so I daresay it picks up things up there.’

That explained it – the hat was basing its song of off the goings-on in Dumbledore’s office. With Dumbledore acting on Harry’s hugely lacking story of what happened last spring and a load of assumptions from the last war – no wonder it thought a new war was brewing.

The food disappeared. Harry was proud of himself. While at Grimmauld Place, he’d managed to get up to normal portion sizes in record time, meaning he could enjoy a small slice of treacle tart without endangering the entire meal. He lent a thankful thought to Kreacher, whose help had been an integral piece to this achievement.

Dumbledore introduced the new teachers, first Professor Grubbly-Plank – without mention of Hagrid. Then the new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher – a squat woman with a flat, circular face, wearing a gaudy, fluffy, shockingly pink cardigan over her robes called Professor Dolores Umbridge.

‘What is she wearing?!’ Harry heard Lavender whisper loudly to Parvati, who grinned.

Dumbledore continued on to the customary information about Quidditch try-outs and dangerous forests when Umbridge stood up from her seat. Her chair screeched loudly as she pushed it back.

Dumbledore looked at her questioningly.

She cleared her throat with a high-voiced, girly, ‘hem, hem.’

It became clear to all that she was intending to make a speech. Dumbledore, with his bottomless well of patience, sat down courteously, as if it was normal for new teachers to speak to the assembly at opening feasts. The rest of the staff were not as gracious. Professors Sinistra and Vector were hiding vicariously embarrassed smiles behind their goblets, Professor McGonagall’s mouth had turned to a thin line and Professor Snape had adapted a look usually reserved for Neville’s melted cauldrons. Many of the students were smiling cruelly – clearly this woman didn’t understand how things were done at Hogwarts.

‘She’s not going to last a week!’ Harry heard Lee wheeze a few places down from him.

‘Well, it is lovely to be back at Hogwarts, I must say! – And to see all your happy little faces looking up at me!’ said Umbridge cloyingly with a smile that revealed a mouth chock full of too many tiny, pointy teeth spaced a little too far apart. They reminded Harry of the teeth on a chainsaw.

He glanced around the hall for those aforementioned smiles. Most faces in the hall had more of a disbelieving look. Clearly, they thought this woman wasn’t the sharpest pin in the cushion.

‘I am very much looking forward to getting to know you all and I’m sure we will be very good friends!’ the woman said with a single, hollow clap that echoed awkwardly through the quiet hall.

Students exchanged amused looks. Some were snigg*ring into their sleeves and swapping jokes under their breaths. Umbridge cleared her throat again with another ‘hem hem,’ and the rising murmur quieted back down. She then went on with an exceptionally boring, obviously rehearsed speech that Harry tuned out after the first sentence or so. He let his mind wander.

…If even the sorting hat thought the school was in danger, why weren’t there more safety routines like in his third year? They’d all been searched and scanned with Probety-probes that year… But Filch hadn’t been equipped with one this year…

‘…nothing if not nurtured…’

Were Aurors searching their luggage while they were eating? He did see some scarlet robes by the gates. Good thing he kept the locket on him and not in his trunk. It was clearly a Dark artifact, no question, but was it malicious? It was also a part of a human soul. Would the Aurors have found it?

‘…noble profession of teaching…’

…How much soul was in the locket anyway? Would it be possible to use a ritual to find out? Or a diagnostic array? There might be a few he could try in the book about dark healing enchantments and rituals he had nicked from Grimmauld Place…Would Voldemort notice Harry experimenting with his soul?

‘…changes will be for the better…’

Harry turned his attention inward for a second, finding the connection to Voldemort effortlessly. The essence of Mind flowing through it was rigid – the man was awake. If he could learn to deduce Voldemort’s state of mind efficiently enough, he should be able to experiment and be alerted if Voldemort picked up on it…

‘…ought to be prohibited.’

Scattered and unenthusiastic clapping brought Harry’s attention back to his surroundings.

‘Thank you very much, Professor Umbridge, that was most illuminating.’ Said Dumbledore, standing again and giving her a small bow. ‘Now, as I was saying, Quidditch try-outs will be held…’

‘Yes, it certainly was illuminating,’ said Hermione with a frown.

‘How? I wasn’t listening.’ Confessed Harry.

‘Me neither,’ said Ron.

Hermione rolled her eyes fondly. ‘Yes, it explained a lot,’ she said.

Harry raised a sceptical brow. ‘It did? Sounded like a lot of waffle from what I did hear.’

‘Well, there was a message hidden in the waffle,’ she said sourly, crossing her arms on the table.

‘Oh?’ said Ron, blanching.

‘Mhm… The Ministry is interfering at Hogwarts.’ She said darkly.

‘Argh. The Ministry as in Fudge.’ Groaned Harry as they joined the other students now leaving the table.

Hermione nodded. ‘Come on Ron, we need to show the first-years where to go,’ said Hermione, sliding her legs over the bench.

‘Oh yeah! Forgot about that.’ Said Ron brightly.

The other Gryffindor Prefects were herding the first-years together by the end of the table. Harry could feel the scalding glares of several of the students passing them. The hall suddenly felt pressingly crowded, making him yearn for the solitude of his bed with the curtains drawn. He had learned some new wards to put on it too…

‘See you later then,’ said Harry with a wave to Ron and Hermione, and weaved his way out of the great hall, stares and whispers following him out.

***

When Harry finally closed the hangings around his four-poster bed that night, he was too tired to read or do any warding work, but the row he had minutes before with Seamus made him too aggravated to sleep.

Had he known Dumbledore would announce the return of Voldemort so soon, would Harry still have told him? Well, yes – how else would you’ve explained how you suddenly appeared holding hands with a dead Cedric Diggory? - Added a scathing voice to his thoughts.

What did he really think would happen? That Dumbledore would just ignore it? Keep it secret? Dumbledore was convinced Voldemort would wage all-out war on the wizarding world and wreak havoc on the Muggle one the second he returned to life – of course he announced the resurrection as loudly as he could, even at the cost of his own position and those of his allies. No, the problem wasn’t Dumbledore, it was that people like Seamus’s mum were stupid.

The thought of war unearthed another adjacent thought from his mind: he still knew little of how the wizarding world organized itself or what the original cause of Voldemort truly was. Maybe he could get Ron and Hermione to help him.

Ron probably knew a lot already, he just had to phrase his questions correctly… Not let him get wind of why Harry was so curious about this. His mind drifted to images of days in the library with his friends, without other students starring or whispering.

Hermione would find the thickest book in the library, and Harry would browse the dull history sections while Ron would complain mildly, ‘oh, have you both become swots now? I thought it was just Hermione.’

Ms. Pince berated Ron for being loud when Seamus suddenly stormed to the table with his mum in tow yelling, ‘Tell us what happened with Cedric! Every detail!’ and then Ron and Hermione joined the crowd of people whispering that had always been there, and Harry ran out into the corridor… which was no longer Hogwarts’s third floor corridor but clad in black tile… a door at the end… if he could just get to the door. He walked faster… He lifted a hand to the door – he awoke with a jolt.

Having stared at the canopy for half an hour, not getting any more sleep, Harry got up despite it being only five thirty in the morning. Years of being forced up at dawn had made him a morning person, but even the earliest days at the Dursleys’ never started before six. For the first time in years, Harry got dressed in the dormitory outside the privacy of his bedcurtains (after thoroughly checking that everybody else were fast asleep). It was nice to not have to wrestle with his full-length robes sitting down.

He grabbed Mind on Matter – The Theory of Sentient and Semi-Sentient Objects by Gayle Goyle, which he’d taken from Grimmauld Place’s library, and his notebook and Muggle-pen from his trunk. He packed it all in his bookbag, which already held the Marauder’s map and his invisibility cloak, and left for the Rune-lab in the Come-and-Go room on the seventh floor.

The halls were deserted this early, and Harry appreciated the tranquillity of it. The cool, pinkish glow of a cloudy sunrise was filtering through the diamond panes of the oldest glazed windows in the castle. It was quiet, apart from his footsteps echoing off the medieval tile floor and the jolly bird twitters ringing through the drafty walls.

The only other being he passed was the Fat Friar, who hovered lazily above a stairwell, chanting his morning prayer. Once by the tapestry of Barnaby the Barmy, Harry paced smartly in front of the empty wall across the corridor, intently thinking …I need somewhere to practice runic rituals…

A heavy wooden door appeared on the third pass and Harry slipped inside. The room hadn’t changed. The wall with the door was covered in flaking silver mirrors, the others were dark stone, and the floor was a textured, black, almost chalkboard-like stone. A lilac velvet loveseat stood in a corner. On the wall beside it was a bookcase coupled with a desk and a shield-back chair with a seat to match the sofa. The last wall had a large tool-rack with compasses, rulers, and boxes of chalk. There were ever-burning oil lamps with frosted glass bells posted as reading lights over the sofa and on the desk, casting a milky glow over the otherwise dark room. A chandelier hung from a chain in the centre of the ceiling, but none of the two dozen lilac candles were lit.

Harry sat down at the desk and fished out the golden locket from under his clothes, looking it over under the reading light. It felt nice and warm in his hand, buzzing slightly like there was an insect trapped in it. Now that he’d taken it off, the spot on his chest where it used to rest felt ice cold.

If he was to experiment with it, he needed a plan. On a blank page in his notebook, he wrote:

Are all soul-objects sentient – Is the locket sentient?
Can the soul be displayed with a ritual?
Can the soul be moved to a different container (with or without its possible consent)?

Taking out the book he brought and summoning a few reference tables from the bookcase, he got to work. The next two hours flew by. Around seven-thirty, the little dots representing Ron and Hermione on the Marauder’s map left Gryffindor tower. Harry packed up his notebook and books, slipped the locket back on (curiously, it felt a bit like getting into a warm bed in a cold room) and put on his invisibility cloak. He was planning on staying invisible as much as possible that day. The corridors were filling up with students on their way to breakfast, and Harry had a hard time dodging Ravenclaws before he could slip in behind a tapestry where a shortcut led him directly to the second-floor corridor sparsely populated due to Moaning Myrtle. It was a good spot to take the cloak off.

He intercepted Ron and Hermione in the entrance hall, bickering loudly.

‘I’m not going to talk to them alone! They’re your brothers-‘ said Hermione frustratedly to Ron as he caught up with them.

‘Yeah, which is why I’m telling you it’s useless, they’ll laugh me off.’ Argued Ron.

‘You’re a Prefect!’

‘They don’t care!’

‘What’s going on?’ said Harry, startling both of them.

Hermione let out a bone-deep, weary sigh, drifting sideways to make room for Harry between her and Ron. ‘Fred and George have put up a poster in the common room seeking guineapigs for their experiments,’ she said irately, ‘and Ron doesn’t think we should talk to them about it.’

‘Well, I’m not doing it for you, mate.’ Harry said to Ron, who only scowled at him in response.

They found their usual seats at the Gryffindor table. The ceiling displayed a measly forecast for the day, projecting a densely overcast sky. It would likely rain later. Ron began filling his plate with eggs and bacon, Harry grabbed some toast and begun slathering it with cloudberry jam while Hermione was glaring daggers at Fred and George where they were laughing with Lee at the end of the table.

‘When did you get up?’ asked Ron with a hopeful glance at Harry, probably eager to change the subject away from his brothers.

‘Five-thirty… Didn’t sleep well.’ Replied Harry defeatedly.

He had a sudden impulse to tell them about his ridiculous little dream-war with Voldemort, but he knew they wouldn’t take it well, and dismissed the idea.

‘Tha’ stuff abo Seamus bo’erin uo?’ asked Ron, mouth full.

Harry shook his head,‘honestly, I kind of forgot about it already, I don’t really care what he thinks.’

His friendship with Seamus was cold and sporadic at best. And what use was it anyway? The Daily Prophet was lying, Harry was lying – what Dumbledore was saying wasn’t entirely true either, but by no fault of his own.

‘What happened with Seamus?’ Asked Hermione, ladling yoghurt into a bowl.

‘He think’s I’m lying about Voldemort being back.’ Answered Harry plainly. ‘Blamed me for his mum not wanting him to return to Hogwarts this year, something stupid like that.’

‘His mum believes The Prophet.’ Clarified Ron.

‘I don’t get why you’re still getting that rag, Hermione.’ Sighed Harry as a grey owl swooped down with a fresh copy hanging limp and wet in its beak, ‘It’s all rubbish.’

‘Best to know what the enemy is saying,’ She said, giving the soaked front page a scan while paying the owl, ‘nothing interesting today. Nothing about you or Dumbledore.’

‘Good. Let’s hope it stays that way, then perhaps Seamus’s mummy can reverse her brainwashing.’ Sneered Harry, his appetite gone.

Seamus had asked Harry to talk about Cedric, which was probably the true core of his problems with Harry. I refuse to indulge their morbid curiosity.

They finished their meal and waited patiently as Professor McGonagall worked her way down the table, handing out timetables. Theirs contained what must be the worst possible Monday of their Hogwarts career so far. Thankfully, Harry had quit divination (being continuously predicted to die and have to make up prophesies about your own death to get a decent grade was… it messed with him) and swapped it for Ancient Runes a few weeks into his third year, otherwise Trelawney would be on Monday’s hell parade too. Like it was on Ron’s timetable.

History of Magic was the first one out, as boring as ever. The subject of the day was Giant Wars – for Hermione that is – who managed to pay attention while Harry and Ron played Hangman in the corner of a piece of parchment.

It had begun drizzling densely when they crossed the yard on their way to Potions afterwards. Curiously, Cho Chang greeted Harry as they passed her. Harry returned the greeting with a polite smile and wave. She made a stunted motion forwards as if expecting him to stop and talk to her, and then some awkward steps back when he didn’t. Harry had a sinking feeling she wouldn’t be the last person to try to corner him for a chat about Cedric.

Potions opened with Snape fearmongering about the dreaded O.W.L-year and how he only accepted O’s for his N.E.W.Ts students. Harry hadn’t paid much thought to what he’d do after Hogwarts (most likely he’d be dead), but it certainly wasn’t Healer, Auror or Potioneer, and so Harry had every intention of dropping Potions next year.

Potions was dreadful, as usual. Snape vanished his even though it was far from the worst concoction there. He also kept shooting Harry extra suspicious looks, checking on their bench unreasonably often – like he was expecting some malicious prank any second.

Harry clenched his teeth through the unfairness, biting down every retort and complaint his brain wanted to hurl at Snape, while the locket was riling itself up into a fever. Ron and Hermione merely gave him sympathetic looks over their own cauldrons.

After Potions, the three of them had lunch together in the great hall. Ron and Hermione bickered over Snape’s place in the Order (Harry felt they’d had this particular argument before but couldn’t place when) and then Ron was off to the North Tower for Divination and Hermione to the sixth floor for Arithmancy, while Harry left for the library to study wizarding politics.

Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts was exactly as uninformative as he remembered. It focused more on the fall-part. The same was true for Dark Lords and Ladies Trough History Volume XIII, 1800-1975, though there was one interesting fact to be gleaned from that one: The name of Tom Riddle, and the life of the person he was before he became Lord Voldemort in public and founded the Death Eaters, wasn’t known to historians – and that meant that his real face and name had never been publicly attached to the legendary Lord Voldemort.

Harry slumped back in his seat for a moment after that realization, gazing unfocusedly out the window. Tom Riddle could take a leisurely promenade about Diagon Alley, and no one would bat an eye. Harry pictured the man going shopping and getting ice-cream at Fortescue’s, getting flirted at by clueless witches – the image was absurd.

At a glance, Parliamentarism in the Wizarding World appeared very informative. He also skimmed through a chapter of Wizengamot – The Reformation Years 1911-1937 and what little he read was encouraging. He decided to check out both and set out for Madam Pince’s desk.

‘Hi Harry, ready to go to Defence?’ said a drifty voice behind him.

Turning around, he found Neville entering the library with Ron trailing sleepily behind.

‘Yeah, just let me get these.’ He nodded to the books in his arms.

‘What are those?’ yawned Ron. Clearly, the stuffy, perfumed air of the North Tower had gotten to him.

‘Politics. Divination boring?’ said Harry, steering them away from the question “why politics?”.

‘You bet. Topic was dream-interpretation. We have to keep a dream diary as homework – how am I supposed to do that, I can’t remember any of my dreams.’ Said Ron blearily as Harry slid his books to Madam Pince.

She co*cked an eyebrow at him but stamped them out without a fuss. They left the library for the Defence Against the Dark Arts-classroom. Neville didn’t seem all that awake either and the two of them were pulling Harry down with them.

‘I remember you once had a dream about spiders wanting you to tap dance...’ said Harry amusedly, fighting with his eyelids not to get any drowsier.

‘Really?’ said Ron smiling, Neville let out a small laugh that morphed into a yawn.

‘Yeah, you woke up in the middle of the night and asked me for advice – then you fell back to sleep after I encouraged you to just tell the spiders you didn’t want to tap dance.’

They shared a dopey laugh.

They entered the Defence Against the Dark Arts-classroom a little early. Under Lupin and Fake Moody, the room had been filled with teaching aides, instruments, and creatures. Quirrell had wallpapered the room in garlic and Lockheart in pictures of himself. Now, the classroom was bare. A lonely, blank wheel-in blackboard stood beside the teacher’s desk. Professor Umbridge was sitting behind her desk, looking expectantly at the students filing in. She was wearing a huge, black velvet bow on her head and the same cardigan as the day before. Harry and Ron chose seats in the middle of the room – safest choice when you didn’t know anything about a teacher’s style yet. Hermione came in a few seconds later and joined Neville at the table across the aisle from them.

‘Well, good afternoon!’ said Umbridge as the last person in closed the door behind them.

There were some mumbled replies scattered about the classroom. This wasn’t good enough for Professor Umbridge; She demanded they answer her as one, and Harry joined the class in droning a monotonous "Good afternoon, Professor Umbridge."

Within the first three minutes, Harry knew she wasn’t going to be a particularly good teacher, and within the next ten, he was convinced she may be the worst one yet – and that list included Gilderoy Lockheart. She had a propensity towards 1950’s style, strict discipline which made Harry suspect that she got off on the power it provided. This woman desired reverence, that much was clear. As for the contents of the lessons…

‘I would like you to turn to page five and read “Chapter One, Basics for Beginners”. There will be no need to talk.’ Instructed Professor Umbridge.

Never in his life had Harry had a teacher willing to waste classroom time on having the students read quietly – that was what homework was for.

Harry began reading the first few sentences and then drifted off into a daydream. These days, most daydreams were of a home of his own. They had no plot - it was just a time and a place – and in his mind he would construct the house and garden. On good lucid dreaming nights, he could visit the place properly in his dreams. The more he worked on mapping out the location, the easier it got.

The sound of Umbridge’s girly voice drew him back to reality. ‘Did you have a question about the chapter, dear?’ she said in a sugary, high-pitched tone.

‘Not to the chapter no, but to the course aims.’ Said Hermione. Her hands were folded on top of her book, unopened. She continued quickly, ‘there’s nothing in them about using defensive spells.’

Harry re-read the course aims Professor Umbridge had written on the blackboard at the start of class. Hermione was right, of course.

‘Using defensive spells? Why, I can’t imagine any situation in my classroom that would require you to use a defensive spell, Miss Granger. You surely aren’t expecting to be attacked during class?’ said Professor Umbridge with a cloying little laugh, like Hermione was the stupidest person she’d met.

Someone from the Ravenclaw side of the class piped in, ‘Isn’t there a practical exam on the Defence O.W.L anymore, then?’ at the same time as Ron exclaimed, ‘we aren’t going to use magic?!’

Umbridge looked to the Ravenclaw first, then squinted at Ron. ‘Students should raise their hands when they wish to speak in my class Mr-‘

‘Weasley,’ said Ron, now with a raised hand.

In fact, Harry saw there were now several raised hands. Hermione had raised hers.

‘Yes, Miss Granger. Did you want to ask something else?’ said Professor Umbridge with a wide, phoney smile. It accentuated her similarities to a giant toad and Harry struggled to take his eyes off all the creepy little teeth.

‘Yes – Surely the whole point of Defence Against the Dark Arts is to practice defensive spells?’ said Hermione confidently, folding her hands over top of her book again.

‘Are you a ministry-trained educational expert, Miss Granger?’ asked Professor Umbridge in a mockingly sweet voice.

‘No, but-‘

‘Then I’m afraid you’re not qualified to decide what the “whole point” of any class is. Wizards older and cleverer than you have devised this programme. You will be learning defence in a secure, risk-free way –‘

‘What use is that? If you need to use defensive spells, it’s not risk-fr – ‘ said Harry impulsively.

‘Hand, Mr Potter!’

Harry raised his hand. Professor Umbridge turned to one of the other hands. Dean reiterated Harry’s question and was similarly shut down. A flame of rage crackled to life in Harry’s lungs.

‘I do not wish to criticize the way things have been run at this school’ said Professor Umbridge unconvincingly, ‘but you have been exposed to some very irresponsible wizards in this class – not to mention some extremely dangerous half-breeds.’

This started another round of arguments and hands from the class. Dean defended Lupin, while Padma Patil pointed out (‘Hand, miss Patil!’) that the worst teacher they’d had was the normal human one. Parvati Patil fronted the question about the O.W.L exam again.

‘As long as you study the theory hard enough, you should have no trouble with the spells under carefully controlled examination conditions.’ Said Professor Umbridge in a pitying tone.

‘Without ever practicing them beforehand? Are you telling us the first time we’ll get to do the spells will be during the exam?’ said Parvati incredulously.

The room broke out in murmurs, Professor Umbridge cut through it. ‘I repeat, as long as you study the theory hard enough-‘

‘But what about after we finish school, what about the real world?-‘ said Harry loudly, never having lowered his hand. ‘How are we to prepare for what’s waiting out there?’

He was getting angrier and angrier by the minute. This woman was vile.

‘There’s nothing waiting out there, Mr Potter-‘ Professor Umbridge chided in a mockingly placating tone.

This woman isn’t just vile, she’s mad.

‘Oh, yeah? What about Dark creatures? Or you know, common criminals?’ said Harry on the verge of shouting, unapologetically holding a hand over the locket in a meagre attempt to pacify it.

The class murmur had grown mutinous.

Professor Umbridge jotted her chin up at them. ‘The ministry protects-‘

‘What about Death Eaters?!’ said Ron, close to yelling now, hands clamped over the edge of the desk to stop himself from standing.

‘Ten points from Gryffindor Mr Weasley!’ Now Professor Umbridge was yelling. The class quieted down somewhat, murmuring at a lower volume.

‘Now, you’ve been told that a certain Dark wizard has returned from the dead, but that is a lie,’ said Professor Umbridge as if telling a small child that their goldfish had gone to live in the ocean now.

Whether the scorching hot feeling came from the locket or his own anger, Harry would never know. He simply reacted in accordance with it.

‘Pft, it’s not a lie! Voldemort is not dead-‘ A collective flinch went through the class, some gasped and the remaining whisperings stopped. ‘-he never died in the first place, and yeah, and he is returned!’ said Harry, fuming while trying hard to stay in his seat. The locket felt like it was approaching melting temperatures.

‘Detention Mr. Potter!’ said Professor Umbridge shrilly. ‘Tomorrow evening, five o’clock, my office. I repeat, this is a lie. The ministry of Magic guarantees that you are not in danger from any Dark wizard. If you’re still concerned, by all means come see me after class hours and if someone is telling alarmist fibs about reborn Dark wizards, I am here to help. Now will you kindly continue your reading.’

Harry starred heatedly at the same spot on the page for the remainder of the class. His heart wouldn’t slow down. He had no idea what to expect from detention with this woman. She seemed like the type to favour corporal punishments (the glee in her eyes when dishing out punishments reminded him of his uncle), but they were supposedly outlawed long ago (to Filchs’ continuous despair).

Finally, the bell rang. Harry bolted without as much as a glance at anybody else. He needed to be alone. He dodged through the masses in the corridor and slipped into a secret nook behind a chimera statue where he threw the Invisibility Cloak on.

He spent the next two hours aimlessly wandering the top floors under his cloak, letting the anger smoulder. At a quarter past six, his conscience caught up with him. Ron and Hermione surely must wonder where he’d gone off to. He put the cloak back in his bag and went to dinner to a cacophony of whispers. The topic of Professor Umbridge had taken over the school by the sound of it, and the news of Harry’s little outburst about Voldemort had spread fast.

‘Sorry, I needed to cool off.’ Harry said, dumping his bag on the floor and climbing into the seat at Ron’s side.

‘Figured.’ Answered Ron. ‘Glad you didn’t take it out on us this time.’

‘What do you mean, “this time”?’ Asked Harry indignantly.

Hermione sucked in a breath, but they were both saved from answering by Lavender and Parvati’s passing conversation.

‘…I just don’t think anyone could survive a fight with You-Know-Who for real, like… it has to be a lie – Only Dumbledore…’

Harry stared gloomily after them. ‘What I don’t get, is why they all believed Voldemort was back when Dumbledore told them two months ago, but now…’ said Harry, putting boiled carrots and peas on his plate.

‘Thing is, I’m not sure they did, Harry.’ Said Hermione darkly. ‘Try to see this from their perspective… You just appeared with Cedric’s dead body in the middle of the lawn… None of us saw what happened in the maze… we just had to take Dumbledore’s word for it.’

‘I guess.’ Said Harry defeatedly. The longer this went on, the more he wished Dumbledore had kept what Harry had told him a secret.

‘Mhm, and then they went home for the summer, reading about how you and Dumbledore are nutters.’ Added Ron between bites.

They had a long discussion about Professor Umbridge, Dumbledore and O.W.Ls that evening over their homework. Snape had assigned two feet that got first priority. Binns had assigned a foot on the Giant Wars of the 1840s that had to wait for Hermione to finish hers. Thankfully, Professor Umbridge had not assigned any homework.

Fred and George were testing Skiving snackboxes on students who had responded to their ad in the common room, to Hermione’s huge dismay. Ron still refused to participate in chastising them for it and Hermione’s threats of penalty were simply laughed away.

She did attempt to take points once, which resulted in her own unpopularity rising by loud, common room-wide dissent, paired with wicked smiles from the twins.

‘We don’t care about the House Cup, Oh Great Prefect.’ Grinned George, while Fred openly repeated the offense Hermione had docked points from George for.

***

After finishing up homework for the evening, Harry left for bed early, again itching to be alone. Once changed and safe behind his closed bedcurtains, he pulled out the books he’d checked out from the library that day.

The Wizengamot as it operates in Brittain today puts great effort into the vetting of new members. Any existing member of the Wizengamot, senior member of the Minister's Office or Ministry Department Heads can put forth a new name for consideration when a seat opens.

Candidates, once put forth, then collect signatures from backers all across Magical Brittain. Careful examinations are performed to ensure that all members of the Wizengamot are of sound mind, health and can offer valuable perspectives to the assembly.

Members of the Wizengamot are to represent their own opinions and those of their backers and may not be a member of any organization or group devoted to specific political philosophies or generalized pursuits of power. I.e. Partisanship is not permitted within the court.
***
Members can apply for seats on up to twelve committees. This rule was first introduced in the thirteenth century when the knight Barnabas “The Barmy” of Ullden joined all committees available in an effort to instate trial-by-combat as a means to settle all disputes within the Wizengamot.

The Chief Warlock is responsible for accepting or denying requests to join a committee, and any one committee can have a maximum number of seven members.
***
The Minister for Magic is chosen by an extraordinary Wizengamot session vote. All members must be present, and the candidate must receive at least a two-thirds majority of the votes to be confirmed to the position.

Harry closed Parliamentarism in the Wizarding World and put it back in his bookbag. The chapter on Brittain had been short, most of the book was devoted to the more complex systems of the largest wizarding nations, like The Magical United States of America, Gujarat, and The Middle Kingdom.

It also had a lot of chapters on the smallest nations and non-nation covens around the world too – Including the strange regions scattered around the world where the Muggle-to-wizard ratio was far lower than on the British Isles. Like Iceland, which out of three hundred thousand people, had almost fifty thousand wizards and witches. Harry made a mental note of reading the rest of the book later.

The Wizengamot members and the Minister for Magic aren’t democratically elected – Harry realized while putting the library book away in his bag.

Despite that stirring revelation, he felt no closer to deciphering the strange speech Voldemort made in the graveyard. Perhaps the other book would provide more clarity, but for now, he was too tired to read on. He lowered his bookbag to the floor outside his bed and got in under the covers. The locket buzzed warmly against his skin under his pyjamas. He traced the “S” on it with his finger, deep in thought.

Voldemort had sent another corridor-vision last night, Harry needed to find a dream in return… He also wanted to test the connection a bit more, for when he was to experiment on the locket… Anger seemed easiest to bait out – it was an emotion he had already felt coming through from Voldemort before his resurrection.

Closing his eyes, he retreated into his mind. The connection was fluid and wavey, meaning Voldemort had fallen asleep. Armed with a memory, Harry reached for the bundle of Mind. It was one that angered and saddened Harry to this day, even though he was only seven when it happened, and it was far from the worst one pain-wise. This time, he stayed half-awake, feeling the link for Voldemort’s reactions.

The dream ended naturally at five in the morning and Harry woke up with a start, sweaty and lying awkwardly at the very edge of the bed, an arm dangling out under the curtains. He could feel Voldemort’s flow of emotions drift steadily through the bridge of their minds.

He laid perfectly still, engrossed in Voldemort’s emotional output. Most was indeed anger, but not all. Something sad, like pity, hid within it.

For a second, Harry thought he’d imagined the empathy he’d sensed from Voldemort’s mind, but just as he finished that thought – dark gloom floated through with the anger. Harry had often speculated on what stayed Voldemort’s hand in the graveyard. In fact, it had been eating at him for weeks.

A part of him believed it was only gratitude. That his life was his reward for helping with the ritual. However, that notion crashed with his understanding of Voldemort. Why should he care about fairness? There had to be something else. Maybe pity played a part, too?

Harry had a clear memory of seeing his own, pale complexion reflected in the foe-glass in Fake Moody’s office, face streaked with tears of blood. It hadn’t exactly been the face of a threat. No matter what had happened inside the Dark Lord’s mind that day, one thing was certain – the resurrected Voldemort wasn’t as emotionally stunted as the adults in Harry’s life had presented him to be.

Chapter 8: Misplaced Misery

Chapter Text

He was kneeling down in the flower beds in the Dursleys’ front garden, the blistering afternoon sun baring down on his neck. Aunt Petunia had set him to pull weeds, which meant killing perfectly nice, flowering dandelions basking in the early summer warmth. In between the carefully pruned rose bushes, was a friend. He’d met her a few weeks prior, and they had talked almost every day since the start of summer – whenever he had gardening chores, he made sure to find her.

Her name was actually a smell, she’d explained to him, but he gave her the name Diana after the Princess in Aunt Petunia’s magazines. Though he pronounced it “Rose-Lady” to her. She liked it.

‘I think your big humans are a danger to you, hatchling,’ she said, pointing her little black head towards where Aunt Petunia was adding more bark around the rose stems – God forbid if a single weed ever dared poke its leaves out among her roses again.

‘They’re not, not really. Besides, I make a lot of trouble.’ He hissed back with a shrug.

It was true. Most of the time, he knew he’d be punished for his actions, but he did it anyway. So, of course, he deserved it when the inevitable happened. Thankfully, it had been a while since last time.

In fact, he felt he had been exceptionally good lately. He hadn’t rescued any rats, birds, or cats, and he’d been quiet in his cupboard. All his chores had been done on time and he hadn’t burned any more food. He grabbed a dandelion with both hands, yanking hard. The root snapped below the surface.

‘What trouble do you speak of now, hatchling?’ Diana asked as he tossed the weed into the pile behind him.

‘You know, the freak-things I told you about,’ he answered while digging up the remnants of the dandelion roots. ‘The dead birds and stuff.’

At that moment, the neighbour from number eight passed him on the sidewalk.

‘Are you playing you’re a snake? You’re such a sweetheart’ said the woman fondly.

He looked up at her, puzzled. He wasn’t playing anything; he was just chatting with Diana. The neighbour mussed up his already messy hair, smiled sweetly at him, then walked off to where Aunt Petunia was kneeling.

‘Afternoon there, Petunia!’ said the neighbour loudly.

Uncle Vernon, who had been hosing down his car, turned the water off and went to join his wife in greeting the neighbour.

‘What did the human say to you, hatchling?’ Asked Diana, slithering closer into the shadow of the large, yellow rose bush.

‘Didn’t you hear her?’ He had thought the neighbour had been rather loud.

‘Yes, but it’s just noise to me, I can’t understand human-speak.’

‘Oh.’

That meant speaking to Diana was certain to be a “freak” thing. He shrunk a little with fearful anticipation, sharpening his ears for signs of anger in his uncle’s voice. There was still hope the neighbour wouldn’t mention it.

‘Oh, your nephew is so cute! I just passed him playing over there, pretending he’s a snake – hissing and all! It sounded almost like a real snake!’ the neighbour laughed friendlily.

His head whipped around lightning fast to look at the adults. Aunt Petunia was laughing a galling, fake laugh that was miles removed from her eyes. Uncle Vernon was smiling in a way that could also be a snarl, and a pink flush was rising up his neck.

The three adults chatted a little more about the weather, lawns, and traffic, then his aunt and uncle waved goodbye to the neighbour. His uncle disappeared into the house, face swelling to beetroot red as he went. Fear surged in like a flood wave.This was bad. Really bad.

‘You need to go!’ He hissed anxiously to Diana.

‘Why?’

‘My uncle is up to something, go before he sees you!’ he said with urgency, looking behind him. His Uncle had come back out, stomping straight towards him.

‘Now!’ He pleaded desperately, prodding at her cool, black body with his finger.

‘I will protect you, hatchling!’ Diana curled herself together in a ready-to strike position.

Uncle Vernon came up on his right, casting them both in a deep, dark shadow. He had a pair of kitchen scissors in his hand.

In a single, quick, unceremonious motion, Uncle Vernon bent down and cut the head of the snake with a flashing snip of the scissors.

Diana didn’t even try to strike or flee – She’d thought her human friend was the one in danger. He stared at his decapitated friend. Her body twitched in death. This could not be fixed with freakishness and nine-pointed stars in circles.

‘Inside. NOW’ said Uncle Vernon through gritted teeth.

He complied teary-eyed, trying his best not to tremble or show the distress on his face. He was in for it now.

Once the door closed behind them, Uncle Vernon grabbed him harshly by his upper arm, ‘What have I told you about that freakish, abnormal behaviour, huh! AND YOU STILL DO IT – OUTSIDE – WHERE PEOPLE CAN SEE YOU! - HAVE YOU ANY IDEA? - THE SHAME?!’ Shouted Uncle Vernon, shaking him violently.

Dizzy, in pain and crying, his legs went out under him, making him hang limply from his uncles’ hands like a ragdoll. A pressure was building inside his brain from where it repeatedly collided with his skull. Stars dotted his vision. He felt nauseous. He vaguely noticed being dragged over to the kitchen, where he was brusquely dropped on his knees. Staggered and hunched over, he tried his utmost to keep from retching. It would only make things a million times worse if he did.

‘Take it off!’ Commanded Uncle Vernon. ‘You get five for this!’

He didn’t need clarification to know what “it” was. As quickly as he could manage without toppling over, he tugged Dudley’s old t-shirt over his head.

There was a swishing sound, then leather connected with his back with a loud tchick. He bit his cheek, but the tears fell anyway. It stung horribly, but he was grateful it was end-first, not buckle. It was a splitting and cutting sort of pain that combined forces with the duller pain of punches and aches. A cold, runny feeling slithered down his back. Thankfully, he managed to keep from crying out or whimpering.

His knees were gradually sliding apart, and he could sense himself keening forwards with every blow. If he were to catch himself from falling, would Uncle Vernon think it was an escape attempt? Probably. He steeled himself for the next blows.

He counted to five. Five sharp stings. Five loud smacking noises. Finally, he let himself tip over, catching himself from falling with a trembling, dirty hand. Uncle Vernon walked past him, snapping a tea towel off a peg by the door. His uncle used it to wipe off the belt before putting it back on.

‘Cover that up, boy!’ Uncle Vernon barked at him.

Slowly, he shimmied the shirt back on, trying not to get any garden dirt transferred to his wounded back. As soon as it was on, a hand closed around his arm again.

Uncle Vernon marched over to the cupboard, towing him along by the arm. ‘No noise! Or you’ll be sorry, boy!’ Spat his uncle as he was dumped in the cupboard like a sack of potatoes.

With a slam of the door and locking bolt, total darkness enveloped him. The shirt stuck to his back. Everything smelled of damp earth. He waited until his uncle’s receding footsteps had ended in the closing of a door to cry for real. Diana was dead. Gone forever.

He woke as if a gun had gone off in his room, disoriented and trembling. His muscles burned and his jaw was clenched to the point of pain. The ghost the lashings lingered on his back. A drop of sweat trickled down his spine, sending a cold shiver through him. Instinctively, he reached around, feeling for wounds. The skin felt whole, his hand came back bloodless. Another dream as Harry Potter.

He was beginning to suspect they were deliberate. Why else would there be a different dream each time? One would think the nastiest ones would run on a loop, terrorizing the owner in perpetuity. Tugging at his hair, he tried mindfully slowing his breathing, hoping his heartrate would follow suit. Were they real? Were these his true, lived experiences?

They must be. These dreams were spent inside the boy’s mind, thinking Potter’s thoughts, as if they were his own. The experience was bizarre to say the least. When they first began, he believed them to be a remnant from the ritual a month or so before.
It seemed logical. Harry Potter had participated in his resurrection; it wasn’t wholly unlikely that some temporary bond of sorts had been created. But such pure Legillimency Mind-links would fade with time and distance, not linger as a lasting after-effect. And the connection between the two of them appeared to be growing stronger.

But why? The mystery was maddening. If these dreams indeed were intentionally sent – how?

He had been using the string of Mind he knew belonged to the boy to send visions, thinking it had been transferred with the blood, and would vanish if left unused. The dreams he sent were all the same. Tantalizing snippets designed to tickle the curiosity within a young mind. But he was a master Legillimens. Harry Potter was a bloody fifteen-year-old.

…What did he mean by “Parasite”!?...

…A fifteen-year-old who knew Necromancy.

Why does he know Necromancy…? Who taught him…?

For the umpteenth time, he cursed the cauldron for melting away with the evidence and his own brain for its woefully inadequate memory of the preceding events. Incensed, he threw the blankets off him and swung his feet to the floor. He paced the spacious guest room, trying to force his own mind to focus on the important aspect of this: Divining a way to break the connection.

I should have killed him when I had the chance, he thought bitterly. A vivid image of a failed spell flashed into his brain, searing his synapses with embarrassment. There are witnesses to that co*ck-up… a voice reminded him, riling him up further, making his teeth grind together and nails dig into his palms. Stop it!

The sound of glass shattering pierced the silence of the night. Shards glinted in the moonlight where it hit the nightstand. The carpet and bed had dark, wet spots.

Compose yourself! You cannot get to him, not for a year at least, he conceded, feeling his nostrils flare and the quick, deep breath cool his airways.

He stopped for a moment to stare out at the bright crescent moon over the treetops. The orange lights of the city in the distance. The half-kept garden. Nagini had created squiggly patterns in the grass, dotted with dark splatters where she’d caught a gnome or small mammal. He found her yellow eyes glinting under a large Rhododendron bush. Slowly, he unclenched his fists.

He waved a quick, wandless repairing spell at the crushed glass. It came together with a high-pitched whine. If he was to murder Harry Potter, it needed to be planned well, in order to get both the prophesy and the answers he needed from the boy. And to circumvent his previous problems.

First, he must intensify and diversify his efforts to get the boy interested in going to the Department of Mysteries. Perhaps he should skew the visions to be more informative? Show the target and the place? Then later, perhaps falsify a vision of one of his friends kidnapped and taken there? A Weasley, maybe?

He dragged a clammy palm over his face. Harry likely knew whence the corridor visions came. Why else would the torturous nightmares he was plagued with consistently strike him soon after he had sent the boy a vision?

It was retaliation for the visions, that he was sure of. Which meant he could not stop now else the boy would win. Surrendering to Harry Potter was not an option. No, it was imperative that he get the boy to trust what the visions were showing. He had to believe they were real events, entering his brain from his unwitting enemy... That should still be possible if the revenge-dreams were left unacknowledged and the boy believed the visions to be memories sent on accident. Persistence would be key.

There had to be something else he could do in the meantime to regain control over his nights, and his moods, for that matter. A way to block it... So far, no spell or technique he tried had worked. The link between them passed straight through any shield he’d erected.

It was beginning to feel hopeless. He’d been in increasingly gloomy moods for several weeks now with no correlation to the events of his life. Hanging about this house all day with no money, few constructive things to do and only Nagini for company was boring, yes, but not depressing. Besides, his gracious hosts returned every evening, often with good news that by all rights should be elating. But all victories were dampened, colourless and bland. Because of Harry Potter.

Gods, the boy’s life is nothing to envy, he thought with dour pity, resuming his walk on the carpeted floor. Perhaps it would have been a mercy, had he killed Harry in the graveyard. Or taken him somewhere to be killed later. There had been plenty of options that he foolishly dismissed.

Impulsive… Rash… Sentimental… Simpleton…

It wasn’t the first time his impulsive decisions had disastrous consequences. Hopefully, it was the last. The annoying thing was, he knew this burning regret would be gone by morning. As always.

He had let the boy go. Because it was well deserved. A debt owed. Because there was something unnatural about the prospect of killing him. A force that made the wand feel foreign in his hand. An unholy feeling, that every fibre of intuition he owned screamed for him not to fight.

He recalled the disbelieving look in the boy’s eyes, wand raised and ready to battle for his life. Had it been the eyes or the gut feeling that made him hesitate? He did not know.

What he did know was that the lifelong abuse Harry suffered created a resilient but miserable person, prone to deep dives into melancholia that rivalled any he had ever felt even after the worst mistakes of his much longer life. And it was infectious.

There had been times in his youth when he’d grappled with negative thoughts. There were enough mistakes to obsess over, especially those from his reckless, frivolous escapades into the Muggle world. But he had always bounced back in the end, pride intact. Now, he often felt like he had a Dementor trailing him wherever he went.

Images of Harry Potter surfaced in his mind again. Terrified in a cupboard. Terrified tied to a grave. The defiant, dirty face of the fourteen-year-old mixed with the defeated face of the same child, several years younger. The spirited refusal to bow to the commands of an Imperio.

An admirable strength of character.

The more he let his mind linger on these thoughts, the less harm he wished on Harry Potter. A parselmouth with a fascinatingly strong talent for runic magic and a mind of metier that eclipsed that of many adults. A wizard truly worthy of life, in his personal ideology.

Though he tried not to think on it, Harry also reminded him of certain children from Wool’s. Those who refused to sleep alone in a bed for the times they’d spent tied to one. Who took on responsibilities as if they were adults, cooking and cleaning and tending to the other children. Who worked newspaper routes, shoeshining on streetcorners and shovelling manure without a single complaint. Who were fiercely independent and skilled, and who taught him how budget, repair broken things and survive fistfights against bigger kids. Harry was one of those. A child without a childhood.

But none of the redeeming qualities took away from the fact that these anguished dreams must not be allowed to continue. They were bleeding into his waking hours, and he refused sit idle and be tortured by this boy. It had gotten to the point where he’d begun to feel a certain amount of trepidation before going to sleep at night.

Have you not always? Remarked an unwelcome voice in his head.

Truthfully, he did not want his own dreams back either. By no means did he miss waking up with the scorching scent of burning flesh in his nose, creaking wood, and damp, rotting earth. Or worse – hours of desperate pleading into the dark void. No light, no sound, no taste, smell, or touch. No, his own dreams were no less frightening, but they were preferable to being trapped within the boy’s tormented life. At least in the void, his thoughts were his own. And the abyss was peaceful. Whatever fear and pain existed was all in his head.

In contrast, the boy’s visions were viscerally vivid, and the young brain had little control over its own patterns and reactions. It could not protect itself, the way his own adult brain could against the black nothingness.

Sadly, neither his own nor Harry Potter’s visions could be schooled away by any trick of the mind. No amount of meditation or Occluding could suppress them. Both were profound dreams of death and despair that only Dreamless Sleep could repel. He had walked that path before. Weaning himself off the stuff had been excruciating.

Ashamed and angry, he pinched the bridge of his nose hard enough to feel the pressure clearing his sinuses. A sudden, familiar, tearing pain rippled through his spine. They had thankfully been in remission as compared to what they were fifteen years ago. Another conundrum of the resurrection ritual. He tried physically shaking the episode off as it reverberated into his limbs, while wallowing in his anger for another few rounds around the room. It didn’t help much.

Perhaps he could track down those Muggles and have them beheaded… He imagined placing the heads up on display on the shelf where Harry’s aunt kept stiffly arranged photos from her wedding and her lumpy son’s baptism. Stasis charm to keep them fresh, wards on the house to keep the Muggle police away…

…Until Harry comes “home” for the summer…

It was very tempting, but not very wise. Dumbledore’s men surely had their eyes fixed on that family.

Though not on Harry. Or perhaps they knew of the abhorrent conditions but wouldn’t intervene for fear of losing the protections presumably bestowed upon him, simply by being a resident in his relations’ house. If so, they were oblivious to the fact that Harry's aunt and uncle's actions were severe enough to break foundational clauses for the blood-ward. Likely, the barrier was about as useful perfume on a troll.

Yet, there was nothing to be done about the arrangement now that did not incur severe adverse consequences. And it wasn't like Harry Potter would stop the dreams should some calamity befall his relatives that resulted in his removal from their care. It was a worthless route to send thoughts down.

The problem is not solvable... at least not now...

A wave of dense, black, tiring, gloom washed over him as he returned to bed. It did not come from the boy’s mind.

I will persevere... I am still alive... This too, can be endured...

Chapter 9: A Low Boiling Point

Chapter Text

The next day had Charms, Transfiguration, Care of Magical Creatures and finally Herbology. On his way to a quick meal before his detention with Umbridge at five, Harry was ambushed by Angelina.

He’d barely stepped foot in the Great Hall when he was stopped by a brusque, ‘Hey Harry!’.

‘How come you’ve landed yourself in detention for five o’clock on Friday?’ she said, poking his chest hard with her finger.

His hand unthinkingly flew up to cover the locket. ‘What?’ said Harry before he remembered, ‘oh yeah, Keeper tryouts!’

‘Mhrm!’ nodded Angelina angrily. ‘Didn’t I tell you I wanted to do a try-out with the whole team and find someone who fitted in with everyone? Didn’t I tell you I booked the pitch specially? And now you’ve decided not to be there?’

‘Wha- That’s unfair, it’s not like I chose to get detention with that Umbridge woman, you know!’ snapped Harry back, narrowing his eyes at her.
What did she think detention was? A tea-party?

He’d had a short temper all day, not aided by the simmering anger still dripping through his bond with Voldemort. Maybe that experiment should have been left for a night when he didn’t have detention the next day… Then again, Voldemort’s anger was likely completely unrelated to Harry’s games.

‘Well, you can go straight to her and ask her to let you off on Friday,’ said Angelina severely, ‘I don’t care how you do it, just make sure you’re there.’

She made a move to storm away, but Harry grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her back forcefully. This was crossing the line, in his humble opinion.

‘I will not! That woman hates me, it won’t work! And for the record, if this is the way you’re going to handle minor adversities as team captain, maybe you should run try-outs for a new Seeker too, while you’re at it.' Threatened Harry – and he found he meant every word.

She blinked owlishly at him for a moment, struggling to comprehend what she’d heard.

Then, she shrunk away, her face falling to guilt instead. ‘Sorry, Harry… Just, do what you can, please? I didn’t mean…. Anyway, good luck with the detention and all.’

Harry mumbled a ‘thanks’ he didn’t mean. He watched her leave and turned around to find Hermione observing him with an inquisitory look on her face.

‘Did you mean that, Harry? Would you actually quit the team?’ she said in a low, concerned voice as they found their usual places at the Gryffindor table.

‘Yeah. I would.’ He said agitatedly, and then in a quieter tone added, ‘I love playing for the fun of it, and I’m not going to let her ambitions ruin it for me. Then I’d rather just…not play this year.’

Now that he thought about it, spending more of his Saturdays in bed instead of flying had its allure. Ron would think he’d lost the plot of course and would likely make sure Harry would have no net gain of free time from quitting. And the team would never forgive him. Professor McGonagall wouldn’t approve either. Additionally, it would look suspicious. Perhaps it was for the best he wouldn’t have to make good on his threat.

Hermione craned her neck to look down the table after Angelina, who’d sat down with the rest of her year. Her head was bowed in with two girls Harry hardly knew, whispering. For some reason, that annoyed Harry even more.

‘Oh, Harry… I think you scared her a bit.’ Said Hermione worriedly, stealing peeks at Angelina while they served themselves some soup.

Harry just shrugged.

***

He knocked on Professor Umbridge’s door at five o’clock on the dot.

‘Come in,’ said a chipper voice from within.

Harry opened the door slowly, taking in the room as he entered. It was a fierce assault on the senses. There were lace tablecloths, drapes and hangings, flowery upholstery, and pink cushions. The wall behind her desk was completely covered with a display of decorative plates picturing obnoxiously cutesy kittens, each with a different coloured bow around their neck.

Small spindly setting tables were crammed in between the other furniture, decorated with doilies and vases of dried flowers, all pink. Potpourri piled in pink press-glass bowls oozed a strong scent Harry associated with Mrs. Figg’s bathroom, only without the top-note of cat-piss. A huge glass cabinet stood along one wall filled with hundreds of small porcelain figurines of kittens, some repeating uncanny dances or blinking their glassy eyes at them through the window.

‘Good evening, Mr. Potter.’ Said Professor Umbridge.

Harry initially hadn’t noticed her because her robes blended in with the flowery tablecloth on the table she was sitting at.

‘Good evening, Professor Umbridge.’ Replied Harry stiffly.

She gestured towards a small, frail table covered in a lacy tablecloth with a roll of parchment on it, coupled with an uncomfortable-looking wooden chair. Harry sat down, dropping his bag at his feet.

‘You will be doing some lines today, Mr. Potter, no – not with your quill,’ she stopped him when he reached for his bag, ‘you’ll be using a special one of mine.’ She handed him a black, ornate, extremely pointy quill with a gleeful look on her face. ‘I want you to write: I must not tell lies.’

‘What about ink? And, how many times, Professor?’ said Harry, trying for a polite tone, but it came out a bit spitting.

‘Oh, you won’t need any ink. And keep at it for as long as it takes for the message to, let’s say, sink in.’ She sounded giddy.

With that, she went back to her table with a springy step. She poured herself a cup of tea and resumed working on something Harry first assumed were papers for grading, though he couldn’t imagine what class had submitted homework so soon into the new term. It had to be something else.

Harry unrolled the parchment and began writing. The letters came out bright red. The ink felt fine as it flowed out of the pen-split, but diffused blotchily into the parchment, as if it was too thin.

I must not tell lies… I must not tell lies…

The back of his left hand itched and tickled. He flexed the fingers. It wasn’t asleep.

I must not tell lies… I must not tell lies…

The good thing about getting these types of braindead tasks in detentions was that he could let his mind wander. He began planning what dream to send to Voldemort next. Not the teeth-one, but maybe another one from primary school? A Harry-Hunting one?

I must not tell lies…

A few of the memories from school contained things he didn’t necessarily want to share with anyone though. There was that one with the dead cat… Perhaps if he cut away the part from the playground and showed only the consequences? Maybe the one where Dudley jumped on his ribcage?

I must not tell lies…

Or perhaps the one where he apparated to the roof? The beating when he got home was memorable… The school had called Aunt Petunia, it was a disaster… The itching had subsided, and just a warm tickle remained. He flexed his fingers again. It felt strange.

I must not tell lies… I must not tell lies…

The older lines on the top of the page were browning, as if… he pulled his left hand up from his lap.

The tell-tale peachy glow of healing shone subtly on the back of his hand, as if it was healing a papercut.

Oh. The Quill is trying to hurt me…Harry thought vacantly.

As soon as the quill left the paper, the healing stopped, revealing perfectly unmolested skin. This wasn’t going to work. The quill was probably meant to carve the words into his hand, but every cut was healing too fast to leave a mark.

‘Um – Professor… This isn’t going to work.’ Declared Harry stupidly.

‘Whatever do you mean, Mr. Potter?’ she said sweetly, but with a hint of agitation underneath.

‘Look-‘ he held up his hand and made some quick, random squiggles on the parchment. His hand glowed lazily, healing the injury before it appeared. ‘I heal too fast. We can keep this up till Christmas and it still won’t leave a mark.’

She looked perplexed. ‘Then cease the healing spell.’ She said sharply, but her expression was one of uncertainty. She got up to look at his left hand. It was as unblemished as before he started. He had almost filled a foot of parchment with “I must not tell lies”.

‘I can’t control it, it’s innate.’ A slight lie.

He could technically empty his magic stores to stall healing temporarily, but that wasn’t knowledge he was inclined to share with Umbridge. Besides, Harry had reason to suspect his core was healing an inner organ or something on the downlow. He often felt a curious cramping and stabbing pain in his back and abdomen whenever he drained the core completely.

‘Well, eventually, the message will stick. I am confident the quill will catch up if you simply write faster.’ Said Professor Umbridge, face somewhere between a fake smile and a sneer.

‘It won’t, I heal too fast.’ Reiterated Harry angrily.

‘Tsk, tsk, no more lies, Mr. Potter. Back to your writing now, hep-hep.’

Show her – whispered a small voice in his head maliciously. Show her properly... She wants you to hurt, let her have her way…

No, that wasn’t a good idea.

Then this is what you will be doing. Every evening, for weeks on end. No Quidditch practice. No Come-and-Go-Room. No trips to Hagrid when he gets back… And just imagine how far behind you will be on your homework. You might even fail your O.W.Ls…
Isn’t it worth taking a little risk?

Harry sighed and reached for his bookbag where he fished out one of the razor-sharp potion’s knives that permanently resided in it. The locket suddenly felt a degree or five warmer. He twirled the handle around in his palm a bit first, feeling the weight of it.

‘With all due respect, Professor,’ he began, raising the knife to his own throat using his reflection in the glass cabinet to guide him.

She knitted her eyebrows together confusedly for a second before her expression turned to panic, realizing what was about to happen.

In a single, smooth motion, Harry drew the knife across his throat. Warm magic and peachy glow appeared instantly, the healing of the cut trailing after the knife as it moved through the flesh. He felt a panic-rush and a horrid drowning sensation as he crossed his trachea, but it lasted for less than three seconds.

‘Mr. Potter!’ exclaimed Professor Umbridge, taking two steps backwards and away from him in shock, bumping into the table behind her. The vase of dried flowers that was on it fell and smashed on the floor.

The depth and location of the injury meant a few trickles of blood escaped before it could heal, but other than that, there wasn’t even a mark considering he had ample energy to heal now. The healing magic had even expended enough power to make a faint, high-pitched grinding sound, like stepping on a bed of crushed glass.

Professor Umbridge stared wide-eyed at him, clutching the edge of the table with one hand.

Harry smiled sweetly at her, ‘see? Your quill isn’t going to cut it.’

She looked at him like he had just declared he was secretly a demon intending to eat her alive, and judging by the look of his reflection, it wasn’t an unfair assessment. Her knuckles were turning a stark white against the cherry-wood of the table.

‘I suppose we can go ask Professor McGonagall if she can recommend alternative detention methods?’ he suggested, trying to keep the schadenfreude off his face.

The locket felt like it had a trapped hummingbird within it.

This little stunt is going to come back to bite me later, isn’t it, he thought bitterly, cursing his own impulsivity while the familiar itching sensation increased in intensity towards pins-and-needles.

‘Dismissed! Y-your detention has been s-served, Mr. Potter’ she said, pointing to the door with a shaking hand.

Harry strode out, smiling as the door closed behind him.

He ducked into the first boys’ restroom he came across. Darting over to a sink, he dropped his bag to the floor and hastily filled the sink with cool water. He glanced up at his reflection, his own acid-green eyes glaring wildly back at him. Regret hit him like a brick to the face.

It certainly looks bad…Oh, why couldn’t I just shut up… stupid…

He could see thin trails of blood beginning suddenly on unmarked skin, like someone had squirted it there with a dropper, trailing down and disappearing under his shirt collar. It had trickled down to his chest where the locket was, now sticking uncomfortably to his skin. He would deal with that later, for now he needed to wash off what was visible before anyone saw him. Hands shaking, he managed to rub it off with some wet paper.

When he entered the Gryffindor common room, it was bustling with activity. Fred and George were testing products again, Neville and Dean played Gobstones, while others were still trying to get some homework done. Hermione sat at the table furthest from the portrait hole, nose deep in her charms book. Ron was nowhere to be seen.

‘Hey, Hermione. Where’s Ron?’ he said as he sat down beside her, trying to keep his voice steady.

‘Hi Harry, you’re back early… Um, I don’t know. I went to the library after dinner, haven’t seen him since. What was detention like?’ she shot him a suspicious look, and Harry agreed it seemed strange for him to get out of detention early.

He pulled at his tie self-consciously.‘Lines. Just boring lines. I finished all she assigned today, so I won’t have to go back tomorrow or Friday.’ Said Harry with a merry grin.

Hermione smiled back hesitantly. It was obvious she didn’t believe him, but she didn’t confront him about it.

They worked in silence for a while. Hermione finished her homework after about an hour and moved to a comfier armchair by the fire to knit hats for house elves (An effort that Ron and Hermione had been squabbling over since start of term – and Harry refused to weigh in on). Harry finished his drawing of a Bowtruckle for Grubbly-Plank but didn’t feel he had the necessary focus to work on anything else. Giving Hermione a quick ‘goodnight,’ he shuffled up the stairs to the dormitories.

He fetched his pyjamas, toiletries, and a towel, then went straight for the bathroom. Finally locking the door behind him, some of the anxiety let up and he felt air fill his lungs properly in one deep breath. He showered quickly, keeping the locket on to wash the blood off it. Scrubbing the detailed “S” clean of coagulate with his thumb, his mind raced through all the possible ways revealing his accelerated healing to Umbridge in such a macabre way could potentially backfire on him. Hopefully, her pride would prevent her from sharing it with the other teachers.

The dorm was blissfully empty when he finished his shower. Being only nine thirty in the evening, Harry decided to test some wards on his bed. The fear of someone creeping up on him while he slept was ramped up by the possibility of Umbridge telling Professor McGonagall of his theatrics. Not that it was probable, it worried him none the less.

On his bed, he drew three sets of wards. A silencing enchantment, intrusion ward and a barrier to keep him from rolling out of bed in his sleep, were stacked together with a clause-line. The purpose of clause-lines were to provide conditions, in this case, detailing the exceptions of himself to the intrusion ward, and to null all the wards when the curtains were open. He was running a few tests when Ron entered the dorm.

Clearly not prepared to find Harry there, he stopped cold in the doorway, staring like a deer caught in headlights. He was wearing his least favourite brown trousers (a hand-down from Percy) and last year’s maroon Weasley jumper. He looked a bit windswept, with rosy cheeks and messy hair, as if he’d been outside in the cold for a few hours. The most damning evidence was the fact that he was trying to hide his new Cleansweep behind his back. Obviously, he’d been flying.

Ron probably didn’t understand what Harry was up to though. Harry was standing over by Dean’s bed with a rolled-up pair of socks in his hand, aiming at the closed curtains of his own bed, which already had a few sock-balls strewn on the floor around it. They stood completely still like that for a heartbeat until Harry lowered his sock-throwing arm and Ron entered the room properly.

‘Where’ve you been?’ asked Harry at the same time as Ron asked, ‘What’re you doing, mate?’

A beat of quiet went by before Harry answered, ‘Testing some runic wards on my bed,’ he said truthfully and threw the socks at it. It bounced off in a nice arch with a soft bzzh.

‘Wicked… Why ward the bed though?’ returned Ron, eyes following the socks as they rolled away.

Harry shrugged, ‘I set it to only work when the curtains are closed. I’m not exactly popular this year, figured it could be useful against Dungbombs and such…’

Ron nodded hollowly in agreement, walking to his own bed, and shoving the Cleansweep under it.

‘You’ve been flying?’ said Harry leadingly.

‘I – well – well – OK, promise you won’t laugh, all right?’ said Ron defensively, ‘I thought I’d try out for Keeper now I’ve got a decent broom. There. Go on. Laugh.’

Harry gave him a flabbergasted look. ‘I’m not laughing, why would I? I think it’s a brilliant idea!’ Harry beamed at him. ‘It’d be really cool if you got on the team! I’ve never seen you play keeper, are you good?’ It was nice to talk to Ron about something that wasn’t his disagreements with Hermione, dangerous territory, or homework.

‘I’m not bad.’ Said Ron looking relieved at the outcome of his confession. ‘Charlie, Fred and George always made me keep for them when they were training during the holidays.’

‘So you’ve been practicing in secret?’ asked Harry, opening his bed curtains and sitting down on his bed.

‘Yeah, Fred and George are going to laugh themselves stupid when I turn up for try-outs.’ Said Ron nervously before wringing his jumper over his head. His ears were turning bright red. ‘They haven’t stopped taking the mickey out of me since I got made Prefect.’

‘I’ll back you up.’ said Harry, smiling happily.

‘Really? That Umbridge let you off?’ said Ron disbelievingly.

Harry nodded enthusiastically and told him the same lie he told Hermione.

***

The latter party had seen a recent surge in popularity, likely as a backlash to political movements sweeping the Muggle world. The populace had taken to calling the coalition “The Censen”, after they formally entered an accord in 1906. Party leader of The Sensibles, Hugh Veeley, declared that the coalition’s priorities for their term would be political reform.

Reform began with election policies and voter rights. Veeley and leader of The Centrists, Marlon Prewett argued that elections were vulnerable to fraud – particularly by foreign wizards – because at the time, voting was open to anyone who could see the polling stations.

In 1911, the first reformist policy was enacted, making polling stations manned by wizards that checked voter identity through wand-weighing. The old voting goblets that had been appearing when needed faithfully since 1780, were retired.

Critics of the law, most notably Mabel Gaunt, Party leader of The Mystic Arts Alliance, argued that the change would mean loss of voting rights for magical creatures that typically didn’t own wands, and squibs.

Another critic, Damien Fawley of The Traditionalists (Abr. Tra, founded 1823) pointed out that having the stations manned meant that they’d have to be placed somewhere a wizard could comfortably work. Thus, the manned stations provided poor accessibility to wand-owning centaurs, nymphs, vampires, and werewolves along with many solitary witches, who resided in remote locations and avoided towns and villages. It has later been estimated that 15 000 – 20 000 beings lost their votes in Veeley’s first reform.

***

The minister election of 1912 was a landslide victory for Censen candidate Lars Dodge (Sen), the oldest candidate on the ticket at 122 years old. Key ministry leadership of note under Dodge included Yvonne Vance (Unaffiliated) as Head of the Department for Magical Law (not split from Law Enforcement until after the trials of Grindlewald in 1945), Barney Burne (Cen) as Head of the Muggle Relations Office and Gideon Greengrass (Tra) as Head of the Treasury.

The election of 1914 ended in another Censen victory, winning 70 of 112 seats, 31 seats to Mys, 10 seats to Tra and 1 seat went to an independent voted in as a write-in. Most of the votes won by the independent had come from central London. The candidate Charles Burke was a known character of strong opinion in the pubs of Knockturn Alley.

His addition to the Wizengamot resulted in discontentment among the other members, as Mr. Burke’s political mind was less impressive to a sober audience. In spring of 1915, the Wizengamot voted to institute a confirmation process where new candidates to the court would need to pass through a series of hearings by the existing members of the Wizengamot before being allowed to start their eight-year terms.

The same process of confirmation was instituted for the office of Minister for Magic a year later, and in 1917, it was decided that the Minister’s election would no longer run separately from that of the Wizengamot seats. This was on the urging of Greengrass in an attempt to conserve funds and likely not meant to be permanent.

***

Summer of 1916, the Muggle Relations office under Barney Burne (Cen) opened a sub-division called “The Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office”, meant to define what objects were classified as neutral, magical or Muggle artifacts. The latter category was not to be tampered with by wizards.

Mr. Burne appointed the first Division Head, Ernie Watts, a muggleborn wizard with a lifetime of service in the DML as an Obliviator. At 94 years old, Watts was criticized by other muggleborn wizards and witches for having outdated views on Muggle manufacturing, and for being too strict in his assessment of artifacts, arguing that his office practically outlawed experimentation on all new Muggle inventions.

***

December 1915, two days before end of season, the Committee of Law set the draft Mrs. Vance submitted just three days prior to the general vote. The draft proposed the merging of the Wizengamot-court and the criminal court appointed by DML judges.

The argument was that there was a great overlap of members of either court, making the rulings political, but not tried before the full Wizengamot. The draft would eliminate the DML appointed judges and set the Wizengamot as jury, with the Chief Warlock and his or her seconds as the judges. It has been argued that the draft was just that – an unfinished draft that the Committee of Law could not have read through properly before putting forth. Another issue was that it was not enacted by the full court, as most members of a more traditional lifestyle had left on solstice holiday.

By then, tensions between members of the Wizengamot had risen to the point of hostility, and strict partisanship had become the norm. The draft passed as law, and from then on, criminal trials were put before the plum robes, and the emerald robes were disbanded.

***

The insurrection of 1929 brought about several changes to the Wizengamot. Censen was largely blamed for the fiasco, and key reformists like Helmer Prince, Tiberius Ogden and Eliphas Dodge now argued the political parties themselves to be the cause of the turmoil. In reformist opinion, the big sweeping changes enabled by the decades of strong Censen majority were not truly the result of representatives voting in their interest, but partisanism. Dodge in particular claimed many laws had been made effective after very little debate and scrutiny by the Wizengamot.

‘It has become a game of numbers, not a forum as our forebears intended.’ – Eliphas Dodge, session 41 of 1929.

The turmoil resulted in the De-affiliation of the Wizengamot. All represented political parties were disbanded. From then on, representatives were to rely on their constituents and themselves only in their decisions. Mr. Dodge and Mr. Prince, along with others held that this would bring representatives and constituents closer together and prevent partisanship from enacting poorly investigated reforms, and avoid gridlocks when blocks were evenly matched.

***

Progress had slowed during the most active years of Grindlewald on the continent. Most Ministry resources were focused on preparing for a possible war.

The last law considered to be a part of the reformation was, as the first, a voting rights law. It was debated on the floor of the Wizengamot for several days, most prominently by Eliphas Dodge and Albus Dumbledore, who wished to prevent infiltration of the Wizengamot by Grindlewald affiliates.

Passed in December of 1937, in order to vote, humanity or “near-human-intelligence” was required as determined by a species list maintained by the Department for Control of Magical Creatures. There would only be three Polling stations – London - Ministry Atrium, Swansea DML office and Hogsmeade Square – Open from 08:00 to 14:00 on election day only.

Wand-weighing was still required, and the attendant could deny any voter suspected of Dark affiliations. But the most important change was that a candidate now needed a letter of recommendation by the existing Wizengamot members or Minister for Magic, along with a signature list of at least 50 possible constituents in order to have their name on the ticket – Write-ins were outlawed.

***

Reformation laws are mostly still in effect to this day (November 3^rd, 1988). Few attempts have been made to repeal them apart from sporadic, opportunistic efforts from the remaining traditionalist Wizengamot members through the 1940’s.

A reconstructionist youth movement appeared with the group “The Knights of Walpurgis” in the 1950’s. Members attempted to run for office but were denied access due to “The Knights of Walpurgis” being defined under article 355 as “Any organization, group, team or gathering at least partially devoted to discussing political philosophy, political strategies, laws and/or regulations.” And thus, defined as a political party. Their activism continued with protests, signature collections and strikes until the troubles of the Dark Lord and his Death Eaters arose in the 1970’s.

Harry closed the book. Soft snores of his dorm-mates filtered through the curtains. A quick tempus told him it was almost three-thirty in the morning. He’d been reading for five hours straight, lost in actual interesting wizarding history as opposed to the topics usually presented by the dreary droning of Professor Binns.

Dumbledore has been a part of the reformation… He’s a reformationist… the nepotism, corruption… the stagnation of wizarding kind… It all came back to these decisions. And that Muggle artifact classification… Now he knew why the most modern Muggle technology that Harry had seen adopted into wizarding Brittain were the 1920’s style Ministry cars.

Sirius had been denied a trial, because the same people who had political interest in seeing Death Eaters jailed were the ones to run criminal trials. The deep seated discontentment among goblins, centaurs, and nymphs… It all made so much more sense now.

No wonder so many magical beings followed Voldemort, if it meant revenge on this… this… system that had taken their rights away and branded them as lesser than… “Near-Human-Intelligence”… Anger that had simmered under the surface while he was reading had now bubbled its way to the front of his mind.

He put the book away and tucked himself in aggressively, fuming as his brain listed all the injustices he personally knew (or was) a victim of. The locket had lost contact with his skin, lying awkwardly inside his nightshirt, weighing it down like a stone in a hammock. The spot it vacated felt cold.

I’m going to find out what happened to those Knights, he thought resolutely, fishing the locket out of its confinement. Its heartbeat drummed soothingly against his palm. Knowing my luck, Voldemort probably killed them all in the 70’s… Did you kill them all? He thought at the locket, briefly brushing his thumb over the “S”. It only buzzed on as normal. He fell asleep holding it.

Chapter 10: June 24th, 1995 – Thaddeus Has a Strange Day

Chapter Text

Thaddeus dropped his plate when a sudden burning sensation flared up on the surface of his left forearm – for the first time in almost fourteen years.
The plate smashed with a spectacularly loud crash against the tile floor, alerting his wife to his whereabouts.

‘Thaddy! Are you sneaking in the kitchen again!?’ she called from the sitting room.

He imagined she was gearing up to berate him about his weight again, top lip trapped firmly between her teeth.

‘Tom’s calling!’

He fished his wand out of his dressing gown pocket and gave it a wave to repair the plate. It came together nicely. The plump piece of cake that had been on it, however, was sadly lost.

‘WHAT!?’ Yelled his wife.

‘I’m going!’ Shouted Thaddeus back, jogging to their bedroom to change his clothes.

‘Where are you going!?’ Echoed his wife’s voice from downstairs.

Thaddeus flung the wardrobe door open, peering into a sea of dark-coloured clothes. He chose a simple set of olive-green under-robes and his favourite black over-robes, both with high collars and not too many buttons.

‘Dunno, Dear, it’s the bloody Mark!’ Spat Thaddeus, equally agitated by his sudden difficulties with dressing himself and the woman’s asinine questions. ‘Have you seen my mask!?’ He shouted down to her, rummaging around his chest of old Death Eater sh*t.

Unlike the yuppies who had copied Tom, Thaddeus’s mask was made of ash wood, with runes chiselled into the back to prevent others from removing it – and another one immunizing it to summoning spells. He was quite fond of it, though right now, the last set of runes were inconvenient.

‘It’s in the crate under the bed!’ the lovely, wonderful wife called back.

Ah, what a treat – to have someone in the house who knew where he’d stashed all his old junk.

‘Thanks, Dear!’

He dove under the bed, slid the crate out and retrieved the mask. The fantastic wife was standing in the hallway when he got down with a cheek ready for him to kiss.

‘I’m going,’ Thaddeus huffed and kissed her rosy face, ‘he’ll probably need a place to stay, Abraxas sold his flat-‘

‘Don’t worry, the elves and I will get everything in order. Just keep Lucius’ grubby hands off him.’ She answered smartly, re-hooking his misaligned cloak for him.’

‘Leaving it to you!’ he said with a nod and flung the front door open to the dewy summer sunset.

The Dark Mark guided his Apparition to a small, foggy, overgrown graveyard somewhere in the countryside. He could see Druella had just dropped in too. Most of the Death Eaters he could see were of the younger generation. Not that there were many left of the older generation to accompany them.

Almost half had died during a Dragon Pox epidemic that burned through the London wizarding community in the mid 70’s. Abraxas Malfoy had perished two years ago, Alphard Black three years before that and his brother Orion almost twelve years ago now.
Mulciber was still alive, but currently occupied a bed at St. Mungo’s with another bout of Bubble-Bone Disease.

Thaddeus casually followed the other Death Eaters and stepped out into an open area from behind a large weeping Willow tree with Druella at his right side. Tom was standing on a charred patch in the grass, barefoot, wearing simple, black robes. The startling thing was that it was Tom – not the creature he’d once become that had called himself “Lord Voldemort”.

He looked about twenty or thirty years younger than he ought to be with the same handsome features Thaddeus had always envied him until he disfigured himself with the Black Arts.The only visible clues to him ever having dabbled in those rituals were his eyes, red instead of brown.

Behind Tom, a stubby little man was crying loudly, covered in blood.
Thaddeus thought he’d seen the man someplace before, but that was at least thirteen years ago, and he couldn’t recall the name.

A few metres away from the sobbing adult man, sat a thin, battle-worn, and weary-eyed teenage boy with his hands tied behind his back, propped up against a tombstone. He had wild and matted black hair and extremely green eyes framed by shabby, wire-rimmed, round glasses.
Now, this name he knew – It was Harry Potter.

Thaddeus took his place in the circle and listened to Tom speak. The man actually apologized for some of the madness of the late 60’s and 70’s, which was a good start.

Apparently, they were also going to get back on track politically, even though this lot hardly had anything to do with the old ideas of revolution. Most of these men had been youngsters wanting action, glory, and varying degrees of pure-blood supremacy.

They had come to follow Tom in the late 70’s, many as hostages to reign in their rebellious parents. Most of these kids only had a surface-level understanding of what the original plans had been like and Tom’s long absence had only served to radicalize them further. Their confusion was palpable.

Thaddeus struggled to believe Tom’s words himself – they were too good to be true. Lucius Malfoy prompted Tom to speak about his return to the living, and they were given a rather shallow account that skirted around the actual resurrection and focused on the years prior.

He's hiding something, thought Thaddeus. Plans on how to wheedle the truth out of Tom later were already forming in his brain.

After finishing his story, Tom sent the younger Death Eaters away with instructions, leaving only Druella and Thaddeus there with him and Harry Potter. Druella unmasked herself and Thaddeus followed her lead.

‘It’s good to see you again, my Lord.’ She said honestly.

Tom smiled anxiously at her, looking distinctly uncomfortable in his own skin.

‘Indeed.’ Said Thaddeus, ‘and I mean it. Thought we’d lost you for a while. And I’m not talking about just the last thirteen years, mind you.’

That was about as much of a complaint he could get away with if Tom turned out to still be the volatile Lord Voldemort underneath the pleasant exterior. He clasped a hand on Tom’s shoulder for good measure, like he used to do when they were young, – something that’d earned him a curse or two had this been 1978. Tom didn’t react, and let Thaddeus get a proper look at him in peace.

He was pale, but with a healthy tone. Not the bone-white and scaly skin he had before. His face had a couple of signs of age, including crow’s feet and heavier eyelids and cheeks, and his fingernails were long but not the talons he used to have. He had some grey hairs dispersed at the temples, but overall, he looked unfairly young.

‘It’s like none of it ever happened… How… ?’ said Thaddeus, gaping at his old friend.

When Tom’s experiments had warped his friend’s appearance (and addled his mind), Thaddeus had believed it to be irreversible. He was dead certain that if Tom had the means to undo the damage, he’d have done so many years ago. Which meant that he must have had help.

Tom’s eyes flickered down to Harry Potter, who now was staring fearlessly into the lidless eyes of an absurdly large snake Thaddeus could only assume was Tom’s pet. He regarded the boy with a subtly pained expression, and it quickly became apparent that the boy had something to do with all of this. If Potter had helped Tom regain control over his mind, then Tom owed the kid a huge f*cking favour. And wouldn’t that be a problem. If Tom’s plan wasn’t to kill the boy, Thaddeus would eat his hat.

He looked over at Potter again, who sat completely unfazed by the enormous tongue snapping out to taste the air inches from his face. The boy simply observed the beast coiling in around him as if it was the least upsetting thing he’d seen all day, which might be true for all Thaddeus knew. Tom’s snakes had unnerved him for years. He never quite got used to them, or trusted that Tom could control them, even after fifty years – and those had all been significantly smaller than the monstrosity in front of him now.

Yet, Harry Potter looked perfectly comfortable with this one. The snake hissed at Potter’s face and – to Thaddeus’s surprise – the boy hissed back. Tom however, took no note of what Thaddeus believed ought to be world-shattering news to him. He must have already known the boy could do this.

Thaddeus distinctly remembered Tom’s reverence for inborn gifts like parseltounge – He’d even said once that if he ever met another one, he’d make sure to win them over to his cause and gain their allyship, even at great cost. It was the highest of compliments a hypothetical person could ever earn from Tom. Together with the fact that the boy had helped Tom in some way with his resurrection… And, well, Potter looked eerily like the type of boy Tom had tended to get these nasty, unnatural obsessions with when they were teenagers themselves... This didn’t bode well for Tom’s plans to off him.

‘I see your problem.’ He told Tom, who promptly put up a wall of privacy spells between the three of them and Harry Potter (and the snake).

‘You don’t want to murder this boy, do you.’ Stated Druella matter-of-factly.

She must have caught on to the same issues as Thaddeus did.

Tom sighed deeply and shook his head. ‘No. In a sense, I owe him a debt… He did some revisions to my resurrection ritual… and then he fed the ritual more magical energy too – everything he had, by the look of it, and I have no idea why. When I asked, he said something about a “parasite”… I can’t let him go either, he has seen too much and is too close to Dumbledore.’ Said Tom, frowning distractedly into the weather. ‘Something is wrong here. I can feel it…’

Thaddeus took a mental note of the refreshing amount of honesty from Tom, despite his vagueness – it was still Tom, after all. But whatever the boy did, the results were extremely promising.

‘Imperius? Force the answers out and then get him to keep his mouth shut?’ suggested Thaddeus.

‘Temporary solution at best. According to Barty’s letters, he has successfully thrown them off in class. Even with a stronger caster, there is a risk he will break free after a while.’ Mumbled Tom.

That was another point to Harry Potter in Tom’s book then – strength of mind.

‘Kidnapping? Then you can coax the answers out over time. You don’t have to kill him, do you? Keep him if you want.’ Said Druella nonchalantly, as if the boy was a stray cat they’d found in a box on the street. ‘And when you spring my daughter out of prison, she’d be ecstatic to help raise a child, even an older one. With an order from you, Rudolphus can shut his trap.’

‘She’s been lying to you, Druella. Bellatrix has had ample opportunity to have children within her marriage. She wants children, yes, but not Rudolphus’s children.’ Said Tom quietly.

‘How can you possibly know that, Tom?’ snapped Druella, crossing her arms behind her back the way she did when gearing up to school some fools.

‘I know, because she has been presenting me with offers, remember? Sometimes very insistently, bordering on violently in fact - that I have repeatedly declined. And she told me as much when I tried to get out of these situations without harming her... And after thirteen years in Azkaban… She needs a hospital stay where others may care for her and her mind, not - not responsibility over others… I will break her out, Druella, but if she keeps pushing herself on me like she did before… It will be her end.’ Tom warned gravely with an ominous glint in his already freaky, red eyes.

Druella didn’t argue. Thaddeus knew she had seen her daughter’s blatant wantonness towards Tom. He could even recall her once saying that prison might be good for Bella, some thirteen years ago. And she knew Tom’s threat to be genuine. Twenty years ago, it had been more explicit. Something along the lines of, “If you cannot control your wretched offspring, I will put the bitch down.”

Additionally, Thaddeus had a fuzzy memory of himself drunkenly trying to get the girl to see reason. She was barking up the dead wrong tree, he’d told her. He had even explained why. Plain as day.

Tom’s suspected nightly activities made Thaddeus’s stomach turn and no remotely sane woman would wish to insert herself into such a sticky situation. When he told her that, Bellatrix had lost her composure. She screamingly called him a liar, and threatened to out what she perceived as his treasonous accusations to Tom. In short, the whole undertaking had been a total fiasco. She was too far gone, that one.

‘What’s the boy and the snake talking about anyway?’ asked Thaddeus, mostly to get the conversation back to the issue at hand and Bellatrix Lestrange off his mind.

‘It is smalltalk. Nagini is telling him of how she came to be in my service.’ Tom said blandly.

‘Waaay back when, didn’t you say something about… If you ever met another one like you, you would-‘ Druella began drawling, but Tom shot her down with a warning look.

Tom cast another glance at the boy, co*cking an eyebrow at whatever the most recent hisses meant.

‘What?’ barked Thaddeus.

Tom shook his head, fighting a small, ironic smile from widening. ‘Just something the boy said. It’s not important.’ He said dispassionately, though Thaddeus could guess he liked the boy’s guts, conversing jovially with the Dark Lord’s ruddy snake while waiting to die.

‘Well, I’m not going to murder this child for you, Tom.’ Said Thaddeus flatly, longing for a smoke.

He could picture the pack of Blue Camels resting on the windowsill in his office back home, taunting him.

‘Me neither.’ Chimed Druella. ‘But I won’t laugh at you if your spell fails if that’s worrying you. Though the boy might.’

‘I’ll f*cking laugh.’ Huffed Thaddeus – he could see it in his mind’s eye: The Dark Lord failing to kill his “mortal enemy”, a fourteen-year-old boy.

Tom raised an eyebrow at him which meant “And you will be punished if you do”. Together, he and Druella stepped aside to let Tom get on with his dirty work. The snake had slithered away into the grass behind Tom, and the boy was glaring at them silently.

Maybe he had been waiting for them to move, because the second Tom stepped forwards, a wand came flying through the air straight into the boy’s open hand. Before Tom could react, Potter had sprung to his feet and shot out past them.

‘STOP HIM!’ bellowed Tom as he cast an Impedimentia, which the boy avoided easily.

Potter was a fast runner and had a springy, athletic ease to his dodging of spells, and doubtlessly enough adrenaline to keep him going for days. Youth in top physical form was sprinting away from them, his life on the line. Three pairs of creaky, old legs running after him would obviously be pointless; they all focused on their aim instead.

Thaddeus threw his own hindering jinx, while Druella cast a stunner, both missed wildly. Tom was casting stunners too for a change, but it didn’t last. After a few seconds, Tom apparently got angry enough to use Unforgiveables again, sending both Killing Curses and Crucios.

Finally, one of Tom’s trusty, whooshing greens hit the boy square in the back. Potter’s figure glowed a spooky shade of green for a second, and, to Thaddeus’s total, eternal, unparallelled, jaw-dropping shock – the boy survived. He stumbled over his feet and almost fell, but kept going, unharmed. Tom’s Killing Curse had failed.

It wasn’t funny.

Ultimately, Tom was lucky enough to hit him again, and likely infuriated by his recent failure, turned out a proper Crucio. The agonized screams snapped Thaddeus out of his awed trance. The boy writhed around on the ground, but not aimlessly – it almost looked like he was trying to claw away and out of the spell’s range. Thaddeus had never met anyone that could keep a coherent thought in their mind while suffering Tom’s Crucio – and he’d met a lot of people on its receiving end. The boy’s movements were probably a fluke.

Tom lifted the spell after twenty seconds or so, and started to walk towards Potter, who recovered lightning fast and crawled to hide behind a grave. A pair of legs were sticking out a good distance behind it that did not belong to Potter. Was there a dead body there? How did he not notice it earlier? He must have become completely desensitized to this sh*t while in Tom’s company.

Tom was moving between the graves, attempting to goad the kid out of hiding.

‘Harry, don’t be silly – no need to make this any harder for yourself,’ called Tom, ‘come back here, this is useless.’ He sounded on the verge of a laugh; a tone Thaddeus had learned to attribute to his attempts to hide nervousness and other emotions behind superciliousness.

‘You are going to kill me, aren’t you!?’ shouted Potter, in a voice that implied that Tom was a dunce who had just said something extraordinary stupid and needed to have his face rubbed in it.

‘Well - yes,’ said Tom apologetically, still with the nervous edge.

Thaddeus could almost hear Tom’s repressed reflex to tack on a phoney but polite “sorry”.

‘You should meet your death with dignity, don’t you agree?’ tried Tom, but the boy never had a chance to answer, because he had patiently circled around and was able to bend a spell to hit Potter’s side.

‘Imperio!’

Whatever commands Tom was trying to beam into Harry Potter’s mind through the spell, was getting him nowhere. A whole lot of nothing happened for a few seconds, while Tom’s face was frowning faintly in concentration.

Suddenly, while still affected by Tom’s Imperio, the boy yelled, ‘I WON’T!’

Tom lowered his wand, ending the spell. Potter’s legs flashed across a strip of grass as boy dove behind another grave. For a long time, Tom did nothing. Then, seemingly done with his internal deliberation, he cast a light blue spell on himself that Thaddeus guessed was a silencer. He snuck over to the grave the kid was hiding behind and stopped right behind him.

Tom stared at the child for a moment, when the boy cried out, ‘I shouldn’t have helped you!’

Thaddeus didn’t hear Tom’s reply, but he knew Tom must’ve said something, for Potter startled and hurried to back away, wand raised at Tom’s head. Seeing the boy’s face now, Thaddeus knew Tom’s failed Killing Curse hadn’t been painless. Blood was trickling from Potter’s ears and eyes, like red tears. Every vein was popped and blue, visible even from this distance.

Again, Tom did nothing.

‘Did Tom change his mind?’ whispered Druella, perplexed. ‘Are we capturing him after all?’

‘Looks like it.’ Answered Thaddeus, transfixed by what was happening.

The boy looked scared out of his wits. He seemed to stall for a moment, then suddenly, he veered around and ran full tilt to the dead body a few metres away.

‘Accio cup!’

A blue, glowing cup leapt up from behind a grave a dozen meters down, as if kicked up by an invisible foot, and the handle landed in Potter’s half opened hand. His figure blurred as he was propelled away by the cup – which Thaddeus now recalled that Tom had told them all earlier was a portkey. Tom made no effort to stop him.

‘What?! Did you change your mind?’ called Thaddeus to his Lord, flabbergasted.

Druella wasn’t any better, openly gawking at the empty patch of grass the boy had vanished from.

‘Yes.’ Muttered Tom. ‘I – I couldn’t. The first spell failed. I know you saw it. Repeat tries will yield the same results.’

Druella’s eyebrows shot up in exasperation,‘Then why not take him somewhere or use something else? I mean, there are decapit-‘

Tom scrounged up his nose in distaste and sent her a silencing glare. ‘He helped me quite a lot. He deserves… He deserves to live a while longer.’ Tom sighed wearily, staring at the burned streaks on the ground behind them as if they held some deep meaning. ‘Though, there is no doubt I will regret this.’

‘He will run straight to Dumbledore.’ Stated Druella sternly.

‘Oh, I have no illusions regarding that… But as long as nobody draws unwanted attention towards us, there is little Dumbledore can do. I doubt he understands where we will be putting our efforts.’ Speculated Tom thoughtfully, a tense wrinkle forming between his brows.

Thaddeus concluded he must be rationalizing his actions to himself, an effort that would likely yield only short-lived results. In any case, Thaddeus hummed his agreement.

Tom’s very sporadic spurts of kindness should be encouraged and rewarded. Right now, that meant helping him patch up this security hole.

‘Dumbledore is well connected within the Auror department and court, but not many other places. As long as we don’t draw their ire, it should be fine. And that Fudge character can be worked on. Not by Lucius, he’s messed up too many times, but maybe Greengrass? There are a few unmarked that can be of use here.’ Said Thaddeus.

Tom nodded quietly, eyes vacant, his mind elsewhere. ‘Good.’ He sighed, already looking dead tired.

‘And you might want to knock Lucius down a peg somehow.’ Added Thaddeus as kindly as he could.

Tom lifted an inquisitory eyebrow at him, while Druella nodded along, saying, ‘After Abraxas bit the dust, he’s been styling himself the new leader. He’s been egging on Avery and the other dunderheads… Had them attack Muggles during the Quidditch World Cup finals last year,-‘

‘That was Lucius?’ wondered Tom.

‘Definitely.’ Said Druella curtly, ‘caused a wave of house-raids, the fool.’

‘He’s far worse than Abraxas ever was. Avery has filled his head with mould, he even believes the “We-are-gods” and the “stolen-wands” conspiracy theories now.’ Harked Thaddeus, trying not to snicker at Tom’s familiar, lofty eyeroll. ‘Even his wife thinks he’s going a bridge too far.’

Druella hummed duskily, then added, ‘Cissy told me he planted some powerful, cursed belonging of yours on the daughter of Arthur Weasley – they have a petty rivalry of sorts. A book maybe? Something you left in Abraxas’s care,-‘

‘There is only one object that fits that description.’ Tom’s face may have stayed blank, but his voice was livid. ‘I will deal with Lucius in time… For now, I will not bestow him with any political tasks, then perhaps public humiliation…’
Tom trailed off, eyes fixed on the burned grass again.

There was a long pause, until Thaddeus decided to rouse Tom from his quiet, enraged engrossment. ‘C’mon, my Lord. The wife and I have a room for you.-’

Tom returned from whatever faraway land his brain had wandered off to. He quickly hissed a few tones to the snake, which began climbing him like a tree.

‘-comfy place, I promise. We’ll get you something to eat, maybe a nap, and then you can go eviscerate Lucius later, what do you say?’ Joked Thaddeus, reviving the ultraviolent inside joke from their schooldays as a last litmus test for his lord.

‘-And then can we use the juices for fingerpainting?’ Replied Tom boyishly with a fake, excited gasp.

‘Absolutely!’ Said Thaddeus, chuckling. ‘We can do the walls in his kid’s bedroom.’

Druella was snigg*ring too, evolving into her high, rolling laugh as Tom plastered on a big, phony, childishly animated, open-mouthed grin that crashed horribly with his personality.

‘Oh, goody!’ Laughed Tom sardonically, his voice cracking as he broke character.

Druella’s laugh jumped in volume and Thaddeus coughed his way into a long, wheezing laugh with them. Merlin, it was good to have him back.

Chapter 11: The Try-Outs

Chapter Text

Thursdays started with double Ancient Runes, a subject Harry found so intuitive that he usually spent the lessons reading advanced materials or experimenting. But this day, he spent it staring tiredly into space until Professor Babbling dismissed them.

Next was a single History of Magic lesson, which Harry used for a forty-five-minute nap. After lunch, Harry suffered through double Transfiguration (in which he accomplished nothing) and double Charms (resulting in more nothing). He went straight to bed after dinner, reassuring Hermione that he planned to tackle the ever-growing mountain of homework early next morning. Ron came up to the dorms to get his broom sometime around eight, and Harry was sound asleep by nine.

He had dreams of the blank space between dreams. An endless blackness, save for a single theatre spotlight above his head, illuminating him and a circle of the liquid, red floor. Was it blood? Probably… He wanted to build houses… Make streets grow out like veins…

Another spotlight turned on with a chuck. A black, gleamingly polished wooden door appeared in the beam. He walked towards it, bare feet on the warm, rippling surface…He reached for the handle as walls built themselves around him... The door opened into a hallway of black tile, the number “9” set in brass on a beam… and at the end, another door… opening into darkness… just a little further and he’d find it… the blue glow… this time, he would reach it…

Five hours had passed when he woke up. Feeling for the connection to Voldemort, he found the man awake and the emotions flowing through seemed awfully cheery. A bit like smugness, maybe? Glee? It was certainly on the happier side of the spectrum.

Either Voldemort’s mood had nothing to do with the dreams, or everything to do with the dreams. The latter seemed more likely, because even though the corridor dreams were difficult to recall the details of when he woke up, they left an impression. They were tantalizing and frustrating and seemed entirely deliberate. The next question was: did Voldemort realize that Harry was sending him dreams on purpose too? Or did he think Harry had no control over the phenomena?

He laid pondering this for a while, prodding at the connection every now and then until soft, sleepy waves replaced the rigid and perky wakefulness. An idea had hit him – what if he could let Voldemort keep his own thought-process and control his own actions as dream-Harry, while the real Harry controlled how his relatives and the environment reacted?

Harry could imagine how the man would try to retaliate with magic, or escape, or hurl threats and insults at his aunt and uncle. Things Harry himself had imagined doing to his relatives a hundred times over, but that he knew the true futility of. If Voldemort were to be given a sense of control in these dreams, maybe he’d catch on to the fact that Harry was orchestrating them too?

He decided he could place Voldemort’s sleeping mind in a replica of his childhood self, and let his own mind float disembodied above, like what happened in a lot of semi-lucid dreams anyway. Closing his eyes, he picked a memory to send and started editing it in his head. It was two o’clock in the morning, and having already gotten five hours of sleep, it mattered little if the next five were of poor quality. Harry wasn’t entirely sure he got any real restful sleep during the dream-exchanges with Voldemort. He was often tired during daytime, and he did struggle to get out of bed in the mornings… But that could just as well be his dreary mood these days.

He joined the memory on its path into Voldemort’s mind, trying to keep himself separate from Voldemort. It sort of worked, sort of didn’t – if he concentrated on the consciousness he placed in his young self, he could almost read Voldemort’s thoughts outright. It was uncanny. However, he felt his own thoughts meld in with them, blurring the lines to his sense of self and making him rapidly abandon the effort. It was too dangerous. Content with floating around, he watched Voldemort struggle.

He managed to claw at Uncle Vernon’s hands and yell something indistinct, but he obviously didn’t receive full control over replica-Harry. Harry, on the other hand, found that he could quite easily alter Uncle Vernon’s actions and bring in Aunt Petunia though she hadn’t been present in the original memory. Overall, the results were promising. He'd have to try this again another night.

***

The thought of Quidditch try-outs and the possibility of Ron making the team sustained him all through Friday’s classes. He practically jogged through the castle to the Gryffindor tower when the bell at long last rang.

Harry changed into his Quidditch robes, grabbed his Firebolt and joined Fred, George, Katie, and Angelina in the common room, all changed and ready.

‘Hey Harry, I heard you got off detention, great work!’ said Angelina, smiling up at him while straightening her shin guards.

‘Yeah, I finished all the lines she assigned early.’ He grinned back at her.

‘The Slytherins will probably try to sneak in,’ said Katie stoutly, ‘like they did last year.’

Angelina gave Katie a nod, then addressed the group, ‘let’s go. We can handle a couple of Slytherins.’

And with that, they all filed out of the portrait hole together. In the corner of his eye, Harry could see a couple of second years coming down the stairs with their brooms. Harry knew Ron had left for the pitch early, having the last period on Fridays free. He stepped out of the portrait hole last and almost crashed into George. The team had fanned out in a semi-circle in front of a particularly stern looking Professor McGonagall.

‘Mr. Potter, come with me.’ She said curtly.

‘What did you do now?’ said Fred, looking almost impressed.

‘I have no idea.’ Lied Harry, sweetening it with plenty of fake astonishment.

‘Excuse me Professor, but we have try-outs now and the whole tea-‘ Angelina moved to argue.

‘I am sure you can conduct a keeper trial without the Seeker, Miss Johnson.’ Interrupted Professor McGonagall. It was clear from her face that Professor McGonagall would not accept any bargains.

‘OK, come down to the pitch as soon as you can then, Harry.’ Resigned Angelina, giving Harry an apologetic look.

His grip hardened around his broom and his mood darkened tenfold. I told you so… sang an annoying voice in his head.

Professor McGonagall strode off in the direction of her office. Harry followed, dragging his feet sulkily while beating his brain for potential stories he could use to talk himself out of trouble.

‘Sit down Mr. Potter.’ Professor McGonagall said when they reached her messy office.

Harry did as he was told, slumping down into a worn, low-backed armchair in front of her desk. Professor McGonagall sat in her tall, leather-backed office-chair, frowning at him through a narrow gap in the tall stacks of parchment on her desk that would otherwise have walled her in.

‘I heard quite the disturbing tale from Professor Umbridge this morning, Mr. Potter.’ She folded her hands in front of her on top of the ink-stained desktop.

Harry automatically tried for an as blank and innocent facial expression as possible.

When he didn’t say anything, she continued, glaring at him over the rim of her glasses, ‘I was told you used some sort of cruel trick to make it look like you cut your own throat to get out of detention early, and then you did not show up for today’s detention either.’

Oh, so that’s how that hag twisted this, Harry thought caustically.

‘Well?’ She urged him with an impatient tilt of her head.

Harry reckoned from McGonagall’s expression that truth was the safest option now.

‘Did she tell you what she made me do in that detention?’ said Harry hesitantly.

‘I don’t see how that is relevant, Mr. Potter.’

‘It was lines, only with a black quill that made me write with my blood instead of ink. And it tried to cut what I wrote into my hand, Professor.’

Professor McGonagall’s face paled, and her eyebrows were migrating towards the centre of her face as he spoke.

Harry sighed, ‘And when I tried to explain that I heal too fast for the quill to work, she didn’t believe me… So... uh… I did a demonstration.’

Professor McGonagall’s mouth had opened as well in a dumbfounded expression, as if she was ready to retire tomorrow and have him be the last nitwit student she ever dealt with.

After a beat of tense silence, Harry added defensively, ‘She was the one who dismissed me, after that. She said the detention was served…I thought…’

Finally, Professor McGonagall pulled herself together, pinching the bridge of her nose. ‘Have a biscuit, Mr. Potter.’ She gestured to a tartan tin sitting on top of a pile of papers on her desk. Harry helped himself to a Ginger Newt, feeling quite on edge. ‘Now, that a Hogwarts Professor has used a Blood Quill on a student… Thank you for informing me of that, I will certainly take it up with the Headmaster-‘

Harry saw his opportunity to butt in with a thanks-bye and dash, but Professor McGonagall stared him down.

‘What I want to know, is what possessed you to do such a horrific trick? Were you trying to scare Professor Umbridge, Mr. Potter?’ she tipped her head to the side, her expression somewhere between confused, worried, and absolutely livid.

‘Wah, er – Well… It wasn’t a-a trick, per se… It’s that, I know it heals so fast. It wasn’t like I created some - some illusion to scare her – I – I just got angry when she didn’t take me seriously, so I thought I’d show her… And yeah – yeah, I did want to scare her – just a little - ‘cause I was angry.’ Harry stumbled through his truthful explanation, immediately regretting it once he finished.

Now she’s going to ask how you can heal so fast, you moron!

The anger drained away from Professor McGonagall’s face so fast it was spooky, instantly replaced with wide-eyed alarm - and as if on cue, she asked, ‘how is it you are able to do that Mr. Potter?’

He needed a good lie – fast – He scrambled around in his head trying to find one, but there wasn’t any. Harry had implied that he knew it was a safe thing for him to do, which meant that he’d tested his healing capabilities. “I just can” wasn’t going to cut it, she’d expect an answer that contained a frequent exposure to injuries.

Figuring it wouldn’t hurt to try, he attempted the easy way first, ‘I’d rather not say, Professor.’

Professor McGonagall’s expression grew graver.

Her voice was slightly unsteady as she said, ‘Mr. Potter, children capable of healing at an accelerated pace is not unheard of, but the conditions that foster such abilities-‘

sh*t. sh*tsh*tsh*tsh*t!

‘- I think you may be due a visit to Madame Pomfrey, if that is alright with you?’

Harry needed to get out of this. Madame Pomfrey was not an option and never could be. She’d been suspicious about his weight before, and if she forced him to undress, they’d find the locket. And the damages… Talking himself out of a lengthy stay in the hospital wing could prove difficult, especially if she found the…Or those… Could old injuries be found with magic? There was no use thinking about it. He would not be going to Madame Pomfrey. He promised Ron he’d be on the pitch, a promise he intended to keep. This had to be resolved now.

Harry had but two options. Either he gave her something substantial and true, that he could then talk down - or agree to the hospital wing and try to talk his way out of undressing and diagnostic spells. Option one was humiliating and risky - as was option two, in addition to being near impossible to pull off. Really, there was no “option two”.

Gods, I’ve gone and done it now…

So, ultimately, he was faced with the following awful dilemma: which part is less horrible that Professor McGonagall knows about? The Dursleys or the bad habit?

It was the bad habit. No contest. That one didn’t involve anyone else. He knew it was a mental health issue - no sane person did this – so she couldn’t tell anyone without his permission (he hoped). And, it somehow felt less shameful to admit to hurting himself, than it felt to complain about his treatment by his “family” of bird-brained Muggles.

‘No, no, that’s all right… Hang on, give me a second…’ he muttered.

Taking a deep breath, steeling himself for an onslaught of pitiful questions and reprimands, he undid the clasps on both armguards. His heart raced and his fingers became clumsy, but eventually, he slid the armguards off.

Professor McGonagall watched him with a puzzled look as Harry pulled the Quidditch robe sleeves up to his elbows and lifted his forearms up shakily in front of his face. He heard her suck in a deep breath, his eyes flickered between the messy desk with the half-eaten Ginger Newt, the armguards in his lap – anywhere but her eyes. The locket thrummed hotly against his chest. He tried to focus on its pulse, let the rhythm anchor him and to breathe with it, but the air had gotten stuck in his lungs, coming out in ragged exhales as he waited for the explosion.

But a second passed and nothing happened. The silence was unbearable, but he didn’t dare raise his head and look at Professor McGonagall’s face. Thinking she’d seen enough, he slowly put his arms down in his lap.

‘I-I’ve stopped, though…’ he stammered quietly.

It wasn’t a complete lie either. Truthfully, he hadn’t needed to do it for weeks now. The spiralling thoughts had been kept at bay by his multitude of little projects. You haven’t done anything to deserve it yet either – added a mean little voice in his head.

He braved a small glance at Professor McGonagall. She looked like she’d aged thirty years in just as many seconds. Harry felt an extraordinary urge to defend himself. To brush it off, and to diminish it all – he’s OK, really. Anything to relieve him of her disappointment.

‘You see, the quill didn’t hurt – and, - and – we’d be there for ages – ‘cause she said I had to write until the message sunk in – and –‘ rambled Harry, barely aware of what he was saying now, fidgeting with the loose skin on his very scarred left arm. ‘Please don’t tell anyone.’ He begged her, ashamed of how puny his voice was, ‘I have stopped… I promise. I stopped.’

Professor McGonagall’s stare moved from his face to his arms and back again. Suddenly self-conscious, Harry ceased his fidgeting and pulled the sleeves back down. He ate the rest of his Ginger Newt, not wanting to watch more of Professor McGonagall’s revulsion than necessary.

‘I will not share this with anyone, Mr. Potter. For now, I will take your word for it, but I strongly advise you to see Madam Pomfrey about this.’ Her voice was stern, but not nearly as much as it normally was.

Harry merely nodded meekly in response. He had no intentions of ever going to Madam Pomfrey, but if saying so was what got him out of here, then he’d swear it if he had to.

‘Can I go now, Professor?’ he asked as he slid the armguards back on. On the edge of his vision, the shadow of a hat floated off the professor's head and onto a coat stand.

‘Yes, you may go.’ She said, dropping her head into her hands.

Harry got to his feet and picked the Firebolt off the floor.

He was almost at the door when Professor McGonagall’s voice called out again. ‘Oh, and Harry?’

Harry whipped around on instinct. She had tugged her long, black plait loose from its normally tight bun at the nape of her neck.

‘I’m sorry.’ She said in a tone Harry had never heard her use before, and hoped he'd never hear again.

He left without replying. He walked calmly until he was about five feet out from the office door, then broke into a run.

Eventually, he stopped to catch his breath (and collect himself) outside the gates to the pitch. Loud chatter and cheers were coming from beyond the gate, and sometimes the twap of a Quaffle being caught in someone’s arms.

Harry Tripple-checked his sleeves and armguards and tried his very best to stop his hands from shaking while he walked onto the pitch. He shoved his free hand in his pocket to keep it from reaching for the locket, which was hitting his chest with an unusually slow and calm heartbeat. Ron was in the air, defending the hoops from an onslaught of Quaffles from Katie, who was being thrown new Quaffles from the ground by Angelina. He seemed to be doing alright, but a few of the saves were a little unconventional and strained.

‘Oi, Harry! Get in the air, we’ll play a four-on-four after this!’ Called Angelina as Harry approached her.

He needn’t be told twice. Angelina blew her whistle as he got to height. The air whipping against his face blew most of the thoughts away. He did a few laps around the pitch as Angelina gathered up all the extra Quaffles, savouring the freeing sensation of flight.

‘ALL RIGHT!’ bellowed Angelina. ‘You’ll play a four-on-four. No beaters, no seekers. Ron, Fred, Alicia, and Katie on team south, Harry, George and McClaggen and I on team north.’

Ron stayed where he was, while a stocky, dirty-blond boy Harry guessed must be McClaggen and Ron’s rival for the keeper position, flew lazily to the North rings. The other team had the advantage of two actual chasers on the team, but they had worse brooms, and sadly, a worse keeper - technically.

McClaggen was a nightmare to work with. He flew out of position, hogged the Quaffle and tried to yell his own strategies over Angelina’s directions. Within ten minutes, Harry had worked up an unsavoury urge to find a Beaters Bat and take a swing at his melon.

After twenty minutes of playing, the score was thirty-sixty to the South team. McClaggen had saved more than Ron, but his overall attitude and lousy cooperation skills had lost them the game. They landed, and Angelina sent Harry and George a look that effectively communicated her final thoughts on McClaggen.

When they both nodded subtly back, she announced, ‘Congratulations, Ron! You’re on the team!’

Ron looked dazed, grinning widely. Harry went over to pat him on the shoulder.

‘Well done mate, great flying! At least what I saw.’ He mumbled that last part bitterly.

Ron was being swarmed by the rest of the team. McClaggen pulled Angelina out by the arm, probably to get some kind of explanation.

‘Let’s celebrate! We did not know you could do it, Ronniekins!’ yelled Fred, striding across the pitch with a laughing George in tow, while a red-faced Ron was pushed forwards by Alicia and Katie.

Harry brought up the rear, battling with the tornado of thoughts threatening now that his feet were back on the ground.

Ten minutes later, music filled the Gryffindor common room. Someone had procured a crate of butterbeers for the team (probably Lee). McClaggen zoomed passed them to the dormitories a few minutes after, and half a minute after that, Angelina slumped down in the big shabby red couch by the fire, looking like she’d just finished a very long day at some soulless Muggle desk-job.

‘So, what did McGonagall want?’ asked Angelina, opening her butterbeer with flick of her wand.

‘Professor Umbridge had told her I didn’t show up for detention yesterday or today, but not that it was because she herself dismissed me.’ Said Harry – it wasn’t a lie, strictly speaking.

‘Aaah, so she wanted to give you an earful for skipping detentions, when it was really nothing.’ Said Katie and took a sip of her butterbeer.
Harry nodded in confirmation.

The rest of the evening, Harry listened quietly to Ron and Angelina's strategy discussions for the upcoming matches. Ron's suggestions were creative and would likely have been effective, were they not based on the skillsets of professional Quidditch players and thus far beyond what they could feasibly pull off. Harry thought that Ron might become a great game strategist, once he had gained some first-hand playing experience.

Harry’s thoughts caught up with him in earnest when he went to bed that night, spiralling into a pit of circular, agonizing ruminations and anxious spikes in heartrate. A sort of black despair usually only pain got him out of – but it was too risky now – his one reliable way of taking his mind off of his mind, on hiatus until he could shake off Professor McGonagall. He didn’t know when he finally fell asleep, only that for the first time in weeks, sleep was blessedly dreamless.

Chapter 12: Red Eyes and Bleeding Hearts

Chapter Text

The first official Quidditch practice with Ron as Keeper commenced the next day. They ate breakfast together as a team, happy to see the Great Hall ceiling reflect a clear, cerulean sky outside. Harry found he couldn’t eat much. He felt like there were several sets of wary eyes on him, robbing him of his appetite.

Once at the pitch, the bothersome Slytherins who’d been wonderfully absent at try-outs now occupied a patch of the stands, jeering and shouting insults at each team member individually. They learned quickly who was most susceptive to the tactic. Unimaginative jabs at Harry, Katie or Angelina slid off like water off ducks, while those hurled at Ron hit home.

Consequently, Ron’s goalkeeping got worse and worse as practice progressed, ears and face competing with the Quaffle in redness until Harry worried he was going to vomit. Ron stepped off the pitch in a foul mood, darting for the changing rooms without as much as a glance on anyone else. He stayed sulky and snappy for several hours, until Harry could no longer stand talking to him, and let him mope in peace.

The rest of Saturday and most of Sunday was spent on homework. On Sunday evening, Harry finished his Astronomy essay before Ron (who was trying to sweet-talk Hermione into helping him), settling for a mediocre grade. He turned to fiddling with a Show-And-Tell array that he had been tinkering with off-and-on for the better part of a year. It was an idea borne out of Hermione’s attempt to explain the concept of television to Ron, and the goal was to create a sort of flexible Pensive-like array that could pluck images from the users’ minds.

It was quite tricky magic and thankfully, neither Ron nor Hermione knew enough about this type of magic to notice how Dark it was. Harry's own inadequacy got its moment to shine as well when he hit a block where no matter how he turned the energy dials, the Black ether still caused an unwanted skip, producing a patchy image and no sound. Now, he bitterly regretted not bringing the boring tome “Properties of the Blackest of Ethers” from Grimmauld Place.

Hermione was back to knitting elf-hats. She had progressed to be able to add bobbles to the tops of them and neat ribbing along the hems. It was nearly nine thirty when the metallic ticks paused, and Hermione pointed to a proud-looking eagle owl sitting on the window ledge behind Ron.

‘Isn’t that Hermes?’ said Hermione bewilderedly.

‘Blimey, it is!’ said Ron quietly, putting his quill down, ‘what is Percy writing me for?’

He opened the window to let Hermes in, who flew to the table and landed on Ron’s Astronomy Essay, holding the leg with the letter out helpfully. Ron took the letter off the extended leg and Hermes flapped away at once.

‘This is definitely Percy’s handwriting.’ Said Ron, sinking back down in his chair.

‘Well, open it!’ urged Harry, fanning his newly drawn array to dry the ink.

Ron did, and for a minute or so Harry and Hermione sat as frozen, waiting for Ron to finish reading it.

Ron’s face twisted in a tighter scowl the further down the parchment he read. ‘Bollocks!’ he said when he finished, tossing the letter on the table for Harry to read.

Harry picked it up curiously and read it with Hermione reading it with him over his shoulder. It had everything.

Pompous reverie in Ron’s new status as prefect, jabs at those Percy considered to be his lesser brothers (Fred and George). Unsolicited advice, including a warning that Harry may be violent and dangerous, and another warning that Dumbledore may be going mad (both of them people Percy didn’t really know at all). An encouragement to seek out the “lovely woman” Umbridge, of all people, for guidance. Critique of their parents and, last but not least – a hint to Dumbledore being removed from his position as Headmaster.

Spectacular work.

It was the most cohesively written pile of drivel Harry had read in a long time, and he caught himself starting to chuckle as he progressed down the page. To top the madness off, it seemed that Percy had forgotten what Ron was like as a person, because he was trying to appeal to a sense of callous ambition that Ron simply did not possess.

‘So, do you want to “sever ties” with me? I swear I won’t get violent,’ said Harry jokingly when he finished reading, trying his best not to burst out laughing.

It didn’t look like Ron found it as funny as Harry did.

‘Give it here,’ demanded Ron.

Harry obliged and watched Ron tear it to shreds and toss the pieces into the fire, proclaiming Percy the greatest git of them all. They were silent for a bit before Ron went back to moaning about his essay and Harry and Hermione back to their hobbies.

‘You should write to Sirius, Harry.’ Said Hermione after a while.

‘I know, I just don’t really have anything to tell him.’

‘I’d tell him about Umbridge... Whatever Percy was hinting at can’t be good.’ Suggested Ron, brushing parchment lint off his hands. It wasn’t a bad idea.

‘Yeah – yeah, those lessons of hers is worth a letter. Maybe he knows something about her ministry work.’ Said Harry and took out a blank piece of parchment.

Dear Snuffles

I hope you’re OK, both you and the bird.
We’ve got a new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor Umbridge.
She’s nearly as nice as your mum. We got word from a black sheep with red hair that the Headmaster may not stay Headmaster very long. Have you heard anything about this from your friends?
Oh, and speaking of friends, we’re all missing our biggest friend here, we hope he’ll be back soon.

Best,
Harry

He sent it off with Hedwig early the next morning. While in the Owlery, he ran into Cho Chang, who again tried to pin him down with smalltalk. He dodged her as friendlily as he could, claiming to be late for some unnamed activity. Harry had a fairly strong hunch that what she really wanted was to ask questions about Cedric - questions he had no desire to answer.

The next morning also brought an answer to a part of the Percy mystery when Hermione rolled out her fresh issue of the Daily Prophet and let out a gasp. Harry and Ron leaned over to see, and there in a bold headline:

MINISTRY SEEKS EDUCATION REFORM –
DOLORES UMBRIDGE APPOINTED FIRST EVER HIGH INQUISITOR

Hermione read aloud from the article, Ron and Harry paused eating to listen. ‘This is not the first time in recent weeks that the Minister has used new laws to effect improvements at the wizarding school. As recently as 30^th August, Educational Decree Number Twenty-two passed, to ensure that, in the event of the current headmaster being unable to provide a candidate for a teaching post, the Ministry should select an appropriate person - Now we know how we ended up with Umbridge!’ said Hermione when she finished reading the paragraph.

‘So, she was literally the last choice. Brilliant.’ Said Harry dryly.

Hermione kept reading.‘The inquisitor will have the power to inspect her fellow educators and make sure that they are coming up to scratch. Professor Umbridge has been offered this position in addition to her own teaching post. Wizengamot elders Griselda Marchbanks and Tiberius Ogden have resigned in protest at the introduction of the post of Inquisitor to Hogwarts. “Hogwarts is a school, not an outpost of Cornelius Fudge’s office,” said Madam Marchbanks – ‘

‘At least someone’s got some sense left.’ Commented Ron off-handedly, while Harry had a tiny, optimistic kick from hearing old reformist Ogden resigning his seat.

Beside him, Hermione was fuming. ‘First Fudge forced her on us with his “Educational Decree” and now he’s giving her the power to inspect teachers! – It’s outrageous!’ she huffed, but Ron had a growing, gleeful grin on his face.

‘Oooh – I can’t wait until McGonagall gets inspected. Umbridge won’t know what hit her!’

Harry smiled at that thought too ‘personally, I’m more excited for Snape.’ He smirked, popping an eyebrow at Ron.

‘Ohoh, that’ll be a bloodbath!’ Chimed Ron, laughing.

***

Umbridge didn’t show up in History of Magic or Potions (sadly) that day, but Ron told them all about the epic nosedive that was Trelawney’s inspection on their way to Defence Against the Dark Arts class that afternoon.

‘And then Trelawney gave in and made up some of that death and danger stuff she used to say about Harry in third year – And Umbridge was not impressed, I’ll tell you that. She said, “if that’s the best you can do”, and Trelawney looked like she’d explode any minute!’ regaled Ron happily.

Harry snigg*red along with the story. Hermione hummed and smiled to herself, but it was evident her mind was elsewhere. She had a determined look on her face that told Ron and Harry she was up to something.

Hermione took personal offence to teachers who were bad on purpose – lack of talent at teaching, she could live with, but not a teacher actively working against her students, preventing them from learning. What frustrated Harry was that she couldn’t see that Snape belonged to the latter category, same as Umbridge. Simply because he didn’t do it to her personally, she couldn’t fathom him doing it to Harry. Umbridge opened the door three minutes before lesson start, and Hermione made a beeline for the front of the classroom. Ron and Harry shared an apprehensive look and followed her, feeling a bit weird being the only ones on the front row.

Class begun and Professor Umbridge instructed them to read Chapter two of their textbook in silence. Hermione did not open hers; She had her hand raised. Professor Umbridge had apparently planned for this possibility, for instead of calling on Hermione or ignoring her, Professor Umbridge got up and walked over to Hermione’s desk.

‘What is it this time, Miss Granger?’ she whispered.

‘I’ve already read Chapter two.’

‘Then move on to Chapter three.’ Said Umbridge vexedly, but Hermione had anticipated this.

‘I’ve read that too, Professor. I’ve read the whole book.’

Professor Umbridge blinked a few times, then bristled herself up again, ‘well then, Miss Granger, then you should be able to tell me what Slinkhard says about counter-jinxes in Chapter fifteen.’

Had Professor Umbridge known Hermione, she’d also have known that traps like these were absolute folly. Harry wouldn’t be surprised if Hermione could recite the entire book if asked. Precisely as Harry predicted, Hermione answered perfectly, and for a moment Professor Umbridge seemed impressed, but then Hermione stated that she disagrees with the book’s author, and an argument broke out.

‘Miss Granger, I’m going to take five points from Gryffindor House.’ Said Professor Umbridge loudly, having walked to stand in front of the class again.

‘What for?’ said Harry angrily. Hermione hissed for him to stay out of it.

‘For disrupting my class with pointless interruptions.’ Said Professor Umbridge. ‘I am here to teach you using a Ministry-approved method that does not include inviting students to give their opinions on matters of which they understand very little. Your previous teachers in this subject may have given you more license, but as none of them – perhaps with the exception of Professor Quirrell, who at least appear to have restricted himself to age-appropriate subjects – would have passed a Ministry inspection –‘

‘Yeah, Quirrell was a great teacher,’ said Harry sarcastically, ‘there was just that minor drawback of him having Lord Voldemort sticking out the back of his head.’

The silence was deafening. Harry could almost hear the locket’s heartbeat over it, rapid and excited.

Professor Umbridge seemed to recover a few seconds later. ‘Mr. Potter!’ she screeched.

I should shut up now, he thought, but at the same time it struck him: what was she going to do? She could give him detention, which she’d have to find a method for that didn’t include the quill, or she could send him to Professor McGonagall who was sympathetic towards Harry, or she could just dock more points. Those were her options. It wasn’t much, was it? The class had started to murmur. Hermione was gripping his arm hard enough to bruise.

‘What? It’s true!’ said Harry.

Professor Umbridge’s face was reddening, and she had clenched her pudgy little hands at her sides.

‘It is a LIE! He’s dead!’ she spat.

A sudden intrusive thought blasted through every last inch of caution he had, whispering, scare her! McGonagall was testament to it working before!

Closing his eyes in a slightly longer-than-necessary blink, he found the connection to Voldemort – rigid and buzzing.

‘He did sometimes possess Professor Quirrell too, so technically – We’ve been taught about the Dark Arts, by the Dark Lord.’ Said Harry venomously.

Professor Umbridge trembled in anger, the class gasped loudly, and a great, rolling snort escaped from someone close behind him.

‘Twenty Points from Gryffindor, Mr. Potter!’

The class was murmuring uproariously now, but at whom was hard to tell. Harry kept eye-contact with Professor Umbridge, daring her to do more.

‘I’m telling the truth! I promise, heis back,’ he said in a low voice while at the same time collecting his mind and grabbing a hold on the soul-shard of Voldemort’s by the Mind-strings and pulling at it forcefully.

He had done this once before in his fourth year, out of desperation to get rid of the interloping soul. It created a searing pain in his scar, and he knew now that it wouldn’t really budge, but on the outside, it looked absolutely horrible.

The locket reacted instantly, the rapid pulse raging coldly against his chest. It felt like the Mind connection itself struggled too, wiggling and thrashing in his mental grasp, writhing as if in pain. Reflected in her eyes, he saw his own flash a bright scarlet red.

Let go! Don’t overdo it! Screamed a voice of reason in his head, and Harry let go – the connection settled back down, and the locket quieted, shivering as if the experience had traumatized it.

The blink of red ended, having lasted for a mere second. A foreign flash of anger and bewilderment shot through the connection from Voldemort. He’d felt something too.

‘Back to reading! A-all of you!’ shouted Professor Umbridge, then trotted over to Harry on stubby legs with feet pressed into candy-pink, high-healed shoes.
‘I think a week of detentions might do you some good, Mr. Potter. Starting Wednesday, six o’clock.’ She hissed, face almost as pink as her clothes, ‘I won’t fall for your little tricks again, Mr. Potter and I assure you, the next time you try make a fool of me will be your last act at this school.’

Hermione finally let go of his arm.
Harry didn’t dare to look at either her or Ron. He wasn’t certain if they’d seen what he did, though thankfully, he knew the rest of the class hadn’t. They had only seen his back, that he was sure of.

Professor Umbridge returned to her desk without another glance at the class, and for the rest of the lesson, she pretended to work while shooting Harry infuriated and suspicious looks. The feather on her quill rustled as it hovered over parchment and the scratching sounds were shaken and frantic.

Harry smiled sweetly at her and went back to pretending to read, mind racing. He dearly wanted to touch the locket – to soothe it, somehow. He spent the rest of class wallowing in agonizing regret. Yet again, he'd let his temper and poor impulse control get the best of him. Recklessly, he had given Lord Voldemort an unnecessarily hard poke with unknown consequences, and he had likely hurt the locket, an object he knew next to nothing about.

On top of that, he had landed himself in detention with a teacher who hated his guts, which was worrisome on its own. What would detention be like now, that Harry had ratted Umbridge out to Professor McGonagall for using the Blood Quill? Whatever it was, it was sure to be awful.

The bell rang and Harry got about fifteen steps away from the classroom door before he was pulled aside.

‘What did you say that for!?’ demanded Ron harshly. He looked lightly horrified, eyebrows gathered in an orange dot above his nose. Hermione on the other hand, appeared somewhere between disbelief and bitter disappointment.

‘Harry, you have to control your temper,’ she sighed exasperatedly.

‘I’m trying!’ lied Harry defensively while inwardly concentrating on deciphering what Voldemort was thinking. Anger still simmered around the perimeter of his mind. It had an indignant edge to it, as if Harry had phased through time and space to slap him.

‘Angelina’s going to blow her top when she hears you’ll miss a week of practice.’ Remarked Ron darkly.

Harry had nothing he wanted to add to that.

***

Harry declined to accompany Ron and Hermione to the library after dinner, excusing himself by pretending to have too much of a headache to study. Instead, he headed for the Come-and-Go-Room and its handy runes laboratory. Careful theorizing during class had given him several ideas to try on the locket. He was now confident he could monitor Voldemort’s reaction and stay reasonably in control over the experiments.

He had to take several detours to shake Professor Flitwick, who randomly appeared whenever he exited one of his trusty shortcuts, and Professor Babbling, who had developed a sudden fondness for stairs. Eventually, he flipped the cloak and map out, and got both professors off his tail.

Professor McGonagall must’ve been gossiping in the teacher’s longue after all, he thought sourly.

The room materialized exactly the way he left it. He fastened his notes to the wall with a sticking charm and began tracing out the prototype array on the floor. Its purpose was to reveal the piece of soul contained within the locket without removing it, and for that, he needed to manipulate its essence (Mind and Soul) without manipulating its Body. This disconnect was a core feature of necromancy, which meant he had to author the ritual within the Rule of Nines – a challenge that had taken a week of pondering to overcome.

When finished with the chalk-lines, he counted all the symbols and sequences twice, then placed a moderating crystal in its slot in the southern section of the array. Moonstone – not a perfect fit, but getting opals of the right size was too difficult. He fished the locket out and pulled it over his head, immediately feeling like he’d jumped into the Black Lake in February again.

He placed the locket in the array’s centre, and with a bracing breath, activated it with a bolus of magical energy from his hands. It glowed up pink. Air was spiralling around the outer rings, creating a vortex around the locket. After about twenty seconds, the locket shone white, vibrating against the stone floor like the trapped hummingbird was making an escape attempt.

Suddenly, a white streak shot up from the locket, collecting itself into a ball the size of a pea about a foot above it. Thin, barely visible strings connected the ball to the gold, fluttering peacefully as if blowing in a gentle breeze. Mind. Thought Harry excitedly. Visible Mind!

Harry felt around the edges of his own mind, probing the connection to Voldemort. He felt nothing different. Very carefully, he prodded the ball of Soul above the locket with his wand. It shied away, dodging the wand-tip like a piece of plastic evading a hand attempting to fish it out of the river. Obviously, it was distressed. Still, the link to Voldemort seemed unbothered.

He can’t feel it, Harry determined. Experimenting with the locket should be safe.

With a rearrangement of the energy through the array, the soul fragment expanded and darkened, revealing a tangled, fraying mess in dark burgundy threads. It looked like it had been hacked off its parent with a dull blade. Strings of Mind was flailing around, feeling the edges of the array like static hair attracted to a balloon.

How could anyone want to do this to themselves? He wondered pityingly, mesmerized by the fascinating behaviour of the Mind.

It looked so fragile and vulnerable. Before he knew what came over him, he had lifted his left hand and reached into the active array. The fleeting strings of Mind closed in on his hand like it was a magnet.

…Please… Let me out… Please… Dearest boy…Warm boy… Please help me… Let me-

Harry retracted his hand as if it had been burned. The strings of Mind collided helplessly with the magic barrier where his hand had passed through it, grasping for him.

The locket is sentient! …At least partially…

The revelation caused a whirlwind of thoughts and for a split-second, Harry contemplated sticking his hand back in there and try talking to it – to him. To the piece of Voldemort trapped inside it.

Didn’t you cut runes into your skin to prevent this exact scenario? Asked a snide voice in his head.

For a long moment, he stared indecisively at the feeble strings smooched up against the barrier, feeling around as if searching for a crack in the wall. The unpleasant voice was right, it was too dangerous to touch it again now. Instead, he let the locket retrieve its extremely damaged piece of Soul. The array wound down, leaving the floor a little charred.

It was hard to say if the locket was actually sentient purely from those few words, but at least it was responsive to outside forces and able to use language. Before this experiment, his leading hypothesis had been that the locket was alive, but not malicious or cunning – more like a baby that simply existed.

Now, he was more inclined to believe it harboured a few circular thoughts and it could feel whatever hit its golden chassis but was otherwise severely sensory and cognitively impaired.

It called you “Dearest Boy”, a sinister voice reminded him. The locket definitely couldn’t tell who he was. Undoubtedly, it was happy to be worn and not left neglected on a dusty shelf at Grimmauld Place.

Picking the locket up felt like grabbing an ice cube. He slipped it over his head, and at once felt like had stepped into a perfectly tempered shower.

Are you happy to be back? He thought at the locket. It buzzed against his skin.

***

That evening Sirius’s head appeared in the fireplace in the Gryffindor common room. He’d been checking in briefly to see if it was clear before bringing attention to himself.

‘Sirius, this is awfully risky’ said Hermione, putting away her knitting and joining Harry in kneeling in front of the fire.

‘You sound like Molly… This was the only way I thought of that I could reply to Harry’s letter without resorting to code, and codes can be broken. That letter of yours was nice and vague by the way, Harry. Good job.’ Said Sirius smiling. ‘Anyway, that Umbridge giving you trouble? I know she’s a nasty piece of work, that one – you should hear Remus talk about her.’

‘She’s foul. Does Lupin know her?’ asked Harry. He could vaguely remember Professor Umbridge saying something about dangerous half-breeds during her first lesson.

‘No, but she drafted a bit of anti-werewolf legislation two years ago that makes it almost impossible for him to get a job.’ Said Sirius.

The unfairness of it all burned within Harry, and his loathing of Professor Umbridge grew even stronger.

‘So she’s a Wizengamot member then?’ asked Ron.

‘Yes, she’s been a member for a while, nominated by Fudge, no doubt.’ Answered Sirius.

‘What’s she got against werewolves?’ said Hermione angrily, crossing her legs with fervour.

‘Scared of them, I believe.’ Said Sirius, smiling at Hermione’s outrage. ‘What are her lessons like? Is she training you all to kill half-breeds?’

‘No, she’s not letting us use magic at all!’ replied Harry irately.

‘All we do is read the stupid textbook.’ Added Ron.

‘Ah, well, that figures,’ said Sirius with an ironic twitch of his lips. ‘Our information from inside the ministry is that Fudge doesn’t want you trained in combat.’

‘Trained in combat!’ balked Harry. ‘What does he think we’re doing here, forming some sort of Wizard army?’

Sirius nodded crookedly, ‘That’s exactly what he thinks. Or rather, he thinks Dumbledore is amassing an army to topple him from his position as Minister for Magic.’

Harry tried his best to process what he’d heard, but it felt like the information slid off his brain. Instead, it turned into an image of Dumbledore and a crowd of teenagers marching into Fudge’s office with assault rifles.

‘That’s the most stupid thing I’ve ever heard.’ Said Ron.

‘So we’re being prevented from learning Defence Against the Dark Arts because Fudge is afraid we’ll use spells against the Ministry?’ said Hermione, fuming.

‘Yep. Fudge thinks Dumbledore will stop at nothing to seize power. He’s getting more paranoid about Dumbledore by the day. It’s just a matter of time before he has Dumbledore arrested on some trumped-up charge.’ Said Sirius, lips forming a tight, thin line.

‘How can the minister himself have so much power? It’s not like the personal fears of the Muggle Prime Minister gets people arrested or changes how a subject is taught in schools.’ Complained Harry, though he knew the answer.

Sirius hummed, ‘Yes, and he recently changed it so that the Minister leads the Wizengamot in the place of the Chief Warlock until a new Chief Warlock can be selected – and that could take ages. So, if Dumbledore is brought in, Fudge will be the leading judge at his trial.’

‘What?!’ Yelped Hermione, looking positively livid while Harry groaned loudly, massaging his left temple.

This reminded Harry he still needed to look into those “Knights of Walburgis” or what it was they’ve called themselves.

Sirius took in their gloomy faces for a second, before he spoke again. ‘About Hargid… He was supposed to be back by now. We’ve spoken to Madame Maxime, and she said they’d been separated on their way home.’

When he saw their expressions turn even darker, he promptly added, ‘but Dumbledore is not worried. I’m sure he’ll be back soon. Don’t talk too much about it if you can avoid it. We don’t want to draw attention to Hagrid’s absence.’

That didn’t help much either.

‘Look, Hagrid is though. I’m sure he’s just fine.’ He said reassuringly. ‘When is your next Hogsmeade weekend anyway? I was thinking, we got away with the dog disguise at the station, didn’t we? I thought I could –‘

‘No! No… uh – I have plans. With someone… um…’ said Harry, wracking his brain to think of some fake plans to insert into this rushed, half-baked lie.

‘Oh. Oh. I’ll leave you to it then.’ Said Sirius with a smirk and a co*cked eyebrow. ‘Maybe next time? I should go now, anyway. Remus said he’d drop by tonight.’

‘Yeah – yeah, bye then! Say hi to Lupin from us!’ said Harry, glad to have successfully dodged a bullet.

‘Will do!’ said Sirius cheekily, then his head disappeared with a pop.

Harry sat back from the fire.

‘You have plans with someone? Is it Cho Chang?’ said Ron, wiggling his eyebrows at Harry.

‘Nope, I just lied to stop him from showing up in Hogsmeade. The risk wasn’t as bad at the station, where he had Moody and Kingsley and everyone with him, but here…’ said Harry plainly.

‘Oh.’ Said Ron disappointedly. ‘But you do know she has a thing for you, mate?’

‘Nah, she just wants me to talk about Cedric.’ Replied Harry dismissively.

Ever since Hermione briefly dated Victor Krum last year, Ron had adopted the annoying habit of sneaking the topic of girls into every other conversation. He'd ask about everything from who Harry thought was the most attractive among the girls in their year or in 6th, to whether he thought it alright to snog on a first date. To Harry, those were treacherous waters, and he'd gotten quite adept at producing evasive, plain and predictable answers to sate Ron's curiosity.

‘No, I think he’s right, Harry. She’s definitely fancies you.’ Said Hermione with a small, encouraging smile.

Harry reacted without thinking. ‘Urgh – really.’

It wasn’t that there was anything wrong with Cho per se, she had been his preferred partner for the Yule Ball last year, and she was pretty and all… It was just… His interest last year had been wholly superficial, more about dating someone popular and good at Quidditch, and not girly. It had started as a last-ditch attempt to force himself to fancy someone.

After two years of listening to adults preach about the dreaded teenage hormones, and the “discovery” of the other sex, Harry had concluded that either the adults were full of it, or there was something wrong with him. It took less than a minute of watching his peers in the Gryffindor common room to understand that the hormones were real, and so naturally, Harry turned his eye inward.

At first, he hoped he was a late bloomer. He listed all the girls he knew inside his head and sorted them after who he should reasonably begin to fancy, once his brain caught on. Cho landed on top of that list. She played Seeker, had a kind and friendly personality, and was good looking. But the attraction never manifested, turning the whole venture into a farce where he pretended that he was normal rather than anything involving romantic feelings.

‘Well, I’m not interested.’ Said Harry, hoping they’d both drop it at that.

Ron looked at him like he had declared he wanted to return to Trelawney’s Divination class, while Hermione looked only mildly surprised.

‘Are you serious? Not interested? What’s wrong with her?’ said Ron as if it was unimaginable to not be interested in a girl if she was both pretty and interested in you.

‘Nothing!’ said Harry defensively. Maybe the wrong gender… supplied his brain quietly. He mentally smacked himself for it. That thought belonged in a cage along with a thousand embarrassing and demeaning fantasies no one would ever know he had. ‘I’m just not interested – a-and she’s pushy!’

Ron threw his hands up and shook his head. ‘Well, I’m going to bed now. I’ve had enough craziness from you for one day.’ He said playfully and got up.

Harry pulled himself up off the floor and into a worn armchair. He leaned over the armrest and tugged his glasses off to rub tiredly between his eyes. Hermione stood up and started hiding elf-hats around the room.

After a minute she said quietly, barely over a whisper, 'did you just pretend to be interested in her last year then?’

‘Yes.’ Replied Harry softly. A sinking feeling pulled at him. He could guess where this was going, but he couldn’t bring himself to leave or deflect from the conversation.

There was enough guilt built up from keeping all kinds of secrets from them, that it felt like a constant pressure whenever he was with them. Soon, he feared he’d crack under it and tell them something that’d make him lose their friendship forever – and though the conclusion to his romance-themed introspection might not alienate Hermione, it certainly would Ron. And the two of them were closer to each other than Harry was to either of them.

‘I thought so… It’s not because she’s pushy, is it?’ Hermione asked quietly. Harry didn’t answer, busy trying to find a polite way out of the situation. ‘Is it because – because she’s a girl?’ whispered Hermione nervously and took a couple of steps towards him until she was standing merely a foot or so from the armrest of Harry’s chair.

Three long seconds ticked by, and Harry couldn’t bring himself to answer.

She knows, but if you confirm this then before you know it, Ron will know, remarked a cautious voice in his brain. Ron will suddenly think you’re into him. Neville, Dean and Seamus will want you removed from their dorm once they find out. They’ll all leave in disgust. And if Dean and Seamus knows, then soon it will get out and Malfoy will make sure to tell everyone… Gods, the Prophet would have a field day…

‘I’m going to bed.’ He said promptly, standing up in a rush.

‘Wait, Harry!’ tried Hermione, but Harry brushed past her and gathered his belongings from the table they had been working at earlier.

‘Goodnight.’ He said, neither waiting for an answer nor looking back.

Chapter 13: Kitchen Nightmares

Chapter Text

It took less than a minute to realize he was dreaming. Mere seconds ago, he’d been trying to read the tiny names written on a gnarly family tree in a Wizarding lineage book from the 1600’s. He had lit all the lamps and asked the elves for coffee throughout the night, hoping to stave off the inevitable. The closer to dawn he made it, the better.

Obviously, tonight’s quest to dodge punishment had failed. He must have fallen asleep in his chair. Why else would he be lying somewhere cramped, cold, and dark while in pain if he was not, yet again, temporarily transformed into young Harry Potter?

He was shivering feebly, huddled up under Harry’s cheap, pilled, synthetic blanket with his head on a clumpy, compacted pillow. Hunger was gnawing in his belly, so painful it was hard to think of anything else. For a long time, he just stayed there, patiently waiting for the plot of the dream to start.

For the last five dreams or so, he had existed in Harry’s body as a captive spectator with limited agency, but with supremacy over his own thoughts at long last. It made the dreams more bearable, sometimes even interesting, though once he was in them, he couldn’t help but regret sending the boy visions that brought them on. They were no less painful, and if anything, even more tragic now that he had access to his own, capable mind for processing the ongoing experience.

Some days, he truly contemplated giving up. Letting Harry win this silly game. But that would mean delaying the recovery of the prophesy until after he could assume the post as Minister for Magic. And that could take years.

No, he’d endure the dreams a while longer. Awake and rested, he could rationalize the whole complot to himself again. For now, he dearly wanted to get the horror show over with.

So, he waited, listening intently for the curt, choppy steps of Harry’s aunt or the booming voice of his uncle. Soon, the cupboard door would surely be ripped open, and he would be yanked out by the arm like he was a thing. A household appliance for them to use. But nothing happened.

The clock in the kitchen ticked loudly. Heavy, choking snores were drifting down from upstairs. It was the middle of the night. Why would Harry have him experience this? Was the starvation the point of this dream?

Hunger hadn’t been much of a feature in the first dreams. On the contrary, Harry Potter at five years old had been fed regularly, received the occasional smacks and copious amounts of verbal abuse, while more severe beatings had been rare.

However, as the dreams progressed and the boy grew, the abuse worsened. Smacks became beatings became whippings. Neglect became imprisonment and starvation. Verbal abuse became cruel psychological ploys and humiliation schemes. The meaning of the uncle’s shouted reprimands was clear as day – the more magic young Harry performed, the worse it would get. If this escalation was to continue, he was anxious to see what gruesome horrors awaited him in Harry’s teenage years.

A part of him was unshakably curious. Was this still going on? If he were to enter the bland, suburban house some bright July day, would he find the boy kneeling on the kitchen floor?
Was this a cry for help?

It couldn’t be. Harry Potter would never plea to him for aid, no matter how dire the peril. He absentmindedly lifted a hand to scratch his nose, then froze. That had been his willed movement, correct? Not something scripted by the memory?

He tried getting up. Little Harry’s body obeyed, though the action was painful. His head felt too heavy for his neck. The arms trembled weakly under the meagre weight. Every muscle felt sore and the normal hypotensive rush of sitting up gave him a throbbing headache. He thought he felt something crack open on his back. Slowly, he got up to sit awkwardly on the lumpy foam mattress.

Waving over his head, he found the string for the lamp and pulled it. Nothing.

Obviously, Harry’s repulsive relatives had taken the lightbulb away. He could see small strips of light in the ribs of the door vents. Streetlights, filtering in through the obscuring glass in the front door.

Focusing on Harry’s pitiful little body, he located a magic core of rather substantial weight given the age and size of its owner. It was hard at work, healing something in his innards. Tapping into it, he borrowed a small amount and carefully directed a pulse to the sliding bolt outside the door. The cupboard door tipped open with a small creak.

His first instinct was to go straight for the front door. End the nightmare before it could begin, now that he finally had the autonomy he’d been craving for weeks of these visions. However, thoughts of food kept invading his mind. The hunger was impossible to ignore.

He crawled out into the hall, not trusting that he knew the hight of the body he was inhabiting well enough to try standing up inside the cupboard. Holding onto the edge of the stairs for support, he forced his feet under him.

The thigh muscles spasmed and his head swam as more blood drained to his body. Dizzy and unsteady, he slowly made his way towards the kitchen. All the while, suspicion rose in his brain. Nothing in Harry’s dreadful memories were ever this easy for the child. Something was off.

He had lived through quite the number of them now, because in spite of his sustained efforts, no means of weaking the link had been found. Instead, it had strengthened considerably, and he had now long concluded that not only was his participation in these dreams deliberate - but Harry was also widening the bridge between the two of them on purpose.

Harry was experimenting, giving him varying amounts of freedom and access to his own mind while reliving these memories. Oh, and the memories were carefully curated.

Firstly, they were roughly chronologically ordered. Secondly, they only sporadically showed the inciting incidents that led to the beatings he suffered in the dreams, which he would’ve thought crucial to any nightmare haunting the memory’s owner. Harry was editing the “unimportant” stuff away.

Because Harry only wanted him to hurt. He had found a way to subject his enemy to torture without even being present. By trapping his enemy in his own, frail little body, utterly powerless, and then have him suffer endless degradation and pain at the hands of a savage, vile Muggle. The boy’s intent to teach him a lesson in disempowerment was glaringly obvious, and he had to reluctantly concede - effective.

Begrudgingly, he had learned. He knew now that the degree of bodily freedom in this dream was bound to be a bad omen. Not Harry slipping up. Harry never slipped up. These nights, he was a bug in the boy’s terrarium and accepting that was key to keeping frustrated rage from clouding his mind.

Fear, however, was a different matter. A primal, inborn fear of pain permeated these dreams. He had felt it when he lived them as Harry, and he felt it now, worsened by the sinister set-up of the dream. Dread was infiltrating every synapse in his brain as he moved forward, possessing him like a malevolent spirit. It was getting harder to breathe. He had to close his eyes for a second. To stop and listen. Count clock-ticks. To try not to think too much.

Please no sexual abuse… Please… I can’t… Not again… Please…

Steadying himself against the wall, he eventually got out of his own useless thought-pattern and carried on with the straining task of walking to the end of the hall. A tiny console table with a drawer, a mirror and a phone were crammed in between the two glass doors – one to the kitchen and one to the living room. The glimmering lights of a Christmas tree filtered through the living room door and sent a rainbow sheen off of the reflective surface. He stopped for a moment to examine his borrowed body.

Harry couldn’t have been more than eight years old, yet his face was gaunt and sallow, almost corpse-like. His bare chest sported the full piano of visible ribs. The belly looked a little swollen. An image flashed into his mind's eye – a relic from a time in his life where Muggles had waged war and many more children had looked like this. Back when only the “generosity” of an unmentionable man was what kept him from joining the street rats in sifting through rubble for metals, pickpocketing drunks, and robbing toffs at knifepoint.

This is the past, he reminded himself, tearing his eyes away from the reflection. Hogwarts was the home of this boy now, as it once had been for him. Still, he couldn’t supress a blooming pity for little Harry. The emotion was followed by a very faint tug of a nagging, guilt-like emotion that he instantly banished. He had no blame in the placement of the boy in the care of these Muggles.

He opened the kitchen door and stepped inside the warm, noisy room. A violent shiver passed through him at the temperature difference. His fingers suddenly felt stiff. The refrigerator was humming, the clock on the wall ticking and the sink dripped occasionally. It was like the refrigerator was calling to him. He wrenched the door open, squinting into the glaring, bright light inside. The most easily accessible item with a decent nutritional value was a carton of milk. It sat inside the door shelf next to an opened bottle of wine and an unopened carton of orange juice.

Holding the door open with one hand, he yanked the milk carton free with the other, accidentally toppling over the wine bottle in the process. It tipped over the low skirt of the shelf and hit the floor with a deafening crash. A pit opened up in his gut, swallowing his organs.

The snoring had stopped. He knew what was coming. Quickly, with shaking hands, he tore the carton open and began chugging. The cool liquid poured down his throat, soothing the dry soreness and quenching the fire of starvation in his stomach. It felt so good, an unwelcome, voiced sigh escaped through his nose. The click of a lamp turning on hit his ears. He ignored it, concentrating on the milk. He needed energy if he was to win the coming fight.

Footsteps hammered above him, then thundered down the stairs. Nausea was building in his throat, and he forced himself to stop drinking. He set the carton down and wiped his mouth with his arm when he heard an enraged swine-like whine to his right. Harry’s walrus-looking uncle was advancing on him. The round, red face had scrunched up in anger so that only slits were left of his eyes.

Despite his best effort to brace himself and distance himself emotionally, a renewed twinge of fear manifested in his heart. Adrenaline surging, he readied little Harry’s body as much as possible, before he dove into the magic core, retrieving everything he could.

‘Stealing, are we?!’ Spat the fat Muggle.

A huge hand with disproportionately short, stubby fingers swatted at him. He ducked and with every ounce of magic collecting in his palms, threw himself forwards, pressing his hands to the uncle’s abdomen with the clear, unambiguous intent to cut it open.

‘Aaaargh!’

The uncle jerked back. Blood was blossoming on the front of the uncle’s white nightshirt, but no entrails hit the floor. He had been too weak.

But – but it should have been more than sufficient-

Rooted to the spot with the shock of his failure, he never even saw the hand coming for his head. Pain exploded out from his temple, followed by a duller pain in his shoulder from where it hit the cupboards. He slid to the floor, holding his aching head while sharp stinging travelled up his leg and under his feet.

There was blood everywhere. A shard from the wine bottle was digging into his thigh. Suddenly, a new pain erupted in his scalp as the uncle grabbed a fistful of hair, pulling him up. His feet slid around helplessly on the slick floor, desperately trying to unload some of his weight onto his legs and away from the roots of his hair.

‘Let me go, you fu-‘ He caught a glimpse of the uncle’s crazed eyes before a fist connected with his head.

He opened his eyes to a pair of alarmed green ones staring directly back at him. The reflection.

He was back in front of the hallway mirror, holding onto the wall for support, lights from the Christmas tree on his face. The clock was ticking loudly. There were snores rattling from upstairs. He could almost hear present-day Harry’s voice in his ear. A high, sing-song whisper, taunting him:

Try again.

And he did. He was more careful with the carton, but careless closing the fridge. He tried burning the uncle instead. That made him stay conscious long enough to get whipped with a cable.

The next try, he did his best to close the fridge softly, but accidentally knocked a glass of tomato sauce to the floor instead. He ended up both beaten, stripped naked and hosed down outside with ice-cold water behind the house.

The fourth try, he ignored the refrigerator and went for some biscuits in a “child-proofed” cupboard, which had a door that slammed shut on its own with a very loud magnetic closure. He tried fighting again, which made the beating twice as long as the last.

With each new try, a sense futility grew into one of complete doom inside of him. Once, he actually got to disembowel the uncle, but the victory was short lived as he was almost instantly knocked over the head with a frying pan by Harry’s horse-faced aunt. The attempt after that, he got hosed down again.

Slowly, the fear of pain thoroughly ingrained itself in his brain, creating a low tension that never eased up, even in the safe stages of the puzzle. How long had he been in this dream? A single attempt was between twenty minutes and an hour long… And he was on the twentieth? Or thirtieth? He’d lost track. Finally, he gave up and skipped the kitchen all together. Instead, he unlocked the front door and threw himself through it, sprinting at top speed.

He immediately noticed a distorted splashing sound. His feet were wet. The ground was covered in a centimetre deep layer of gluey liquid. He looked back and saw nothing but blackness. The houses of Surrey were gone. There was no light. He was running through complete darkness. His heart was hammering hard now.

Not this. He tried shouting an insult at the dream’s architect, but nothing came out. Don’t panic.

Thinking his best option was to use up whatever was left of the night before he was awoken, and not being Harry’s toy, he found a direction and ran. At least he could still feel a “body” responsive to his commands.

Wake up, wake up, wake up, wake up…

He tried reminding himself who he was. That this was a dream. Where his body was. Then suddenly, he was back by the mirror.

Relief hit like a sense of falling, weightless and free. He stayed perfectly still for a moment, breathing slowly. Then, when he finally was ready to sigh and try again, he found that he couldn’t. The child’s body moved without a care for his input. A layer of chastising, glib emotions vibrated on the outskirts of his mind. They weren’t hard to interpret. Harry had withdrawn his autonomy privileges – and called him a coward to boot.

He watched as the child went into the kitchen and lifted a tea towel off a peg by the oven. The little hands then went for the cupboard with the biscuits. He draped the towel over the top of the cupboard door, covering the magnet and stopping it from slamming shut whenever he lost hold of the heavy door.

He is showing me the answer to the bloody riddle.

Little Harry stuffed biscuits into his pockets, then carefully set the packet back and removed the towel, silently closing the door. But the kid wasn’t done. Cautiously, he opened the refrigerator, held it open with his backside while he very carefully slid the milk carton free.

Again, he was treated to the incredible sensation of the milk dousing the worst of the smouldering hunger-pains as Harry drank deeply from the carton. He set it back gently, then closed the refrigerator door carefully with his finger jammed in between, stopping the sudden sealant effect from rattling the contents. The refrigerator machinery surged, and Harry withdrew the finger, letting the seal close slowly and noiselessly.

Rubbing it in, are you? He thought in the direction of the smug feelings in the corner of his brain.

The emotions there felt amused. Detached from the fact that this was Harry’s reality he was toying with. In truth, it was all quite sad. The nexus of glee whispered a reply.

Yes.

Surprised to get an answer, a sincere sentiment bubbled up in his head, forming a thought unbidden, unconsidered, and unauthorized.

I’m sorry.

Shocking both himself and the listener, Tom jerked awake.

Chapter 14: The Knights of Walpurgis

Chapter Text

By the next morning, the entrance hall had been decorated by two new posters.
Hermione spotted them first, rushing off to read them with a bleary-eyed Ron and a thoroughly distracted Harry in tow.

‘Look!’ She said, tugging on Harry’s sleeve and retrieving him from the depths of his thoughts where last night’s dream ate every joule of brainpower he had.

The posters had been framed and glazed, all pomp and power. Each were stamped with the official “M” logo of the Ministry of Magic and signed with the bubbly, girly signature of Dolores Umbridge (The dot over the “I” was a cutesy, hollow circle as if imitating Walt Disney).

EDUCATIONAL DECREE NUMBER TWENTY-FOUR
Teachers and other members of staff may not contact, collaborate with or request support from Ministry services, non-profit services, or Muggle public services on behalf of a student without explicit permission from the student’s parents or legal guardians, the Headmaster, and the High Inquisitor.

EDUCATIONAL DECREE NUMBER TWENTY-FIVE
All student personal off-grounds activities are hereby prohibited.
Students who for health or family reasons require the use of external Healers and councillors may reapply for regular leave at the High Inquisitor’s office.
The application must be in writing and be signed by a parent or legal guardian.

‘Shuttin’ us in, is she,’ muttered Lee as he read the posters over Harry’s shoulder, while a sixth year Hufflepuff loudly wondered if “Ministry services” included the Department of Magical Transportation and the issuing of apparition licenses.

‘This is horrible.’ Said Hermione.

‘What, why?’ asked Harry honestly, which was seconded by Ron.

In his mind, these decrees weren’t much different from how the system functioned before. He hadn’t forgotten the Hogsmeade debacle two years ago. Though Harry doubted he could get through Umbridge’s hoops the same way with Sirius’s signature. Not that he needed any of those services or regular leave.

‘Because, this means the Madame Pomfrey can’t send injured students to St. Mungo’s without Umbridge’s say-so! Or get medical history from the Muggles.’ Explained Hermione.

‘She just needs parents' permission, I mean, get them to sign a form or something. Isn’t that the way it’s always been?’ Wondered Ron, and Harry nodded with him.

More people were crowding in behind them to read the posters, and so they let Hermione lead the way into the Great Hall for breakfast.

Hermione huffed, walking faster as she said, ‘no! What about emergencies? Or students from troubled homes? It’s not always good for students that the parents know about everything!’

Harry felt his innards dip, tumbling into an empty maw behind his heart. He planted both hands firmly in his pocket, listening to Hermione fuming about Umbridge with only half an ear. Worry ran free in his head as he followed his friends mechanically to the Gryffindor table.

What if this happened because Professor McGonagall blabbed? That means you caused this. If you hadn’t been so intent on showing off, Umbridge would never have reported you to McGonagall, and you’d never misspoken in her office, this wouldn’t have happened. The sick and hurt kids would still have their healers and the teachers could get them help, if it weren’t for you…

His thoughts itched something awful.
Forcing himself to stop thinking, he concentrated on the familiar pulsing of the locket until his brain was calm enough to listen to Hermione again.

‘She looks happy,’ she spat, nodding towards where Umbridge sat at the staff table, wearing a pink jumper with a large, golden brooch in the shape of a cat pinned to the chest.

Mistakenly, Harry looked up, following Hermione’s gaze when he instead caught the downtrodden, knowing, tea-green eyes of Professor McGonagall.

The ill-fated eye contact lingered for far too long as a shadow fell over her face and her lips thinned. Something moved behind her eyes. A guilt that confirmed every suspicion Harry had about what had occurred in the staff room - and Harry couldn’t look away.
A sad, subtle smile formed on her face.
It was an apology.

As covertly as possible, Harry returned her concern with the tiniest of shrugging smiles, telling her he’d be alright. She looked down, not away.

***

Tuesday’s Transfiguration class had Professor Umbridge inspecting it. Ron was right, it was undeniably funny to watch Professor McGonagall put down Professor Umbridge’s little hem hems. There seemed to be buckets of bad blood between the two women and Harry couldn’t help but feel a bit responsible for that. Surely, Harry’s tip about the Blood Quill had stirred up trouble.

The only positive was that Professor McGonagall was too preoccupied by Umbridge’s unpleasant visit to pay Harry much mind. Not only did he escape the classroom without any insistent invitations to talk (something Harry knew full well he could not avoid forever), but he also evaded her notice during the practice session, despite obviously not having conjured a single snail (Hermione was on kittens).

Umbridge was in Care for Magical Creatures too, which was less entertaining.
Professor Grubbly-Plank was a no-nonsense type of woman and Professor Umbridge couldn’t really find anything noteworthy about the class. Therefore, she switched to interrogating Professor Grubbly-Plank about Hagrid’s whereabouts, something of which Professor Grubbly-Plank had been told nothing.

After classes ended that afternoon, Ron wheedled Hermione into helping him with his Charms essay, while Harry used his show-and-tell-array side project in Ancient Runes as an excuse to go to the library without them.

He found the Hogwarts magazine and newspaper archive in a separate room from the rest of the library. It was wall-to-ceiling teak filing cabinets with rail-bound ladders on each wall, and a card index by the door.

The ceiling was higher here than the rest of the library, ladders almost disappearing into darkness towards the top. There were two desks standing back-to-back in the middle of the room with a box of lenses on each and a rusty oil lamp to share.

Harry put his bag down at the one closest to the only window.
He remembered the Knights started in the fifties, and so he pulled six cards at random from the “The Daily Prophet – 1950-1959” drawer of the index and fetched the corresponding papers. Thirty minutes later, Harry found the first reference to the Knights. A small article commenting on a disruption at the announcement of a new regulation on flying carpets.

Seventeen young witches and wizards calling themselves “The Knights of Walpurgis” shouted over the Minister during the announcement and harassed multiple ministry employees and passersby with flyers…

Another fifteen minutes later, he found something that made him gasp.
The December 21^st issue of 1954 had a picture of some of the Knights in relation to a protest after a criminal trial where eighteen-year-old Valerie Moerk was condemned to sixteen months in Azkaban for performing a sacrificial rite on Samhain of that year.

The sepia picture showed a short wizard with wavey dark hair to his shoulders holding a stack of flyers. He was attempting to give them to invisible members of the public, while a very blond wizard with a pointy chin was holding up a sign that spelled “The Mystic Arts Are Our Legacy!”. To their right stood a witch with a slim oval face and hair in an artsy updo that Harry recognized as the woman from the graveyard.

No crows’ feet or smiling wrinkles, and her hair seemed darker, but definitely her. Under the image, it said “The Knights of Walpurgis disrupting the Moerk trial, from the left: Orion Black, Abraxas Malfoy, and Druella Black nee Rosier.”
The newspaper rustled; his hands were shaking. He picked out a lens to get a closer look at the flyers and faces.

He realized two of these people were relatives of Sirius. If he recalled correctly, one was his father and the other his aunt by marriage. Druella Black was also handing out flyers, which even the lenses couldn’t make readable for him.

For a brief moment, she moved far enough to the right that Harry saw a flash of the person behind her. Tall and pale, wearing dark robes with elegant, effortless curls atop his head – Harry didn’t need to see his face to know that it was Tom Riddle.
His heart stopped.

This – THIS! Is Voldemort’s true cause?
For several seconds, nothing productive happened in his brain. The crisis made it all shut down.
He stared at the photo, transfixed by the graceful man sometimes peeking out behind Druella Black.
It can’t be him, right?
But it was. Harry would have recognized him anywhere. This was undeniable proof. Voldemort had started his career in a pro-democracy activist group. But then… What more did they stand for?

A sudden flash of inspiration came over him – If this was a fringe group, they should be garnering the attention of a fringe publication, right?
He put the newspapers aside and rushed to the index labelled “The Quibbler – 1950-1959”. It was a much smaller deck of cards, and Harry ended up pulling the entire stack of magazines out of its drawer.

Leafing through them chronologically, he found what he was looking for in the 1955 spring issue. Glued to the inside cover were several brochures, coupons, and leaflets, among them a bright green pamphlet with black lettering and an uroboros with the words “The Knights of Walpurgis” written around the circumference. Harry read the first page, and found he agreed with, well, all of it.

What happened to the Vote? The Knights of Walpurgis Fights for Your Rights!

We, The Knights of Walpurgis seek to Restore the political rights of all magical citizens of our nation.
One person – One vote!
For both the Minister and The Wizengamot – Separately!

We, The Knights of Walpurgis will fight against the Corruption that plagues our ministry!
The Wizengamot, The Minister’s Office, The Department for Magical Law and Law Enforcement should all be independent entities.

We, The Knights of Walpurgis believe all has a right to their legacy!
The Mystic Arts, including the Dark Arts, are part of our common magical heritage, none should be imprisoned for victimless practicing of their naturally given magic.

We, The Knights of Walpurgis are a Political Party!
The ban on politically active persons organizing over a common political cause, or joining the discussion of political ideas in groups, is detrimental to our Ministry.

We, The Knights of Walpurgis will take power from the “Reformists” and back to you!
Thirty families now decide the fates of all unopposed. The tyranny must end!

He picked the pamphlet out and read the rest of it. Some of it was about what had been the pressing issues of the day, while other parts spoke more generally about their goals and opinions.

There were a couple of things he disagreed with, among them the suggestion that the Ministry ought to dictate Hogwarts curriculum. He was experiencing a bad case of that exact scenario with Umbridge, the thought of it spreading to the other classes as well was chilling.

He didn’t think it necessary to establish wizarding primary schools either. In his opinion, many wizarding children would benefit from going to Muggle primary schools. There was also a sentence about preserving the culture from Muggle influences he didn’t particularly care for.
Otherwise, Harry pretty much agreed with every word.

He went through the rest of the 1950’s and 1960’s editions of The Quibbler and picked out all the flyers and brochures the Knights had in there. He also read two interviews, one with Thaddeus Nott who Harry figured must have been the Nott present at the graveyard, and a Gemma Yaxley.

Both interviews explained their views in some detail and told stories of their battles against the Ministry.
Nott: “We’re trying to get people into the Wizengamot, without being blocked for Party Affiliation, so no Mr. Lovegood – I can’t say anything about the other members – they have to stay secret, you see.
But I can say that our Lord will lead us to victory!”

Lovegood: “So it is a war you are fighting?”

Nott: “Not a war yet, no, but a battle, certainly.”

Lovegood: “Is violence the answer, Mr. Nott?”

Nott: “What’s violent about a few posters and pamphlets, huh? Besides, it is within the rights of the people to take back power and establish a government that represents them, right?

Lovegood: “Absolutely.”

Nott: “Then you too support the revolution, Mr. Lovegood!”

***

Lovegood: “Now, Miss Yaxley, it is not irrelevant. Mr. Malfoy as recently as three months ago published an essay in the Hag’s Herald titled “The Word Mudblood” where he argued that the aforementioned word is simply the correct term and not a slur. Does it create strife within your party, to have members of such extreme views?”

Yaxley: “We do not argue those minutiae in the Knights, and Mr. Malfoy’s view on Muggles and those with Muggle parentage is not representative of the views of our Lord. The Knights is about the right to argue – So we save our disagreements for the forum to come. Blood-segregation, Muggle policies, Goblin wars and taxes aren’t our causes – Voting is. Power is. Rights are.”

Lovegood: “I find that hard to believe, Miss Yaxley. Surely, your Lord must be pureblood himself, seeing as how many of his party members are. How can you be sure his views do not align with Mr. Malfoy if he tolerates his presence in the party.”

Yaxley: “I will say nothing of the true identity of our Lord. We will not be made vulnerable should somebody attempt to ‘cut off the snake’s head’. As for tolerance – The only way to teach tolerance is to tolerate. We cannot soften any hearts by turning them away, Mr. Lovegood, and the purists share our key goal. Perhaps through cooperation, their minds may be opened to new ideas.”

Lovegood: “Or they may open yours to genocide?”

Yaxley: “Mr. Lovegood, our allies are hardly extremists and branding them as such is both insulting and dishonest. The crux of the matter is, that Blood-purity is irrelevant to our current objectives. Malfoy can speak for himself if he so wishes, as can Black, and they are allowed their own opinions.”

Lovegood: “But you do have policies within your programme about limiting Muggle influences over Wizarding culture? Is that not right up the alley of Blood-Purism?”

Yaxley: “That particular line actually comes from a member among us raised by Muggles, who knows better than we do what the cultural threat is. We wish to preserve the distinction between the cultures, and it really is as simple as using the Floo rather than adopt the Telephone. Magic that goes into disuse gets lost, like the ancient wedding and funeral rites, weapon-enchanting and blood-warding.”

Lovegood: “All Dark Magic in the examples there,-“

Yaxley: “The Mystic Arts, Mr. Lovegood. Do you deny their value?”

Lovegood: “Absolutely not, Miss Yaxley, the Mystic Arts are a part of nature’s magic that all should be free to practice. Our readership is of the very same view. Thank you so much for your time, I am sure we can expect great things from your organization and your elusive Lord!”

Yaxley: “Thank you for having me, Mr. Lovegood.”

Harry couldn’t help but wonder what happened between this, and the formation of the Death Eaters. Maybe they ran out of patience and decided to try to take the Ministry by force, like Nott hinted at? Did the number of members concerned with what Yaxley had called minutiae overwhelm them and skew the cause towards blood and Muggles? Did Tom Riddle found this or just join it? Was it him losing his mind that pulled the Party down the drain too?

He decided no one would miss the old brochures and stuffed them in his bookbag.
A strong wave of cynicism hit him as he did. The Knights had failed, and people like Sirius and Lupin suffered for it. If Fudge found something to charge Dumbledore with, he’d suffer for it too.
Whatever happened to the Knights, the result was obvious – they had become the Death Eaters, and the once noble cause had been consumed.
Voldemort even said so himself…

Harry’s pessimism rapidly morphed into abject anger. Anger at the Knights for failing, at the current day ministry for its corruption, the reformists for destroying what they had, and at himself for ever having been stupid enough to believe that all the people fighting for Voldemort were merely evil men who didn’t have anything worthwhile to be fighting for.

He spent the walk back to Gryffindor tower in deep thought, hand over the locket. An impulse to try asking the mind within it grazed his thoughts. He quickly dismissed the idea. The voice in the locket had haunted him since he first heard it, and its words hadn’t exactly been coherent. If he were to try talking to it again, it would be to map its thought-capacity, not to get answers about the man’s opinions and political involvement.

Again, Harry thought about the graveyard and the cryptic speech. Pieces slotted into place the longer he dwelled on it.

Voldemort’s voice rang hollow in Harry’s head, “I lost my perspective, my eye on the cause – and my judgement weakened…”

What if the resurrected Voldemort, with his judgement restored, revitalized the Knights of Walpurgis instead of the Death Eaters? Or at least implemented the changes the Knights wanted if he won the war? Did that mean that Harry actually wanted Voldemort to win?

The thought was horrifying, but it was hard to dispute the fact that he did agree with the Knights – and by extension, Voldemort. The ideologue in Harry wanted to help the cause, but the same drive was repulsed at the thought of helping a mass murderer achieve anything.

Though both you and Voldemort himself knows of his bout of insanity – can he really be held responsible for all his actions in the seventies? And do you actually care, or do you only pretend to because you’re supposed to care – your parents being among the victims and all?
He didn’t particularly like this line of inquiry that his brain was pushing, but he’d never been any good at schooling his own thoughts away from the bad stuff.

Is principle really sufficient grounds for not supporting the cause that would remarkedly better the lives of everyone? Sure, Voldemort’s not a good person, and he’s definitely killed a bunch of people, but do you actually know if it was Voldemort who started the war?

Harry shook his head. His primary school teacher had once said that “The ends justify the means” wasn’t a good method, but now, Harry found he disagreed. The world had created a terrible moral conundrum for him. Put a violent, possibly evil revolutionary in charge, or leave thousands of people oppressed.

Though Harry was sure every other sane person would reject Lord Voldemort for his moral failings, intellectually, Harry felt that the rights of the disempowered outweighed it. Still, knots tied themselves in his heart.
Are you sure this apprehension isn’t simply you blaming him for your placement with the Dursleys again – Which, may I remind you, was Dumbledore’s doing? You never knew your parents, but still you’re fiercely defending them as if they were angels – are you going to let that silly romantic idea you have of your parents stand in the way of you supporting real change in the world you live in?

No, Harry decided. “He killed my parents” was a thin defence for opposition to Lord Voldemort as a political figure and a revolution with potential of this magnitude. If he were to let his personal feelings about the man prevail, it had to be on a sturdier basis. So, what about the fact that Voldemort tried to kill him?
I don’t know why. I have no idea why he would try to murder a baby – even in lunacy there should be some logic to explain such extreme actions, however flawed they may be.

And the fact that Voldemort had let him go, rather than finish the job was no less perplexing. Perhaps it was a delusion of some kind that made him go after Harry and his family? Or gross misinformation? Perhaps he should ask Dumbledore about that again… But Dumbledore hadn’t as much as looked at Harry all term.

The mind Harry had toyed with in their dreams seemed reasonable enough, and uncannily sympathetic.
He apologized even, a small voice reminded him.
But what did he apologize for? Was it an apology, or was it base empathy manifesting as one? Or was it a manipulation tactic to get Harry to release him from the nightmare?

Harry couldn’t tell. It was all so bizarre. Watching Voldemort fight his uncle had been fun, and sensing Voldemort’s fear had been gratifying – at first. But then the hopelessness and despair turned heart wrenching, and Harry had to continuously remind himself that it was the Dark Lord Voldemort whose thoughts he was picking up over the static.

It had felt justified. By all rights, Voldemort deserved whatever Harry could throw at him. However, a small part of Harry’s guilty conscience was adamant that not only was it enough – he had gone overboard.

Though he was only able to decipher the thoughts Voldemort had directed at him as “gamemaster” (including a few curses when the man was running away from the house), Harry had been able to pick up a general vibe from the thoughts still private to Voldemort, and they had felt distinctly pleading.
Like the locket.

He’s still a person, a thought whispered in Harry’s head, coupled with a glimpse of the back of young Tom Riddle’s neck again. Perhaps the apology was genuine – at least you can choose to accept it as such… for your own sake.

He barely noticed himself mumbling the password and climbing through the portrait hole, and almost walked straight passed Ron and Hermione. Ron broke him out of his thoughts.

‘Hey, Harry!’ he said loudly.

Harry snapped up and looked around, feeling like he just teleported to the common room.

‘You alright there, mate?’

‘Yeah, just got a bit lost in thought. What’s up, finished the stuff for Flitwick yet?’ Harry said foggily.

Ron shook his head. ‘You?’

‘Haven’t started.’

He joined Ron at the table under the window, ignoring how Hermione fondly rolled her eyes at them from her armchair by the fire. She was knitting again.

‘Ron and I’ve been talking,’ she began as Harry was unpacking some parchment and ink from his bag. ‘We’ve got to do something about Professor Umbridge.’

‘I suggested poison.’ Chimed Ron. Harry snorted.

‘…about what a dreadful teacher she is, and how we’re not going to learn any defence from her at all. And well – we were thinking that – that maybe we should just – just do it ourselves.’ Hermione continued nervously.

‘Do what ourselves?’ said Harry suspiciously, his mind struggling to get back to his earlier quandary. The sepia image of the back young Voldemort’s head kept resurfacing in his thoughts. What was he thinking about again? Was he truly considering forgiving Voldemort? Or simply not – not torturing the man as much?

‘Well – learn Defence Against the Dark Arts ourselves – Prepare ourselves for what’s out there - Practically.’ Clarified Hermione, once again disturbing Harry’s pondering.

‘Yeah, I don’t think we can get this by reading.’ Added Ron almost shakily.

Harry’s suspicion rose, scanning their shifty eyes. Why were they being so nervous?

‘We need a proper teacher, who can show us how to use the spells and correct our mistakes.’ Said Hermione, her voice had gotten low and unsteady with nerves.

‘Who then?’ said Harry, eager to get out of this strange conversation and back to his thinking.

‘Uh, well – We thought you could do it, Harry.’ Said Ron.

Harry stared at them both exasperatedly. ‘But, I’m not a teacher, I can’t –‘

This had to be a joke of some kind, and it was a bit funny.

‘Harry, you’re the best in our year at Defence Against the Dark Arts.’ Said Hermione as if that made it all obvious.

‘No, I’m not. You are. I’m just good at runes, really. You’ve beaten me at every test.’ Countered Harry, trying and failing at not getting irritated.

‘Not the ones in third year, and those were the only ones we had a real teacher for.’ Argued Hermione.

Harry didn’t quite agree with that, Barty Crouch Jr. had been a surprisingly competent teacher.

‘Besides, it’s not about the test scores. Think of what you’ve done.’ Said Hermione pressingly.

‘How do you mean?’ asked Harry, narrowing his eyes at his smug-looking friends.

‘You know what, maybe someone this dense shouldn’t teach.’ Ron said to Hermione with a smirk. ‘Let’s think’ said Ron, turning back to Harry. ‘First year, you saved the Philosophers stone from You-Know-Who.’ He began.

‘Yeah, I killed Quirrell with some blood magic my mum bestowed on me when she died, not my proudest moment, if I’m honest’ said Harry dryly.

Ron ignored him. ‘Second year, you killed a basilisk and destroyed Riddle.’

‘If it wasn’t for Fawkes, I’d have –‘

‘Third year, you fought off a hundred dementors at once.’ Interrupted Ron loudly.

‘You know that was a fluke, the Time Turn-‘

‘Last year, you fought off You-Know-Who again.’ Ron interrupted again, even louder.
Both him and Hermione were smirking now.

‘Listen!’ Barked Harry angrily. ‘It sounds great when you say it like that, but most of that stuff was luck or some ability I either got from someone else, or I was born with! Don’t sit there grinning like you know better than I do, I was there! And I sure know, I didn’t use a lick of what I learned in Defence Against the Dark Arts! I blundered all through it without a clue what I was doing, guessing, and making it up as I went – Oh, and I didn’t “fight” Voldemort last year, STOP LAUGHING!’

Suddenly, he was standing up. The connection in the back of his mind seeped out some light confusion and something that felt like a plea for him to calm the hell down. The locket was having a drumming contest with Harry’s heart.
Ron and Hermione were watching him silently, smiles gone. Harry took a few breaths, and in a much calmer voice continued.

‘You don’t know what it’s like. You don’t know what he’s like. You think it’s just knowing enough spells to throw at him, like you’re in class or something? It’s not like I’m some clever little boy to be standing here, while Cedric was stupid, like he messed up or something, I -’

Harry forced himself to stop talking. The truth resounded loudly in his brain, daring him to say it aloud.
Voldemort let me go. Voldemort let me go. Voldemort let me go.

He could almost see the conflicted, red eyes looking down on him again, feel the damp grass under his backside and the wand-wood warm in his trembling hands. The soft, whispering voice of Voldemort telling him to go resonated inside his head.
He is a person…

‘We – We weren’t saying anything like that – We weren’t having a go at Diggory – you’ve got it all-‘ said Ron defensively, likely picking up on Harry’s mood dipping. He looked to Hermione for help.

‘Harry, don’t you see? This – this is exactly why we need you… we need to know what it’s really like... facing him … facing V-Voldemort.’ Harry calmed down a little more. It was the first time he’d heard Hermione speak Voldemort’s name. ‘Think about it, please?’ she finished.

Harry nodded humbly and picked up his Charms book, the turbulent thoughts of the Knights and Voldemort now had the company of this damned teaching job. After barely half an hour of working quietly on his homework, Harry gave up. Nothing would stick and he kept forgetting what he was writing before he’d finished the sentence he was working on.

‘I’m going to bed.’ He said, clapping the book closed in frustration. The Charms essay could wait another day. Hermione and Ron said their goodnights to him, and he dragged himself sluggishly upstairs.

Harry had one of his worst nights in weeks.
Thoughts of doom, disgust, fear, guilt, and shame spiralled down until it hit the point where, at two o’clock in the morning, the itch had to be scratched, McGonagall be damned. Surrounded by a black haze, Harry got up to the bathroom to do so.
It felt like a relief. It felt like a defeat. It felt deeply shameful.

A few minutes of bleeding, healing, and cleaning later, Harry returned to bed with a much clearer head. He could now feel the tingling of bewilderment coming across the bridge from Voldemort’s mind, something Harry had no idea how to deal with. He was merely glad to be able to think again and decided not to examine it too closely. He didn’t need anymore reminders that there was a real human on the other side of the connection, else he might start another thought spiral.

Though nothing good had come of the spiral, he now knew without a shadow of a doubt that he had to know why Voldemort targeted him as a baby before he could move on. And that meant asking him. Somehow.

The last thoughts of the night were on methods of communication with Voldemort. He quickly concluded that these dreams were the only way to go, not the locket… But the practicality of that… He’d so far only been able to send memories, and their communication within those were spotty at best.

Harry’s consciousness slowly drifted away and into an open field of tall, dry grass and the sound of waves crashing in the distance. He didn’t remember any more the dream the morning after, but he had a feeling it had been pleasant.

***

Harry’s head spent most of Wednesday’s classes entertaining increasingly imaginative speculations on what awaited him at Umbridge’s office that evening.
The solution seemed at first so mundane, that Harry almost felt a bit let down.

On the same, small table sat rolls of parchment again and another fancy quill. Except this one was a light steely blue, not black.

‘Good Evening, Mr. Potter.’ Professor Umbridge said cloyingly from behind her teacup. ‘You will be resuming your lines today. I presume you recall what you are to write?’
Harry nodded tensely, taking his seat at the desk.
‘Splendid. And I assure you, Mr. Potter – I will not tolerate any more pranks from you.’

Don’t argue! Warned a voice in his head that sounded very much like Hermione’s. Holding his tongue, Harry picked up the quill. It felt cold, like a piece of metal having been left out in the snow overnight.

‘What type of quill is this, Professor?’ He asked as blankly as he could.

‘Oh, another special one, though we should be clear of that snag from last time. And this is Ministry Approved.’ Professor Umbridge drew up her toad-like smile, blinking twice as often as normal. ‘The Deputy Headmistress has already been informed.’

Harry didn’t believe that last part in the slightest, but he set the quill to the parchment without another word. Best to get this over with.

…I must not tell lies…
As before, Harry tried to let his mind wander while the quill fed out plain, blue ink.
If Ron and Hermione knew Voldemort had let him go, would they still want him to teach Defence? Probably not.
Ron would rightfully proclaim him a traitor if he knew…
…I must not tell lies….

What would he even teach them?
He supposed he could try to teach them the stuff he researched for the maze, and eventually the patronus charm… If it was just the three of them, that might even be fun.
Was the quill getting colder? His hand was looking a bit white.
…I must not tell lies…

Perhaps it wouldn’t be Harry teaching, but more Harry deciding the curriculum and the three of them working together on improving? Ron would probably want to invite his siblings, which complicated things…
The twins were fine, but Ginny’s brash personality meant she and Harry tended to butt heads a lot…
…I must not tell lies…

If Hermione had meant he should teach a whole class, then the answer was definitely no. Hopefully, they’d both forget about the whole thing if Harry kept his mouth shut…
His hand hurt. It was getting stiff from the cold and tiny, peachy lights were working on spots where the skin-cells were suffering damage.
…I must not tell lies…

So, this is the maleficence of this quill. It won’t hurt me outright, just cause pain. Brilliant. Harry thought with a sinking feeling.

He refused to give Umbridge any satisfaction by letting his discomfort show. She didn’t know it, but Harry had suffered far worse. His arms itched with the thought. It suddenly felt like there was an insect crawling on his back, reminding him of what was there. He shook it off with a quick shiver.
This cold, he could endure.
…I must not tell lies…

When Professor Umbridge finally called an end to the session right before midnight, Harry’s hand was rigid and cramping. From the wrist down, it was devoid of blood, yellowish-white and with light purple asphyxia dusting the fingertips.

He tried opening and closing it a few times as he walked down the dark and empty corridor. It prickled something awful, and the darkened fingers didn’t move at all, numb and unresponsive. He tried warming them in his other palm but let go almost immediately. His own hand had felt identical to hold as Cedric’s dead one.

A faint heartbeat reminded Harry of a possible cure. He used his left hand to open a shirt button and carefully slid his icy hand under to touch the locket.
Harry involuntarily sighed. It felt like he’d plunged the frozen hand into a basin of perfectly temperate water. Inside his hand, the locket’s heart hammered joyously. He held on to it all the way to the portrait, which swung open to reveal a blissfully empty common room.

The dorms however, sounded abuzz with activity.
He stood on the landing for a few moments, debating what to do while unconsciously scratching at his arms through his robes. There was little doubt in his mind what he wanted to do, but his pyjamas were in his trunk, inside the very lively dorm. He’d rather not go in there.
You have the “kit” in your pocket, you don’t need anything else, a small voice reminded him.

Harry turned on his heel and set his sights on the bathroom, left hand closing around the small, square zipped pouch in his pocket. The promise of relief was already tickling in his skin.
That night wasn’t a good one either.

Chapter 15: Pub Crawl

Chapter Text

Neither Ron nor Hermione mentioned the “teaching job” again for the next two weeks and Harry did not tell them of Umbridge’s terrible new quill. By the third detention session, he learned to pack a towel and spare underwear in his bookbag and head straight for the Prefects’ bathroom, which Ron had graciously provided him with the password for.

There, he could both warm up his hand again in peace, and deal with the oncoming thought-spiral the detentions consistently triggered. His little relapse the night before the first ice-detention had opened the floodgates, and now six new scars had been added to his collection. He had a sneaking suspicion that Voldemort had noticed them all.

The locket certainly had a lot of feelings about Harry’s condition, and Harry decided he’d have to try talking to it again. Due to that assessment however, he found himself conflating wearing it with having company, which made him take it off before cutting. It had the added benefit of the nice, warm feeling of putting it back on again, which soothed whatever remaining anxieties lingered at the bottom of his mind afterwards.
Harry doubted the thing would be so friendly, if it knew whose neck it was around.

Ron was steadily improving at Quidditch, not having been yelled at by Angelina for the last two practices. His performance still hinged entirely on his confidence, which was fragile to say the least. Harry had the ominous sense that it wouldn’t improve without a solid win, which would be hard-fought if Ron’s faith in his own abilities stayed low. It was a vicious circle.

On the question of how to communicate with the Dark lord through a wonky telepathic link, he’d gotten a little further – he was going to construct a memory containing the question he wanted to ask in such a way that it was clear he expected an answer. He had gotten as far as brainstorming what components he wanted to include in that memory but was yet to land on anything solid.

He kept up the normal memory sending every time he received dreams of the corridor, which was finally becoming less frequent, but he didn’t mess with the memories and let Voldemort keep his own mind throughout.

There was now only one memory left from when he was seven. It was a particularly bad one, that he considered skipping. The apology Voldemort made within his experimental dream a few weeks prior had rattled him, making the taste of his vengeance sour once he concluded that Voldemort’s sentiment had been genuine. The effort to forgive Voldemort however, had fizzled out.

Harry and Ron were in the library keeping Hermione company while she was looking up potions ingredients when she brought up the Defence Against the Dark Arts problem again. ‘I was wondering whether you’d thought any more about Defence Against the Dark Arts, Harry.’

‘About me teaching, you mean?’ Harry asked flatly. Hermione made a confirming humming noise. ‘Yeah, I – I’ve thought about it a bit.’ said Harry. If he was honest, most of those thoughts were hopes that Ron and Hermione would forget about the whole thing.

‘And?’ said Hermione eagerly.

‘You did listen to what I said about it being luck and unteachable stuff, right?'

‘Yes, Harry. But there’s no point pretending you’re not good at Defence Against the Dark Arts, because you are.’ Said Hermione insistently.‘You were the only one to completely throw off the Imperius Curse last year-‘

Because the bliss feels fake to me, that’s probably my mental problems, not skill…

‘-you can produce a Patronus-‘

Took me months to learn, even with a very strong motivator, and the “memories” I fuel them with are complete works of fiction…

‘-you can do all sorts of stuff that full-grown wizards can’t, Viktor always said –‘

And that’s when the conversation devolved into what Harry could only describe as Ron either being brotherly protective of Hermione, or jealous of Viktor Krumm. It was difficult to discern the two at times.

Ultimately, Hermione managed to steer them back on track. ‘Well, what do you think? Will you teach us?’ She asked, giving him something best described as “puppy eyes”.

‘Just you and Ron, yeah?’ asked Harry hopefully.

Hermione drew up a guilty grimace, ‘well… I really think you ought to teach anyone who wants to learn,-‘

‘Ah, so just you two then.’ Spat Harry. ‘I’m a nutter remember?’

‘Look. I think you’d be surprised how many people would be interested,’ argued Hermione until Harry cut her off with a reality check.

He could feel irritation build to anger behind his forehead. ‘They want me to talk about Cedric, Hermione, so that they can laugh at my “fibbing” with their little friends later,-‘

‘Just – Try? OK? Humour me. I will organize a first meeting, and we’ll see who shows,’ pleaded Hermione, putting her hand on his arm placatingly, ‘you’ll see. They’re not all like that.’

Harry let out a deep exasperated breath, then resignedly said, ‘fine. Fine.’
He could feel the dread growing already.

***

One week later, Harry found himself sitting in the damp and dirty pub called the Hog’s Head in Hogsmeade clutching an incredibly dusty bottle of butterbeer while a score of students stared at him like a circus act.

He also had the uncomfortable notion that the rest of the bar was watching him as well. Their group stood out in their youth, clean and colourful clothes, and uncovered faces. Not to speak of sheer numbers. This looked to normally be a sparsely patronized pub.

Hermione had introduced the idea of theirs.
Sadly, she’d also used Voldemort’s return as an argument again, and that had landed them in an altercation with the Hufflepuff Zacharias Smith which in turn had revealed the spiel to Harry.
These people were here to hear stories about Voldemort and of Cedric’s death. Harry had no plans of indulging them.

‘Look, if you didn’t believe Dumbledore when he told the whole school last year that Voldemort is back, you won’t believe me, and I’m not wasting an afternoon trying to convince anyone.’ Said Harry bitterly.

The locked buzzed its merry approval against his skin.

The group of students listened patiently, all but Zacharias, who said dismissively, ‘all Dumbledore told us last year was that Diggory got killed by You-Know-Who and that you brought Diggory’s body back to Hogwarts. He didn’t give us any details, he didn’t tell us exactly how Diggory got murdered, I think we’d all like to know-‘

‘And I will never – ever – tell you. I don’t want to talk about any of that. So, if you’re here to hear me talk about Cedric Diggory, sorry to disappoint you, but you might as well clear out.’ Harry’s temper was rising.
He threw an angry look at Hermione for getting him into this mess.

There was a long, tense, pause but nobody left.

‘Is it true you killed a basilisk with the sword in Dumbledore’s office?’ said Terry Boot suddenly, ‘one of the portraits on the wall told me when I was in there last year…’

‘Er – yeah, I did, yeah.’

That impressed a bunch of people, and Harry felt his face heating up.

‘And in our first year, he saved the Philological Stone-‘ Neville spoke up.

‘Philosopher’s Stone.’ Corrected Hermione smartly.

‘Philosopher’s stone, yes – from You-Know-Who,’ finished Neville.

Harry hated that story being brought up as a positive, and he shrunk back a little, praying for the topic to end with that.

‘And that’s not to mention all the tasks he had to get through in the Triwizard Tournament last year – getting past dragons and merpeople and Acromantula and things…’ said Cho with stars in her eyes.

Seated next to Cho was a girl Harry had already forgotten the name of, and who obviously had been forced into attendance. She gave Cho a tired look, edging on an eyeroll, as if she had heard Cho serenade about this before, and was sick of it.

Ron and Hermione were right about Cho, he thought annoyedly.
He zoned out, thinking about ways to dissuade her while another round of bickering broke out over something Smith said again.
Harry longed to leave.

Apparently, they all agreed that Harry should teach, and the conversation moved on to the practical aspects of where and when without getting a final approval from Harry himself. The “when” became once a week, to be decided around everyone’s Quidditch and class schedules, and the “where” was something everyone should have a good think about.

Harry had a thought that the Come-and-Go-room might accommodate this, but he wasn’t all that keen on sharing its existence with so many people. Its runes lab had become his little free space, and he’d hate to lose it to something as silly as increased traffic.

At the end, Hermione produced a blank piece of parchment with a suspicious air about it that she made everyone sign their names to. Cho tried to linger as long as possible using the clasp on her bag as device when the meeting dispersed, and Harry ignored her as politely as he could, pretending to not notice her hopeful gaze.

‘Do you need a hand, Cho?’ said Hermione sweetly.

‘No, I’ve got it, thank you.’ Said Cho, who figured she’d been found out and hurried to the door, pink faced.

He heard her giggle with her friend (Marietta, the signing sheet reminded him) as they left.
I’m going to have to do something about that very soon if she’s going to be in this group, Harry thought tartly.

‘That Zacharias bloke’s a wart.’ Said Ron as they left the pub, scrunching his nose. Harry snickered.

‘I don’t like him much either, but he overheard me talking to Ernie and Hannah at the Hufflepuff table, and he seemed really interested in coming, so what could I say?’ said Hermione with a huff.

‘You could have told him to piss off.’ Suggested Harry in a hard voice.

‘-I mean, Michael Corner and his friends wouldn’t have come if he wasn’t going out with Ginny-‘ she continued.

That set off Ron on a tirade of questions which Hermione struggled to answer without being interrupted.

‘But – I thought Ginny fancied Harry!’ said Ron indignantly.

Hermione shook her head, informatively answering, ‘Ginny used to fancy Harry. She gave up on him months ago.’

Smart girl added Harry in his head.
He couldn’t imagine how much worse it’d be if Ginny was behaving the way Cho did. Ron was protective enough of Ginny when she was dating people distant from him, if Harry had to reject Ginny, breaking her heart… Ron wouldn’t take it well.

***

Harry’s sense of doom steadily bumped up its intensity the rest of the weekend, and he found it harder and harder to concentrate. The strange, intrusive emotions coming from Voldemort had also been increasing in frequency and was slowly turning into an ambient blanket of someone else’s emotional life lying in the back of his mind at all times.

Mostly it was bizarre and uncomfortable to have two sets of feelings like that. Other times, Harry was ashamed to admit, it was comforting. The man’s regular, steady control helped Harry reign in some of his own turbulence.

There was a catch, of course. Though Voldemort’s moods were mostly mellow, he had a volatile temper which could flare without warning, which in turn set off both Harry and the locket. Usually, Harry would cope by dipping deeper into his darker thoughts, talking himself down from wanting to lash out against those around him. Meanwhile the locket would rage purposelessly, leading to Harry taking it off to release the tension at the end of a razor.
Something which again upset Lord Voldemort.

He hadn’t found the courage to try talking to the locket again yet, but not for fear of it, per se. No, if he was to be honest with himself, he was scared he’d find a copy of Lord Voldemort trapped within the locket for years without any normal human way of perceiving their surroundings.
What could Harry possibly say to him? What was he supposed to do with it then?

Preparing to talk to Lord Voldemort Proper was a horrendous hurdle in itself.
At first, he had skimmed his brain for memories where he had either asked the question directly or discussed it with someone. It had seemed like an easy task at face value – find a memory where he soberly talked about this pivotal question with someone – and he did find some. Fewer than he wanted, and each muddied by their own set of problems.

The most obvious memory contained Dumbledore – who Harry could theoretically edit out – but it was also from a precarious point in his and Voldemort’s shared history. After all, that had happened mere days after Harry had murdered his servant and expelled him from a human body. Besides, the child-in-the-hospital-wing get-up might come off as too pathetic.

Other options were memories of talks with Ron and Hermione. It was a topic they spoke about sporadically over the years, but only two memories stood out. One had been an argument, while the other occurred seconds before twelve-year old Harry had heard the basilisk hiss a murderous message in the pipes and Hermione rushed off to the library. He wouldn’t be able to edit the basilisk voice out smoothly.
Obviously, neither memory would be suitable.

That meant he had to create one, and that was a puzzle in and of itself.

***

Monday morning, Ron and Harry descended from their dormitory to find that Harry’s keen sense of doom had struck gold. On the wall was an announcement – an order of the High Inquisitor, disbanding all organizations, teams, groups, and clubs, and banning their reformation without explicit permission from Professor Umbridge herself.
This had to be because of their Defence Against the Dark Arts meeting.

‘Someone must have blabbed to Umbridge, I bet it’s that Smith –‘ said Ron as they left the common room together.

‘They can’t have’ said Hermione quietly, eyes darting around in dodgy little sweeps in search of eavesdroppers.

‘You’re so naïve-‘ began Ron, but Hermione cut him off.

‘No, I mean I put a jinx on the parchment we all signed.’ Hermione explained her jinxing scheme as they walked to the Great Hall for breakfast.

As soon as they sat down, Dean, Neville, Ginny, Fred, and George encircled them with reserved looks on their faces.

‘What are we going to do?’ asked Fred, bending over the table.

‘We’re going to do it anyway, of course.’ Said Harry quietly, thougha part of him yearned to fold and cancel the whole thing, he wasn’t going to let that toad Umbridge win this easily.

History of Magic was as dreadfully dull as always. Harry was close to slipping into a nap with his hand discreetly on the locket when he heard a hollow tapping noise right beside his head.

‘Harry. Isn’t that Hedwig?’ whispered Hermione, shaking him.

Harry opened his eyes and looked where she was pointing to the window. A ruffled and dismayed Hedwig sat right outside with a crumpled note tied to her left leg. He opened the window quietly to let her in, and she jumped unsteadily unto his table. She seemed to be shaking a little and puffed herself up when Harry tried to touch her wing.

‘She’s hurt.’ Hissed Harry angrily.

He made up some excuse of not feeling well to Professor Binns, who didn’t know who Harry was or notice the owl that had suddenly appeared in his classroom, and let Harry go with no fuss. After a small argument with the gargoyles outside the staff room, Harry opted to knock on the door without their blessing. Professor McGonagall opened the door, brusque and stern-faced. Her stoniness melted off the second she saw him.

‘Mr. Potter, is everything,-‘

‘It is urgent, apparently.’ Drawled one of the gargoyles rudely.

Professor McGonagall silenced it with a flick of her wand, then shot the other one a sharp glare. It promptly pretended to be an inanimate statue.

‘I’m looking for Professor Grubbly-Plank actually.’ Said Harry, cursing his bad luck, ‘it’s my owl, Professor. She’s injured.’

‘Injured owl, did you say?’ Professor Grubbly-Plank’s uncommonly hat-less head appeared under the brim of Professor McGonagall’s, smoking a very curled sailor’s pipe. Professor McGonagall stepped aside, letting Professor Grubbly-Plank approach Harry and examine Hedwig.

After a short conversation, he handed Hedwig over to Professor Grubbly-Plank who’d nurse her back to form, and spun on his heel, eager to get out of Professor McGonagall’s reach.

‘Just a moment, Wilhelmina! Potter’s letter!’ Professor McGonagall called after Professor Grubbly-Plank into the staff room. She fetched the letter and closed the staffroom door behind her. Harry thanked her for the letter and turned to leave, when he was called back. ‘Potter, wait!’

‘Yes, Professor?’ He tried for mild-mannered politeness, but his spirits were plummeting. There was no doubt to what this conversation was going to be about.

‘Madame Pomfrey tells me you have not been to see her.’The disappointment in Professor McGonagall's voice was poorly hidden.

‘Didn’t feel the need to, Professor.’ Said Harry, suddenly finding the cracked tile under Professor McGonagall's left foot far more captivating than her face.

‘Mhm,’ said Professor McGonagall doubtfully, ‘it did occur to me that you might not want to confide in a familiar face like Poppy.’

Harry only nodded along. She wasn’t totally wrong – he simply didn’t want to confide in anyone. Familiar or not.

‘So, saying nothing of whom it concerned, I asked Pomona and Bethesda for advice… I am sorry to say that we were overheard.’ Continued Professor McGonagall, arms hanging defeatedly at her sides.

‘Figured…’ Muttered Harry, gripping the letter harder. The parchment crunched in his hand.

‘Then why have they been following me around the halls? If you didn’t tell it was me?’ Harry asked annoyedly, betrayal and shame stinging his eyes and making his jaw clench.

‘Mr. Potter… I did say it was a fifth-year – it was necessary. They are caring, capable educators who observe their students well. I assume they deduced the truth quite quickly.’ Explained Professor McGonagall, ‘Bethesda did suggest a provider in Hogsmeade, perhaps,-‘

‘I need to get back to class, Professor.’ Harry said dismissively, legs gearing up to run.

‘Of course,’ sighed Professor McGonagall. Harry turned to leave, thighs aching to go faster when Professor McGonagall called after him. ‘Oh, and Mr. Potter?’

He stopped and turned, but did not return to talk to her. Whatever more she had to say, she’d have to say at a distance.

‘Bear in mind, the channels of communication in and out of Hogwarts may be watched.’

Her eyes flickered deliberately down to the letter he was holding. He gave her a short nod and watched her return to the staffroom.

***

The letter read “Today, same time, same place”.
Doom returned to the pit of Harry’s stomach with a good portion of the sinking feeling. There was no way for Harry to warn Sirius now that Hedwig couldn’t fly. He discussed it with Ron and Hermione, and they decided to go ahead and look for Sirius in the fire that night, and then issue that warning.

They dragged themselves down to Snapes’ dungeon for Potions, where Malfoy teased the possibility of Gryffindor’s Quidditch team not being allowed to reform, along with a bunch of childish insults. One of them found its mark with Neville (the one about minds addled by magic and St. Mungo’s hospital) and Ron and Harry had to hold Neville back from starting a brawl with Malfoy and his goons.
Snape docked points from them when he showed up, obviously in an even worse mood than normal.

They quickly discovered why. Umbridge was inspecting.
It was the only funny Potions lesson Harry had ever had. She spent the first half hour taking notes in her corner, before getting up to walk among the brewing stations.
‘Well, the class seem fairly advanced for their level,’ she said to Snape, who was peering into Dean Thomas’s cauldron.

‘Though I would question whether it is advisable to teach them a potion like the Strengthening Solution. I think the Ministry would prefer it removed from the syllabus.’ Said Professor Umbridge frankly, blinking at Snape in anticipation of a reaction.

Professor Snape deliberately drew himself up and turned to look at her with a black, silent glare.

‘Now… How long have you been teaching at Hogwarts?’ she asked, sounding a little unnerved while readying her quill and clipboard for the answer.

‘Fourteen years.’ Said Professor Snape slowly. Professor Umbridge took a step back.

‘You first applied for the Defence Against the Dark Arts position, I believe?’ continued Umbridge, straining to keep up her falsely sweet voice in the face of someone so unwelcoming. Harry supressed a giggle.

‘Yes.’ Answered Snape, his tone quite reminiscent of a clap of thunder.

‘But you were unsuccessful?’ tsked Professor Umbridge.

‘Obviously.’

Harry, Ron and several of the classmates now struggled to not laugh. Ron choked his in, while Seamus was disguising his as a cough. Malfoy was hitching silently with laughter into his elbow while Crabbe and Goyle grinned stupidly. Even Hermione was hiding her face.

Umbridge scribbled on her clipboard. ‘And you have reapplied regularly for the Defence Against the Dark Arts post since you first joined the school, I believe?’ she continued into increasingly dangerous grounds with Snape.

‘Yes.’ Said Snape in a quiet voice that simmered with anger. His black eyes scanned the classroom over her head. The repressed snigg*ring that had been floating around the classroom stopped cold. They all knew a very angry Snape should be given a wide berth and no one was dumb enough to attract his fury.

‘Do you have any idea why Dumbledore has consistently refused to appoint you?’ asked Umbridge.

‘I suggest you ask him.’ Hissed Snape through gritted teeth.

‘Oh I shall. The ministry wants a thorough understanding of the teachers’ – er – backgrounds.’

Professor Umbridge spent the rest of the lesson talking to the Slytherins. Snape vanished Harry’s potion again, not that it surprised him; he hadn’t been able to focus on it at all.

Ron told Harry and Hermione about Trelawney’s newest outburst as they walked to Defence that afternoon. She had been issued a warning by Professor Umbridge.
Harry found it bothered him very little.
Defence Against the Dark Arts was just the same as always, and as always, Harry didn’t read a word of the Slinkhard book.

***

It took a long time for the common room to empty that evening. Plenty of time for Harry to get progressively more nervous about Sirius getting caught. Quidditch practice hadn’t gone well, as Angelina was in a foul mood after being forced to recruit Professor McGonagall’s aid to get Professor Umbridge to allow them to reform their team.

Her frustration had mainly been taken out on Ron, whose mood had then taken a nosedive and he compensated by bickering relentlessly with Hermione about S.P.E.W.
Tired and angry, Harry had taken Hermione’s side, which ultimately landed him with the job of sewing thumb pieces onto freshly knitted mittens for the rest of the evening.

Sirius’s face popped into the fire at a quarter to one in the morning.

‘Hi,’ grinned Sirius.

Harry put down the mitten he was working on while Hermione slapped Ron, who was dozing in an armchair. They all approached the fire kneeling on the floor.

‘How are things?’ asked Sirius.

‘Not good.' Said Harry, shifting his legs around, 'the ministry’s forced through another decree, which means we’re not allowed to form groups, like Quidditch teams –‘

‘Or secret Defence Against the Dark Arts groups?’ said Sirius smirking.

There was a bout of strained silence. Hermione picked up Crookshanks to prevent him from sticking his paws in the fire to pat Sirius’ face.

‘How do you know about that.’ Harry demanded heatedly.

‘You want to choose your meeting places more carefully – The Hog’s Head, really?’ said Sirius, grinning widely.

‘Well it was better than the Three Broomsticks!’ said Hermione defensively. ‘That’s always packed-‘

‘Which would make you difficult to overhear and less noticeable,' smiled Sirius, 'you’ve got a lot to learn, Hermione.’
Hermione’s face reddened.

‘Who overheard us?’ asked Harry.

‘Mundungus of course – he was the witch in the veil. The Order is keeping an eye on you, Harry.’ Said Sirius. ‘And just as well, when first thing you do on your weekend off school grounds is to organize an illegal defence group.’

He had a proud look on his face, still grinning widely. Harry resisted the urge to glare irately at Hermione. Sirius continued to relay a message to Ron from his mother, which contained the usual worried nagging about Ron being too young and ruining his future.

‘Sirius.’ Harry began trying to break into the conversation again. Sirius finished his sentence and turned to look at him. ‘We are being watched, Umbridge must had a spy at the pub as well. Just because Umbridge hasn’t caught on to us using the Floo yet… Can you try to find some other way? Hedwig got pinched, and I’m pretty sure they read your note.’ Said Harry severely.

If he’d played this right, he’d have sent Sirius down a creative path to find solutions rather than a defiant one willing to risk everything to talk to them like this.

‘Alright, I’ll see what I can do. Oh, and for the record, I think your group is an excellent idea, so don’t listen too hard to Molly.’ Sirius said with a wink.

They said their goodbyes and again, Sirius’ head vanished from the flames, and not a moment too soon, for a stubby arm ending in a sausage-fingered hand full of gaudy gold rings appeared in the fire, grasping around blindly.

All three of them ran for it. Harry stopped at the top of the stairs, looking back at Umbridge’s determined hand. A wild idea surfaced that suggested he’d find something to stab it with. He pushed it down and was about to head off to bed when he recalled his bookbag was still on the table by the window.

Patiently waiting for Umbridge to give up, he tip-toed down to fetch the bag.
Hermione had forgotten hers too, and her hemp bag full of yarn for the elf-hats. He stared at her things for a long moment, internally debating what to do. A bright green pamphlet was burning in the outer pocket of his bookbag.

Swift and quiet, he slid the pamphlet out and tucked it in between the pages of one of the books in Hermione’s bag. Listening hard, he closed its lid carefully and left for bed. Hopefully, he could get Hermione intrigued enough to want to investigate the Knights herself, then she could be the one to attempt to convince Ron. And it was unlikely she'd discover the link to Voldemort immediately, as she had no chance of recognizing Tom Riddle by sight, like Harry had.
Perhaps with a smooth enough transition, that news would go down well in the future.

That night, Harry made a huge leap of progress in his dream experimentation. In a way, it wasn’t due to any particularly difficult manoeuvres by Harry. Rather, he had noticed a curious trend over the last few dreams:
The more autonomy he gave Voldemort, the more child-Harry’s appearance changed. He’d take on traits of Voldemort, like eyes darkening, growing taller or the hair becoming tamer.

Another noteworthy aspect was that the bridge to Voldemort’s mind was getting sturdy. It took less effort to control the dreams he sent, and it was easier to maintain that control when he followed the memory into the brain of the other.

These observations, which by all rights ought to have been worrying, instead piqued his curiosity.
Harry wanted to try something new.
He prepared a memory like normal, only this time, he let Voldemort’s self-image help him form a body. Harry himself initially planned to stay disembodied, like a floating spy-camera in the hidden corners of the Dursley home. However, as soon as his eight-year-old body formed on the kitchen floor, he blinked and found his perspective to be facing the linoleum, small hands splayed on the smooth surface.

He had started the memory post-beating, but a tidal wave of dread still hit him, knowing he would soon be hauled forcefully to the cupboard.
His uncle’s plump arm popped into view, grabbing a flannel from the basket atop the washer, belt draped over his elbow.

Harry took that as his cue to roll the shirt down when Aunt Petunia spat, ‘Put it in the wash!’

She was dampening a brand-new washcloth, pink rubber gloves pulled on tight and kitchen spray bottle at the ready in her apron pocket. Harry did as commanded and took the opportunity to take a peek out the open kitchen door.

The form of Lord Voldemort was materializing in Aunt Petunia’s pristine, carpeted hallway. He looked about the same as Harry remembered him from the graveyard, apart from the clothes and with shorter, neatly styled hair. Expecting black robes, he was surprised to see Voldemort’s self-image place him in Muggle clothes. Brown trousers with press and a light-blue shirt, both of a cut and style several decades out of fashion.

He looked around for a second and seemed relieved when he caught his own reflection in the mirror hanging by the entrance to the kitchen.

‘Quit dawdling!’ Snapped Uncle Vernon, smacking the back of Harry's head with his palm.

He draped the flannel over his arm with the belt, then seized Harry’s bicep in an iron hold. He was a little pink-faced but not the purple-red of the critically explosive kind.

Resigning himself to relive the humiliation, Harry played his role, going limp in his uncle’s grasp.
The glass door sprung open, and Uncle Vernon pulled Harry after him through it. A pair of black leather shoes passed Harry’s vacant gaze, and he heard the jarring, metallic noise of the cupboard slider being opened.

Once tossed into the cupboard, Harry took in the absurd sight before him. Uncle Vernon took no notice of the menacing, adult stranger looming in his hallway. He shut the door and locked it. Harry immediately pressed his face to the vents, watching with bafflement as his uncle walked past the Dark Lord indifferently and proceeded up the stairs, all the while drying off his belt with the flannel.

Voldemort stared after Uncle Vernon bristling with ice-cold hatred. He craned his neck, peeking into the kitchen where Aunt Petunia was scrubbing splatters off the cupboard fronts.
Most of the mess was food. Not all.
For a moment, Harry thought Voldemort might head straight for the exit and leave, but instead, the vents shadowed over as the man reached for the cupboard latch. Harry dropped to the mattress, curling up on his side.

‘Oh, dear…’ Muttered Voldemort, barely audibly, looking down at the tragic sight.

There was something off about his voice. It sounded deeper, dampened, kind of. Slightly darker than the locket’s voice. It took Harry a second to realize it was probably what Voldemort felt his own voice sounded like.

Harry closed his eyes, unsure what to do now. Should he play the child? Should he try asking his question now? If so, would Voldemort take it seriously?
He was about to turn around and look, when he heard the sound of clothes brushing against carpet and the cupboard door hinges straining.

He couldn’t help it, he opened his eyes, glancing at the shadow cast on the back wall of the cupboard. To his absolute bewilderment, Voldemort had sunk to the floor, propping the cupboard door open with his leg. Harry listened as the Dark Lord tried pulling the lamp string. Nothing happened. Aunt Petunia had taken the bulb away.

Then, surprising Harry once again, Voldemort began petting the matted mop of hair sticking up over little Harry’s scrawny arm. Consoling him.
A disquiet stirred in Harry’s heart. Why was Voldemort doing this? Did he know it was present-day-Harry he was comforting? Was he doing this just to unnerve him? Because it most certainly was creepy.

But it also felt good.

‘Why are you showing me these things, Harry? Is it to punish me?’ Voldemort said in a resigned tone that revealed he did not expect an answer, speaking more to the universe of the dream and himself than Harry.

Still reeling with conflicting emotions, Harry needed a few seconds to process what it was Voldemort was asking. Thinking it was his turn to dole out surprises, Harry opened his younger self’s eyes. Fixing Voldemort’s brown eyes with a death-glare, which almost faltered instantly.

There was a compassionate gleam in those dark eyes, though Voldemort’s face remained almost emotionless. As ferociously as Harry could muster, he answered the man’s question.

‘Revenge.’ Confessed the child’s voice viciously, ‘for the boring door-dreams.’

Voldemort grinned sharply, baring brilliant, white teeth. A low chuckle developed in his chest, rolling up to a proper laugh. It wasn’t the cold, inhuman laugh Harry associated with the face beneath Quirrell’s turban or the boy in the Chamber of Secrets. His voice was warm and the laughter dripping with irony.

‘I think those are boring, too.’ He said, smiling a wide, sharkish, dimpled smile, ‘it is more fun butchering your uncle, don’t you agree?’

Thankfully, Harry was saved from responding to the madman by his own seven o’clock alarm.
Harry thought about his dream a lot the next day.

Whatever means he was going to use to ask his question, that route, direct as it was, would be the most practical.
But using childhood memories as a backdrop rendered him in a quite vulnerable position, and not one where his questions would feel demanding. If he were to have a hope in hell of gaining enough respect from Voldemort to be supplied with a proper answer, the setting had to match.

Additionally, there was a risk of being attacked in dreams where Voldemort had autonomy and Harry approached him in a form of his own age and stature.
He would have to think this over carefully.

Chapter 16: Gold and Fury

Chapter Text

The rest of the week passed miserably. The weather was foul most of the time, and Harry struggled with finding time to himself when he could sneak off to the Runes lab. When he wasn’t in class, Ron and Hermione were sticking to his back like glue. Whenever he did manage to shake them, he often found Professor McGonagall casually strolling after him, “coincidentally” going the same direction Harry was.

Thankfully, she was yet to follow him all the way to the seventh floor, and so his lab remained secret. Nevertheless, the lack of proper alone-time was grating on him, and he was itching to get the locket-business resolved. He had come up with a set of questions he wished to ask it and amassed the courage to do so. There was also another possibility he wanted to explore:
Could he get the locket to accept the fragment Harry had stuck in his scar?

While Harry was grappling with his Voldemort-problems, his friends were focusing on getting the DA off the launch pad. Efforts to find a room for the secret Defence class had gotten them nowhere. The shrieking shack was too remote, an empty classroom bound to be discovered, and the Chamber of Secrets too grizzly and the site of a traumatic memory for Ginny and Harry both. In the end, Harry reluctantly conceded that the Come-and-Go-room was the only good option.

On a happier note, Hedwig was healed and returned to Harry by way of Dobby – who turned out to be the sole customer of Hermione’s knitting, and now also the lone worker cleaning Gryffindor Tower at night.

He chatted a bit with Dobby, who was furthermore burdened with the care for Winkey, the deceased Mr. Crouch’s elf. An arduous job, seeing as she was drinking heavily with no sign of recovery in sight.
As a last-ditch effort, Harry asked Dobby if he knew of a place they could have their defence class – He suggested the Room of Requirement, which Harry figured was the same room as the Come-and-Go-Room. Begrudgingly, he finally shared the room’s existence with Ron and Hermione (crediting Dobby with the discovery), and they set out to investigate the very same day.

As Harry had come to expect from the room, it turned out irritatingly perfect. It was spacious and equipped with all the materials they might need – and a few curiosities they likely wouldn’t need, like a selection of advanced Dark-detectors proudly displayed on a shelf opposite the door.

Hermione took it upon herself to manage the logistics of informing and transporting all twenty-five participants to the room for the very first class that Saturday. It went surprisingly smoothly, as Hermione had instructed the students to travel in groups of twos and threes, and arrive spread out over the course of twenty minutes.

They started off their first meeting by formally electing Harry as leader, and selecting a name for their group, with Hermione leading the discussion from her bright pink silk cushion on the floor.
Harry contributed as little as respectfully possible.
A cracked Foe Glass was tingling at his attention. The shapes that danced in it kept shifting, like the glass was uncertain who his enemies were – which Harry supposed made sense.

Harry quite liked the name Defence Association but didn’t protest when Ginny renamed it Dumbledore’s Army as a jibe at the Ministry. Voicing his distaste would only have prompted unwelcome questions about what there was not to like about “Dumbledore’s Army”.

‘Right, shall we get to practicing then?’ said Harry when Hermione was done adding the name to the top of signature sheet. ‘I was thinking, the first thing we should do is Expelliarmus, you know, the Disarming Charm. I know it’s pretty basic, but it can be really useful-‘

‘Oh Please,’ interrupted Zacharias Smith, rolling his eyes. ‘I don’t think Expelliarmus is going to help us against You-Know-Who, do you?’

‘Well, if you think it is beneath you, you may go.’ Said Harry annoyedly, gesturing at the door with an open hand. He sincerely hoped the wart would take the hint and leave. Smith crossed his arms, but stayed where he was. Breaking off their staring contest, Harry said, ‘Great. Let’s pair up and practice.’

It felt strange giving instructions like this, and even stranger seeing them followed. Neville didn’t get a partner, so Harry ended up practicing with him. He quickly realized that starting with something simple had been a good call.

Many sent off underpowered spells that merely staggered their opponents rather than disarming them, even more people had terrible aims, sending books and cushions flying instead of wands. Neville managed to disarm Harry once while Harry was looking at the others, and didn’t have the heart to point out to him that real life opponents rarely had their heads turned away. He sent Neville to join Ron and Hermione for a bit, while he took a turn around the room, trying to help anyone having trouble and give encouragement to those he felt needed it, stopping to chat once in a while.

When nine o’clock rolled around, they wrapped it all up and agreed to meet again next Wednesday. The return journey used the same strategy as they used for arrival, with Harry, Ron, and Hermione staying last, watching the Marauder’s Map. Luckily, everyone made it back safe and undetected.

***

For the next two weeks, Harry spent Professor Umbridge’s lessons planning his own lessons for the DA. It was encouraging to observe people improve in such a short amount of time, and the thought of fighting back against Umbridge was elating. There was of course a downer to it all – it felt like a bit of a lie.

Harry wasn’t really the soldier they were rooting for. The name of their association also bothered him more and more as he realized just how little of Dumbledore’s core ideology he agreed with, and how much Harry had betrayed the benevolent headmaster in the graveyard. Still, he trudged on through it and together with Quidditch practice and the odd hour he could skim to work on the Show-and-Tell array, it had become one of his favourite parts of the week.

Where the DA showed endless promise, the same could not be said for the runes-projects. Especially the locket-experiments had stalled, mostly due to apprehension. He didn’t want to accidentally hurt the locket or invite it into his head.

Finally, on the Thursday after the second DA meeting, he successfully snuck away to work on it. The top three most boring classes had been productively spent drafting a new prototype array, which should display how the soul inside the locket had been trapped. And, if his theory was correct, it could also allow him to access its Mind with a kill-switch nearby should it all go awry.
The only precaution necessary was to, well, ensure not stumble into the active array with his head, as the ritual would null the wards he had on his collarbones.

He drew it out in charcoal, needing a warmer flux than chalk could provide, and placed the locket in the centre again. It felt cold against his fingers when he set it down, giving of a high-frequent buzz just on the edge of audible.
Harry hesitated.
It felt frightened.

The ritual won’t hurt it, Harry reassured himself, drawing back to the array’s rim.
With a tap of magic to the outer symbols, the ritual activated, glowing a reddish-pink colour, like the flesh of a grapefruit. The soul fragment popped out, small and trembling, visible strings of Mind attaching it to the gold below.

Very gently, Harry touched a trembling finger to the strings.

Hello?... He tried to think clearly, writing the word out in his mind’s eye.

…Hello…. Dearest boy…. Hello… What is your… your name…?

Harry, he thought back at it, staring at the flowing threads for any signs of recognition.
He saw none. The voice that answered bore no signs of ill will at the name either. Clearly, the locket’s fragment had split from the main soul long before Harry’s birth.

…Hello Harry… Darling boy… Please… Let me out… Anywhere… Anything… Anything but this…

Why? Did you not want this? Asked Harry, completely discarding his carefully crafted list of questions.

…Did not know… Quiet… Darkness… Nothing… There is nothing… What year is now?...

Nineteen ninety-five, answered Harry plainly.
Now the strings reacted, visibly darkening, and quivering as if rustled by the wind.

…Nearly fifff…Fifty years… Harry… Dearest Boy… Please… Let me out…

But, don’t your creator want you to stay? Why were you created?
The locket didn’t immediately answer. It’s Mind threads rippled a bit, as if sensing a threat.

…Creator did not know… The agony… The nothing… I was created… For safety… keep safe…

Keep safe from what? Should I hide you away in a vault?
Now this was a question from his list, based on what he guessed the locket would fear the most. The locket reacted with a flare, Mind contracting into a thick, shaking rope.

…NO! Please… no… Darling Harry… The nothing… Please… I don’t want… Alone again… Please…Let me out… Anything… I will do anything… My power… Let me out… Please…

I’ll try, promised Harry.

His heart hurt. A dull, grieving ache pulled at it. It didn’t matter that this soul was the same as the one that had become Voldemort. This fragment had committed no crimes against Harry and was obviously sentient enough to suffer. Harry withdrew his finger again.

How was he supposed to help this thing? Could the fragment be moved? Perhaps to a medium more conducive to contact with the outside world, like the Diary? He was sure that if he went to the bookcase, he’d find a pristine, unused notebook perfect for that purpose. But was it feasible?

Harry activated the second ring, which had a blank on it. A place for the diagnostic to write itself in.
Slowly, the blank space populated. Thin, elongated runes in a handwriting far superior to Harry’s scratched themselves in.

ᛚᛖᚲᚨᛗᛁ ᛟᚱ ᚷᚢᛚᛚ
Body of gold

He stared at the text for a long minute.

If the gold was body, that meant the only way to draw the fragment out was migrating it to a Body which the material Soul had a stronger affinity for.
In other terms: if Harry tried transplanting the fragment into the locket, the reverse was a more likely outcome, because Soul had a higher affinity for a human body than a metal one. And metal would have higher affinity than paper. The nobler the metal, the higher the affinity.
And the locket was made of gold.

The enchantment binding the soul down must have required a huge amount on energy to designate the locket as Body, as if it was a natural being. A dark perversion Harry hadn’t imagined could be done. No wonder the thing liked to be touched, its very threads of being had been plastered onto the metal as if they were transplanted nerves.
This spits on the very concept of life.

He gently picked it up and put it back on. It warmed and fuzzed as if relieved.
Harry held it between both hands, brushing the pad of his thumb compassionately over the “S”.
Its little heart fluttered. He found he wasn’t entirely convinced its mind was as scrambled as it sounded. It might be it merely struggled to communicate but for the sake of his own sanity, he opted for believing its “brain capacity” was limited.

In any case, the experiment of the day was at an end. He dropped the locket under his clothes where it belonged and pushed himself off the cold, stone floor.
Admittedly, Harry felt a bit stupid. He should have anticipated this result.
Voldemort’s soul piece had ended up in him, not a random nearby object. Of course his body’s pull was stronger than any trinket could achieve. It should have been obvious.

The only one who could viably remove the parasite from Harry’s scar, was its owner, and it was only him who could free the locket soul from its torment.
Frustrated and disappointed in himself, he officially gave up on the whole venture.

Consider your days as a test subject served, he thought at the locket.

***

The last week of October, DA-meetings were put on hold due to Angelina setting up daily Quidditch practice up to their match against Slytherin on October 31^st. The last two days, tensions before the match were rising to dangerous hights. Players were getting jinxed in corridors and teachers of certain affinities ramped up their partisanship.

Ron’s anxiety was rising by the hour. He was particularly vulnerable to Slytherin tactics designed to make him lose confidence, and so when Harry passed a group of Slytherins wearing crown-shaped pins reading “Weasley is our King” on the way to breakfast the morning of the day of the game, Harry knew there’d be trouble.

‘This stinks of Malfoy,’ He said to Angelina with a nod to some passing Slytherin second-years on their way to breakfast.

‘The Slytherin Seeker?’ She asked, eyeing the badges with a deep frown. Harry nodded.

‘Pettiest wanker in the entire Slytherin house.’ Complained Harry, though he had to admit, Malfoy could be surprisingly crafty when he wanted to be – and he knew where it hurt.

Paired with Slytherin House’s superior ability to stick together and coordinate, Malfoy had been able to both manufacture and distribute “Potter Stinks – Cederic Rules” badges to half the school by the first task last year. These simpler badges must’ve been a cakewalk in comparison.

The whole team tried to encourage Ron throughout breakfast and the walk down to the pitch, but by then, Ron had seen the badges and developed a distinctly green hue to his skin.

‘OK, I’ve just found out the final line-up for Slytherin,’ said Angelina after they’d all changed and gathered by the benches. She peeked at a piece of parchment. ‘Last year’s Beaters, Derrick and Bole graduated, looks like Montague has replaced them with the usual gorillas, rather than anyone who can fly well. They’re two blokes called Crabbe and Goyle, I don’t know much about them-‘

‘We do.’ Said Ron and Harry together.

‘They’re dumb as toast, both of them.’ Continued Ron.

‘Alright, no surprises then – they didn’t look like they knew what a broom was.’ Said Angelina, folding the parchment and stuffing it in a pocket. The crowd had gotten louder, and Harry could have sworn he heard singing. Ron’s complexion had morphed from green to grey. ‘It’s time,’ said Angelina, looking at her watch. ‘C’mon everyone… good luck.’

They got up and marched single file onto the pitch.

Lee resumed his commentary, heroically shouting out the Quaffle passings as loudly as he could, but the Slytherins got louder too. Harry reared his broom around and set off towards Ron, but by the time he got there, Ron had floundered in a goal that should have been an easy save, if he hadn’t been so flustered.
The Slytherin fans roared as Lee announced the goal, then resumed their singing with renewed enthusiasm.

This is it, he’s only going to get worse now that he’s let in one goal. I need to find the snitch – fast, Harry thought to himself, veering skywards again.
Harry had to concede, this was an excellent strategy by Malfoy.
He intensified his search for the snitch while the Slytherins were singing even louder as Ron was continuously missing saves. Basking in the fruits of his labours, Malfoy had stopped, hovering by the stands to mime conducting the choir with a detestably smug face. Temper rising, Harry sped up for the hights, ignoring Malfoy's antics.

Ron had let in four more goals by the time Harry found the snitch fluttering between the Gryffindor goalposts. As per usual, in a straight Seekers-game, Malfoy was helpless as a heavier person, on a slower broom, with worse reflexes and no daring to speak of.
Despite being way closer to the Snitch when it was spotted, he still lost by an arm’s length.

Right as Harry were to land with the snitch in hand, a Bludger hit his side.
It knocked the wind out of him, sending him in a barrel roll off his broom. He came to a stop a few feet away from the midfield-line, opting to keep completely still while the warm magic did its work on the back of a rib or two. Madam Hooch’s whistle screeched, and a roaring riot was starting in the Gryffindor stands. Running, thudding footsteps approached.

‘You alright, Harry?’ Angelina was standing over him.

‘Of course I am.’ He ground out angrily as he took her hand and allowed her to pull him to his feet.

‘It was that baboon Crabbe, he hit it at you as soon as he saw you had the snitch – But we won!’ she grinned at him, Harry grinned back before looking around him in search of Ron.
Instead, he found Malfoy.

‘Saved Weasley’s neck, haven’t you?’ he said to Harry, seething. ‘I’ve never seen a worse Keeper… but then he was born in a bin… did you like my lyrics, Potter?’

‘Ah, I figured that was you.’ Said Harry coolly. ‘And it didn’t even work. All that effort, just to lose the game the exact same way you always do – Slytherin loses because you’re a lousy seeker, Malfoy.’
He switched to the most pitiful tone he could manage at the end.

Malfoy’s face flushed bright pink.
Behind him, Harry could see Ron dismounting his broom and slowly dragging his feet towards the changing rooms. Fred and George had landed two steps behind Angelina when Malfoy decided to dig himself a hole, pale eyes flickering to the redheads he was hoping to catch the attention of.

‘We wanted to write another couple of verses, but we couldn’t find rhymes for fat and ugly – we wanted to sing about his mother, you see-‘ Katie and Alicia had come to hug Harry, but Malfoy wasn’t done,
‘-we couldn’t fit in useless loser either, for his father, you know-‘

At this, Fred and George, seemed to realise what Malfoy was talking about. They stiffened for a moment before stomping resolutely towards Malfoy, shoulders squared and ready. Harry and Angelina scurried to stand in their way.

‘Leave it!’ said Angelina.

Harry turned to Malfoy again, a sudden, irritated headache pounding against the back of his eye. The Slytherin chasers were watching from a few meters behind Malfoy, making no motion to help him. Crabbe and Goyle were busy with Madam Hooch. Malfoy was in this alone, and that gave Harry a confidence boost.

‘Wow, you – you are a pathetically sore loser. Why are you even still talking?’ laughed Harry mockingly. The locket cheered him on with a tiny flutter. Malfoy’s face reddened again but regained his sneer quickly.

He opened his mouth to resume his offensive speech, ‘Someone needs to break the news to you! But you like the Weas-‘

Harry purposefully, in an almost exaggerated gesture, turned around to his teammates, ‘Look, he’s still going!’ he said humorously, jotting his thumb over his shoulder in Malfoy’s direction.

Fred and George slowed their advance, smiled, and relaxed a bit, leering at Malfoy over Harry’s head. Harry turned back to face Malfoy, grinning and putting his hands casually in his pockets. Malfoy gaped at him.

Go on – humiliate yourself more, Draco thought Harry.
His vindictive mood fuelled by both the excitedly buzzing locket and a smouldering anger filtering through from Voldemort.
Harry made a long thssssk sound, as if the image of Malfoy stung him with second hand embarrassment and turned back to his teammates again.

‘I think we should go now, before he starts crying.’ And with that, Harry strode off towards the changing rooms. The team followed.

When they were almost at the portrait of the Fat Lady, Alicia pulled him aside. ‘You know, I don’t like that Malfoy, at all. He is a horrible bully, but that – the things you said to him were just mean, Harry. Don’t stoop to his level.’

‘He deserved it.’ Responded Harry. He didn’t particularly care what Alicia thought about this, nor Malfoy’s feelings.

‘Maybe. But do you want to be that person?’ she asked sisterly.

‘It’s only Malfoy.’ Defended Harry, before speeding up his gait to catch up with Fred and George instead.

***

Once showered and changed, Harry felt oddly abandoned. Hermione had rushed off to the library with the clear, unambiguous body-language of someone who did not want company, while Ron avoided the whole of Gryffindor house throughout the Halloween feast that evening. Eventually, Harry managed to pin him down while Fred and George were gearing up for celebrations in the common room.

‘I’m sorry.’ Mumbled Ron, eyes down.

‘What for?’ Harry could feel his patience with Ron’s confidence issues thinning. Malfoy was right, Harry had saved his hide, but he wasn’t going to rub it in like Ron thought he would.

‘For thinking I can play Quidditch… I’m going to resign to-‘

‘This is silly,’ interrupted Harry, patience gone. ‘You can play Quidditch, you should work on not letting the Slytherins get to you. It is when you lose confidence that you mess up.’

Ron nodded, still not meeting his eyes.‘The song got to me.’

‘Yes, and it would have gotten to almost anyone, so stop blaming yourself. We won, remember?’
That seemed to lighten Ron’s mood a little.

That night, the corridor dream took a turn for the worse. This time, he was chasing someone down the corridor.
Ginny.
Red hair whipped around corners and in through doors, crossing a room that spun and into a blue mist where what he was looking for hid… If he found it the girl would be free… unharmed… The Hall…. Just a little longer…

He woke up in pure anger. Voldemort should know better by now.
Frustrated, tired, and worn down from hours of agitated moods and poor sleep, Harry decided it was time to share what was arguably one of his top ten worst memories.

One he had simply dubbed “that time with the teeth” and usually tried to not think about.
He wasn’t going to follow the memory over the bridge this time, it was bad enough having to think though the whole thing in order to send it cohesively. It was a very long memory to cram into a single dream, and he most certainly wasn’t going to give Voldemort a single ounce of freedom in it.

Settling in with closed eyes and an angry frown, he pulled up the memory of a day he walked home from school when he was seven years old. Him and Dudley were both losing their baby teeth around that time, and Dudley was a fierce believer in the tooth fairy…

Abandoning all the careful plotting of the last weeks, he tacked on a hastily constructed memory to the tail-end of the teeth one. Rough-hewn and based on a practice session in front of the rune-lab mirror wall, it was only one scene of himself boldly demanding an answer to the question that had been on his mind for years.
Why me?

Chapter 17: Chain-smoking with Voldemort

Chapter Text

Thaddeus Nott awoke in a state of alarm. Noises of someone rummaging around were rising from the downstairs parlour. He squinted at the brass, wind-up alarm clock on his nightstand, blinking its arms into focus through bleary, mucky eyes.
It was bloody four o’clock in the morning.
With a long, dawn groan, he got up, old joints creaking and cracking as he swung his legs down to the floor.

‘Hmmm…’ came a sleepy hum from his wife, nearly woken up by his rising.

‘It’s fine, it’s probably just Tom. I’ll go check what he’s up to.’

She slept on.

They had given their Lord free reign of the house, so it wasn’t like there was anything wrong. Simply strange. It wasn’t like him to faff about the house in the middle of the night. When Tom did stay awake, he did so reading quietly in the upstairs library.

Concerningly, that habit had been on the increase lately, reminding Thaddeus of times when his friend hardly slept at all, and in turn had suffered dangerous deliriums. Thaddeus didn’t know which came first, the psychosis or the insomnia, but he did know that a repeat of the 70’s should be prevented at almost any cost. Perhaps it would be prudent to offer Tom a potion? Or maybe a glass of honey-wine?

Thaddeus shoved his feet into his slippers and pulled on a robe. He made his way out of the bedroom in the dark and padded down the stairs with his wand lit in front of him. The house was silent apart from the grandfather clock in the sitting room ticking and the occasional howl of the wind down a chimney. A strip of light streaked out from under the door to the parlour. Thaddeus opened it, extinguishing his wand light.

Tom was sitting in the large, deep blue armchair by the window, whiskey glass in hand. The bottle was standing on the floor beside his chair, half spent. A cigarette was giving off light tendrils of smoke from an ashtray on the windowsill. The window was open to the night.

Chilling, tender gusts of wind made the lace curtains billow and dance out into the room, partially shrouding the Lord from view. He was wearing a conjured, black dressing gown over his nightclothes.
Thaddeus crossed the room quietly, spelling the curtains out of his way and levitating another armchair over from the salon by the cold fireplace to sit across from Tom.

‘Don’t think I’ve seen you drink in what – twenty years? Thirty?’ said Thaddeus gruffly, some midnight phlegm rolling in the back of his throat. He reached down with an involuntary groan and picked up the bottle. Tom had chosen a good one – not the most expensive Thaddeus owned, but not the worst stuff either. He conjured a crystal glass with ice and poured one for himself. ‘So why the drinking now?’ He asked as he leaned back in his chair, swirling ice cubes and whiskey.

Tom picked up his cigarette again. He smoked a few drags silently, looking somewhat indecisive. The lack of sleep had carved dark, purple circles under his eyes, which were bloodshot enough to obscure the edge of his red irises. He bit his bottom lip, raking his teeth over it and ripping off a piece of dry skin, leaving it raw and bleeding.

Finally, he stumped the cigarette and turned to answer Thaddeus. ‘The last few months I’ve been sending visions of the Department of Mysteries to Harry Potter via dreams… I discovered the opportunity quite by accident when I suddenly received a dream that could not possibly be mine… Since then, I have been trying to entice him to fetch the prophesy I told you about…’
He was talking slowly, like he was simultaneously holding a fierce debate in his head that needed his attention as much as speaking did.

‘… And he started to send visions back.’ Finished Tom.

Thaddeus’ eyebrows rose until he felt his forehead scrunch, impressed. That Tom had the fortitude to send visions hundreds of miles away though some strange version of Legilimency made sense - but that the boy could return it, did not.

Tom turned his head back to look out the window at the glowing city outside. A shrill, wailing Muggle-noise drifted on the wind. Thaddeus could vaguely recall Tom naming them “sirens” despite being made by machines that had nothing in common with water nymphs.

‘How? What… What kind of visions is he sending?’ asked Thaddeus.

It had to be something disturbing, to make Tom get up for a drink in the middle of the night. He took a fortifying sip of his own drink, savouring how the spirit burned through the slime and opened up his airways.
Tom took a deep breath through his nose.

‘How, I do not know. He is torturing me… with memories of his own childhood.’ Said Tom quietly. He appeared to be feeling around his mouth with his tongue a lot.

‘I thought he grew up spoiled rotten in some countryside manor?’ mumbled Thaddeus roughly.
Potter was the famous wonderchild of Wizarding Brittain, after all – and from a very wealthy family.

‘No…No, he grew up with his aunt and uncle and their child… In some dreary suburb… Worst type of Muggles…They don’t treat him well….’ Tom’s voice was barely above a whisper.
He downed the rest of his glass and poured himself another, still not looking at Thaddeus.

‘Beatings?’ asked Thaddeus.

It had been normal for children to receive corporal punishments at the time they grew up, often spankings or raps with a cane to the palms or soles of the feet.
‘Whippings, yes… but also much crueller things… unpredictable things… burns… starvation… they left him locked in a dark cupboard for days… his simpleton cousin would break bones or – or use weapons...’
Tom took another sip and lit a new cigarette wandlessly, letting it sag between his bloodied lips while the smoke poured out his nose. His head lolled back a little against the earlaps on his chair, sluggish and tipsy.

Thaddeus scratched the scruff on his chin absentmindedly.
Tom had always had an additional investment in the welfare of children. He was the one who originally proposed establishing magical primary schools and was the hardest proponent for early inclusion of muggleborn children. Not that he’d own up to it, the git. He’d play it off coldly, like it was nothing more than another equally important issue on the Knights’ agenda.

But Thaddeus knew him better than that.
Tom had grown up around three distrustful, emotionally distant adults and a huge flock of children. He hadn’t had a lick of faith in the teachers when he got to Hogwarts but was disturbingly good at forging relations with students both younger and older than himself.

Despite his initial handicap as a “Mudblood”, he got in close and found a place in the group long before revealing his ties to Salazar Slytherin. Of course, he’d been an oddity with a threatening aura and an arrogantly domineering demeanour - but he also had both the power and prowess to back it up. Additionally, he’d been very mature for his age and leveraged his superior knowledge of violence and sexuality against his more childish classmates, obtaining both shock and awe – and most importantly, respect.

But the way he treated his peers versus the Hogwarts staff was the strangest part.
It was like he believed children to be people while adults were enemies, something that persisted until he was almost an adult himself. Thaddeus supposed it made sense.

Some of the children Tom grew up with probably ended up in that orphanage due to circ*mstances similar to the abuse Harry Potter was tormenting him with now.
The Potter boy would never know it, but he had accidentally stumbled upon a huge, exposed nerve to stab that effectively led straight into the sorry remnants of Tom’s heart.

‘This last dream… His cousin ambushed Harry after school. You know, Muggles have a myth about a fairy that comes to take away children’s discarded baby teeth in exchange for money?’ said Tom.

Thaddeus shook his head. Almost seventy years old, and Muggles could still surprise him.

‘Well, Harry’s cousin believed this fiercely… He had his friends hold Harry down – they sat on his arms and legs, while another boy held his forehead down and pressed here, hard-‘ Tom pointed to the dip of his chin, ‘forcing Harry’s mouth open, while… while his cousin tried to pry Harry’s teeth out with a set of big pliers Muggles use for carpentry and such.’ His face contorted into a disgusted mask as he said this. Thaddeus mirrored it.

‘They got out three of his baby teeth and one adult tooth,' continued Tom, frown deepening, '- and they crushed one of his adult molars…Chipped another… His aunt and uncle punished Harry when the boys got home… because it looked like he’d been brawling…with the blood and the swelling… They locked him in the dark cupboard…spitting pieces of that molar for days… Thinking he swallowed bits of his teeth in his sleep…’

Thaddeus unthinkingly began feeling around his teeth with his tongue. Every ground-down old nub suddenly felt loose, and the gums numb and swollen. He downed the rest of his glass too, and reached out to Tom, who handed him the bottle. They’d have to get a new one soon.

‘And he made me live through it… Trapped me in his body while the boys held him down… Made me feel every painful pull… The crushed pieces… I saw it through his eyes… I was thinking his thoughts… Shivering and starving in that cupboard…’
Tom took the bottle back and poured out the last few drops into his own glass.

‘…I didn’t know who I was when the dream changed… I was so disoriented, I had been living as… as little Harry for three days… Oh, yes - he put in a question at the end. After a three-day long dream… Just - Just Harry as he is now, sitting on the surface of a lake of blood in the dark, big theatre spotlight over his head…’ Tom drunkenly made an illustrative gesture with one hand and took a deep drag of his cigarette in his other.

‘…He asked me why.’ Said Tom, aggressively stumping his cigarette and turning towards Thaddeus, face twisted into a sour smile. ‘Why… Why, why, why… Why him.’

Thaddeus got up to fetch a new bottle of whiskey from the glass-fronted cabinet on the other side of the room.

Taking a quick look to ensure there was no wand in Tom’s hand, Thaddeus braved a cruder comment, ‘Tom – just tell the kid the f*cking truth.’

Tom whipped his head around the side of the chair to glower at him, but no hexes or curses came. Instead, the anger melted away to resignation atypically fast.
He’s tired of the f*cking games too, he thought as Tom wilted down into his chair again.

Thaddeus shuffled back with another mid-tier bottle of whiskey and poured his Lord a glass, then himself. Now on the rare occurrence that Tom was drinking, Thaddeus thought it only fair to get him properly pissed.

Tom accepted the glass with an unsteadily hovering hand. ‘I suppose I could bargain with him… He knows something about this – this connection… And I still want to know why he fed power to my resurrection ritual… and what he meant by parasite…’ He said foggily.

Thaddeus harrumphed at that. ‘Of course, can’t simply give the boy anything without getting something in return now, can we.’ He said, adding a hint of sarcasm.
Tom shot him a hard look.
‘You’re not going to use the fact that you let him go, right? Hold that over him and require payment?’

It would be the easy way – make the kid feel indebted to Tom for not murdering him.
However dim that sounded, Thaddeus was certain Tom could make it work.

‘No. No that was payment. For his input with the ritual.’ Said Tom clearly, stressing his point with a tensely open hand patting the air in front of him. ‘There is something wrong with him…’

‘What, children aren’t supposed to know that magic you mean?’ Said Thaddeus.

‘Yes, but that may merely be a symptom… Or – or, I don’t know, it sounds so absurd, but… My attempt to kill him back in June and the Cruciatus Curse before it felt so off kilter… A bit like trying to kill a unicorn, only worse… and ominous… It was like having a power not even I could want,-‘
Thaddeus couldn’t help but hark. He narrowly stopped it from becoming an incredulous laugh by nipping some whiskey. Tom didn’t notice.
‘-Like having the spell that would forever put out the sun… Instincts screaming not to use it, all the while I kept my wand on him…’

Thaddeus hummed ponderingly over his whiskey. Honestly, he had no idea what Tom was on about and figured it was better not to ask for clarifications. It was probably just drunken rambles anyway.

Moving on, Thaddeus asked, ‘About that day… Did you know the boy was a parselmouth? Before that, I mean?’
Tom shook his head.
‘Didn’t think the Potters were descended from the Slytherin line… I thought those were the only ones who had that ability… Or am I missing something here?’ Thaddeus said leadingly, hoping Tom would take the bait. He used to be obsessed with wizarding lineages in their school days.

‘It surprised me too.’ Said Tom, whirling the liquid in his glass.

‘Could your family have an offshoot? Bastard cousin that ended up in the Potter family somehow?’

Tom took a sip while he shook his head.
‘No, but I wondered about this too, so I have been studying family trees in your library… It’s not impossible that he simply inherited the trait after it had laid dormant through the Potters. He and I have common ancestors in the Peverell family, and that line crossed with both the Slytherin and Gaunts several times over the last thousand years… There are connections between the Potters and Gaunts too, quite far back… But your books document the female lines inadequately… Some never state the maiden names of the wives…’

Thaddeus could only conjure up a hoarse noise in response.
The topic of female lines of inheritance was a sore one for Tom. The archaic rules of the Registry of Wizards and Witches and the Department of Magical Records had hindered him in assuming his mother’s maiden name as his last name.

Thaddeus had once suggested he’d marry one of the eligible pure-blood girls in their social group and take his wife’s name, mostly in the hopes of saving his Lord from an onslaught of nasty rumours. He’d used preserving the Parseltongue ability and the Slytherin line as an argument too.
Tom had not taken it well.

In any case, Tom uncovering Potter’s abilities gave the rare trait a renewed chance to survive. If Tom would only let the boy live long enough to procreate, that is.
It wasn’t hopeless. Tom had a harder time disposing of people he knew than strangers and faceless adversaries. Perhaps some amicable interactions between them on common ground could solidify Harry Potter’s right to life in Tom’s head. It was worth a shot.

‘I think the boy would listen to a show of good faith, Tom. He seems like the type. Talk to him.’
Thaddeus took a larger sip and then leaned over to the windowsill to nab a cigarette from Tom’s pack. Tom didn’t stop him.

‘I think you’re right about that… He is the type for that… Ever since he started sending dreams in return… this mysterious link of ours has gotten stronger… I can almost always sense him now… In the back of my mind… Distraught emotions… His – his deep despair at night…’ Said Tom, eyes shifting thoughtfully, breathing out a long stream of smoke.

‘Sounds infuriating.’ Coughed Thaddeus.
A teenager forcing his depression on Tom. It was a whole new level of absurd. He couldn’t decide if this information counted towards the boy’s safety or not.

Tom snorted humourlessly, ‘It is… But I found I must dampen my reactions… Or his gets worse… Which makes me angrier… Vicious cycle…’

Thaddeus downed the rest of his glass. He needed it.
If Harry Potter was behind not only the astonishing restoration of Tom’s sanity, but also the reason behind the slow mellowing of Tom’s normally violent temper over the last few months…
Thaddeus owed the boy a f*cking prize.

They stayed silent for a few moments, before Thaddeus spoke again. ‘I doubt he understands why you let him go, Tom. Were it me, it’d be eating me up.’

Tom seemed to mull it over for a minute.
‘I think he knows. Or at least, I think he has guessed… He took a huge risk, interrupting Wormtail and I preparing the ritual… He should at least listen to propositions, all things considered…’ He gave Thaddeus a crooked, dimpled smile. ‘I think I know what to do.’

Chapter 18: A Sign of Good Faith

Chapter Text

Sunday evening, Hagrid returned to Hogwarts.

‘Hagrid’s back!’ Hermione had said at once the portrait hole closed behind her, ‘there’s smoke from the chimney at least.’

She stopped at the table Ron and Harry were using to tackle the horrendously long essay about stirring speed due the next day.

‘Let’s go!’ Said Harry, packing up quickly.

He cast a glance over at the library books Hermione was clutching to her chest, and his stomach did a little flip. Wizengamot – The Reformation Years 1911-1937 and an earlier book in the same series was in her pile.
This is promising, thought Harry, biting back his smile. Hopefully, Hermione would announce the results of her labours soon. She’d been wonderfully cagey lately, in a manner that reminded Harry of the last few weeks before she started S.P.E.W.

They hurried to dress warmly and with cloak and map, rushed into the night down to Hagrid’s.
He was a foul sight to behold. Eye black and swollen, split lip and eyebrow bleeding. It took a bit of nagging, but eventually, he told his story while holding a big, green steak to his eye (they had offered to heal him, but he refused).

With some persistent persuasion, Hagrid’s half-hearted attempts at maintaining any level of secrecy folded, and he laid out a mad story of attempting to win over giants with gifts. In the end, language barriers and feuds within the giant community prevented them from making any new allies.

‘Stange thing though,’ said Hagrid as he finished his story. ‘There weren’ any Death Eaters. Dumbledore, he though’ You-Know-Who would try an’ get ‘em for his army, but… Non’ but Olympe ‘n me there.’

Hermione and Ron frowned and started speculating in why Voldemort had lost interest in the giants. Harry kept his mouth shut.

‘Maybe they’re so few now, You-Know-Who won’t bother with them?’ guessed Ron, ‘or maybe he’s realized they’re too erm, difficult to handle?’

‘Or maybe we were faster?’ suggested Hermione.

‘Dunno. Migh’ be. Could ask Dumbledore abou’ it, migh’ be some news I missed.’ Said Hagrid, passing around his tray of rock cakes.

Harry thought he had a fairly good idea why Voldemort would skip the giants. He took a rock cake to be polite and at the first opportunity, brought the conversation back to Hagrid’s injuries.

‘Come off it, Hagrid, it looks like you’ve fought a troll!’ Harry injected into a budding argument about giants being “a violent bunch”.

Hagrid turned the finger he’d been pointing at Ron and Hermione towards Harry instead, ‘Now, yeh listen here, it,-‘
Before Hagrid could finish his answer, there was a brisk knock on the door.

They scrambled to get under the invisibility cloak and huddle into a corner.

‘Hagrid, hide our mugs!’ hissed Hermione.
Hagrid shoved them under a cushion in Fang’s basket and went to open the door, barely restraining the over-excited Fang.

Professor Umbridge was wearing something Harry thought looked like a Sherlock Holmes costume.

‘So – You – are – Hag-rid – are – you?’ she said loudly and slowly, as if speaking to someone old and hard of hearing.
She let herself in, waving her handbag at the friendly, but huge and unruly Fang.

Hagrid asked her some rudimentary questions, like who she was and why she was here, and she answered him rudely, as if he was a small, stupid child.
Their conversation moved to an interrogation about footprints, injuries and mugs that Hagrid did his best to answer, though that wasn’t very good. Harry wished he’d just kick Umbridge out of his house the way he had Lucius Malfoy three years ago.

Finally, Professor Umbridge left.

Hagrid stared after her out the window and said, ‘She’s goin back ter the castle… Inspectin’ people, is she?’

‘Yeah. Trelawney’s on probation already. She’s been in loads of classes.’ Said Harry, lifting the cloak off the three of them.

‘Um, what sort of thing are you planning to do with us in class, Hagrid?’ asked Hermione with tender care.

‘Oh, don’ you worry abou’ that, I’ve got a great load o’ lessons planned,’ Hagrid replied happily, smacking the nasty steak over his eye again. ‘I’ve been keepin’ a couple o’ creatures saved fer yer O.W.L year; you wait, they’re somethin’ really special.’

Harry, Ron, and Hermione exchanged ominous looks. Hagrid’s idea of “special” overlapped with “dangerous” awfully often.

‘Look, Hagrid. Professor Umbridge will have you sacked if you bring anything dangerous.’ Stated Harry.

Hermione and Ron nodded their support. Hagrid lifted the steak off his face for a moment, the uninjured eye raised its eyebrow.

‘Dangerous? Don’t be silly, I wouldn’ give yeh anythin’ dangerous! I mean, all righ’, they can look after themselves-‘

‘Hagrid! You’ve got to pass Umbridge’s inspection, and to do that it would really be better if she saw you teaching us how to look after Porlocks, how to tell the difference between Knarls and hedgehogs, stuff like that!’ said Hermione with emphasis.

‘But tha’s not very interestin’, Hermione-‘

‘It’s just while Umbridge is inspecting!’ Harry cut in- ‘Once she’s gone, you can show the interesting stuff again-‘

‘She hates half-humans, Hagrid!’ cried Hermione, catching Hagrid’s ear. ‘She’s been fighting for all kinds of awfully bigoted legislation for years. She even submitted a draft to the Wizengamot to have non-humans “capable of cross-breeding” who lives among humans sterilized!’

That last draft was new to Harry. A new spurt of hatred for Umbridge boiled in his brain, soothed slightly by the happiness of witnessing the first results of Hermione’s newest library-dive.

‘I don’ think tha’s hate. Lots of Wizards want sep’ration. An’ bein’ half… well, migh’ be for the best fewer of ‘em are born.’
Hagrid shifted in his seat. It was obvious he wasn’t entirely confident in his answer.

Sensing a good opening, Harry said, ‘No, she definitely hates. When we talked to Sirius about her classes, his first question about what she was teaching was “is she training you to kill half-breeds?”. That was his guess!’

‘She really is notorious, Hagrid! Please don’t provoke her when she’s inspecting, and show really harmless things,-‘ Hermione pleaded to Hagrid’s far more concerned expression.

‘Yeah! Just lay low for a few weeks, and-‘ Ron added, accidentally torpedoing their efforts.

‘A few weeks? It can’ be tha’ bad, can it?’ asked Hagrid rhetorically.
He leaned back until his chair groaned and said with reassurance, ‘Look, don’ you go worryin abou’ me, I promise yeh I’ve got really good stuff planned fer yer lessons now I’m back. Tha’ woman will see too.’

In the end, they left feeling unsettled. Harry vocally hoped that Trelawney was worse, and Hermione shared his sentiment.

‘I’ll plan his lessons for him if I have to. I don’t care if she throws out Trelawney but she’s not getting rid of Hagrid!’ she said angrily.

***

Hermione went back to Hagrid’s the next day to try to convince him to keep Professor Grubbly-Plank’s lesson plan, or at least sway his own down a safer route. Ron and Harry stayed inside with their mountain of homework that had built up while they had daily Quidditch practice the week before.

Hermione came back with only disappointing news. She’d not made any headway with Hagrid. He still didn’t take Umbridge seriously, no matter how animatedly Hermione tried to explain her character. Harry went to bed that night dreading the Care for Magical Creatures class on the morrow.

Care for Magical Creatures started out good.
Hagrid met them carrying a cow carcass over his shoulder and led the class into the darkness of the woods. Harry, Ron, and Hermione knew then that Hagrid couldn’t possibly be heeding their advice to show something harmless.

The creatures Hagrid had chosen were Thestrals, the ugly, white-eyed, winged horses that pulled the school carriages. Finally, Harry had indisputable proof he hadn’t imagined these things.

They tore pieces of the dead cow while Hagrid addressed the class, ‘Now… Put yer hands up, who can see ‘em?’
Harry and Neville raised their hands, as did two others.
‘I knew you’d be able ter, Harry, and you too, Neville, eh? An’-‘

‘Excuse me,’ interrupted Malfoy rudely, ‘but what exactly are we supposed to be seeing?’

Hagrid extended a large finger towards the rapidly vanishing cow meat on the forest floor. There was a small outburst of shrieks and surprised yelps. Hagrid waited for them to calm down before naming the creatures and taking a minute to dispel a myth Parvati had learned off Trelawney.

‘Don’ worry, it won’ hurt yeh. Righ’ now, who can tell me why some o’yeh can see ‘em an’ some can’t?’ Hagrid asked the class.

As per usual, Hermione raised her hand and Hagrid prompted her answer with a wide grin on his face.

‘The only people who can see Thestrals are people who have seen death.’ Said Hermione methodically right before an unholy ‘hem hem’ broke through the forest peace.

Professor Umbridge had trotted up behind Harry, wearing the same cloak and deerstalker hat as she had on when she visited Hagrid’s hut two days prior.
Hagrid greeted her friendlily, but all communication went downhill from there. Professor Umbridge kept treating Hagrid like a simpleton, who in turn thought Professor Umbridge was slow minded, which created a vicious circle. Eventually, Umbridge let Hagrid return to teaching.

It only lasted a few minutes before she interrupted, clipboard on the ready.

‘You are aware that the Ministry of Magic has classified Thestrals as “dangerous”?’ she said, voice dripping with her habitual, contemptuous syrupiness.

Stupidly, Hagrid replied with a jolly balk and grinned, ‘Thestrals aren’ dangerous! All righ’ they might take a bit outta yeh if yeh really annoy them-‘

‘Shows…signs…of…pleasure…at…idea…of…violence…’ Umbridge read as she wrote.

Hagrid tried to defend what he said, sadly to his own detriment. Harry knew then that Professor Umbridge’s strategy was to deliberately bait Hagrid into admitting to being violent. Her prejudices against half-humans were clear on show. She began moving around the class, asking the Slytherins leading questions and noting down their answers while Hagrid tried to teach.

Harry listened infuriatedly to Parkinson’s lies to Umbridge when something bumped into his hip. Looking down, he met the milky eyes of an adult Thestral. It stared at him expectantly, sniffing his robes with large, flaring nostrils.

‘Who did you see die?’ He heard Umbridge ask Neville somewhere to his right.

Harry’s head whipped around to where they were standing. Neville appeared awfully uncomfortable.

‘Um, my granddad.’ Answered Neville, sending nervous glances at Hagrid and Hermione.

‘And what do you think of them?’ Umbridge asked, waving at the Thestrals.

‘Well…They’re OK…’

‘Students… are… too… intimidated… to admit… they are… frightened…’ Umbridge read aloud again.

Enraged, Harry was about to break in with a defence when something bumped into him once more.

‘They seem to like yeh, Harry!’ hollered Hagrid, catching everyone’s attention.

The first Thestral had been joined by two more, standing around Harry like spokes on a wheel, sniffing him absorbedly.

Mostly to spite Umbridge, Harry tried petting one of them.
The skin felt identical to human skin. It was disturbing. The Thestral tipped its head up, staring brightly at Harry as he switched to scratching behind its ears. It made an unsettling groan that sounded more like a raven’s caw than any noise a horse would make. Suddenly, another Thestral usurped his kin’s attention by bodily forcing his own head in under Harry’s hand, pushing the other away.

‘Hey! Nothing for you, if you do stuff like that!’ laughed Harry, giving his attention to another instead.

‘For those tha’ can’t see ‘em, Harry’s got five aroun’ him now.’ Declared Hagrid to the class, which was largely ogling Harry like he was bonkers.

Harry bent over to scratch one of the smaller Thestrals, which a tall one took as the opportune moment to loudly sniff Harry right in the ear.

‘Arh!’ He laughed at the audacious animal, which had moved its muzzle to nip gently on his hair.

‘Do yeh wan’ me to take ‘em off yeh, Harry?’ asked Hagrid, walking over while ignoring Malfoy’s attention-seeking bully-question (Does that mean Potter will die soon?).

‘Nah. They’re quite sweet.’ Said Harry, beaming at him.

Hagrid grinned back sunnily.
He didn’t notice when Umbridge left the class.

***

The rest of November passed in a flash. It felt like the leaves had hardly began falling before the trees were bare and covered in glittering frost overnight. The cold seeped into the drafty corridors, and Harry was happy to spend most of his evenings in front of the fire in the Gryffindor Common room with Ron. Hermione was mostly absent, running off to the library on her own as soon as classes ended with no invitation for her friends to join her.

‘Well, at least she’s stopped putting hats out for elves.’ Ron had shrugged when Harry had commented on it.

He was right. Hermione usually didn’t get in before curfew, and then only to head straight for the girl’s dorms with a wave and a quick “goodnight”.

Harry glanced over at her usual chair. ‘She hardly knits at all anymore. Think she’s given up on the elf-stuff?’

‘A man can dream.’ Said Ron sunnily.

December brought a spike in homework, and Prefect duties for Ron and Hermione. Harry was so busy, that he barely noticed that the corridor-dreams had stopped. In fact – he had more nights of restful, peaceful sleep the last six weeks of term than he’d had all of the rest of the year combined. The vibes coming off of the link to Voldemort were also exceptionally tranquil, to the point of soothing – it mystified Harry to no end.

The last meeting of the DA before Christmas was focused on stunning and impedimentia-jinxes. Harry could hardly believe how much some of them had improved, particularly Neville and Cho, who both had shown to be highly motivated and diligent. He made sure to dose out praises to everybody, but gave Neville and Cho some extra attention. A great idea for Neville, a great mistake for Cho.

When the meeting dissolved, she sent her friend Marietta away in advance and hung back as Harry watched the little dots on the map reach their common rooms.

‘What’s up?’ asked Harry when he realized she was still there. Ron and Hermione had already left – Cho had finally managed to catch him alone.

I have to tell her off… Better I do it now when no one else sees it. Save us both some embarrassment, he thought. He looked up from the map to see tears streaming down her face. What the bloody hell do I do now?

‘Er… Are you alright, Cho?’ he asked feebly.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said with a big sniff. ‘It’s just… I suppose… learning all this stuff… makes me wonder whether… if he’d known it all… he’d still be alive.’

She dried her eyes with her jumper, and Harry did his utmost to supress an eyeroll. Fine – if you want to talk about Cedric, have it your way.

‘Cho…’ Harry sighed dejectedly, ‘Cedric was hit with the Killing Curse seconds after the portkey landed. He never even saw his attacker – the only way Cedric could’ve survived, was if he didn’t take the cup with me.’ He tried to keep his voice gentle, but he could feel frustration bleeding through.

Cho hiccoughed. ‘You survived when you were just a baby.’ She said thickly.

Harry’s light frustration morphed into proper irritation. The locket vibrated electrically against his chest in agreement.

‘Yes, due to circ*mstances entirely out of my control.’ He said hotly and took a few reaching strides towards the door.

‘Oh, don’t go! I’m sorry!’ said Cho with a sob, grasping after Harry’s sleeve with fingers tucked into the cuffs of her jumper.

Her hand migrated to hold Harry’s wrist then slid downwards as if wanting to hold his hand. Harry withdrew it gently. Against his chest, the locket abruptly went ice cold.
I need to check on that, he thought, resisting the instinct to touch it.

‘You know… I think you’re so brave, standing up to Umbridge, telling the truth about what happened and all.’ She said, interrupting her reach for Harry’s hand by tucking a strand of hair behind her ear in a pitiful attempt at being suave.

‘Erm, thanks.’ Harry replied stiffly, the hand Cho kept up by her face distracting him. The back of it had a white, complex, raised scar, as if she’d been rasping at her own skin with a sewing needle for a few hours.

She put her hands down, tugging the jumper sleeves down over them and said, ‘I’ve tried standing up to Umbridge too, you know… Say the truth about Cedric.’

Cho fixed him with an anticipatory look. Did she think that would impress him? What was she trying to achieve here?

‘Erm… is that why you’ve had so many detentions this year?’ Harry asked as conversationally as he could muster, given the staleness of their interaction.

‘Yeah… Professor Flitwick says if I get more, I won’t be a prefect anymore…’

Harry wasn’t sure what to do with this information. On one hand, he felt bad for Cho, but on the other, it was her choice to risk the Prefect badge as she wished. ‘Then, er… are you sure it’s worth it?’ He asked.

Cho nodded with a wet sniff, ‘I wanted to be brave too, like you.’

She was looking at him flirtingly from under her lashes. A few tears clung to them, but the eyes were hopeful.

‘Cho… I’m not interested in…in that way, you know.’ Harry ground out, trying to be careful when selecting his words. This was incredibly awkward.

‘Oh.. uhm.. I thought…’ she sniffed again, ‘Is it Hermione… or that Ginny girl?’

Harry could hear the unspoken why not me. For a moment he felt sorry for her.
It didn’t last.
That Cho wanted to go out with Harry, of that there was no doubt – but that she was basing that wish on genuine feelings, well… It made no sense to Harry. He was a year younger than her, he was shorter than her and plain-looking. From all he knew of girls’ desires, that should’ve outright disqualified him from entering their dating pool.
And he knew she was not over Cedric.

‘No. no, I don’t fancy anyone at the moment.’ Said Harry.

That seemed to reignite Cho’s hope. She tucket a strand of hair behind her ear with a coquette flourish, giving Harry an urge to roll his eyes once again. ‘OK… I wondered maybe if- if you wanted to come with me to-‘

‘No- Cho…’ Groaned Harry aggravatedly before he could stop himself.

‘What…? I don’t understand…’ She was getting teary-eyed again. ‘Why not?’

Harry braved another step backwards in the direction of the door and put his hands in his pockets. His patience with her and this situation was growing threadbare.

‘Do I need a reason?’ He countered, voice sharper than first intended. The cold spot on Harry’s sternum was growing painful, like the locket had been kept in a -40° box freezer before it was dropped around his neck.

‘But,-’ Cho started to argue, her expression sincerely confused. ‘I thought- I mean, you asked me to the ball and,-‘

‘Yeah, I had to ask someone! I asked you ‘cause you seemed cool, not,-‘

That was apparently the wrong thing to say. Tears were streaming down Cho’s face again, her lip wobbling, eyes and nose swollen.

‘Why… Why don’t – don’t you like me?’ She sobbed.

‘It’s not that I don’t like you, Cho, just not that way,’ Reiterated Harry impatiently, clenching his fist to keep his hands off the locket, which was now so icy it was agonizing.

Cho began reaching for him again, still with her hands buried in her jumper sleeves like an adult’s socks on a tiny child’s foot. ‘But – but then why not give me a chance, like… come to Hogsmeade with,-‘

Harry cut her off, frustrations amplified by pain carried his voice up to the verge of yelling, ‘Why can’t you just respect that I don’t want to?’
Don’t want you, amended his brain.

Cho answered with a whimper, crying harder now than she had before. Harry stood there for a minute, shifting his weight around in discomfort a few times before giving up. Going over to console her would probably make things worse. Instead, Harry gave her an irritated wave.

‘See you around, Cho,’ he said, leaving.

***

When he got back to the common room, Ron and Hermione were in their favourite chairs by the fire. Hermione was writing a letter, while Ron appeared to still be doing homework.

‘What kept you?’ he asked when Harry arrived.

‘I had to let down Cho. And she was crying about Cedric.’ Harry shook his head at the ridiculousness of it all. The locket was warming back up, which was a relief, but Harry still longed to check on it properly.

Ron gawked at him, then said confrontationally, ‘I can’t believe you let down Cho. I mean, she’s pretty, smart and plays Quidditch! What is it you don’t like about her?’

The silence was deafening.
He could cook up some more half-baked reasons or spin some elaborate lie about fancying somebody else – both strategies likely to backfire. Tellingly, Hermione kept her mouth shut.

‘What does it matter to you?’ deflected Harry.

‘Wha- it matters if my best friend’s gone mental, doesn’t,- hey! What’s with you!?’ called Ron as Harry motioned towards the dorms.

‘Ron…’ Hermione leaned over, putting a hand on Ron’s arm and fixing him with a meaningful, dejected look.

‘What?’ cried Ron, his confounded glare bouncing back and forth between Harry and Hermione.

Harry felt frozen to the spot. Hermione shot Ron another glance which slowly melted the hostility off his face, making way for open realization.

‘Is there someone else you fancy?’ Asked Ron with an uneven mix of excitement and apprehension. Clearly, he missed the core message of Hermione’s stare. Harry opened his mouth to answer a spirited ‘no’, but apparently, he was too slow for Ron.
‘There is, isn’t there! Who!?’

‘No one!’

‘It’s my sister, isn’t it!’ accused Ron.

‘No!’ defended Harry, thoroughly ticked off while Hermione slapped her own forehead.

‘Fine. You don’t have to tell us.’ Said Ron tartly with a hint of disappointment.

‘You’re right, I don’t.’ Replied Harry in kind.

He fled for the dorms without another word, itching to lock the bathroom door behind him and be alone. Once in the dormitory, he greeted Seamus and Dean (who were reading a Muggle car magazine together on Dean’s bed) and hastily fetched his toiletries and pyjama.

Finally alone, he took the locket off and gave it a thorough inspection. It seemed unharmed, though a bit chilly for an object that normally stayed quite toasty.
He took a meaninglessly long shower, washing his hair sloppily before sitting down on the heated tiles, procrastinating getting out of the warm spray. Almost forty minutes later, he gathered enough energy to finish his evening routine and return to the dorm.

Neville, Seamus, and Dean’s curtains were already closed, wheezing snores drifting out from Neville’s. Ron had yet to close his and was laying in his bed with his back to Harry.

He didn’t say anything as Harry pinched out his candle and climbed into bed, but as Harry began closing his bed curtains, he said, ‘You know you can tell us anything, right?... Hermione and me… I mean anything. Even if you do fancy Ginny, I won’t get mad – it’s weird, but,-‘

‘Ron,’ sighed Harry quietly, ‘I don’t fancy Ginny.’

There was a painful pause. Harry stayed as he was, holding onto his curtain while the cogs turned in Ron’s head. It wasn’t hard to imagine what was going on in there. He and Hermione had doubtlessly talked about it after Harry left for the shower.

At last, Ron spoke again, ‘OK – Good…erm… but – yeah. You can tell me anything, mate… Just wanted you to know.’

Harry answered with a non-committal hum and closed the curtain. A deep, mournful sigh slipped through the fabric, before he heard Ron close his own. Soon, familiar snores filled the air and Harry closed his eyes, trying his best to think of absolutely nothing.
Eventually, his thoughts grew distorted and the images behind his eyelids vivid as he slipped into a dream of tall, dry grass, windy weather and crashing waves – and realized almost immediately that he was dreaming.

On the edge of a white, jagged cliff before a twenty-meter-high drop into the ocean, stood Voldemort. He was wearing Muggle clothes again. A midnight blue, button-down shirt, sleeves rolled up to the elbows under an old-fashioned, black waistcoat, and black trousers. He had his hands in his pockets, all confident, relaxed elegance that somehow conveyed the man's threatening nature better than the snakes, skulls and black robes ever did. Harry wanted to take a step back, but he found he had no control over his body.

Instead, he took three involuntary steps forward. Voldemort’s wine-red eyes were looking almost at him, the same way Harry sometimes would when he wasn’t wearing his glasses and couldn’t quite make out where people's pupils were, merely the shadows in their eye-sockets.
Harry realized that this was likewise a “recording” to what he had sent Voldemort at the end of the teeth-memory.

‘I thought we ought to make an exchange.’ Said the Voldemort mirage with a tranquil, dimpled smile. ‘I will answer your question if you answer mine.’
Harry couldn’t move or look around as he wanted, and so he began studying Voldemort’s face.

His features were noticeably unclear and the skin unnaturally smooth, like an airbrushed magazine cover. Likely, the medium of dreams was incapable of producing a higher resolution. A shame because saying that Voldemort was “Easy on the eyes” would be a gross understatement.

His long, graceful neck ended in a sharp jawline. There was a brush of grey hair at his temples, waving back into the neat coif. The outer corners of his eyelids had gotten heavier than they were in his teens, making his otherwise sharp face look kinder.
A dangerous illusion.

‘I want to know what you did to my resurrection array – I cannot seem to remember the details of our discussion anymore. I also want to know why you fed the ritual everything you had, and what you meant by “Parasite”.’

Those weren’t unreasonable requests, thought Harry, but by responding he risked simply giving Voldemort what he wanted and not receiving any answers in return.

‘As a show of good faith,’ the diffuse figure Voldemort on the hill drew up a charming, close-lipped, smile and threw his arms out in an open gesture, ‘I offer you this: The corridor and doors you have been seeing are from The Department of Mysteries. My plan was to tickle your curiosity enough for you to go there for me. There is something there I need, but I cannot go myself. It has been a headache of mine for months. And as a bonus – I have sent Nagini to scout the place out tonight – she’s there now. I know Dumbledore’s Order of fools have been keeping guard on the door. If Nagini is discovered and threatened, she will kill whoever it is,’ he made a palms-up, exaggerated shrug.

‘She’s a snake.’ Said Voldemort matter-of-factly, his grin all sharp-toothed and devilish.

‘Ready to wake up and save your ally?’ said Voldemort, taking on a frisky tone and a mischievous gleam in his eye.

He clapped his hands playfully, and the sun began falling for the horizon like the universe’s slowest comet.
‘Ready –‘
Voldemort’s voice got lower, demonic grin dyed red by the rapid sunset. Harry felt his heartrate spike.
‘Set –‘
There was hardly any sunlight left. Voldemort bent a little at the waist, then breathily he shouted:
‘GO!’
Blackness.
Harry awoke like a switch had been flicked, brain spinning in place until his thinking caught up with reality. He said now.
He said NOW!

He clumsily jammed on his glasses and shoes, not bothering with socks or a dressing gown, and ran for Professor McGonagall’s Office. He’d go to Dumbledore if he knew the password, but McGonagall was both closer and seeking her out was theoretically allowed at night for emergency reasons.

There was always a chance Voldemort had lied to Harry, but it didn’t feel ingenuine, and it wasn’t a risk he was willing to take anyway. And frankly, what were the odds of Voldemort wanting to lure the Order out to the Ministry of Magic, of all places?
Running full pelt through the corridors, his mind drifted to what Ally would have been stationed at the ministry at night. Perhaps one of the Aurors? Mundungus maybe? He had a lot of guard duty according to what Harry had been told.

Professor McGonagall’s great oaken door came into view. He skidded to a halt, hunched over to catch his breath, and knocked raptly at the door. She answered a few seconds later, bleary-eyed in her tartan dressing gown.

‘Mr. Potter?’ she said confusedly, looking him up and down.

‘I had a vision - Attack-‘ Harry tried to catch his breath, ‘Voldemort’s snake – attacking– you need to get help – Nagini will,’

‘What do you mean, vision?’ her eyebrows contracting.

‘I had a vision in a dream – I know it’s real, I just know – please.’ He said desperately.
Talking had gotten easier, but his heart still hammered in his chest, fresh panic surged – we’re wasting time.

She nodded. ‘Come on, Mr. Potter. We’re going to see the headmaster.’

Chapter 19: Possessed

Chapter Text

The walk to the headmaster’s office was tense. Cooped up energy was vibrating inside Harry’s muscles, begging for action. He repeatedly had to stop himself from breaking into a jog. Meanwhile, his brain was straining to stay calm and think.

What was he going to say to Dumbledore when he asked about the “vision”?
“Voldemort told me his snake was loose in the Department of Mysteries”? That sounded absolutely barmy, and worse, it opened up for the obvious question:
‘Why would Voldemort tell you that?’

Not to speak of ‘Why are you talking to Voldemort in your dreams?’ and ‘Why have you not spoken to any adults about these problems?’, which would then bring up inquiries into how long Harry had been communicating with him and how that started.
Inevitably, that would lead to questions about how Harry knew Voldemort would be receptible to any of it, when by all metrics, Voldemort should be as deranged as he was fourteen years ago.

No, he had to come up with some feasible lie, and fast.
He could say that he was spying on Voldemort in his dreams? That he watched it all from above?
He’d tell him that Nagini was the attacker of course… and that she was in a dark corridor. But he couldn’t explain that he knew it was the Department of Mysteries, and he didn’t know who was on guard duty or if they’d actually been hurt.

… He could say that he was the snake. If he’d experienced it from Nagini’s point of view, her eyes wouldn’t be as good as his, explaining why he couldn’t see who it was, but he could say the man tasted or smelled familiar to Harry.

Professor McGonagall spoke the password to the gargoyle, and they hurried up the spiral staircase. There were voices coming from within – a lot of voices. The door opened on its own. Dumbledore was sitting alone behind his desk in a nightshirt and dressing gown, wide awake, reading by candlelight.

Dumbledore’s gaze lifted as the door closed. ‘Oh, it’s you Professor McGonagall… and…ah.’

‘Professor Dumbledore, Potter has had a… dream… or a vision?’ said Professor McGonagall, looking at Harry with a pinched expression.

Harry took that as his que to talk. ‘A vision.’ He said, clenching his jaw, ‘it was real, I saw it … Nagini, erm - Voldemort’s snake, attacking someone… they seemed so familiar – In-In a dark corridor, with smooth tiles.’

This sounded stupid. Trivial, actually, and almost comically so, in Harry’s educated opinion. He wouldn’t be surprised if Dumbledore didn’t believe a word of it.

Obnoxious, fake snores erupted from some of the portraits, their painted irises sneaking little squinting peeks at the late-night guests. Dumbledore’s blue, twinkling gaze was fixed on Harry, yet avoiding his eyes, emotionlessly observing him for three unbearably long seconds. Harry suddenly felt exposed, both metaphysically, and literally undressed. He wished he’d taken the five seconds it took to put on a dressing gown before he left the dorms. Those few seconds he saved skipping it had been wasted by the dawdling of both Professor McGonagall and Dumbledore anyway.

You’re wearing the locket! A panicked voice abruptly reminded him.
Indeed, the thing was pulsing calmly against his chest, as if trying to soothe his anxiety before he began sweating. Harry was beginning to wonder if it was reacting to his emotions and instinctively to comfort him, or if it was merely limited in its understanding of every feeling except anger.

At long last, Dumbledore’s benign but intense scrutiny moved on.
A cold trickle of relief ran down Harry’s spine. The locket remained undiscovered - for now.

‘How did you see this?’ said Dumbledore quietly, eyes on the papers in front of him.

‘Well… I don’t know how this dream-vision stuff works,’ lied Harry.

‘You misunderstand me, I mean… can you remember where you were? Were you watching the scene from above as it happened… or watching from the side of the victim perhaps?’ asked Dumbledore calmly, still not meeting Harry’s eyes.

‘No… I was the snake,’ said Harry, sticking to the half-baked plan he formed on the way over, ‘I didn’t really watch all that much, I smelled? … Or tasted… It’s hard to explain.’

The fact that Dumbledore never looked him in the eye made it easier to lie, but it was stressful none the less. He closed his hands around some pyjama bottom fabric to keep himself from scratching at his arms, which had turned up their itchiness to the edge of pain. In turn, the locket was warming and cooling in cycles, enticing him to touch it. He resisted its allure, digging his fingernails into his palms.

‘Are they seriously injured, the person in the corridor?’ said Dumbledore, who was yet to display any sign of being troubled by Harry’s news.

‘I don’t know.’ Answered Harry honestly, then impulsively added, ‘I woke up when I smelled blood.’
Risky lie, that, he chided himself. Only bad lies had excessive detail.

After a short pause, Dumbledore sprung to action, calling on different portraits to check their alternate frames and call for help. Professor McGonagall guided Harry to sit down in one of the gawdy, red chairs in front of Dumbledore’s desk, leaving him there with a few pats on the shoulders. Harry clawed at his thighs, which had begun itching hotly along with the arms.

Dumbledore spoke quietly to his phoenix, Fawkes and Harry assumed it must have understood the message, for the bird vanished in a puff of flame seconds later. Dumbledore moved to one of the many spindly tables that held a single, curious silver instrument Harry knew nothing about.

He picked it up and fiddled with it on his desk for a bit, then set it down to whirr and puff as was its apparent function. After a minute, the whirring stopped, and it let out a cloud of smoke shaped like a snake.

Dumbledore muttered something that sounded like “In essence divided?” and the snake split itself into two snakes like a bacterium dividing. Dumbledore looked pleased for a second until the snake rejoined into one. He frowned at it and put the instrument away.

There was a sudden shout from the wall. ‘Dumbledore!’

‘What news?’ said Dumbledore and looked up at the offending portrait. Its peers were all awake now too, leaning into each other’s frames to exchange whispers.

‘I yelled until someone came running,’ said the depicted elderly man with a brown cone-hat, ‘- said I heard something moving downstairs – they weren’t sure whether to believe me but went down to check – you know there are no portraits down there to watch from. Anyway, they carried him up a few minutes later – redheaded fellow, long brown cloak-‘

Mr. Weasley! Harry thought, panic rising to new hights.
For some inexplicable reason, he had expected it to be Kingsley, Mundungus, or Dodge, or one of the ten or so other Order members Harry didn’t know. It never occurred to him that it could be someone close, like Mr. Weasley or Lupin.

‘He doesn’t look good, covered in blood-‘ continued the portrait, then Harry tuned out the final words and Dumbledore’s subsequent answer.

His ears were ringing. Mr. Weasley was going to die. Harry had been too late. Too slow. He should have run to Dumbledore’s office first and just yelled until he got to see him, he should have...

‘Minerva, I need you to wake the Weasley children.’ Said Dumbledore calmly, turning away from the wall of portraits.

‘Of course …’ Professor McGonagall got up from her chair, ‘And Dumbledore – what about Molly?’ she said, standing in the doorway.

‘That will be a job for Fawkes when he has finished keeping a lookout, but she may already know… that excellent clock of hers…’ mumbled Dumbledore, pacing between the bird perch and his desk.

Harry thought about Mr. Weasley’s hand pointing at “Mortal Peril” or “Dead”. Did it have a number for “Dead”? He couldn’t remember.

He thought of Mrs. Weasley’s Boggart, a corpse of the floor, swapping its way through the appearances of everyone she loved… Harry remembered thinking her fears were sensible. How would Mrs. Weasley take care of all her children alone? Granted Bill and Charlie might help her, but as far as Harry knew, she'd never had a job.
I’m going to pay for the funeral, no matter what guiles Mrs. Weasley tries, Harry decided, I’ll hide Galleons in all her teacups if I have to.

He stayed absorbed in his own thoughts until four tired, afraid, and confused Weasleys were ushered into the office by Professor McGonagall. She’d apparently tried to explain to them what was happening, because Ginny turned to him immediately with questions about his “Vision” that thankfully, Dumbledore saved him from answering.

‘The Floo is watched so you’ll be taking a portkey.’ Said Dumbledore, pointing to an old kettle sitting on his desk that Harry had no recollection of him fetching, ‘we’re waiting for Sirius to reply through Phineas Nigellus-‘

There was a flash of bright orange flame in the middle of the office, spitting out a single, golden feather.

‘It’s Fawks’s warning,’ said Dumbledore loftily, ‘Professor Umbridge must know you’re out of your beds … Minerva, go head her off – tell her any story –‘

If Harry hadn’t been so caught up in his inner turmoil, he’d appreciated Dumbledore’s disdain for Umbridge more.

‘You have all travelled by portkey before?’ asked Dumbledore, holding out the kettle. They all nodded. ‘Good.’

The Weasleys shuffled around the old kettle and found grips. Harry moved to do the same, heading for the opening between Dumbledore and Ron when out of nowhere, he felt as if had been stabbed.
Sharp, icy pain pierced his sternum right below the locket, which no longer emitted individual heartbeats more as a terrified, tense vibration.

Fighting to not let the pain and horror show on his face, Harry reached out and touched the kettle. His eyes were watering and there was no conceivable way to withhold his hand from cupping the locket through his clothes. If someone asked, he’d deal with it then. For now, his only objective was to not wrench the damned thing off before it was safe to do so.

Finally, with Harry gripping the kettle snout, Dumbledore let go, then peeked at the clock above the office door and said, ‘On the count of three… one… two… three.’

Harry felt a strong jerk behind his navel, and they were off in a whirl of colours, dragged along by the kettle. They landed in a pile on a cold, tiled floor, kettle clattering to the ground and rolling away.

‘Back again, the blood-traitor brats. Oh, and young Master! – Young Master is not dressed… No worries, Young Master, Kreacher is here.’

Harry was helped to his feet by the old house elf, who promptly disappeared, ignoring the Weasleys struggling on the floor. Under his hand, the locket seemed to be withdrawing its ice dagger from Harry’s chest.
It fears Dumbledore, realized Harry, absentmindedly reaching a hand down for Ron.

They had landed in the chilly, dank kitchen of Grimmauld Place. Sirius was rushing towards them, looking scruffy and smelling faintly of alcohol. Kreacher popped back a few seconds later with a posh, deep-blue, velvet dressing gown with a quilted silver lining and matching trim which he levitated gracefully for Harry to slip his arms into.

Sirius frowned suspiciously at Kreacher, who was spelling dust of the leg of Harry’s pyjama bottoms, and then scanned Harry, who was tying the dressing gown shut.

In the end, his eyebrows lifted in an expression of acceptance. ‘Well, Reggie isn’t using it anymore…’ he mumbled, swaying slightly.

Kreacher shot Sirius a dark look and then padded out of the kitchen, muttering obscenities under his breath.

‘What’s going on?’ said Sirius to Harry and the general group of Weasleys, ‘Phineas Nigellus said Arthur’s been badly injured-‘

‘Ask Harry,’ said Fred in a hard voice.

‘Yeah, I want to hear this for myself.’ Said George, staring at Harry with his brows collected into a single, severe line.

Harry stalled for a heartbeat, unsure what to say to them. A good chunk of his brain capacity was still taken up by the locket, which was slowly warming back up, as if wishing to repair the damage it caused.

‘Well, say something!’ urged Ron impatiently, his leg bouncing up and down.

‘Erm, I had a – a vision in a dream that someone was attacked by a snake,’ started Harry, again uncertain how to tell this story without sounding like a complete nutcase, ‘eh, from the snake’s perspective. And I just knew it was real, it didn’t feel like a dream at all – I, I didn’t know it was Mr. Weasley before Dumbledore figured it out, the person only smelled familiar to me when I was the snake.’

‘You – you were the snake?’ asked Sirius gravely, as if he wanted Harry to change his mind and say something else. Harry nodded firmly.

There was a slight pause before all four Weasleys and Sirius entered into an argument over when it would be possible for them to go to St. Mungo’s. Meanwhile, Harry took a seat at the kitchen table, oscillating between observing the argument and getting lost in his own disordered thoughts.

Harry found it oddly difficult to empathize, having grown up without loving or being loved by a single adult – and at present, he had to admit that the feelings towards adults he now said he loved, like Sirius, were new and hard for him to make sense of. Mrs. Weasley had tried to get him to call her Molly for years, but he simply couldn’t.
It wasn’t right. She wanted him to think of her as a mother figure, but Harry wasn’t sure he knew what that meant.

He stayed out of the conversation. He neither had the right to a say or anything helpful to add. Besides, the more he talked about his supposed foray into the mind of Voldemort’s snake, the higher climbed the risk of getting caught in his lie. All he could do was wait, and that was a mind-numbing conclusion to reach.

Feeling guilty for his detachedness, Harry tried to force his thoughts towards compassion. He tried imagining Mr. Weasley’s fear, and even the funeral to come, but images dissolved too quickly. The emotional impact didn’t come. Instead, his thoughts snapped back to vague fears about being found out in his lies or blamed for Mr. Weasley’s death or disfigurement, which only made him feel even guiltier.

Thoughts were spinning out of control, the inner monologue turning chaotic and useless. Underneath, wordless thoughts and feelings were taking him dangerously close to the cliff’s edge, below which an abyss of ruminations awaited him.
The return of a faint heartbeat caught a smidgeon of his attention. The locket was back to humming calmingly. Harry counted its little flutterings.

Eventually, Sirius managed to talk the Weasley children out of hurrying to the Hospital at once and served them all a butterbeer. The clank of the bottles fished Harry out from his blackening depths, allowing him to stuff the worries behind a wall made up of the locket’s heartbeats and Voldemort’s mystically soothing, sleeping brainwaves.

Beside him, Ron was hunched over his bottle, curtains of ginger hair obscuring his face. Harry wondered what was expected of him, both as Ron’s friend and as the harbinger of Mr. Weasley’s death.

The instinct he had was to offer Ron a hug, but that was the sort of feminine blips in his judgement that he couldn’t act upon even under less muddled circ*mstances. Failing to settle on what was the correct action, Harry again did nothing.
They drank in silence for a while.

I need to know what Mr. Weasley possibly died for, Harry thought gloomily.
There were two routes to that information, the Order and Voldemort, and right now, the most agreeable of those two options was actually Voldemort. Which was mad.
Hopefully, he would keep his end of the bargain after Harry delivered him the answers he wanted.

A sudden, bright flame burst in midair over the table, startling everyone out of their thoughts. A small roll of parchment fell to the table as the flame burned out along with a single golden feather.

‘Fawkes!’ said Sirius, snatching up the parchment, ‘That’s not Dumbledore’s writing – must be from Molly – here –‘ he gave it to George who ripped it open feverishly and read aloud:

‘Dad is still alive. I am setting out for St. Mungo’s now. Stay where you are. I will send news as soon as I can. Mum.’

Fred pulled the letter out of George’s hands and read it himself. Harry could feel eyes on him. Scrutinizing, dark looks, as if Mr. Weasley would’ve been just fine if it hadn’t been for Harry.
Even here, you’re the freak, said a treacherous voice in his head, snide and shrill like Aunt Petunia’s.

No one went to bed again that night. Not even Harry, despite longing for time alone under a nice, noise-muffling duvet. Ginny curled up sideways in a chair like a cat, staring blankly into space. Fred and George dozed sitting upright, while Ron had his head in his hands.
Harry and Sirius exchanged looks now and again, but mostly both kept their eyes down their bottles.
At ten past five in the morning, Mrs. Weasley swayed through the kitchen door.

‘He’s going to be all right,’ she said tiredly. ‘He’s sleeping. We can all go see him later. Bill’s sitting with him now.’

Unspoken relief flooded the room. Ginny got up and hugged her mother, Ron downed the rest of his butterbeer, and Sirius called for breakfast in a rejoicing howl.

Sirius yelled half-heartedly after Kreacher, but the elf didn’t answer. Eyeing an opportunity to get away from the smothering aura of the Weasley family’s relief-and-worry-mix, Harry shot up from his seat, darting for the kitchen counter.

‘So, breakfast for seven – let’s see – eggs, bacon – some tea… toast,’ muttered Sirius, yanking things out of cupboards as he went.

Harry lit the range, pulled out pans and had started wandlessly summoning eggs and bacon from where Sirius had put them when Mrs. Weasley pulled him into a hug. The pack of bacon hit the floor with a slap.

‘I don’t know what would have happened if it wasn’t for you, Harry,’ she said into his rigid shoulder.
‘They might not have found him for hours, and then it’d be too late, but thanks to you he’s alive and Dumbledore was able to come up with a good cover story… you’ve no idea the trouble he’d be in otherwise.’

Harry didn’t know what to say to her, so he merely smiled crookedly at her when she released him, and silently watched her trot off to talk to Sirius. Remembering that he was supposed to be cooking, Harry flicked his finger at the pack of bacon on the floor and it bounced into his hand with a spin.

Over by the pantry, Mrs. Weasley spoke to Sirius about the possibility of all of them staying at Grimmauld Place for Christmas.

‘The more the merrier!’ said Sirius elatedly.

Harry could feel his own spirits lift a twinge too – he really liked this house and staying with Sirius for the holiday’s had been something he’d dreamed of for almost two years.

He cracked the eggs into the frying pan one by one and flung the shells lazily into the bin under the sink. Cooking was his second favourite chore after gardening. It gave him time to himself and his thoughts without the stifling atmosphere of being imprisoned.

And, when his aunt and uncle were elsewhere, it was an opportunity to practice subtle, wandless magic for something useful and not as intricately difficult as manoeuvring padlocks around blindly through a door.

‘Blimey, Harry, are you using magic?’ said Ron with furrowed brows as Harry levitated a stack of plates and the tray of bacon onto the table.

Harry looked behind him to see all five sets of eyes on him with varying degrees of captivation. Apparently, they’d all been quietly watching him for a little while.

‘Yeah – as long as I don’t use any spells, it’s fine. Won’t set off the trace.’ Said Harry, turning his back again to resume transferring the second batch of eggs from the pan to a serving dish.

‘But – but that’s impossible.’ Said Ginny gapingly, ‘How…’

Harry levitated a couple of pewter tankards stuffed with knives and forks and a basket of toast onto the table, then the eggs, mugs, and teapots.

Sirius was looking at him curiously, crossing his arms relaxedly as he said, ‘It’s not impossible no, obviously. I remember Reggie used to fawn over Lord Voldemort’s supposed wandless abilities… but it is a very rare talent.’

Harry didn’t think a skill borne of necessity and desperation should be called a talent, be it wandless magic, healing, or resistance to compulsion-magic. He shrugged it off.

‘It’s just very time consuming to learn, and I’ve a lot of time in the summer.’ Said Harry, sitting down and serving himself. The rest followed suit.

***

When Harry and Ron entered their room that morning after breakfast, the difference between their sides of the room was almost comical. Ron’s bed had threadbare sheets and a scratchy, brown blanket. Harry’s side had crisp, fresh sheets, a thick duvet, and a quilt decorated with squares of shimmering silk in teals and silvers. His nightstand had an iced glass of water and a lit candle.

‘Wow – What the bloody hell did you do to that elf?’ said Ron shaking his head. Harry laughed.

‘Do you want the quilt?’ offered Harry with a smile. The room was quite cold and drafty.

‘Uh- I’m going to ask mum if she brought anything from home.’ Ron said humouredly, then disappeared out the door.

Harry heard his steps recede as he jogged downstairs. Moments later he returned with his own, bright orange quilt, a pair of fluffy, maroon, home-knitted socks and an extra pillow.

‘Mum thought of everything.’ Said Ron fondly.

They slept until noon and enjoyed a simple lunch together. Their Hogwarts trunks arrived while they were eating (Kreacher brought Harry’s upstairs at once and put all his things neatly away in the wardrobe), and they changed into Muggle clothing for the trip.

Tonks and Mad-Eye Moody came to escort them through Muggle London. They were both wearing (in Harry’s opinion) completely ineffective Muggle disguises. Mad-Eye had on a bowler hat that covered his magical eye which was a peculiar mismatch against his rugged, leather coat. Tonks was wearing perfectly Muggle acceptable clothes, but she had adorned the outfit with a head of bright pink hair. Her eyes were an unnaturally azure shade of blue, it reminded Harry of something.

After thinking it over, Harry decided to brave a question. ‘Tonks?’

‘That’s me.’ She said with a sunny smile as they got on the tube.

‘Are there any other Metamorphmaguses – magi? – in your family?’ he asked, thinking about Druella Black’s blush-pink eyes.

‘I don’t know… I don’t really know much about the wizarding side of the family. Mum got disowned when she married my dad… Why? Met any others like me?’ Her eyes brightened excitedly, approaching the electric-blue of Mad-Eye’s hidden eyeball.

‘I think so,’ mused Harry, taking a seat beside her, ‘One of the Death Eaters I saw last spring had pink eyes-’ Tonks’s smile flattened slightly. ‘-I didn’t see the hair though. Hoods and masks, you know.’ Harry added a thoughtful shrug to his lie.

Tonks hummed, wrinkling her brow, ‘Could be a Metamorphmagus, yeah… Come to think of it, I believe Mum once mentioned that her mother was one. My grandmother…’

‘Could she be a Death Eater?’

‘Oh, yes. Not convicted, of course. But she is a Black, and a Rosier before she married. That’s prime Death Eater stock, I reckon.’ Said Tonks with a tight-lipped, lopsided smile and a shrug, refreshingly unoffended by those circ*mstances.

So Druella Black is Tonks’s grandmother, alright… That means she’s Bellatrix Lestrange’s mother too… And Malfoy’s mum’s, maybe?... He tried to picture the tapestry from the first-floor drawing room of Grimmauld Place to little avail, but he recalled Sirius saying something about being related to her.

The entrance to St. Mungo’s was eccentric, to say the least. Good Muggle-repellent strategies typically were. Even stranger was the reception area, which was a large checker-tiled room with a deceptively low ceiling, making it feel both cramped and endless at the same time.

Black, leather-covered benches were set in front of a white receptionist desk. The benches were populated by people with very visible hurts and disfigurements and people who looked fine but made funny noises or behaved oddly, all sitting orderly alongside completely sane and healthy-looking people. Witches and wizards in lime-green robes hurried around, discussing intently as they walked.

They were directed to the first floor by the “Welcomewitch” at the counter. Mr. Weasley was kept in a ward for bites. It was a dark room with wood-panelled walls and six beds whereof three were occupied. Mr. Weasley was sitting upright in his bed, covered in bandages.

‘How are you, Arthur?’ asked Mrs. Weasley and kissed her husband’s cheek. She looked him over, ‘You still look a bit peaky.’

‘I feel absolutely fine!’ said Mr. Weasley with a big grin, pulling Ginny into a one-armed hug. His left arm was enveloped in a thick bandage. ‘If they could take these bandages off, I’d be fit to leave.’

‘Why can’t they take them off, Dad?’ asked Fred.

‘I start bleeding like mad every time they try.’ Said Mr. Weasley brightly, like this was all just a big fairytale adventure. He conjured up some chairs for them. Harry chose the one by his legs. ‘It seems there was some rather unusual venom in that snake’s fangs that keeps wounds open –‘

Harry didn’t really pay attention to the rest of what he said.
I could use a bit of that venom, he said to himself. It would solve his issues with having to drain his ever-growing pool of magic, to simply scratch a certain itch. Dosing it would be difficult though.

Nagini was most likely a Lindworm, but so young she was yet to gain the characteristic, mane-like hairs, or “fin” on her back. According to The Monster Book of Monsters, it was a rare creature after having been hunted close to extinction, mostly for glory and because of their kinship with dragons.

When he tuned back into the conversation, it had moved on to Fred and George pressuring their father for information on what he’d been doing when he got bitten by a giant snake. Mr. Weasley was attempting to deflect, talking about some man jinxing toilets to mess with Muggles.

‘Didn’t you say You-Know-Who’s got a massive snake, Harry?’ asked Fred, rousing Harry from his ponderings while eyeing his father for a reaction. ‘Saw it the night he returned, didn’t you.’

‘Yes. Her name’s Nagini.’ replied Harry, also watching for Mr. Weasley’s reaction.

He briefly wondered if Nagini would be capable of attacking someone unprovoked. She hadn’t exactly come off as brave, needing both Voldemort’s and her mother’s constant urging to escape the enclosure she knew meant certain death at the hands of the apothecary who was breeding them for slaughter.

‘Could it be that it was that snake you dreamt of being?’ George asked Harry.

‘That’s enough-‘ tried Mrs. Weasley, but Harry cut her off, the memory of the childish creature asking if Quirrell was as bad as the apothecary nudging him on.

‘Erm, you didn’t by any chance… cast any spells on the snake, Mr. Weasley? A stunner?’ said Harry carefully. Talking about Nagini as “the snake” felt a bit off, as she was clearly intelligent enough to qualify for personhood.

Mr. Weasley made a surprised face, ‘Why, yes – I cast a cutting curse and a stunner.’ He fiddled a little with a loose tab sticking out from the bandage on his arm, ‘then it bit me, and I dropped my wand…Why do you ask?’
His face was suddenly serious, sparse orange eyebrows pulled together into a centred dot.

Harry hesitated, then he almost whispered, ‘Because, if that was Nagini… Mr. Weasley - she’s very young. She’s childish, naïve… and she’s really curious, like a – like a five-year-old. About as smart as one too. Are you sure she was – hostile – before…?’

A stumped silence followed Harry’s words. Mr. Weasley shook his head. ‘I don’t know.’

‘Oh, I think that’s enough. Out!’ commanded Mrs. Weasley, dispelling their chairs, ‘the adults needs to have a word.’

Fred and George protested half-heartedly as they were ushered out of the room in exchange for Tonks and Moody. Mrs. Weasley closed the door behind them, and Fred and George wasted no time in fishing out five sets of Extendable Ears to all.

‘Let’s see if St. Mungo’s puts Imperturbable Charms on their doors, shall we?’ said Fred.

Harry mimicked the others, putting the end of the fleshy string into his ear and letting it spool out on the floor. The ear-end of the Extendable Ears wiggled their way under the door.

‘…They searched the whole area, but couldn’t find the snake anywhere. If what Harry said about it being young is true… Do you think there was someone there with it? You-Know-Who can’t have expected a snake to get in, right?’ he heard Tonks whisper as loudly as if she was whispering to him.

‘I reckon it was a lookout,’ growled Moody, ‘He’s trying to get a clearer picture of what he’s facing on the lower floors, and if Arthur hadn’t been there the beast would’ve had a lot more time to look around.’

‘It can’t have been alone,’ said Mr. Weasley in a low voice, ‘it would have been found by now if it was. What I don’t understand is how they got it out. Did any of the sentries go off?’

‘Not one. I wager the snake was chosen precisely because it would not set those off,’ huffed Moody irately, ‘Dumbledore was right, the Ministry is infiltrated. It is only a matter of time before it’s compromised.’

Mrs. Weasley made a dubious, throaty noise. ‘I hardly think it’s that dire, Alastor. Any intern could have spotted a sentry array.’ She said.

‘Think with your brains!’ Barked Moody.

Mrs. Weasley made an offended little noise, doubtlessly crossing her arms.

‘Arthur didn’t see anyone, and he was found within minutes. Whoever was escorting the beast didn’t flee by Floo. They must be employed either by the Auror Office or the Minister’s Office to have access to the emergency apparition rooms on the lower floors.’ Explained Moody in a hard voice. ‘There simply isn’t any other way they would have time to escape otherwise.’

A few sombre seconds ticked by quietly before Moody carried on, ‘So, Potter says he saw it all happen? Did he see any Death Eaters?’

‘There were no Death Eaters in his explanation, no… but, yes, he saw the attack,’ said Mrs. Weasley, sounding uneasy, ‘and something is off about it. And what’s stranger is that Dumbledore seems almost to have been waiting for Harry to see something like this.’

‘Yeah, well – there’s something funny about the Potter kid, we all know that.’ Said Moody.

Lots of funny things actually, commented Harry’s brain dryly.

‘Dumbledore seemed worried when I spoke to him this morning,’ whispered Mrs. Weasley.

‘Of course he’s worried,’ said Moody. ‘The boy’s seeing things from inside You-Know-Who’s snake. Obviously, Potter doesn’t realize what that means, but if You-Know-Who’s possessing him, we’ll need to take actions.’

That took Harry aback. Now he was really curious to what sort of information Dumbledore had given them for them to be worried about that.
Voldemort couldn’t possess Harry if he tried. Harry had specifically carved Runespells into his skin with a “Necromancer’s Stylus” to prevent Locket-Voldemort from doing exactly that.

‘And what actions would that be, Mad-Eye?’ said Tonks. ‘Harry seems fine to me.’

‘Mmm, but you don’t know him, Tonks. He’s been withdrawing… and sometimes he says things that makes me wonder…’ Replied Mrs. Weasley driftingly.

‘We’ll keep an eye on him.’ Stated Mr. Weasley clearly, ‘I’m sure it will be fine.’

Chapter 20: The Shadow of Regulus Black

Chapter Text

Sirius was in exceptionally high spirits the days leading up till Christmas. Retiring the Firewhisky bottle, he spent his time filling every corner of the house with the most garish, cheap, Muggle Christmas decorations Harry had ever seen (probably intending to tick off Kreacher), while bellowing an assortment of jolly Christmas carols through the halls.

The Weasley children were anxiously anticipating the return of their father from St. Mungo’s, but his stay dragged on. The resulting atmosphere was an odd blend of holiday cheer and delicate, fretful impatience that Harry didn’t know how to navigate.

He didn’t want to intrude upon the Weasleys, but Sirius’ behaviour made him twitchy, and the choice of Muggle Christmas decorations wasn’t helping. Before he had the option to stay at Hogwarts or with the Weasleys, Christmas had been Harry’s least favourite time of year.

Luckily, nobody tried too hard to include him in their house-decorating, or their nervous speculations about if and when Mr. Weasley would be home for Christmas. In fact, Harry felt like a lot of them were outright avoiding him, and for once, he didn’t mind in the slightest. He wanted to be free to poke around the upper floors and browse the library.

Kreacher was spending most of his time in the attic or with Harry, and by the second day, the elf functioned as a lookout – warning Harry whenever someone was approaching by making loud, rasping sniffs and coughs.

As during his summer stay, Kreacher would perform all sorts of helpful little tasks, like mending Harry’s shoes, cleaning his school trunk of broken quills and other debris, and bringing snacks that didn’t taste like lard. In turn, Kreacher brought Harry enchanted objects in need, most notably smaller portraits which were in danger of loosing their preserved Mind-threads of people long dead if the enchantments didn’t get touch-ups.

The alone-time also meant Harry had the time and peace to plan and construct a memory-message for Voldemort, stitching together memories in a cohesive way with some sort of verbal explanation layered on top of it. The difficult part was to make it into a sequence that didn’t change whenever he thought about it, but something more akin to a memory.

On December the 23^rd, Hermione unexpectedly showed up at Grimmauld Place. Harry was exploring the game room on the second floor when she found him.

‘So this is where you’re hiding.’ She said, startling him.

‘What are you doing here?’ he asked unsteadily, standing up from where he’d been crouching in front of a camphor wood chest filled with silken blindfolds and a deck of charades suggestion cards. ‘Didn’t like skiing?’

She shook her head, ‘wasn’t for me. But don’t tell Ron. I told him skiing’s really good because he kept laughing so much. Mum and Dad are a bit disappointed, but I’ve told them that everyone who is serious about the exams is staying at Hogwarts to study.’

‘And they accepted that?’ frowned Harry, not sure if it was normal for parents to let their children celebrate Christmas away from them when they were at their age.

‘They want me to do well, they’ll understand,’ Hermione smiled meagrely, obviously unwilling to talk about her parents. ‘Anyway, let’s go to your bedroom. Ron’s mum has lit a fire there and sent up sandwiches.’ She made a hooking gesture with her arm, signalling him to follow her.

It turned out to be a trap.
The bedroom didn’t purely offer a cozy fire and lunch, but also Ron and Ginny, sitting stiffly as if waiting to pass their judgement on participants in a talent show, hands folded in their laps.

‘What’s going on here?’ asked Harry as Hermione joined their ranks.

‘We need to talk.’ Said Ginny.

‘About what?’ enquired Harry blandly as he sat down on his bed.

‘You.’ Stated Ginny, taking a sandwich off the tray balancing on the nightstand by Ron’s bed.

‘Ron and Ginny say you’ve been hiding from everyone since you got back from St. Mungo’s.’ Said Hermione, revealing her role as mediator in the conflict they were starting.

Harry took in their faces in turn, weighing his options. ‘I’m not hiding from anyone.’ He said hotly with just a dash of well-meaning confusion.

Technically, one could argue there was a difference between hiding from someone and wanting to be alone.

‘Oh, don’t lie, Harry! The others have told me what you overheard on the Extendable Ears.’ Hermione said crossing her arms, and Harry answered with a blank stare.

‘We wanted to talk to you about it, but you’ve been hiding ever since we got back!’ huffed Ginny.

Harry scowled. ‘I haven’t,-‘

‘You have! Which is a bit stupid, seeing as you don’t know anyone but me who’s been possessed by You-Know-Who! I actually know how that feels, did you think about that?!’ Ginny’s jaw jutted out offendedly. It took several seconds for Harry to catch on to what she was talking about.

‘Oh – You think that I think I’m being possessed by Voldemort?’ said Harry, trying his utmost to neither smile nor console the over-excited locket, which was having a hammer-party against his sternum.

‘Think it’s funny?’ said Ginny angrily, and Harry cracked a smirk.

‘Well, yeah. It’s magically impossible, look,’ he tugged the neckline of his jumper and t-shirt down to the collarbone, exposing the faint row of runes carved there.

Hermione leaned in, squinting as she tried reading them. Harry tipped his torso forwards to help her. The runes were above her grade level, but she might be able to understand the shielding-sequences.

‘I’ve been seeing snippets of what Voldemort’s been doing for over a year and you seriously believed the danger never occurred to me?’ Harry sneered, letting go of the clothes and reaching for a sandwich.

Ginny’s face had gone watermelon pink.

Ron's complexion matched his sister's. ‘Then why are you avoiding us?’ he cried.

‘I’m not.’ Lied Harry with a bite of the sandwich. Unpleasantly, it had a surprise pickle hidden in the middle.

‘You are! You’re all broody and hiding around!’ Ron’s voice was increasing in volume, officially transforming Hermione’s friendly little intervention into a proper row. She had put her hand on Ron’s thigh, squeezing it in a silent attempt to calm him.

‘I am giving you and your family space, Ron! I’m not stupid, you’re all having a hard time and I thought you’d like to prioritize your family right now.’ Countered Harry, starting out loud then softening his voice as he talked.

Ron gaped at him, dumbstruck and guilty while Harry ate the rest of his sandwich, glad to have successfully deescalated the situation. However, a very small tingle in his brain wondered if that qualified as the singularly most manipulative sentence he had uttered so far in his life.

‘But – but why did you say that about You-Know-Who’s snake? How’s that helping dad?!’ accused Ron with a jotting finger, catching Harry off-guard.

‘I er…’

‘Well?!’

Harry dropped his shoulders. ‘Look! I spoke to her a bunch in the graveyard, and she’s – she’s kind and – and pretty much like a five-year-old! I just hoped it wasn’t her, alright?’ he defended, surprising himself with his own degree of honesty.

‘Why – why were you chatting with You-Know-Who’s snake?’ said Ron, equal parts dumbfounded and appalled.

‘I was tied up, and Voldemort was busy going off about his resurrection to the Death Eaters.’ Retorted Harry, raising his voice again, ‘she came to sniff me, what was I gonna do!?’

‘I dunno, keep your mouth shut, maybe! What could you possibly gain from gossiping with that thing!?’ barged Ginny in with renewed hostility.

Harry bristled. He and Ginny had a very spotty friendship to begin with, and her self-insertion into this wasn’t doing her any favours.

‘Well, she told me loads of interesting stuff actually.’ Harry said acridly, ‘like that she was rescued from an apothecary breeding Lindworms for ingredients and that her mother and Voldemort encouraged her to escape in Quirrell’s boot.’

Ron and Ginny both gawked at him. Hermione pursed her lips, tucking her elbows in close to her waist in discomfort.

‘What?’ Asked Harry, baffled by their rigid reactions.

Ginny’s words were hard as stone. ‘The snake that bit Dad is a Lidworm?’

‘Yeah, didn’t St. Mungo’s,-‘

‘No, they didn’t. That’s why Dad isn’t home yet, they don’t know what type of snake bit him, so they haven’t found an antidote.’ Said Ginny, her face puffy and lower lip trembling with anger.

‘You knew what snake it was this whole time?’ blanched Ron, then sprung to his feet, ‘I’ll tell Mum!’
The door slammed shut behind him.

‘Uh, Harry…Did you know that the hospital didn’t know what snake it was?’ Hermione spoke tenderly, gaze flickering between Harry and Ginny, as if worried she might set one of them off yelling again.

‘No, I thought St. Mungo knew. Honest!’ replied Harry with his hands in the air, as if begging not to be gunned down.

There was a long, dreadfully uncomfortable pause. Hermione ate a sandwich while Ginny glowered at the side of Harry’s face. He contemplated leaving. Pretend he wanted to talk to Mrs. Weasley about snake venom and bolt.

‘What else has Voldemort been showing you then, if you’ve had these dreams before?’ Ginny asked in an edged tone.

‘He’s shown that corridor before and a bunch of boring stuff, like reading letters and talking about Goblin laws with some Death Eater, that kind of stuff,’ answered Harry, making it up as he went.

‘What do you think he wants, Harry?’ Hermione asked, her softness a stark contrast to Ginny’s warrior stance.

Harry shrugged, biting his lower lip, ‘No clue. I don’t think he means for me to see any of it, I sort of just drop in on him.’

‘So, you’re accidentally seeing glimpses of Voldemort plotting his takeover and it never even occurred to you to tell the Order?’ Ginny said so acerbically Harry could almost hear her teeth grinding.

‘What do you think the Order would say, Ginny?’ sighed Harry, his annoyance with her reaching its zenith, ‘If I say to Dumbledore, “by the way, I’m having dreams about Voldemort discussing the wording of some affiliation law with a blonde bloke. It’s so boring I can’t remember much.” What’s Dumbledore going to say to that?’
Harry tried imagining the scenario he described and found it funny enough for the corners of his lips to twitch. He gave Ginny a nonchalant pop of his brow and shrugged, ‘It’s so stupid. I’m not going to bug the Order with this stuff.’

‘I just think you’re awfully calm about all this.’ Ginny said, her distrust rolling off her so strong Harry could feel it thicken the air.

There was something uniquely infuriating about being openly distrusted, even though Harry was lying, and had no right to be angry, a fire roared in his lungs anyway.

‘I’ve had boring visions for years! This is the first time Voldemort’s actually done something, and I reacted, so what more do you want from me!?’

Ginny flinched, her ears now as red as her face. ‘I don’t know! I just think it’s weird that we’re only now hearing about this!’ her reply was a few decibels short of a shout.

Hermione put a hand on Ginny’s shoulder, which had no effect.

‘Then what do you expect me to do? Seriously!?’ Harry yelled back. ‘Whine about it to everyone at dinner?!’

‘I’d think it would affect you!’ retorted Ginny, ‘I’d be pretty scared, were it me! I might want to talk to my friends about it!’

‘Has it occurred to you, that it might just be you I don’t want to talk to, Ginny?’ Snarled Harry, swinging his legs to the floor. He’d had enough. ‘Did it ever factor into your brain that it could be that simple?!’

With that, Harry stomped out, slamming the door behind him.

He jogged lightly down a single floor, looped around the grand stairway and into a hidden door where the malicious grandfather clock used to stand. Behind it was a claustrophobically narrow servant’s staircase, lit by a single, flickering gas scone halfway up.
Harry slumped down on the fifth step, ripped his glasses off and buried his face in his palms.
Why did I say that…

The locket, which had been burning and beating feverously since Hermione first lured Harry to the intervention, was still operating at an uncomfortably high temperature.
He plucked the chain up from under his clothes and lifted it free, gently transferring it to his hands. It calmed at once, buzzing contently against his palm.

Did you make me say that? He thought at the locket, knowing full well it had no means of replying. The idea had been tickling in his brain for a while. The temperature swings certainly had an effect on his mood, and the locket seemed able to recognize individuals who were standing physically close enough. It wasn’t unthinkable that its brand of Mind-magic could manipulate either Harry’s temper more directly or that of those around him.

You know the Locket is dangerous. This isn’t news. Keep it away from your friends! Cautioned an irate voice in Harry’s head.
Harry gave himself a miniscule, agreeing nod.
Physical distance, he corrected the voice, and I’ll have to take it off from time to time… But not now.

He stayed sitting on the dusty stairs for almost twenty minutes, resting his head against his clasped hands, elbows on his knees. The locket pulsed soothingly against his forehead, and all the while, Harry’s mind stayed blissfully quiet. He kept to himself for the rest of the day, reading in the first-floor parlour where he could be found by anyone who wanted to challenge his lie from earlier.

Nobody did.

***

Like last year, Christmas morning came with a small pile of presents at the foot of his bed. Ron woke up before him and had already opened a few of his. They both got the same from Hermione: a homework planner that bellowed slogans at them when opened. Mrs. Weasley had given them knitted jumpers again, while Sirius and Lupin had gone with books.

The two oddest gifts that Christmas were both from elves.
Dobby had given him an awful painting that had to be self-made, its motif impossible to discern. Harry supposed it was the thought that counted, though he had no idea what to do with the artwork now that he had it.

Kreacher, on the other hand, had given him a mahogany box with his name engraved on the lid that turned out to contain chalks, charcoal and coloured oil-sticks organized by magic conductivity in neat compartments that folded out with the help of a small, brass switch on the side. Harry was staring slack-jawed at the indisputably best gift of the year when the twins popped in to warn them against going downstairs.

‘Percy sent back his Christmas jumper.’ Explained Fred, picking up Dobby’s painting from where Harry had put it on the bed.

‘Without a note. He hasn’t asked how Dad is or visited or anything.’ Added George sombrely.

‘We tried to comfort her. Tell her Percy is nothing more than a humongous pile of rat droppings.’ Said Fred, flipping the painting on its head, squinting at it.

‘Didn’t work. So, Lupin took over. Best let him cheer her up before we go down for breakfast,’ continued George, nabbing some of the candy piled between Harry and Ron’s beds.

‘What’ve you got there, Harry?’ asked George, nodding to the box in his lap.

‘Chalks and things for drawing Runes with. Gift from Kreacher.’ He said, setting the box carefully down on the bed, reminding himself to thank the elf later.

‘From Kreacher?’ asked Fred at the same time as George said, ‘Why are you getting stuff from Kreacher?’ and Ron exclaimed a simple ‘What?!’

Harry shrugged, not sure how to explain it. ‘He just likes me for some reason,’ he said, then pointed at the painting in Fred’s hand, ‘I got that from an elf too.’

‘Dobby?’ said Ron, and Harry confirmed it.

‘Yeah. Dunno what it’s supposed to be though.’

Fred handed the painting over to George, who flipped it around again, then over to search the back of it for clues.

‘Hah! It’s you, Harry!’ he shouted with a laugh, which soon infected the whole room.

‘Perhaps we should hang it on the spot where Sirius’s mum was, see if Kreacher will worship it?’ grinned Fred, receiving another round of laughs.

‘He probably won’t see that it’s me either,’ said Harry, pushing himself off the bed, ‘I’m going to brave the kitchen now. Anyone else?’

He left the bedroom with the twins in tow and Ron lagging a few paces behind him. They had gotten about halfway down when something tugged on the locket chain.

‘Who did you get this from, Harry?’ said George, causing Harry’s mood to flip a one-eighty from relaxed and happy to abrupt panic in less than a second.

‘Looks like real gold.’ Added Fred as Harry rapidly caught the chain, stopping George from hoisting the locket free from under his clothes.

‘None of your business.’ He said, slapping George’s hand away.

Fred whistled, ‘Ohoh! Have you got a secret admirer, Harrykins?’

‘Or maybe not so secret. That Ravenclaw Seeker has been giving him googly-eyes all year.’ George shot in, giving him a friendly shove which Harry used as a pretext to run three steps ahead of them.

‘I dunno, George. Doesn’t seem like Harry’s type.’ Said Fred.

‘Whatever do you mean, Fred?’ chuckled George, and Fred’s voice drew up in a high, fake, posh accent.

‘Why, only that there are different tastes in this world, Georgie. Most favour the buns, while other rather prefers the sausa,-‘

‘Will you piss off?’ Harry snapped, spinning around to set the twins with a steely stare once his feet hit the ground floor. He held on to a section of the locket chain, preventing any repeat attempts from anyone daring enough to try.

‘So sensitive.’ Smiled Fred while George snickered.

Behind them, Ron’s expression had curled up in something between perplexion and concern. Harry ignored it, racing ahead to the kitchen with long, choppy steps.

Physical distance, he reminded himself.

***

They visited Mr. Weasley at St. Mungo’s again after breakfast. It was not an enjoyable trip.
Ron, Hermione, Harry, and Ginny (who had not forgiven Harry in the slightest) had a rather unpleasant run-in with Gilderoy Lockhart, and an even worse encounter with Neville and his grandmother, who were visiting Neville’s parents.

Christmas dinner was a dour affair compared to earlier years with a chair left notably empty at the end of the table. Mrs. Weasley tried her best, as did Sirius, though his attempt at cheering everyone was emboldened by alcohol which made him unpredictable. Being seventeen, the twins accepted Sirius’ offers of Firewhiskey (to Mrs. Weasley’s great dismay), turning dessert into a bit of a party which Harry fled at first opportunity.

Sirius’ mood soured soon after Christmas – possibly dreading the return to being cooped up in a house he hated with only Kreacher for company. He’d lock himself away in his mother’s bedroom with Buckbeak and spread his sullen mood to everyone in his vicinity.

His moping did make it easier for Harry to visit the library, but it also made him feel uneasy about going back to Hogwarts and leaving Sirius alone again. By December 30^th, the uneasy feeling had turned into the recognisable sense of doom Harry had lived with most of his life, only without the accompanying sinking sensation in his chest.

Despite this, Harry went to bed in good spirits that night; the long, constructed memory was ready.
He got into his bed, warmed by a charm Kreacher put on it every evening, and played the whole thing one last time in his head before sending it off.
Now, all I can do is wait, he thought.

New Years Eve, Harry found it impossible to focus. He tried to join games of Exploding Snap, but he constantly had to reel himself back in as he drifted into a turbulent sea of emotions and thoughts that weren’t his own.

His message to Voldemort must have hit a weak spot in the man’s armour, provoking feelings of being exposed and vulnerable. Fear was seeping through the connection, becoming as ever-present in Harry’s mind as it normally was at the Dursleys’. The Weasleys prodded him with concerned questions that he brushed off with ‘I’m fine’ and left them to draw their own conclusions.

The next day was also the last day of the holidays. Having finished packing, Harry and Ron were playing a game of wizarding chess in their bedroom with Ginny and Hermione spectating. Hermione had Crookshanks struggling in her lap while Ginny and Harry were egging on their separate fighting pieces when Mrs. Weasley poked her head in the door.

‘Harry, dear, could you come down to the kitchen? Professor Snape would like a word with you.’ She said in a sweet voice she regularly used when asking her children to do a chore they disliked.

Harry’s head turned so fast he almost got whiplash. ‘Snape? What, why?’ he said gaping.

The others were switching between looking at Harry suspiciously and Mrs. Weasley enquiringly. With Hermione stunned, Crookshanks escaped her arms and leapt onto the chessboard, sending the pieces scattering in panic.

‘Professor Snape, dear.’ Mrs. Weasley corrected, ‘now come along, he’s waiting for you.’

‘What have you done?’ said Ron in pure, friendly curiosity.

‘Nothing, I don’t know.’ Said Harry looking back at Ron as he followed Mrs. Weasley. He honestly had no clue what Snape could want with him during the holidays.

A minute later, he entered the kitchen where Sirius and Snape were both seated at the table in an unparallelled tense silence, resolutely not looking at each other. Sirius had an open letter in front of him.

‘Er,’ started Harry, unsure what to do.

‘Sit down, Potter.’ Barked Snape.

Harry moved to do as he was told when Sirius said, ‘You know, I’d think I’d prefer if you didn’t give orders here, Snape. It’s my house, you see.’ He was balancing his chair on its back legs, looking up into the ceiling.

Snape’s face flushed with anger. ‘I was supposed to see you alone, Potter, but Black-‘ he started with his usual sneer, face gradually returning to its normal pallor.

‘I’m his godfather,’ said Sirius loudly.

Snape’s voice went low and icy.‘I’m here on Dumbledore’s orders, but by all means, Black, stay. I know you like to feel involved.’

Harry wanted nothing more than to leave and go back to losing his game of chess against Ron. If Crookshanks had left any surviving pieces, that was.

Sirius bared his teeth, ‘What’s that supp-‘

‘Why am I here?’ interceded Harry loudly, cutting Sirius’ snarl short.

He wanted to get this over with, preferably without having to watch Sirius and Snape have at each other for an hour first. There was a pause.

‘The Headmaster has sent me to tell you, Potter, that it is his wish for you to study Occlumency this term.’ Said Snape, words clearly chosen to divorce himself from any responsibility for this idea.

Harrys eyes widened. If Dumbledore wanted Harry to learn Occlumency, that confirmed his theory that Dumbledore thought he and Voldemort were connected with an entirely “Mind”-based link. Some form of Legilimency or another.

‘I’m sorry you had to come all this way to tell me that, Professor. I won’t be studying Occlumency.’ Said Harry blankly, thankful Snape had no power here. It wouldn’t be possible for him to learn Occlumency the traditional way without burning the runes off his skin first anyway.

They protected him from intrusive attacks made of “Mind” and that included Legilimency - and you can’t know if your Occlumency barriers work unless poked at with Legilimency. It was hard for Harry to imagine what his teacher would do when they discovered the runes, especially if the teacher was to be Dumbledore himself - the potential for trouble here was through the roof.

Snape looked taken aback for a second, before regaining his composure. Sirius frowned, then both of them spoke at the same time.

‘This is not optional, Potter. The headmaster believes it is of utmost importance that you learn to guard your mind. The Dark Lord is an accomplished Legilimens-‘

‘Harry, Dumbledore is usually right about these things. You need to learn to protect yourself from-‘

‘Fine! Fine! It won’t work, but… sure, fine. Who’s going to teach me?’ said Harry raising his hands to placate the men. He’d rather not explain the runes now and he had his fill of fights for the holidays.

‘I am.’ Said Snape darkly and Harry instantly regretted agreeing to this.

‘Why can’t Dumbledore teach Harry?’ asked Sirius belligerently. ‘Why you?’

‘I suppose because it is the headmaster’s privilege to delegate less enjoyable tasks. I assure you; I did not request it.’ Said Snape as he rose from his seat. ‘I will expect you at six o’clock on Monday evening, Potter. My office. If anyone asks, say you’re taking remedial Potions. Anyone who has seen you in my classes would agree you need them.’

‘Wait a moment!’ said Sirius when Snape turned to leave.

‘I am in rather a hurry, Black-‘ said Snape turning back towards them, hand on the doorhandle, face oozing with contempt.

‘I’ll make this brief, then.’ Said Sirius threateningly, standing up to tower over Snape.

Snape put his hand in his cloak pocket and narrowed his eyes at Sirius.

‘If I hear you’re using these lessons to give Harry a hard time, you’ll have me to answer to.’ Threatened Sirius.

‘How touching,’ drawled Snape. ‘But surely you have noticed that Potter is very like his father?’

Harry resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Snape didn’t know Harry at all, he only ever spoke to him not with him. It was obvious that Snape had decided Harry was a carbon copy of his father long before Harry had said as much as a word to Snape. He was going off of what Harry looked like, and frankly, Harry thought that Sirius wasn’t any better, which is why Sirius’ reaction took Harry completely by surprise.

‘No, he’s not.’ Said Sirius shortly, baffled as if Snape had just told him the sky was green. ‘Harry isn’t like James at all – apart from appearance – they have almost nothing in common.’

Snape’s eyebrows had contacted to form a thick, black ridge, shadowing his eyes. They stood there in silence for a moment, glaring at each other disbelievingly. Harry could see the gears turning inside their heads. Sirius was probably realizing that Snape was treating Harry as if he was James Potter.

‘How can you think they’re alike, Snape?’ There was some genuine curiosity in Sirius’s voice. ‘James was confident, optimistic, fiercely caring – he was disorganized, an open book… ruled by his emotions and he loved the limelight.’

Snape didn’t disagree with Sirius’ description, though Harry assumed he’d probably use less favourable terms himself.

Sirius made an open-handed gesture at Harry. ‘Harry is cautious, independent, pessimistic, resilient… reserved and introverted, but kind… In fact, he’s so much like my brother Regulus that my ruddy house-elf is treating him as if he is Regulus!’

Harry switched from looking at them to staring at his lap, tucking his hands in under his thighs before they unwittingly rose to the locket. Snape’s eyes moved to stare at Harry, who returned it with a numb glance.

‘Sure, he’s braver than Regulus ever could hope to be, but I do wonder about that Gryffindor sorting sometimes.’ Sirius sent Harry a wry smile, ‘you don’t really fit the mould, pup.’

‘I argued with the hat.’ Confessed Harry, hunching up his shoulders, ‘it wanted me Slytherin.’

Snape flinched, momentarily looking like he’d been slapped.

‘Hah!’ burst Sirius victoriously, ‘there we have it. James was the very antithesis of the “Slytherin creed”, he was pronounced lion before the hat hit his head. But really, when I first saw Harry, I thought he was going to be so much like James, the shock I got,- nevermind, anyway, they are not remotely the same, Snape.’

For a brief moment, it looked like Sirius’ tale had disarmed Snape somewhat, but then the beady, black eyes dimmed again.

‘Mr. Potter has been a persistent and incurable troublemaker since he first arrived at Hogwarts, Black.’ Snarled Snape loudly, ‘prancing about the castle as if he owns it, just like his father.’

Sirius opened his mouth to argue on, but before he could get any words out, there was some commotion outside. The kitchen door opened and in leaped a high-spirited Mr. Weasley followed by the majority of his family and Hermione.

‘Cured!’ he declared loudly, ‘Completely cured!’

The rest of the crowd had paused right inside the doorway, taking in the outlandish scene playing out between the three people around the kitchen table.

Sirius and Snape were both standing upright, leaning a little forward with their arms hovering at their sides, as if preparing to draw revolvers in a Mexican stand-off. Harry was still seated, but probably looked precisely as tense as he felt.

‘What’s going on here?’ asked Mr. Weasley, looking between the three of them.

‘Snape was just leaving.’ Said Sirius, straightening his back and letting his arms fall.

Snape nodded. ‘I was. Six o’clock, Monday evening, Potter.’ He said and fled the kitchen, robes billowing behind him. Sirius watched Snape disappear before turning to Mr. Weasley.

‘So, you’re cured? That’s great!’ said Sirius, and with that the bubble broke and normal talking resumed.

***

Transport to Hogwarts the next day was to be by the Knight Bus with Tonks and Lupin escorting them. They had already arrived at Grimmauld Place when Harry and Ron came down to breakfast, holding a hushed conversation over their mugs. They ate quickly and everyone gathered in the hall, trying to organize luggage, and getting into their warm clothes.

Sirius covertly handed Harry a package which he wasn’t allowed to open until he was out of Mrs. Weasley’s sight. Harry stuffed it in the pocket of his thick, woollen cloak and then promptly forgot about it, his mind still stuck on the conversation between Snape and Sirius in the kitchen the day before. A tiny piece of hope that Snape would stop comparing him to his father had been lit.

The Knight Bus ride was exactly as chaotic and nauseating as the first time Harry took it. At least the beds had been replaced by seats and rails for daytime. The group chose seats in the back of the bus, holding onto the railing for dear life as the bus bounced around as if they were inside a giant pinball machine.

Hermione and Ginny had taken seats across the aisle from them, and Harry was watching their increasingly creative attempts at calming down Crookshanks when Ron leaned over Harry’s shoulder and said, ‘have you found someone then?’

‘What?’ Harry said, a genuine reaction and a necessity, as Crookshanks’s meows had become screams and the bus itself roared like a jet engine.

‘You know – since you’re wearing jewellery and all…?’ Ron fished with an expectant twitch in his cheek, not quite yet a smile, but wanting to be.

Harry didn’t answer, not trusting his brain to come up with a safely worded response.

Ron cleared his throat. ‘Just… You know, most blokes don’t wear necklaces.’ He said.

‘But what has that got to do with anything?’ retorted Harry, feigning confusion.

Ron seemed to mull his next words over for a second, before leaning in even closer, eyes darting over at the girls guardedly. ‘It’s alright, you know… that, uh, if – if you’re gay.’

In that instant, Harry wanted nothing more than for one of London’s double-deckers to hit them head on and kill everyone on board.

‘I mean, it’s a bit – bit weird, but… you’re still my best mate…and,-‘ continued Ron in a low voice.

In the absence of sudden death, Harry found he had no idea what to say.

When a minute ticked by and Harry still hadn’t said anything or even acknowledged that he’d heard what was said to him, Ron sighed, ‘I’m no good at this… Forget I said anything.’

He turned his head away to look at the blur of colours that was all they could see of the British countryside outside the bus windows.

‘Please don’t tell anyone.’ Harry had hardly noticed he was talking before the words were out, small and thin.

‘Of course not. Never, yeah.’ Said Ron, with an audible smile. If Harry was to be completely honest, he sounded a twinge relieved.

A hand clasped Harry’s shoulder reassuringly, and Harry braved a glance at his best friend. Ron’s expression seemed genuine, with a compassionate, close-lipped smile and light eyes.

Harry bit his cheek. ‘You’re not-‘ disgusted? Uncomfortable? Angry? He didn’t have it in him to complete the question, the options were too many.

‘Hey, as long as it’s not me you’re fancying, or my brothers,-‘

‘I don’t fancy anyone,’ sighed Harry exasperatedly, plastering annoyance over the wound in his heart from having one of his fears proven true.
Told you. He’ll think you fancy him, remarked a snide voice in his brain.

‘-Or Malfoy.’ Continued Ron, oblivious to Harry’s heartache. ‘Seriously, Harry, if you start dating Malfoy, I’ll bloody bludgeon you to death with my broom.’

‘If I start fancying Malfoy, I’ll let you.’ Grinned Harry, still feeling a bit emotionally haggard, ‘as my best mate, I trust you will put me out of my misery.’

Ron cackled.

They got off the bus at Hogsmeade Station, a few metres from the start of the drive up to Hogwarts. The train had arrived hours ago, and no carriages were waiting for them, so they walked with Ron at the head, creating a trail through the snow. Despite the heavy trudge through wet, compacted snow, Harry’s body felt lighter than it had for months.

That night, Harry received Voldemort’s reply.

Chapter 21: The Cheshire Cat

Chapter Text

Tom was dreaming.
He was walking somewhere completely dark, with no control over where his legs were taking him. His steps made soft, wet splashing noises as if he was walking through a slightly viscous, shallow puddle. A light appeared in the distance. It turned out to be a single, theatre spotlight, illuminating the short form of Harry Potter.

Tom came to a halt a metre and a half in front of the light. Harry was wearing his school robes, the hem of it soaked in the dark, burgundy liquid they were both standing in. His eyes were closed.
The spotlight went out with a loud CHOCK. Darkness.

‘When I was thirteen, I saw my godfather swarmed by a hundred dementors. I saw his soul leave his body.’ Said a disembodied voice that sounded like Harry’s, only slightly distorted. Tom thought it might be the way Harry’s voice sounded to Harry himself, inside his head.

Suddenly he was standing on the stoney shore of the Black Lake, a hundred dementors spiralling through the air like a tornado of black cloth. It centred around an unconscious man in a tattered Azkaban-jumpsuit and a distraught, younger Harry. A little white dot was hovering above the prisoner’s mouth, a dementor leaning towards it.

The silvery flash of a Patronus blinded him and he was back in the darkness.

’And I began to wonder why dementors doesn’t rule the earth, considering their immense power over humans. I began researching souls – mostly through the lens of runes – my best subject.’

Flashes of memories from Harry’s perspective where he was pouring over books, eyes fixating on the key sentences Harry wanted Tom to read, including one about the force needed to divide a soul and that a soul could only be split in equally weighing halves.

Another book highlighted that the fabric of “Soul” was always accompanied by the threads of “Mind”, and so losing one’s soul meant also losing one’s mind. Not for the first time, Tom felt a stab of annoyance at his younger self for not seeking out more such facts before performing the first Horcrux ritual. The part about halves was new to him.
Not that he thought the knowledge would have stopped him when it came down to it.

‘I found a ritual that allowed me to see my own soul – and I found a stowaway.’

Tom materialized in a small, dark room with silver mirrors on one wall. A younger, lankier Harry was sitting cross-legged in the centre of a large, complex array. He had what looked like a ball of shining, light green yarn the size of a pumpkin suspended in the air in front of him. Harry poked at the yarn with his finger – bringing Tom’s attention to a contrastingly dark, reddish dot.

‘I knew this was yours… Touching it felt like holding your diary or getting pulled into its memory.’

Tom blinked, and again he was in a memory from Harry’s point of view, holding Tom’s old diary. The recollection shifted in a blur, and he was standing in the Chamber of Secrets. The basilisk laid dead in the grimy, black pool, a gaping wound in the roof of its open mouth. A redheaded child laid sprawled lifeless on the floor, with a very young Harry kneeling by her, a bloodied sword at his side.

Harry was talking to a teenage Tom. All fuzzy around the edges and wearing all layers his school uniform, prepared for a day in the cold Chamber. A snapshot from the day of the first Horcrux ritual.
The diary was on the floor too, along with what looked like an old leathery rag.

Tom stared at the scene with utter fascination. What on earth had happened here? From Lucius’ confessions, he knew the diary had attempted to drain the girl, and her face did tickle a recollection of sorts… Somewhere buried in the depths of Tom’s brain, unreachable by his conscious ego.

A sudden movement snatched his attention. Harry had picked up a basilisk tooth and fiercely stabbed the diary with it. Tom’s heart lodged itself in his trachea as his younger self lounged to stop young Harry’s hand, but the teen disintegrated, and the dream whisked Tom away.

‘I tried so many rituals to remove it…It felt unclean, at first. Like I was sullied… Stained…’

The dream blinked in flashes of several rituals in quick succession, all performed in the dark room with the mirror-clad wall. Interlinked were segments of Harry scrubbing furiously at his hands and legs with soapy water and a stiff brush, skin red and sore and bleeding.

The scene was painfully familiar. Tom could understand how it might feel horribly invasive to have a piece of someone else’s soul inserted into you and fused to yours without your knowledge or consent. The images dug up forbidden memories of violations he’d reacted likewise to, a very long time ago.

Watching Harry desperately trying to cleanse himself of Tom’s intruding essence graced him with an alien and stingy twinge of guilt, despite knowing this had happened by complete accident.
Even at his most addled, Tom would never have intentionally bestowed a piece of his soul on another human.

‘The hunt for a “cure” brought me deeper into darker runes, into necromantic rituals where I learned what became of the piece in the diary when it died and how “Soul” attracts “Soul”.’

More images of related books and rituals flew past. Then, he was once more standing in the Little Hangleton graveyard, only this time he was seeing what was going on while his past self was inside the cauldron.

‘At your resurrection ritual, I added a line of necromancy to pull the piece from the diary down from Limbo, and I added catchlines and expanded the ritual to gather all of the same “Soul” in the surrounding area – I hoped it would pull the piece I had with it, if the piece you had was significantly larger and I fed it enough energy…’

His head was forced to turn to the runes glowing on the cauldron, and then to the surrounding catchlines. Harry was laying on the grass a few feet away in what appeared to be excruciating pain, convulsing, and screaming, while the cauldron sparked and sputtered. Again, it all went dark.

‘It was unsuccessful. I checked… I should have known… A soul can only naturally be torn in half and only parted in equal measures – the piece I had of yours was very small compared to my own, and so the ritual tore at the centre of my own soul unyieldingly.’

The ground under Tom’s feet turned from grassy to solid as the dream moved him to some dilapidated Muggle building, runes glowing on the concrete floor. It was the same ritual, but Harry was a bit older here and looking far worse for wear than in any of the previous memories, except perhaps the graveyard one.

So, the abuse never stopped, Tom thought distantly, frowning at Harry’s appearance.
He wore a horrid, overlarge, grey short-sleeved shirt; the stick-thin arms poking out were so densely covered in neat, straight scars that the skin looked puckered and loose. Oh. So that must be what causes those attacks I've been having, Tom thought to himself.

Harry’s normally rather striking features were twisted with sickliness. The eyes were dull, cheeks were hollow and complexion pallid. His face contorted into a pained expression as he exhaled a bright dot. Green eyes faded through brown and into an increasingly stark red.
Harry poked crudely at his own soul, and the yarn flexed and stretched. The green soul-threads looked rougher than before, bearing evidence of Harry’s long-term use of sharp implements on himself chafing them, and the dark bit was still there.

‘Which brings me to something you didn’t ask, but I’ll volunteer: I know there are more of these pieces... I did the math. I know at least six of these were made, starting with the diary.’

The scene shifted back to Harry in the dark, standing across from Tom in the blood-like liquid, spotlight directly overhead. Here he was healthy.
His slim, oval face had full cheeks with flawless, youthful skin ending in a sharp jawline. The wild, black hair was cut short in the back and around the ears but kept long enough at the top to mostly cover the scar on his forehead. His eyes were open and back to their true, impossibly vivid, acid-green colour. He was looking straight at Tom, lips lifting into a delicate, almost coy, teasing, smirk which faded abruptly.

‘So, I ask you again. Why me?’ Harry said, his voice hard as stone.

The dream ended with the spotlight going out with another ear-splitting CHOCK.

Tom awoke with a heave, heart racing in his chest and the spotlight’s boom echoing in his ears.
The boy knew about his Horcruxes – The boy was a Horcrux of sorts – He had used necromancy to fuse the available soul pieces together. But it did not relieve him of his own fragment.
His fragment.
Harry’s fragment.

Harry Potter is a Horcrux.

For an entire second, Tom’s brain emptied of thought, making way for sinking comprehension. Then, it all geared back to life. How much range did those catchlines add? Could it be…

Tom rushed out of bed, dressed, and hurried out the door, not caring if he woke the entire household on his way. He shoved his feet in a pair of Thaddeus’ boots and stepped out into the blistering December cold, not bothering to borrow a cloak. He waded through the snow that had buried the path to the gates and Apparated as soon as he passed the wards.

He appeared again on an icy road in Little Hangleton. The Riddle manor was standing gloomily in the distance. Up ahead was his family’s run-down old cottage, roof-less and rotted, drenched in the strongest spell-wards teenage Tom had mustered.

He vanished some of the snow to clear a path to the door. Inside, he felt for traces of his own magic and found wards and curses aplenty, but no Horcrux.
Bending down by the fireplace, he shimmied out the box from its hiding place under the decaying timbers, and took out the chunky, gold ring from it. Nothing. No Horcrux. Just a cursed, lifeless ring.

He removed the curse from the ring and put it on, then he sat the box back right where it was and left the old ruin. Tom’s mind was reeling – if Harry’s necromancy had worked, and his sources were correct, Tom now had a bit more than three quarters of his soul back in his body.
This explains everything.

The day of his resurrection he had risen from the smoking cauldron feeling better than he had since he was a teenager. Warmer, calmer, alert… the sinister snickering and thundering footsteps he’d likely hallucinated before hadn’t resurfaced… and now he knew why.

Simultaneously, memories of the last twenty or thirty years were foggy and distorted, almost as if he’d been inebriated the entire time and was just now coming to. This also meant that the two greatest pieces of his safety-net had been obliterated.

An urge to check on the other Horcruxes grew in his gut. He forced the impulse away, reminding himself that those were all far out of range of the resurrection ritual. The cup was a kilometre underground in the Lestrange family vault, nigh inaccessible to Tom now that Reginald was dead, and both his sons were in prison.

He had performed a Gringotts break in before in pursuit of the Philosopher’s Stone. Although, that had mostly been an effort to land Quirinius in the witness-detention area inside DMLE offices where Tom could possess him, sneak off and retrieve his wand from their stores. But even a shallow ploy like that had demanded thorough planning beforehand.

The Diadem was at Hogwarts, no more in reach than the cup. However, the Locket should be easily checked upon where it laid in its poisoned basin.
But if Tom had his way, he would never set foot in that cave again. It was the last Horcrux he’d wish to visit, let alone use. No, he’d leave it be, for now.

Then there was Harry himself…

Safeguarding that particular fragment… Was it even worth the trouble? It was rather small, if Harry was correct about the halves – a percent and a half, that was all. Really, the cost-benefit depended entirely upon the prophesy, and that was a problem to solve another day. He pulled himself together, placing a lid on this inner turmoil. It could all build up to be dealt with later.

He had to formulate a response to Harry – and that demanded a clear mind.

Harry could hear waves crash in the distance and feel a gentle breeze on his face. I’m dreaming.

He opened his eyes to find himself in a now familiar landscape of grassy, white cliffs. Thunder clouds were forming above the open ocean, towering menacingly into the sky. Voldemort was again standing by the cliffside, the Muggle clothes all black. Harry’s legs moved on their own, taking him up closer through the tall, dry grass.

Voldemort was looking out over the ocean with a forlorn expression on his face. ‘That “parasite” is called a Horcrux, and you are quite right – I have made six, including the one you carry, which I assure you was made entirely by accident. Without the rest of the Horcrux ritual, the soul-shard must have bound itself to you without guidance. I don’t think it can be removed without killing you.’ He turned his head to face Harry, again missing Harry’s eyes by a centimetre or two. ‘It must have happened when I tried to kill you as a baby. Which I did because of a prophesy.’

Voldemort looked pained, like he was admitting to something embarrassing, which Harry thought he was, sort of. Divination was a woolly brand of magic which Harry had no faith in, and he honestly thought Voldemort felt the same. Funnily, he was a bit disappointed.

‘Almost sixteen years ago, Severus Snape spied on Dumbledore’s efforts at hiring a new Divination teacher. He overheard the first few lines of a prophesy made during the interview and relayed them to me after the barman evicted him for eavesdropping. It said “The one with the power to vanquish the Dark lord approaches. Born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies”. I never heard the rest. A copy of the prophesy is kept in the Hall of Prophesies in the Department of Mysteries. Only parties involved can take it off the shelf.’

Voldemort let out a sigh and turned back to watch the sea. ‘I need to hear the rest of the Prophesy but retrieving it myself means probably exposing the return of Lord Voldemort to the world.’ He said tiredly. ‘…and that would be unwise… Besides, Dumbledore and his Order knows I want it, and are hoping to seal me within the Department of Mysteries should I venture down there. They have spent months covertly scratching their sentry-arrays into the walls, and I am not optimistic that my men within the Ministry can find them all.’

He put both his hands in his pockets, red eyes still fixed on the horizon. ‘Therefore, I was hoping to tempt you into getting it for me with tantalizing visions, but now that we have decided to have an honest conversation with each other-‘ he smiled wickedly at Harry for a moment, ‘we should be able to find an arrangement, I believe. I imagine you want to hear it too. If I clear the way for you, can you get it from the Hall of Prophesies and to the Ministry Atrium or out of the Ministry entirely? I cannot risk becoming trapped on the lower floors. Once you get it out, we will listen to it together, and of course, I guarantee safe passage for you back to Hogwarts.’

Ooooh, so this is why he let me go! Mused Harry’s brain.
It wasn’t gratitude or pity – it was practicality. He must have remembered he had a use for Harry once he collected himself after that Crucio… He stayed quiet for a moment, eyes back on the sea. Harry still couldn’t talk, bound to the rules of Voldemort’s false memory.

‘This method of sending premade dreams is a bit bothersome. I have tried to get to you directly, but I can never remember much of those attempts when I wake. And whenever I pull you into my dream, I’ve found that you do not remember them afterwards.’ Muttered Voldemort, turning his head to look in Harry’s general direction, ‘you have gotten further with this, I know. You allowed me to make my own decisions in some dreams, including letting me talk. Can you find a way I can speak to you directly?’

Harry wanted to nod but couldn’t. He had already achieved the requested feat in his experiments with hosting a cognizant Voldemort in his memories. However, Privet Drive was a poor venue for peace-talks, but the half year of experimenting had given him several ideas on how to fix that.

The dream ended, sending Harry rearing back to consciousness. The brainwaves from Voldemort’s mind were still of the sleeping-kind.

Harry would need some other kind of scene, and he didn’t really think the plain, dark place right for the job. Instead, he chose to use the house he’d been furnishing in his mind over and over for years.
It was a place of comfort that he knew every nook and cranny of, and he had many memories of past dreams that took place there, that he could use as a blueprint. And, more importantly, nothing could scare him there. It was his place.

A few minutes later, with a little preparation to ensure lucidity, he found himself sitting in the downstairs parlour of his imaginary house. The room had a salon of twin light green Bergere chairs and a tea table, an ornate fireplace with a fan-shaped, cast-iron spark catcher with a peaco*ck motif and a golden-brown velvet rococo sofa under the window. As the “best room in the house”, every wall had pictures on it, and every surface was richly decorated. A Victorian display of Middle-Class wealth.

Harry sat down in the left chair and called Diana the “Maid of All Work” for some tea. He guided Voldemort’s consciousness in, carefully manoeuvring the Mind around. A shape of a person materialized in the other chair, slowly morphing into Voldemort as Harry had seen him last.

‘Where…?’ Voldemort looked around the chintzy parlour.

‘It’s a house I’ve had in my mind for a few years.’ Said Harry nervously.

Voldemort turned his head to look perplexedly at him.

Diana (this time a blond woman in a traditional black and white maid’s uniform) backed into through the door carrying a silver tea tray. ‘There you are sirs.’ She said, putting the tray down on the table between them.

‘Thank you, Diana.’ Said Harry friendlily.

Diana did a small curtsy before leaving the room, bustling off into the kitchen.

‘Named for the snake?’ asked Voldemort, watching the imaginary woman leave while picking up his cup of tea.

Harry nodded, feeling his remaining confidence drain away under Voldemort’s scrutiny. ‘Er… sorry about all that, by the way… I got sick of dreaming of the corridor; they sort of supressed my normal dreams. I use dreams to, erm… escape…’ he said, trailing off.

‘So, you decided to retaliate by sending me nightmares?’ said Voldemort mildly.

Harry knotted his hands together in his lap. Voldemort's laidback and open behaviour was unnerving. He reclined elegantly in his chair and took a small sip of his tea, as if this was his house, not Harry’s.

‘Yeah… I’ll stop n-‘

‘Don’t.’ Interrupted Voldemort shortly, not looking at Harry. ‘As long as I can keep my sense of self through them, I do not mind them much.’

Harry stared at him in absolute disbelief. ‘Wha – You prefer those? How-‘ Harry suddenly realized that he was about to ask a very personal question to Lord Voldemort, and promptly shut his mouth.

Voldemort set his tea down. ‘Yes, because they are ultimately your experiences. And the iterations where you allow me to disembowel your uncle are fun,’ he sent Harry a crooked smile. ‘Though I do wish I could stand for a larger portion of the violence myself, and not be a victim as much.’

Harry enjoyed watching Voldemort fight his uncle, too, and he got the distinct feeling that Voldemort knew that.

‘My own dreams are often repetitive and dull – or rehashing of times I’d rather forget. Death and terror, most of it.’ Voldemort sounded weary, despite smirking confidently with half-lidded eyes. ‘Why not spice it up with somebody else’s death and terror?’

Harry was stumped. He hadn’t expected Voldemort to answer his unasked, overly personal question with such honesty or detail. ‘Umm - OK…’ he started, unsure of what to say.

He supposed he could keep dropping the Dark Lord’s brain into his own eight-year-old body like some insane horror videogame. Last time he did that had been quite fun – and horrifyingly cruel, since Voldemort never consented to playing. He took a sip of his tea to buy time. It tasted like mangoes.

‘And furthermore, there are some of your experiences I wish to see in their entirety, Harry. If you would indulge me. Particularly the episode when Salazar’s old basilisk died.’ Said Voldemort amusedly. His grin was wide, shark-like, and blindingly handsome. Harry tried valiantly not to stare.

‘Sure, yeah – That was terrifying. I tried to get sixteen-year-old you to help me save Ginny Weasley, until he showed me that him and you were the same person…’ Said Harry timidly.

‘Showed you?’

‘Yeah… He used my wand to spell out your name and the anagram in the air…’ Harry mimicked the action in the air with his hand, feeling a little stupid when he realized what he was doing.

Voldemort seemed to supress a snort, ‘Thought I was so clever at sixteen. I really hated my given name.’

‘Because it was your father’s name, yeah, you told me.’ Said Harry quickly. Voldemort narrowed his eyes at him, puzzled. ‘Do you still hate that name?’ Harry asked before he could stop himself, cursing his own curiosity.

Voldemort shook his head. ‘Only when Dumbledore uses it,’ he smiled, ‘I never completely stopped thinking of myself as “Tom”.’

Harry raised his eyebrows, aborting the impulsive motion to stare into Voldemort’s eyes at the last second. Just when I thought he was out of surprises, he conjures up another one, he thought astonishedly. Then something else tickled his mind.

‘Why do you call me by my first name? You always have.’ Asked Harry, nervously tugging on the rough, wool fabric of his trousers where they clung to his thighs.

Voldemort observed him for a few seconds before answering. ‘Because to me, Mr. Potter is an annoying brat three years below me at school pestering the prefects to promote his half-baked Boil-and-Bubble-tournament… Or a dead, twenty-one-year-old Auror who tried to hold me off without his wand – Both of them people you are nothing alike apart from your appearance.’

Harry didn’t know what to say to that. Was it an insult to his family or a compliment to Harry, or both?

He fell for the temptation to ask. ‘How can you say that when you don’t know me?’

‘Oh, but I do know you. Or at least the child you once were.’ Voldemort set his teacup down with a clink. ‘I only knew your father through the memories of others. Over-confident man of mediocre ability who prioritized short-term happiness until his late teens, then seemed to have an epiphany and began expending the effort to improve academically and socially. Which he did, understand me right. Likely the shift came because of the death of his father, Fleamont Potter. Now that person, I knew. An overly extroverted menace with incredibly low self-awareness.’ He paused for a second, searching Harry’s eyes (and maybe the link?) for adverse reactions. When he found nothing but Harry’s genuinely emotionally disconnected interest, he continued, ‘neither of them were particularly talented, and both spent their youths cultivating shallow popularity amongst their peers,-’

‘Isn’t that what everyone does at school?’ Remarked Harry.

‘Yes. That is my point exactly. How many fourteen-year-olds do you think has the determination and stamina to teach themselves something as complex and dry as runic magic to Mastery level on their own initiative? Even when the motivator is fear?’ Voldemort’s eyes were searing into his now. Harry had to look away.

‘Erm, I have a knack for it. It’s just easy for me –‘ Harry began explaining, staring at the chevrons in the tweed pattern on his trousers move up his knee like steps in an escalator. It would seem the dreamscape had troubles portraying finer details.

Voldemort was giving him too much credit. He’d never have studied something as avidly as he did Runes had he not been a natural at it. Reading rune diagrams hardly felt like studying. To him, it was in the same category as reviewing Quidditch strategies or read about professional feints. It was a hobby, not a chore.

Voldemort threw his chin up in a haughty gesture, then stressed in a hard voice, ‘Natural talent is never enough on its own. As evident by your poor word choices in parseltongue. Practice is key. Hardly anyone of your age have the resilience to sustain the effort unless they see immediate results. In fact, I can think of only one other who at that age put in the hours the way you have done with your runes and mystic arts, which is what all your soul-work is by the way.’

‘Who?’ said Harry crossly.

‘Myself.’ He smiled a tight-lipped, conceited smile.

Harry flinched. That wasn’t the answer he expected. A funny sort of serenity fell over him.

‘Both half-bloods, orphans, raised by Muggles…’ Harry quoted mumbling under his breath. He omitted the part about them looking somewhat alike. The jury had been out on Harry’s appearance as a twelve-year-old, but at fifteen, it was clear that comparing his looks with Voldemort’s now would be a sad affair.

‘Yes… There are bizarrely many likenesses between us.’ Commented Voldemort, frowning a little.

‘You’ve said that before. Right before you set the Basilisk on me, actually,’ said Harry, shifting a little in his seat.

Feeling the acute need for something to do with his hands, Harry put a spoonful of sugar in his tea and stirred it. It made no difference to the taste.

‘Is it still me, when I have no memory of it?’ quipped Voldemort confidently, with the intent to rile Harry up, no doubt.

Harry decided to take him at face-value anyway. ‘Well… Before the graveyard, you had a percent and a half of your soul left… Now, you’ve gotten fifty from the diary back…’ he pondered aloud, eyes on his tea, ‘so now you’re more diary than not, right?’

A strained silence fell over the dream-parlour. The grandfather clock by the hallway door chimed softly. The fire popped and sparked. Voldemort’s eyes shifted around under furrowed brows, contemplating Harry’s question. Harry drank his tea, regretting his words while trying to find something clever to say to break through the tension.

Voldemort spared him the trouble. ‘Isn’t it difficult… chatting with your parents’ murderer like this?’ he asked with a deriding look, lacing his long fingers together in his lap.

Harry thought about it for a moment before answering. His feelings about Lord Voldemort had been turbulent since the graveyard, but Harry hadn’t actually articulated any of the shifting thoughts aloud before. Nor the conclusion he’d reached.

‘Yes… And no…’ Harry started, stirring his tea. ‘Actually – I…Er… I’ve thought about why I hated you so much… I used to say it was because you killed my parents, but… Now I know that I wouldn’t have felt so strongly about it if it weren’t for the Dursleys. Sure, I’d be sad – but if I’d grown up with a foster family who genuinely cared about me, I don’t think I’d have hated you as much. Like the other orphans of the war… And I’ve realized it’s not fair. It’s not you who stuck me with the Dursleys. You never meant for me to survive in the first place… Dumbledore did that. He also enlisted them into his Order, and they chose to fight, but ultimately, I can’t truly mourn someone I never knew, can I? I’ve been mourning the life I imagined I’d have if they were still alive. And that’s a fantasy that’s got nothing to do with you.’

Harry felt a pressure build up in his face when he finished. He pushed it away. ‘Sorry… Didn’t mean to go off like that… I can’t talk to anyone about this, or they’ll think I’m losing it.’ He sighed. This was something he’d been keeping in for a while.

Voldemort was regarding him with a lightly mystified expression. ‘I don’t mind, Harry. If I did not want a proper answer, I would not have asked.’ He straightened up his posture and began spinning his teacup on its saucer by the rim. It made a low ringing noise. ‘I got the sense that you were not so zealous in your hatred of me as I believed you would be when I first tried to communicate with you directly back in October.’

That took Harry aback. ‘Erm, I have no memory of that.’ He said.

‘No, I quickly learned that. I asked only one thing of you, which you agreed to do, and then proceeded not to do. It was an unproductive conversation. Your state of mind was, well, addled.’ Voldemort stopped spinning the cup.

Harry frowned, trying to uncover when this dream had taken place. He came up with nothing, his head filling with undecipherable thoughts so dense it might as well have been foam.

Before he knew what the chaotic brain was commanding of his mouth, new words slipped out. ‘When you tried to kill me… Your mind was addled too, wasn’t it?’ Voldemort’s glare was nothing less than hostile, prompting Harry to amend his statement, ‘I mean, you had like three percent of your soul at the time… and, erm, you acted on a prophesy as if it was self-defence?’

Voldemort’s insulted expression softened, breathing out a simple, ‘Yes.’

Harry waited but Voldemort didn’t elaborate. They stayed quiet for a minute.

‘How am I going to get into the Department of Mysteries?’ Harry asked after collecting himself and finishing his cup of tea.

Voldemort smiled smugly. ‘So, you want to know what the prophesy says too, yes?’

‘Of course I do.’ Said Harry and refilled his cup. ‘And it is what you kept me alive for, isn’t it?’

Voldemort didn’t answer. In fact, he looked a bit stunned.

Not wanting things to get awkward again, Harry asked, ‘but how am I going to avoid getting stuck down there?’ He distinctly remembered Voldemort saying something earlier about being trapped on the lower floors.

Blinking out of his stupor, Voldemort shook his head. ‘It is little issue for you.’ He said, running his finger along the rim of his teacup, ‘the Order has been building a trap for me specifically. Their members have been planting sentry arrays around the building that go off should a person with an aura of a certain magnitude pass them. If that were to happen, the sentries open up holes in the Ministry wards, allowing the Order to apparate in to seal the department doors from the outside.’

‘But won’t other Ministry employees find them? And what if some random person sets them off and they destroy the wards? Won’t there be trouble for them?’

‘Oh yes, they are taking a substantial risk, but not of a stranger triggering the sentries. I imagine Dumbledore could set them off, but not a regular Auror. They have been putting out weaker trackers too, that go off on visitors appearing after hours but cannot detect Ministry Employees. It is the reason why I have been sending Nagini out with a rightly employed Death Eater to scout for guards and sentry-arrays. She is without aura, and the Death Eater is exempt.’ Voldemort ended his explanation with a long tea-break.

Harry drank his tea for a bit too, trying to articulate his next question in his head properly before talking. Something about Voldemort made him abnormally prone to just blunder out thoughtless inquiries.

‘Do you know why Nagini attacked Mr. Weasley then? If she was just there to look around?’ Harry asked, though it didn’t quite cover all he wanted to know.

‘According to her – though do keep in mind, she is quite stupid,’ began Voldemort, sounding oddly fond, ‘the man cast magic on her, so she panicked and decided to bite him until he stopped moving. Did he survive?’

‘Yes. I got Dumbledore to help him.’ Said Harry.

‘Ah, then you are very welcome, Harry.’ Smiled Voldemort. Harry supressed the desire to balk at the man’s audaciousness. ‘Nagini will not join you on your excursion there, mind. The incident was a bit traumatic for her, I’m afraid.’

That suited Harry fine. This mission would be nerve wracking enough without having Lord Voldemort’s pet to look after as well. But would he have some other escort?

‘So I’m just going to walk down there alone? What about the employee-sensing things?’ asked Harry.

Voldemort gave him a curt nod. ‘I have men on the inside who are working on that. They will add you to the employee-list covertly, granting you passage. That way, we won’t have to hunt down all the sentries.’ He waited a few moments, patiently regarding Harry with a neutral expression. Likely reaching the conclusion that Harry was out of questions, he asked, ‘So, think you can do this little task?’

‘Yeah… But, erm… It won’t be easy for me to leave Hogwarts unnoticed, not with that Umbridge woman controlling the school.’ Mumbled Harry, already scanning his brain for solutions.

Voldemort hummed unimpressedly. ‘Hm, yes, I have read about her – accomplishments – in the Prophet.’

Harry nodded. ‘Really, it’s a good example of why I don’t agree with you and your old Party on the Ministry’s role in Wizarding education. It’s an absolute nightmare, and her classes are pointless – all we do is read from a textbook,’ he sneered with a bitter tone.

Voldemort all but gawked openly at him; eyebrows as high as they went. ‘What do you know of the Knights?’ he said suspiciously.

It was Harry’s turn to smirk now, glad to be able to retaliate with at least one surprise of his own.
‘Your activism was mentioned in a book on wizarding parliamentarism. From there, I looked at old issues of the Prophet. One had a photograph of Druella Black handing out flyers – you were standing behind her – and I found those flyers inside old issues of The Quibbler.’

When Voldemort didn’t say anything, Harry continued, hoping to foster some goodwill, ‘I actually agree with the majority of it, you know… Are your goals back to what they were then? Is that what you meant in the graveyard?’

Harry picked up his teacup again and took a sip, mostly to hide his face. It suddenly dawned on him how obsessive he had sounded. The realization made his face feel a bit hot.

Voldemort simply smiled as Harry spoke. Weakly at first, then it grew into a grin. ‘Yes. Yes, it was.’ He replied, then took another sip of his tea, still smiling. ‘Does that surprise you?’

‘Yeah.’ Answered Harry, focusing on his own cup, ‘I was always taught you wanted to exterminate Muggleborns and enslave Muggles, stuff like that.’

‘I do not.’ Voldemort said, effectively ending the conversation while peering sceptically into his cup. ‘Does this taste like pears to you?’

‘No, mango.’

Chapter 22: Mind Magic

Chapter Text

Harry spent all of Monday’s classes dreading the first, and likely only, Occlumency lesson with Snape. The appointment wasn't alone in spreading dread. He was approached by DA-members in every break, asking when the first meeting of the new year would be. Sadly, Harry was yet to return to speaking terms with Ginny and so, in lieu of planning or promising anything, everyone got referred to the fake Galleons Hermione had crafted for them as a messaging system right before Christmas.

He had been making some light plans for the DA-lessons this term, including an “exam” of sorts - if he could get the show-and-tell-array up to level. It could now reliably play memories, but inventing images for it on the fly was still not working properly. It turned out fuzzy, and the figures would sometimes blink out only to phase back in on the other side of the array. Likely, there was an unwanted energy-skip somewhere.

Six o’clock on the dot, Harry knocked on Snape’s door.
The office was a gloomy, dank room with a low, vaulted ceiling. The walls were completely covered by shelving crammed full of jars of miscellaneous gross materials suspended in sickly, yellow oils. It was lit only by a few candles on Snape’s desk and had no windows.
Dumbledore’s Pensive was standing on the desk, giving off a shimmery, blue light.

‘Shut the door behind you, Potter.’ Said Snape from the shadows somewhere.

Harry did as he was told. When he turned back, Snape had moved into the candlelight and was gesturing towards the straight-backed wooden chair in front of his desk. Snape sat down. Harry did the same.

‘You know why you’re here, Potter. The headmaster has asked me to teach you Occlumency. I can only hope that you prove more adept at it than at Potions.’ Said Snape, the candles and Pensive light on his face hilariously reminiscent of the way Muggle children lit theirs with flashlights when telling ghost stories.

‘This isn’t going to work.’ Said Harry quietly, trying not to smile at the silly images in his head.

Snape narrowed his black eyes at him. ‘I assure you I will do my utmost to teach you – if this “doesn’t work”, it will be due to your personal failings, not mine. – And even though this is not an ordinary class, I am still your teacher, and you will call me “sir” or “Professor” at all times.’ He said sourly.

Harry stifled a huff of resignation. Snape misunderstood him but pointing that out was hazardous. Instead, he just nodded complacently.

‘Sir, what I don’t understand is why Professor Dumbledore wants me to learn Occlumency when I am capable of defending my mind with Runespells.’ Harry said neutrally. He doubted saying this would change anything, but it might ease the shock later, when Snape inevitably discovered the futility of his endeavours.

‘And what if the enchanted jewellery or clothing is removed, damaged or forgotten? Occlumency is a more permanent solution than Runespells.’ Said Snape, sneering. Harry’s eyebrows twitched. ‘Now, if you’re finished with your childish inquiries-‘

Snape stood up and began moving silvery memories from his mind to the Pensive, occasionally peering down at Harry through a curtain of greasy, black hair.

‘Stand up and take out your wand, Mr. Potter.’

Harry got up calmly and drew his wand out of his pocket. Snape was facing him from the other side of the desk.

‘You may use your wand to attempt to disarm me or defend yourself in any other way you can think of,’ informed Snape.

Harry clasped his left hand over his right, wand pointing downwards in front of him. He wouldn’t be needing it.

‘And what are you going to do?’ asked Harry, though he had a pretty good idea of what the answer would be.

‘I am about to attempt to break into your mind, and we are going to see how well you resist. I have been told that you have already shown an aptitude at resisting the Imperius Curse. You will find that similar powers are needed for this.’ Said Snape, lifting his wand and staring intently into Harry’s eyes. ‘Now, brace yourself. Legilimens!’

The spell was without light but had a mild wave that dissipated visibly about ten centimetres away from Harry’s face.
Snape’s hostile mask immediately scrunched into a deep scowl. Harry could feel the corners of his lips twitch. It was hard not to find Snape’s confusion funny, but laughing now might get him killed.

‘What – Did you do, Potter?’ asked Snape in a low, dangerous tone.

Harry thought it was likely better to simply show him. He lifted his hand to loosen his tie and top two shirt buttons fumblingly. He carefully pushed the chain of the locket out of view and pulled the shirt down to point at the raised runes circling his neck by the collar bones, trailing over the slope of his shoulders. The ink he’d used in the stylus looked blue when he carved them but had since turned a very faint purple.

Snape was staring at him slack jawed.

‘I own a Necromancer’s Stylus. And I have a knack for Ancient Runes, Sir.’ Said Harry as innocently as he could manage. ‘This is what I meant, when I said it wouldn’t work.’ Harry buttoned his shirt back up and tightened his tie again.

Snape’s expression had shifted from surprised to aggressively suspicious. ‘You will meet me outside the headmaster’s office in fifteen minutes, Mr. Potter. Go.’ He said darkly.

Harry needn’t be told twice. Once the door closed behind him, he ran. He had to hide the locket and preferably also the Necromancer’s stylus and dark books he had in his trunk, fast. Sprinting through secret passageways and using every shortcut he knew he made it to the Portrait of the Fat Lady in three minutes.

He walked briskly through the common room while Fred and George called out, ‘What’s the hurry there Harry?’ and ‘Where’s the fire?’ when he passed them.

Harry didn’t answer, out of breath and huffing he took the steps to the dorms in twos.
He flung open the dormitory door and rushed to his trunk, threw his bookbag upside down over his bed, dumping his school-things out in a heap. A quick look on his watch told him he had ten minutes.

He threw all six questionable books into the bag, yanked the locket off and threw it in there along with the stylus that he summoned from the depths of his trunk. Slinging the bag over his shoulder, he ran back down, dodged Fred and George who were jumping starfish-style into his path and bolted out the portrait hole.

Having regained some stamina, he ran for the Room of Requirement. The lightly damaged leg that normally didn’t bother him was now aching and the calf muscle felt awkwardly swollen.
His watch said seven minutes to go when he got to the seventh floor.

I need somewhere to hide this… I need somewhere to hide my stuff… Somewhere Dumbledore and Snape won’t find it… The familiar oaken door appeared across from the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy. It opened to reveal a complete riot of a room.

Things were stacked almost to the ceiling, with narrow winding paths in between like sprawling city blocks. There was a familiar buzzing somewhere, calling him - Like the locket.
Harry pulled the locket out of the bag. It was warm and buzzing, but it wasn’t the source of the fuzz he felt in the air.
I’m wasting time, he thought, frowning.

He ran down one of the paths, locket still in his hand. It seemed to buzz stronger and hotter.
Rounding a corner and looking around for somewhere fitting and memorable to hide his things, an ugly bust with a cheap-looking wig on it caught his eye. There was a cupboard beneath it.
In there, perfect.

He threw the cupboard door open, and the locket promptly went berserk in his hand. There was a small, elegant wooden box sitting on the top shelf inside the cupboard. Harry threw his bookbag into the shelf below. Unable to resist the locket’s enthusiasm, he opened the wooden box.

Inside was an odd crown of sorts in a coppery metal with gleaming blue sapphires, the front shaped like an eagle. It buzzed, though in a melancholier way as opposed to the locket’s slightly aggressive way.

Another piece of his soul, Harry realized. He closed the lid with a snap and put the locket on top of it. I’ll be back for the both of you – I promise, he thought verbally at the locket and tiara.

Harry tried his best to memorize the specific junk he passed on his way back out, his watch now declaring he had only two minutes to get to the gargoyle. Thankfully, he knew a shortcut. He skidded to a halt in front of the gargoyle with barely twenty seconds to go.

Ten seconds later, Snape appeared around the corner, black robes flapping behind him. Not sparing Harry as much as a glance, he spoke the password and marched up the spiral staircase, Harry following clumsily behind him, still winded to the edge of feeling faint.

Dumbledore was sitting behind his desk, fingers posed in a pyramid under his crooked nose. He was wearing traffic-cone orange robes embroidered with green parrots. It was hard on the eyes.

‘Good evening,’ he said, eyes glinting at them over the rim of his half-moon-shaped spectacles. ‘Professor Snape's message said you ran into a hiccup of sorts with the Occlumency lesson. I trust you are getting along?’

‘Mr. Potter’s tattoos appear to be sabotaging my efforts.’ Said Snape slowly, hands clasped behind his back.

Dumbledore looked mildly surprised. ‘May I see them, Harry?’ he said, voice light and calm. He stood up and moved around his desk to stand beside Snape.

‘Um, yeah.’ Harry loosened his tie and top shirt buttons again, pulling the shirt down as he had done in Snape’s office. He was careful to keep his shoulders and the deformed ribs still covered, but nerves were gathering into a bristling feeling in the back of his neck anyhow. What if they saw something?

Dumbledore stepped closer to Harry, bending at the waist to study the faint symbols on his skin. After a minute or so, he straightened his back again.

‘Where did you find the tool to do this, Harry? This magic is quite Dark,’ Dumbledore said, his voice lathered in disappointment.

‘I found the stylus at Grimmauld Place, Professor.’

‘Do you still have it?’ queried Dumbledore, tilting his head.

‘No, I left it here.’ Harry lied. ‘But sir, I don’t understand… How is this dark magic?’

There was a bit of honest curiosity in this question, but mostly spite. At no point in Harry’s magical education so far, had anyone outright told him the definition of Dark magic. At first, he had assumed it was all types of magic designed to hurt others, but then he was taught that hexes and jinxes, even curses weren’t necessarily Dark, and that seemingly benign things like internal transfiguration and some forms of healing were classified as Dark.

Eventually, he’d developed a vague sense of what the wizarding world considered to be Dark Magic, enough to intuit what spells were most likely to be Dark, but only after actually studying Dark texts, did he find anything resembling a real answer.

Apparently, it had to do with which of the eight naturally occurring flows of magic, collectively called the ethers, the spell or piece of magic resembled the most.
From what Harry could gather, it was a rather arbitrary category as resemblance was judged by literally looking at magic through an Adder Stone. A more realistic view was probably that all the ethers blended together, like wavelengths of light.

‘Ah, I’m afraid that is a tough one to answer. Scholars on the topic has divined it so by comparing the magic of Necromancer’s Styluses to the Darkest Ether. It is all very complex,’ said Dumbledore unhelpfully. ‘This is permanent. You do understand that, Harry?’ he was looking Harry in the eye, for the first time since June.

‘Of course, Professor.’ Said Harry, slightly offended at Dumbledore’s implications, but also relieved that he was willing to meet Harry’s eyes now.

It was a sign of trust in Harry’s runes – and Harry was now leaning towards the conclusion that he’d been right to think Dumbledore was avoiding him in fear of him being possessed by Voldemort.

‘May I then ask, why you did this?’ asked Dumbledore.

Harry realized he was woefully unprepared for this question. It should have been the most obvious question for any of them to ask, and Harry hadn’t spared a thought on it beforehand. He couldn’t very well reveal that he’d been afraid that a malevolent locket he found at Grimmauld Place would possess him, without opening Pandora’s Box.

Cursing himself internally, he scrambled to come up with a feasible lie. ‘The graveyard, Professor… He could always tell when I lied.’

It sounded horrendously fake to his own ears, making him instantly regret the words. Hadn’t it been better to say that he came across the concept of Legillimency while studying some runes about sentient objects and freaked out, afraid it was the same as Muggle mindreading?
Yeah. That would have been way better, idiot, he berated himself.

Dumbledore nodded at Harry’s lousy lie and turned to Snape, who had been conspicuously silent during this whole exchange. Harry couldn’t tell if Dumbledore believed him or not, and the stress was beginning to cloud his mind.

‘Well, you cannot be taught Occlumency with those marks, I am afraid.’ Said Dumbledore with a pronounced exhale. Harry instantly felt ten kilos lighter, and seemingly, so did Snape. ‘We will have to place our faith in your rune work, Harry, but this begs the question… How did Lord Voldemort’s vision penetrate your protections when you saw the snake attack Arthur Weasley…?’ Dumbledore moved to sit down behind his desk again.

‘If I may, Headmaster… Perhaps the Dark Lord’s ritual forged a link that functions by other means?’ suggested Snape, eyebrows raised up high.

‘What means would that be?’ asked Harry. Snape ignored him.

‘What indeed… Harry, you may return to your common room. I am sure your friends are waiting for you… As of now, consider your lessons with Professor Snape discontinued.’ Said Dumbledore in a tone that left no room for arguments.

Harry would have liked to hear their speculations, so he could gauge how close to the mark they were. ‘Oh, OK… I’ll just… Bye, Professor.’ He said, smiling feebly as he scurried out the door, letting it fall shut with a heavy thud behind him.

For around a minute, he just stayed on the landing outside Dumbledore’s office. His breath was catching in the bottom of his throat, he could feel a cold sweat breaking out and the ever-present itching feeling had turned into a burning sensation running the surface of his skin. Slowly, he got to his senses again. He couldn’t hear any of their voices through the door after he closed it. They must have put a charm on it.

He retrieved his things and the Horcruxes from the Room of Requirement. They were surprisingly easy to find. The buzzing of Voldemort’s soul functioned as a beacon, guiding him along the narrow pathways between the mountains of stuff. There had to be centuries worth of students hiding things in here, Harry concluded dreamily. Largely junk, probably, but there were bound to be some treasures hidden in between.

When he got back to the common room, Ron and Hermione were indeed waiting for him there. Hermione was in her usual armchair by the fire, petting a very drowsy Crookshanks, while Ron was at the table by the windows, surrounded by parchment and books.

‘Where’ve you’ve been?’ asked Ron, looking up from what looked like his Potions homework.

‘Dumbledore wanted to talk to me some more about the vision.’ Answered Harry after slumping down into the chair across from him.

‘Ah, what’d he say? D’you think you’ll have more of those visions? Spying on You-Know-Who?’ rapid-fired Ron excitedly.

Hermione's hand stilled in the cat's orange fur, her lips pursing in a worried frown. ‘I think you should try to stop them. What if V-Voldemort finds out Harry’s been in his mind?’

Harry bit his cheek. ‘Yeah, that was what Dumbledore was worried about too, but er, he wanted me to take Occlumency classes with Snape, but I refused.’

‘But, Harry,-‘ Hermione reacted, but Harry interceded in time, ‘I’m going to create some runic protections against visions and Legillimency. Apparently, Voldemort’s big on that.’

The half-truth made him feel itchier than normal. At that exact moment, he really wished he could tell them everything.

‘That’s a really good idea, actually. Any thoughts on how you’re going to do them?’ said Hermione, rising from the armchair. She put Crookshanks down on the seat she vacated and came to join him and Ron at the table.

‘A few.’ Said Harry, smiling. ‘But it is a bit Dark though… Mind magic often is.’

‘Uhh, I don’t think you should mess anymore with Dark Magic, mate… It was bad enough last year, wasn’t it…’ Ron scowled but Hermione seemed undeterred.

‘What makes it too Dark then, Ron? Is it the Dark Ether you don’t like or is it all the Mystic Arts?’ she asked smartly.

‘Dark magic can scramble your brains you know!’ defended Ron, missing Hermione’s point by a mile.

‘Well, it can’t be done without the Black ether, Ron, so what would you have me do? Have Snape picking around in my head or Voldemort?’ said Harry rhetorically.

Ron’s scowl only deepened, but he didn’t argue on.

‘So, how will you do it, Harry?’ asked Hermione, purposefully turning away from the moping Ron.

They discussed rune-theory until Ron got fed up and roped Hermione into helping him with his essay. It was two feet on the use of oil-bases due Thursday, one that Harry hadn't even started yet.

Ron was inking up the final version when Hermione suddenly said, ‘I’m renaming and refocusing S.P.E.W.’

Harry and Ron shared a loaded look, unsure what to make of that statement.

‘To what?’ enquired Ron tenderly, quill hovering over the inkwell.

Hermione straightened her back. ‘Society for the Promotion of Intelligent Non-human Entities. S.P.I.N.E.’ She said with a proud but careful smile.

‘Er…Cool.’ Said Ron apprehensively.

‘Yeah! It is cool. Way better actually. It even includes ghosts, right?’ said Harry, happily watching Hermione’s smile broaden to an enthusiastic grin.

‘Mhm, that was why I thought Entities would be best.’ Hermione beamed at him.

‘What are you two on about now?’ Ron’s gaze pin-ponged between them under tapered brows. 'What do you want with ghosts?'

For a short second, Harry wanted to ask Ron what his problem was, then he recalled the Death-Day debacle in their second year and thought better of it. Ron had good reason to be skeptical of activities involving ghosts.

‘Well, I was thinking, elves aren’t the only ones being oppressed. Why fight for just this one group, when there are changes that could be made that would benefit all?’ explained Hermione.

‘Yeah! Like, discrimination laws that keep Lupin out of a job.’ Added Harry, trying to recruit Ron.

Orange brows lightened up a little, and his shoulders sank back to a more natural height. ‘Sure, yeah… That’d be good…’ Admitted Ron.

‘Good, so you’ll actually wear the badges this time?’ said Hermione, fishing out a handful of gleaming, new badges.

They were dark red with the letters S.P.I.N.E. centred in bold and a white border around the circumference that Harry first thought was lace, but on closer inspection turned out to be tiny, white vertebrae.

‘Sure!’ he said, freely encouraging Hermione and taking a badge from her hand. ‘The spine-pattern is pretty cool, actually.’

Ron took a badge as well, scrutinizing it closely. Harry gave his shin a light kick under the table.

‘Yeah… Yeah, it is. Loads better than spew – uh, the S.P.E.W badges,’ Ron fumbled, saving the sentence at the last possible second. ‘So, what’s S.P.I.N.E gonna do, then?’

‘Well, to put it simply - First, we recruit some members, inform the public, then get back the right to vote! For everyone!’ declared Hermione boldly and began explaining.

It took every ounce of self-control Harry had to not give away his established position on the issue, and simply let Hermione do her passionate pitch uninterrupted. They quickly ended up down in a bog of attempts to explain modern democracy to Ron, and by one o’clock in the morning, Harry left for bed feeling carefully optimistic.

Sadly, it didn’t last.

As he went to hide the crown away, he found evidence of his belongings having been searched. Even though he had expected it and successfully dodged that bullet, the invasion of his privacy felt icky. He wondered who had received the honours. Perhaps Professor McGonagall.

Frowning at his too neatly re-packed trunk, he decided to keep the crown within the safety of his warded bedcurtains until he could ward the trunk better. He tossed and turned for an hour, while all the pressing concerns that had been there before S.P.I.N.E returned with a vengeance. In the end, Harry bestowed himself with some new scars.

Blissfully calm in his bed afterwards (purposefully ignoring Lord Voldemort’s simmering anger on the link), he examined the crown under wand-light. It too had a sense of life over it, but rather than a heartbeat, the thing felt like it was breathing.

Slow, steady pulses of fuzzy static oozed and withdrew from the metal, making it quite soothing to hold between his hands. It wasn’t as lively as the locket, or clingy. No protests came as Harry carefully hid it away under the extra blanket he kept folded in the foot-end of the bed.

I need to get the trunk warded tomorrow, he thought, wiggling in under the blankets. He’d rather not leave it where it could get a hold of his dorm-mates’ minds. And I should probably speak to it. Perhaps it has a more coherent mind than the locket.

As he finally got to sleep that night, he sent the memory of the Chamber of Secrets to Voldemort. In the spirit of good faith, he chose to start at the point where he and Ron witnessed Gilderoy Lockheart cowardly packing his bags to flee Hogwarts.

He had a distinct feeling Voldemort would find the man hysterically appalling, which again might translate to some very entertaining dreams in the future. For now, Harry had to keep Voldemort’s options limited for the true memory to be shown, but respecting the man’s wishes, Harry let him retain his own sense of self.

Chapter 23: The Interview

Chapter Text

The next day, Harry spent his lunch-hour creating a warded pocket for the crown. He decided to use the fold-out pocket under the lid, as the leather could withstand the energy-load and heat quite well. Plus, the oil sticks Kreacher gave him for Christmas were perfect for enchanting leather.

Starting the stack with a basic notice-me-not, Harry covered the pocket in bright magenta runes, letting the oil seep into the leather and imbue it with magic. He carried on layering wards until he was confident nobody could breach them without spending at least half an hour on the task. As he fetched the crown from inside the mess of bedcurtains, a thought flipped into his brain from the sidelines.

Could the crown manipulate the Mind of others from afar? The trunk pocket was warded to restrict access from the outside, not to contain the dangerous, unknown abilities of the contents. He could trap the Mind within the pocket, for safety.

But should he do that? Create a barrier for the Mind of something that likely relied entirely on Mind to sense the world? In the odd chance that the Horcruxes had no other senses, that meant that shutting their Mind in would be akin to removing their senses altogether – and wasn’t complete sensory deprivation a form of torture?

Nobody hangs around the dorms anyway. There’s limited damage it can do to sleeping minds. Harry thought to himself, electing to risk it. He tucked the crown away and shut the trunk lid.

After that afternoon’s Care for Magical Creatures class, Hagrid pulled them aside and told them he’d been put on probation by Professor Umbridge. That news didn’t shock anyone, what was alarming however, was that he looked about as beat up as the day he arrived, and Harry spotted several injuries he was sure had to be new.

‘Whatever he’s doing that’s giving him those black eyes needs to stop.’ Said Harry to Ron and Hermione when he was certain Hagrid was out of earshot.

‘Hard to do as long as he refuses to tell us anything about it, and you’re right – He’s drawing far too much attention to himself – and now he’s on probation.’ Said Hermione tensely while they walked through the Entrance Hall. Harry knew she was holding in a severe “I told you so” during the conversation with Hagrid.

Hagrid’s situation grated on Harry's nerves the rest of the day. It seemed unsalvageable. Especially because the greatest vulnerability in Hagrid’s qualifications as a teacher was the fact that he had passed neither the Care for Magical Creatures O.W.L or N.E.W.T himself before teaching the subject. A fact Umbridge surely knew and could use to sack him.

Harry still held that Hagrid’s expulsion from Hogwarts, wand-snapping and subsequent ban from learning magic was an overly harsh punishment for the accidental murder of Myrtle Warren as a thirteen-year-old, especially since he never went to trial for it as far as Harry knew.

From what he’d gleaned from talking to Hagrid, the punishing of underage crime in the 1940’s appeared to be reliant on the headmaster, and not an actual justice system. The fact that he’d later been proven innocent hadn’t helped Hagrid’s situation at all.

To Harry’s knowledge, no uprising had been paid or corrections attempted. The real murderer would never face any justice, that Harry was sure of… But maybe said murderer knew more about how Hagrid got “convicted” the first time? He was the one who framed Hagrid, after all.

That night, Harry took a risk and pulled Voldemort into the dream house without prior agreement or warning. He made it rain outside for variety; Diana served tea again, but in this dream, she was a brunette with piercing blue eyes.

It took a few minutes for Voldemort to properly materialize. Harry passed the time in his armchair, listening to Diana humming in the kitchen while gazing at the silhouette pictures of Ron and Hermione in their oval, gilded frames on the wall. He thought about possibly adding one of Sirius too, but maybe it was too soon.

‘Good Evening, Harry,’ said Voldemort’s honeyed, though slightly deep and distorted voice.

‘And to you-‘ began Harry stiffly, ‘though I’m not quite sure what to call you, now.’ He wasn’t about to call the Dark Lord by his first name without permission and calling him “Voldemort” felt wrong.

‘That makes two of us, I’m afraid. My teenage fancies seem sillier and sillier by the hour. Particularly after seeing your encounter with my younger self last night.’ Said Voldemort, rubbing at the bridge of his nose. ‘It was overall agonizing to witness. Though, thank you for including the bit with that Lockheart clown… Up until last night, I assumed the stupidest person alive was Mortimer Crabbe.’

Harry couldn’t help but smile a little. ‘I know a Vincent Crabbe, he’s a good contender to that title. He and Goyle follows Draco Malfoy around like ducklings after their mother.’

‘Some things never change, I suppose. Vincent is Morty’s youngest grandson, if I recall correctly. I still believe Abraxas Malfoy had Morty brush his hair every morning, but I never saw it,’ mused Voldemort as he took his place in the same chair as last time, ‘I know Lucius played with Morty’s braindead offspring as well. Their parents put them all together in a padded playpen during meetings… The tots treated it like a boxing ring…’

The image painted itself in Harry’s imagination of a Death Eater meeting turned playdate, which was swiftly giving him a stroke. ‘I forget how old you are,’ he mumbled without thinking.

There was a sudden sharpness to the air, as if there had been a fire long ago, and the damaged walls painted over. An irregularity.

‘There is no magic in this place, is there?’ said Voldemort dangerously, and Harry caught on. He had tried something the dreamscape couldn’t accommodate, and it fizzled out.

‘Right. It’s really hard to recreate, and er… I’d be stupid to have magic with you here, wouldn’t I?’

Voldemort’s glower dissolved into concession. Harry cleared his throat, wanting to get on with this dream before Voldemort figured out that physical violence was still very much on the table even though magical violence was taken off it.

‘Actually, there was something I wanted to ask you about…,’ Harry started timidly. He'd been dreading this part. The prospect of asking the Dark Lord questions about his crimes was nerve-wracking.

‘Yes?’ said Voldemort, eyebrows raised.

‘When you framed Hagrid for Myrtle Warren’s murder, did he get a trial or...’

Voldemort threw his head back dramatically, eyes to the ceiling, ‘Ah, yes. That brat in the diary sure knew how to run his mouth,’ he let his head fall forward again, peering at Harry through the corner of his eyes. A small, entertained smile played on his lips.

‘Alright, it was a complete accident on my part, I had no idea she’d be there, and then Headmaster Dippet threatened to close the school…’ Voldemort sighed, making a vague, circular gesture in the air with his hand. ‘No, there was no trial. There are never any trials unless it benefits the members of the Wizengamot directly… Headmaster Dippet handled this quietly. Not that Rubeus appeared all that bothered at the time… I remember he was doing dreadfully in all his classes. He got made fun of a lot... I thought he was an absolute oaf, still do – really. But now I understand that not all are capable of or interested in academic pursuits.’

Voldemort paused. He eyed the tea tray interestedly. ‘Why do you ask?’ He said while he helped himself to a cup, the dainty little teacup looking a bit misplaced between his long fingers.

Harry poured tea into his own cup and answered, ‘Well, he works as the Care for Magical Creatures teacher now,-’ Voldemort recoiled, then quickly recovered, ‘- and that Umbridge woman has put him on probation. He’s actually decent at it, though some creatures are a bit… Well, they’re monsters. I think he’s been punished enough, for something he didn’t do, that’s all.’ He tried his utmost not to get angry while saying this. Fury wasn’t conducive to a productive conversation. He needed to prioritize getting answers over speaking his mind.

‘Lucius told me he never finished his O.W.Ls. Dumbledore’s doing, no doubt.’ Said Voldemort plainly, stirring sugar into his cup of tea.

Harry eased out a low, doubtful whine. ‘What makes you think it’s Dumbledore and not the Ministry or something?’ He took a sip and flinched - The tea tasted like baked fish.

‘The Ministry’s got a short memory. Dumbledore’s is painfully long. He is also adept at keeping people indebted to him. I will bet you a galleon that Rubeus, if asked about Dumbledore, will mention owing everything to him and how great of a wizard he is.’ Said Voldemort with an eyeroll, then sent the teapot a quizzical look.

Harry stifled a snort. Funny how he’d guessed almost verbatim what Hagrid had said about Dumbledore, on multiple occasions. ‘You’re spot on – Hagrid has said exactly that many times. I can send you that galleon if you’re strapped for cash.’ He joked, emboldened by Voldemort’s light and easy responses.

Sensing Voldemort was equally dissatisfied with his own tea, Harry picked up the bell on the tea tray and rang it once.

The corner of Voldemort's mouth twitched. ‘In fact, I am. I have been trying to get Gringotts to reissue me a key for my vault. I have received the one for the old Knights’ coffers, but not my personal one – The Goblins has me down as dead, you see.’ He sneered. Harry could imagine convincing Gringotts to amend their records to be quite the challenge.

Diana entered the room, drying her hands on a long, gathered apron. ‘May I help you, sirs?’ she said in a high, polite voice.

‘Yes, there’s something off about the tea, could you make a fresh pot? Thank you, Diana.’ Said Harry.

She picked the pot off the tray and left with a small curtsy.

‘Good. Mine tasted like caramelized onions. Yours?’ said Voldemort casually.

‘Baked fish.’

‘Anyway, I am staying with a friend until I can get hands on my money, but I have definitely overstayed my welcome…’ continued Voldemort, pouring the remaining tea in his cup out into the potted plant behind him, ‘and some of my belongings are in vaults administered by people currently rotting in Azkaban. It is getting inconvenient, so – I am going to spring them out.’

‘Really?’ said Harry, worried. ‘Who? Not the ones that are completely mad, right?’

‘Regretfully, the very maddest of them all is the one I need the most… And her mother insists.’ Voldemort smirked, but Harry had spent enough time with the man’s mind chained to his own to know when he wasn’t happy about something. ‘And there are others among them that we need out and about in order to get to the prophesy. I know you will not run to Dumbledore with this, you’re not that stupid, but a fair warning here, Harry… The man is an accomplished Legilimens, he can pick this conversation out of your mind without your knowl-‘

‘No, he can’t’ said Harry a little too smugly and a little too fast.

Voldemort stared at him with narrowed, sceptical eyes for a few seconds before his face fell. ‘…Runes…’ he said quietly ‘I should have known…’

Harry nodded, ‘Yep. In fact, Dumbledore wanted me to learn Occlumency from Snape,-’ Voldemort’s eyebrows twitched, ‘-and I couldn’t convince them that I’d be impossible before after Snape had tried to invade my mind. You should have seen their faces when I showed them the marks-‘

‘Marks? Like Stylus-marks?’ interrupted Voldemort in surprise.

Harry merely nodded again, trying his best not to appear as proud as he felt.

‘I don’t know why I’m so surprised, I have been the subject of your necromancy…’ mumbled Voldemort high-browed. ‘All right… What are you working on now, Rune-boy?’

Harry went off into a detailed explanation of the show-and-tell, how far he’d gotten and what the current hurdle was. Voldemort listened as if genuinely interested, asked a few questions, and even had some helpful suggestions.

It was incredibly refreshing to be able to engage in Rune-theory talk with someone who actually was able to follow and had new insights. Harry let the stimulating conversation carry him away, his nervousness forgotten. It didn’t feel awkward or imbalanced, or uncomfortable for that matter. Really, after a few minutes, it felt like they’d been fast friends for years.

Although Voldemort wasn’t as deep into the specifics of Runes and Symbols like Harry was, he was a far superior scholar of magic in general and held a deep understanding for the darker ethers. In those (what felt like) four hours, Harry made some real headway with his array and the debate on double-Thurs-Loops that sprung out had been truly interesting and shifted his views quite a bit.

‘I think it is morning…,’ said Harry standing by the window.

The rain had stopped, and a light glow was filtering through the blinds. Voldemort hummed, still looking at some of the drawings they had produced in the last hours.

‘I am getting my madmen out of Azkaban today or tomorrow.’ Informed Voldemort, looking up from the papers, ‘I will send a couple of them to scout out the Department of Mysteries some more and hopefully, we can plan that little excursion soon.’

Diana had given them two more rounds of tea. The first one had tasted like caramel for Harry and strawberries for Voldemort.

‘I think I know of a way out of the castle… I was thinking of using the fireplace at Honeydukes to Floo over, since it is outside of Umbridge’s control.’ Said Harry, sitting back down.

‘The pathway behind the one-eyed witch statue?’ asked Voldemort. They both took sips of their newest round of tea.

‘Yes, that was what I had in mind. I have an invisibility cloak, I can just sneak past whoever is patrolling.’

There was a heartbeat’s pause before Voldemort said in a unnervingly saccharine, consoling voice, ‘You have not lost your famed bravery, I must say – There is still a good chance the prophesy will be in favour of your death, Harry. And I am not going to risk my own cause and goals for you. But you know that, don’t you?’

Harry finished his tea quietly, thinking that if Voldemort meant for his question to sound intimidating, it failed miserably. If anything, he sounded reluctant to ask. Like he didn’t want to hear the answer.

‘I don’t really care if I die… as long as I have some say in when and how.’ Voldemort’s expression lost its airiness as Harry said this. It was true though, and Harry would be lying if he said he’d never entertained the thought of, well, leaving it all behind. ‘And I am choosing to do this. I know - ’ – you’ll kill me if you want to, went unspoken. Instead, he said, ‘I won’t fight you.’

Harry felt like a lot of the time, his apathy was confused with bravery, or his gullibility for that matter. He didn’t want to talk about this, and the quiet was growing tense.

‘You never answered. Earlier…’ Harry said, staring at the tealeaves swirling in his cup, ‘what I am to call you now…’

‘Harry, we share a piece of soul.’ Voldemort replied, as if Harry was silly to even ask. ‘Here you may call me by my first name, like I do you.’

Harry didn’t think that was necessarily a clear answer, and he briefly deliberated if it was a test of sorts. But why say anything like that if he preferred any other name than his given first? Ultimately, Harry resolved that it was an allowance to think of him as “Tom”. It ought to have felt strange, but it didn’t.

‘Mine tasted like figs this time, yours?’ said Harry, dropping the subject again.

‘Orange and chocolate biscuits.’ Answered Tom.

Chapter 24: The Storm

Chapter Text

The North Sea was an unforgiving place. A fitting place for a barbaric, medieval prison.
After dispelling the perimeter wards, Tom had landed on a jagged rock, sticking out of the waves about thirty metres from the main Azkaban Island. The prison block stuck out like a triangular obelisk, sharp and unyielding, relying on magic to hold it upright against the crashing waves. The building was almost completely black apart from a skirt of glistening lichen around the foundation. Only the ground floor windows had lights in them.

Kicking off from the slick stone, Tom hovered through the whipping sea winds onto the island where a gravel path wound its way from the pier to an open, flat square in front of the main entrance. The Dementors descended on him at once. He could feel their cold presence as their roaming Mind sought his. A chance to pull his soul free.

Their draining auras didn’t affect him much this time. If there was something he’d been thoroughly prepared for, it was hopelessness and despair. Harry’s torments had taught him well – it was best to simply accept it, and work within the frames of the artificial depression rather than grasp for the lost light.

Tacking onto some of their Mind, he sent his Legilliment message to the nearest three individuals.

‘I come to free you, and all your kin.’

The onslaught halted in a domino-like manner. The closest Dementors silently conveying his message to the ones approaching from the skies and so on until all hung in the air like tattered, black laundry on an untidy clothesline.

‘Lead me to the stones, and I will break every bond tying you to this rock.’ He added, keeping his eyes on the three right in front of him.

He could sense their swelling numbers swirling above him. Perhaps if he took his hood off and looked up, it would be akin to what Harry had shown him from the Black Lake. Or worse.

…Cost…?

It was more a thought than a word. The naked concept, communicated over Mind.

Praying he interpreted it correctly, Tom replied, ‘I am to take ten humans from the prison, and we will depart in peace before any of you leave or notify other humans.’

…Agreed…

A small, pleased smile cracked through his dampened mood and the chilly atmosphere. The three closest Dementors flew off, and the others followed, creating a stream of black curving around the eastern corner of the prison. Tom flew after them, landing under the storm of Dementors that was forming above a crisply chiselled chunk of obsidian.

Runes glowed blue against the dark stone. The first line detailed it was one of six such runestones, but Tom knew he’d only have to destroy one of them. The stone itself was protected against the most obvious magical attacks with charm-based barriers that some poor guard would have to renew every three weeks.

Thaddeus’ contacts had suggested he bring disenchantment resources and redirect the energies into a gemstone reservoir, a time-consuming process that Tom had no intention of fiddling with. Rather than deal with the intricacies of the magic, Tom decided to simply obliterate the whole thing.

‘I will summon Fiendfyre. Give me more space.’ He communicated to the Dementors, who promptly cleared off, hovering high above him instead.

Tapping into his core and channelling a wide torrent of magic, Tom conjured the cursed flame. It flared up bright green with blues and yellows streaking it as it formed into soaring birds and coiling snakes. He coaxed the flame into spiralling inwards towards the stone, melting a deep, smooth pit into the rocky ground around it.

Slowly, he withdrew energy from the fire until it could no longer sustain its rampage and the spell ended. It left a crater shaped like a snail house the size of an elephant where the runestone had been.

‘It’s done. I will retrieve my humans now.’ He said to the dementors, ‘I will call others to help me.’
They didn’t react.

While walking to the prison entrance, he brought forth his new Dark Marks and located the singular strings of Mind he had left that reached to their anchors in the Dark Marks of others.

His original marks had been lost along with his born body. Fifty-eight Dark Marks had there once been. Fifty-eight small, greyed, snake-tattoos with names spelled in their scales, writhing around his arm when willed visible. Now, only six, fresh, black serpents roamed on his skin, linking him those few Death Eaters he had been able to rekindle the bonds to thus far. To summon any others, he’d need to touch another mark.

For now, he was content with reaching out to Druella, Lucius and Mulciber. The first to appear was Lucius, appropriately clad in his wool cloak, stacked with impervious charms. Druella dropped in seconds later with whisps of canary-yellow hair sweeping over her mask. Mulciber’s apparition skills were poor, and they had to wait for him to climb some stairs from the empty pier and up to the prison.

‘Good of you to finally join us.’ Said Druella impatiently as Mulciber huffed and harked up phlegm, his cloak already moistened by sea-spray.

‘Will those be of any hinderance, my Lord?’ asked Lucius, throwing an anxious glare at the Dementors whirling high above their heads.

‘No. They have agreed to stay on guard until after we are gone. Else their escape might alert the Aurors.’ Answered Tom plainly before turning towards the front doors. ‘We should hurry. The destruction of the runestones will be sensed in the DMLE. Our man on the inside can only hold the information for so long.’

‘Fifteen minutes in total, according to Thaddeus.’ Said Druella, peeking at her communications wristband where Thaddeus’ updates were scrolling over the gold. ‘Twelve now.’

Not waiting for the others, Tom set a brisk pace down the slick footpath and pointed his wand at the door. Its locking spells, wards and shields were dispelled with a quick burst of raw power, sending offshoots of smoke and lightning into the air. The door blew off its hinges and flew off to sea, releasing a dozen Dementors into the air like a black gust of wind.

They strode right in through the ozone-perfumed smoke and split up by the first staircase. Lucius had four men to retrieve in the low-security ward on the ground floor, and Mulciber had two to fetch from the intermediate level on the first floor. Tom and Druella were bound for the maximum-security wards on the second and third floors.

‘Eight minutes.’ Reminded Druella before taking the stairs.

Encountering Dementors only sporadically, the challenge now was navigation. Dementors did not require a system to track prisoners. No maps were drawn and point-me’s only resulted in useless spins, leaving only locator-artifacts and good old searching. And neither Tom nor any of the free Death Eaters owned locator-artifacts capable of functioning on top of a natural mana-font such as the one Azkaban was built on.

Lucius and Mulciber had the benefit of their prisoners having written them letters on where in the building they were being held. Their search should be a short one. Druella was off to the women’s section, which held less than ten prisoners. She would not encounter any trouble. The hardest task had befallen Tom, and his best hope was that the dismissing of the dementors would awaken the inmates enough to show their faces – else the search could take hours.

Ascending to the top floors, light was dwindling fast and the both of them lit their wands.

‘Good luck, my Lord.’ Druella said as she veered off into the second-floor corridor which had an image of a vulva crudely drawn in chalk above the doorway.

Tom carried on up another floor.

With the Dementors absent, the prison was slowly stirring to life, just as Tom had hoped. Wails and whimpers that he assumed were commonplace noises within the ward, were increasingly overshadowed by heartier shouts and calls. Some prisoners scurried away into dark corners as he passed, other crawled to the bars, sticking their arms through to claw at his robes.

Raspy voices pleaded, shouted, and cried, ‘M’Lord…’, ‘Lord!’, ‘Please, m’Lord!’

Even people who according to their nametags would never have supported him before their incarceration, were calling out to him. He ignored them all. That was until Ex-Auror Harland Codd wailed a thin, pathetic, ‘Please my Lord!’, arms reaching out for him as he passed the cell. Tom laughed then.

At long last, he found the Lestrange brothers, housed across the corridor from each other.

‘Merlin, how I love you, my Lord,’ Rudolphus grinned euphorically as Tom stopped in front of his cell. He was sitting on the floor, holding onto the bars like a sailor on a rope-ladder.

Tom didn’t deign legitimize Rudolphus’s words with a reply. Instead, he lifted his wand and watched the man hastily scramble to get clear of the door. It was blown off its hinges with a simple Bombarda. Below them, a high, rattling, mad laugh was ricocheting between the stone walls and echoing up the stairwell. Druella had succeeded.

‘Aaah, my lovely wife…’ Drawled Rudolphus, climbing to his feet using the toilet for support.

Tom turned his attention to Rabastan, who was standing in the centre of his cell, knees trembling over noodle-thin legs. ‘Antonin is three cells down m’Lord,’ he said hoarsely, backing off as Tom repeated the Bombarda.

‘We have less than three minutes.’ Tom informed them, starting a brisk pace down the hall to where Antonin Dolohov was leaning on his cell door, squeezing his gaunt face through the bars to see around the corner.

Tom approached the door with his wand drawn. The Lestranges padded barefoot after him and Dolohov popped his cheeks free of the bars, backing out of the way of the third Bombarda.

‘Barty died, my Lord.’ He said, tilting his head towards the empty neighbouring cell.

Again, Tom didn’t answer. They were running out of time. He sped up down the hall. The three men followed gingerly on cold, bare feet, dodging covetous, skeletal hands that darted out from cell doors. They reached the stairway when a loud ringing noise permeated the prison, like a tuning key struck on a metal bowl. The alarm.

The prisoners were screaming along with it, most as wordless shrieks of terror. Some words could be made out within the cacophony, like ‘Go now!’, ‘Hurry!’, ‘My Lord!’ and ‘Run!’.

‘Move, move, move!’ Druella’s voice urged from further down to the accompaniment of her daughter’s crazed laughter, ‘the Aurors will be here any minute.’

Tom took the steps in twos, almost colliding with Lucius and his trail of ducklings when they landed on the ground floor.

Mulciber was peeking out the gaping hole where the main doors had been, his sparse, sliver hair sticking to the damp face of his mask. ‘All clear, we should go now!’ he said, waving the others on.

Lucius and Druella began herding the prisoners outside while Bellatrix were doing twirls and mock-ballet steps behind them.

‘AH! My Lord!’ She exclaimed animatedly when she spotted Tom at the head of his group.

Tom ignored her, commanding the group as a whole. ‘We need to leave now!’ He fished a length of green petersham ribbon out of his pocket and tapped it with his wand, ‘Portus. Two minutes!’

‘Give it here,’ said Mulciber, and Tom tossed him the end of it.

They filed out the door while Mulciber distributed the ribbon between hands, tying a knot around Bella’s wrist. In the end, only Tom himself was disconnected from the portkey. Outside, the sky had darkened with rain-heavy clouds, now without the hurricane of Dementors circling below them.

‘There they are!’ Shouted a man’s voice off to their left.

The crimson robes had arrived. He barely had time to shoot a single stunner at the huddled mass of prisoners and Death Eaters when the green ribbon whisked them away. Suddenly, Tom was alone, facing down a steadily rising number of Aurors.

Apparition cracks split the silence sporadically in between distant claps of thunder. For a long, tense moment, neither Tom nor the Aurors moved. There were eight of them now, staring fearfully at him. They were led by tall and stout Kingsley Shacklebolt, who had a man Tom recalled was named Hammond on his right.

Three juniors were scattered on the rocks behind them while a senior Auror Tom believed was called Bree Manderly brought up the rear with a woman sporting fire-truck red hair and yellow eyes and a short, middle-aged Auror called Proudfoot. There were no non-Auror Order members.

Harry held his tongue, then, Tom thought and smiled to himself. Good boy…

Rain had begun drumming on his hood. Lightning struck somewhere in the distance, closer to the Norwegian mainland. The Aurors had set up perimeter wards, hindering apparition. A fresh crack of thunder pierced the air, closer now. Tom weighed his options.

He could cut them all down, though that did seem quite unnecessary. A couple of the younger recruits in cleaner robes were cowering behind their superiors. They were hardly a threat and killing them served no purpose.

He could try to blow his way through the barrier and apparate away, though it was hard to gauge the strength of the ward from this distance. It might fail, and suffering a splinch at sixty-nine years old was an embarrassment he simply could not allow.

Another portkey would struggle with the interference from the last. Besides, he’d have to summon a rock or something to use as a carrier, which would leave him wide open to attack while the spell resolved. The last option was to fly away and apparate closer to or outside the wards.
He had scarcely decided upon an action when one of the younger Aurors launched a stunner his way.

Looking for glory, are you? Your superiors know not to throw the first punch, Tom thought, watching with disinterest as the weak spell bent its trajectory around his aura and fizzled out some eight metres off target.

He made a “what-did-you-think-would-happen-you-moron?” sort of shrug at the recruit, whose face had paled significantly. Somewhere behind the boy, an older voice hissed ‘You idiot!’ while a taller Auror up front decided to finish whatever his fresh colleague started, sending his own, stronger stunner at Tom.

It too bent on the aura, but not as egregiously. Figuring he had to retaliate this time, Tom set his wand on a spot of free air and once again, called upon flames. A great, green, and purple serpent grew from his wand, its fiery mouth opening to breathe forth ravens and lynxes and bears. He whipped the flames around himself, letting them lick the stone building behind him and create a burning storm’s eye of a thousand colours.

Shouts and screams were erupting somewhere beyond the wall of flame. In a steady, controlled manner, he released the inferno from the thrall of his wand. The burning spirits continued their circular gallop and Tom stepped gingerly into the centre of the tunnel. Concentrating on the air ether surrounding him, he tapped deeply into his magic core, letting the ether propel him into the air.

For a brief moment, he looked down. All eight Aurors were still alive, battling the Fiendfyre with raw magic and sending patronuses in calls for aid. There was none among them with scarlet hair anymore, instead, a dot of blue was holding her ground against the blaze.

Metamorphmagus…

He resumed his soar upwards, feeling the ward pop as he broke through it. Finally, with a sharp spin in the air, he disapparated. He reappeared within bounds of Malfoy Manor on a pedicured lawn dotted with decoratively trimmed bushes. Narcissa Malfoy was leaning in the open doorway of their greenhouse extension, smoking a long, slim pipe.

‘Welcome back, my Lord. We are all very pleased with this great success.’ She said loftily, exhaling small, bluish puffs into the night air.

‘Happy to have your sister back?’ He replied sunnily, watching Narcissa’s lips form a taught, thin line where her smile had been.

‘Absolutely ecstatic.’ She replied as Tom passed her, plastering her smile back on. ‘Lucius has taken the men upstairs with some elves. Mum is giving Bella a bath.’

Tom couldn’t help but snort. ‘Déjà vu.’ He said with a gentle smile at Narcissa, who chuckled back.

‘It does feel like I have said that exact sentence before, yes.’

She put her pipe out with its small, silver lid and followed him inside the greenhouse. It was a high-ceilinged room in all white wood and glass, large enough to fit full-grown tropical trees. The floor was laid with heated, unglazed terra-cotta tiles and the domed ceiling lit by live fairies milling about the tree canopies.

Mulciber and Rookwood sat at an ornate, white-painted, iron garden table with matching chairs, speaking softly. An elf was serving them, sliding a tray with an eclectic collection of dishes onto the table. Tom took a seat between them, dropped his hood, and pulled the mask off. Rookwood’s eyebrows collected themselves around a large pox mark between his eyes.

Mulciber chortled, ‘Don’t you recognize your Lord, Augustus?’

Rookwood recoiled, returning to a more open and polite expression. ‘No. No I do not… So, this is what you meant “wait till you see…” You look good, my Lord,’ he said, still a little apprehensive while Mulciber struggled not to choke on his low laugh.

Mulciber chuckled, his horse-like grin drawn up to its full capacity. ‘It is his own face. You should have seen him forty years ago, the girls,-‘

‘Enough, Charles.’ Warned Tom.

Mulciber didn’t quite wipe the smirk off, but the laughter ended.

‘I need you back in service. What support do you require for that?’ Tom asked Rookwood, who had begun serving himself some quiche.

‘Depends. Where do you want intel from?’

‘DoM.’

‘Isn’t John there?’ enquired Rookwood mildly, holding out a bottle of cider for Mulciber to open with his wand. The cork sprung out with a loud pop.

‘No, we had him moved to the Minister’s office to do some work on that Fudge. He is doing more than satisfactory work there, we do not wish to move him back again. Abel was transferred to the DMLE almost eight years ago, which means the only ones left in DoM are your old sources.’ Explained Tom in low tones. He never quite trusted there weren’t unwelcome ears lurking around these grand mansions.

Rookwood seemed to consider the situation for a moment. ‘I need a month and six hundred galleons to build an identity, the rest should be a cakewalk. What sort of intel are you in need of? I’ve no contacts in the MBS division or the tunnels.’ He said between bites.

‘I require the specific location of a prophesy, the guard and ward details for that hall… Everything we’ll need to know for a break-in.’ Informed Tom softly, waving away the cider Mulciber was trying to hand him.

‘That’s doable.’ Rookwood chewed for a few seconds, then picked up his cider with a thoughtful frown on his face, ‘but, you know only the owners can retrieve the orbs, my Lord?’

‘Oh yes. Harry Potter will be fetching it for me.’

Rookwood promptly choked on his cider.

‘He has already agreed to it.’ Added Tom while Rookwood coughed the obstruction out of his throat.

‘Ach – rrrm, alright. I can work with that. Easier than smuggling you in, that’s for sure...’

‘That is what I assumed, yes.’ Said Tom plainly, giving the snigg*ring Mulciber a silencing side-eye, ‘I can give you six weeks. The money, you will have to get elsewhere. Gringotts is yet to reissue me a key,-‘

‘I’ll get you the money, Augustus. Or you can go shake down Lucius.’ Mulciber cut in, grinning sleazily.

Tom knew he and Malfoy had something of a feud along the old vs. new money lines. At least Mulciber disliked the Malfoys’ ostentatious spending, proclaiming it tacky, and Tom tended to agree. It had been a friendly rivalry when Abraxas was head of the Malfoy family, but Lucius was far pricklier than his sire, and the battlefronts had grown colder.

‘He ought to be paying more, I’d say,’ continued Mulciber, glancing up at the rainforest around him. ‘Not that the rest of us are poor, mind you, but we’re not the Potters or Blacks… If we are to host ten fugitives for several months...’

Rookwood kept quiet, likely not too keen on taking sides in the Mulciber – Malfoy rivalry so soon.

‘You and Lucius may broker whatever agreement you need to get the costs covered fairly.’ Said Tom in a flat voice, ‘do not trouble me with this.’

‘Of course, you have enough on your plate, my Lord. I guess I’ll speak to Lucius.’ Sighed Mulciber dramatically.

‘Good.’ Said Tom, standing up, ‘I need to have a word with Druella before I leave.’

‘First floor, Cassiopeia suite, I think Narcissa said.’ Informed Mulciber, back to his easy-going demeanour, ‘or maybe that was where Lucius went.’

Tom simply nodded in farewell to the two of them and left down the tiled path winding between flowerbeds. The fleeting brainwaves that had been lulling in the back of his mind from Harry dozing a hundred miles away were turning turbulent. He wasn’t asleep, not properly at least.

The greenhouse door led to a grand hall with a curving, marble staircase up to the bedrooms on the first floor. Two corridors branched off from the landing, both with fishbone parquet, lit by candlelight and decorated with portraits that at first glance looked to all be of the same, blond person. A physical testament to the inbred nature of the staunchest blood-purist families.

Druella and Thaddeus had been right when they warned him on his resurrection day. Lucius had fallen far further down into the rabbit-hole than his father ever had, believing the age-old, insane conspiracy theory “Mudbloods are Muggles who steal wands to obtain magic and if we don’t stop them, all Muggles will do the same”. Abraxas had stopped at “Mudbloods wants to bring Muggle-traditions into our world and ruin it”.

It had been tempting to cut Lucius off completely, but sadly, he was an indispensable source of funding. Besides, disposing of him could elevate him into a martyr for the traditionalist faction, creating more problems than it solved. Instead, Tom decided to be patient. Preventing Lucius from leading an open traditionalist political movement was imperative, but that stage was still months away.

Cassiopeia was four doors down the corridor, and Tom knew at once that it was the right room.

‘Sit still, insolent girl.’

‘Yes mummy, I’m sorwy!’

Tom tapped on the door twice, silencing the bickering inside.

‘Still working on it, Cissy!’ hollered Druella frustratedly through the door.

‘It’s me.’ Tom called back, hand on the doorhandle while mentally preparing himself for the conversation to come.

‘COME IN MY LORD!’ shouted Bellatrix while Druella aggressively shushed her. Tom decided that was enough of an invitation and opened the door.

Bella was clad in a fluffy, white bathrobe, looking haggard and sunken-eyed, but clean. She was sitting in front of an oaken vanity with Druella standing over her, metal comb in hand and a large bottle of Sleekeazy’s Hair Potion at their side. Obviously, Druella was having her stubbornness tested by the matted mess that was her daughter’s hair. It still looked like a rat’s nest.

Tom caught Bella’s eyes in the mirror. She was gaping openly at him, a faint blush on her pallid cheeks. She’s going to be a right menace, he thought to himself, opting to stand right inside the door.

‘How can we help you, my Lord?’ said Druella, arms flopping down tiredly at her sides.

Skipping straight to the point, Tom asked, ‘Do you have any relatives in the Auror corps?’

‘Not that I know of. Why?’ returned Druella severely.

‘There was a metamorpmagus among them tonight.’ He told them, keeping careful watch on Druella’s face, which seemed to sink further.

Tom felt himself sag where he stood too. Either Druella’s gloom was infectious, or Harry was awake and about to do something terrible. He had to get home. Soon.

‘Perhaps Dromeda whelped.’ Muttered Bella crudely, picking at her fresh-cut fingernails with jealousy written bold on her face.

‘Might be. I have not spoken to Andromeda since before she married that tramp.’ Spat Druella, resuming her siege on Bella’s hair with fervour.

‘Filthy Mudblood are the words you’re looking for, Mum.’ Twittered Bella, as if correcting a mere grammatical mistake.

Druella knew better than to answer. Her youngest had been radicalized decades ago by her husband and his friends. Attempts to moderate her use of words would be useless, likely to devolve into a proper row.

Fourteen years ago, arguing with Bella had been like arguing with a wall, content with calling out buzzwords and “what-abouts” rather than address what was being said. It was best to avoid the subject altogether.

Though Tom had to admit, the arguments had been fun. When she was young, Bella had sought him out to playfully argue politics. They’d rile each other up into friendly shouting matches. At first, it had been innocent – a confident teenager seeking a role model and a challenge. A brilliant mind wishing to be trained by one.

It did not last. The final mock-debate of theirs ended with a Crucio, though their friendship ended with an unwelcome kiss the minute before. Not that she respected that it was over. Now, Bella's reflection stared intensely at him, a hungry, flirting smile on her lips. She uncrossed her legs.

‘Well, I thought you ought to know. I will be leaving now.’ Tom said, determined not to spare Bella another glance, else she might start relieving herself of what few clothes she had on.

‘Already!? But,-‘ Protested Bella.

‘Thank you, my Lord.’ Druella cut her daughter off before she could say anything to shame her mother.

Tom gave them both a small nod and left without another word.

He got six steps down the stairs before Harry had found a sharp object. Slicing pain, slow and gruesome, moved down his spine. It didn’t transpose itself to the correct spot, which Tom assumed was an arm based on the vision Harry sent. Rather, it stayed within his spinal cord, cold and piercing as if it was his very nerve-centre being cut open.

Forced to stop, he gripped the banister tightly, hunching over to counteract the instinct to arch his back, waiting for it to end while trying to focus on Harry’s paradoxically blissful emotions.

After standing there for several minutes, frozen in place, curled halfway to his knees and clutching polished wood for support like an invalid, Harry’s carving session ended, and the pain receded. Slowly, Tom hobbled down the rest of the steps and dragged his feet out the front door, apparating the second he passed the manor’s great, iron gates.

***

At close to three o’clock in the morning, Tom’s head finally hit the fluffy, down pillow in Thaddeus’ best quest-room. Nagini had been let inside by the elves and wasted no time climbing into the bed with him.

‘You never talk to me anymore.’ She complained with no prior greeting.

‘I am very busy, and you are outside stalking gnomes most days.’ He replied tiredly, not in the mood to argue with her. ‘Now I wish to sleep.’

She burrowed her head under the blankets, coiling her body in circles around him. Her scales were ice cold where they hit his skin.

‘You sleep all the time, Master. Yesterday, you slept the whole night and all morning.’ Whined Nagini, dragging her head around to smell his face.

Tom resisted the urge to swat her head away and replied, ‘Yes, I was sharing a dream with Harry. Now let me sleep.’

‘…The Speaker would talk to me if he was here.’ She said, and Tom imagined that if snakes could pout, she would. Nagini had spoken with Harry in all but ten minutes, but that was enough for her to gain a point of comparison she did not possess before.

‘I don’t doubt it.’ He hissed back, determined not to answer if she spoke again. Thankfully, she didn’t, and Tom let his eyes fall closed.

Within seconds of having replaced the blueish hue of the room with complete blackness, Tom’s vision was unveiled to the nostalgic glow of Harry’s dreamworld.

He had materialized outside the house, on the cobbled sidewalk framing a dirt road heavily scarred by wagon wheels. A gas streetlamp glowed orange over his head, casting a soft halo of light into the misty air.

The house itself could have been picked out of any of Victorian London’s mass-development sites, which had built urgently needed homes for the rising middle-classes. It was tall and narrow, constructed from the more costly brown bricks rather than the regular, clamp-fired reds, with white windows and cast-iron details.

A warm, greenish light poured onto the tiny front yard through the parlour window. He could see the top of Harry’s head through the sheer, white curtains.

Shoving his hands into the deep pockets of his Victorian tweed trousers, he jogged up the three, slate steps to the front door. He couldn’t pinpoint how, but something about the place made his subconscious dress him accordingly. Or perhaps it was Harry’s brain that was doing it, sticking the multiple layers of clothing on the both of them like paper dolls.

He hung up his cloak and hat in the hallway, like a proper person, then paused. Harry had quite recently carved lines into his own flesh on purpose. There was a decent risk he wouldn’t be all that approachable. Yet, it was Harry who pulled Tom’s consciousness in here. Surely, he could expect the boy to behave in a civil, collected manner?

‘Did you get stuck?’ quipped Harry from the parlour.

‘Ah, no. It has merely been an eventful day.’ Tom said, shaking the trepidation out of his head.

Harry was sitting in the same chair as in previous dreams, a tea-tray waiting on the table.

‘So, remember the switch we did from Tyr-string to Kaunaz-string on the fifth ring? I tried it, and the addition of blue ether creates skips right before the connectors to the sixth ring,’ said Harry cheerily, jumping headfirst into his rune-work where they’d left off the night before.

Tom sat down in and served himself some tea from the paper-thin porcelain pot.

‘Perhaps the frequencies of the black and blue ethers are incompatible with the sequences before the connectors, though I cannot se why that would be…’ Tom said ponderingly, ready to let Harry pull all his thoughts into magical theory.

It would be a well-deserved reprieve from work, aches, and the cumbersome navigation of the social environment around the Death Eaters. He settled in his chair, took a sip of his tea and stared at Harry’s paperwork, ready to be sucked into it. But something lingered. Something preventing him from letting go and immersing himself in the Rune-boy’s diagrams.

Maybe, if Tom tread carefully, he could ask Harry about that awful habit of his. The boy was compassionate enough that perhaps if he knew the pain got transferred, he’d stop. Then again, Harry would probably proclaim the pain well deserved. After all, he had spent months devising bespoke torture to send as dreams. The likelihood of Harry wishing to spare Tom a bit of minor stinging was low.

‘Ah, that makes sense with what I saw when I drew it out. Which do you think is higher, black, or blue?’ Harry asked in a chipper tone, oblivious to Tom’s inner debates. Whatever upset he suffered earlier didn’t mar Harry’s mood now.

Perhaps that is the intended effect of the self-harm. A clean palate, temporarily free of any and all distressed emotions…

‘Blue,’ Tom said, studying the diagram. ‘The Black ether will always have the lowest frequency and strives for low temperatures. Magic that uses the Black ether exclusively will expel a lot of light and noise, but not much heat.’

He peeked up from the charts and his eyes were instantly caught by large, attentive green irises. Looking at them burned. They belonged to a baby, silent in his crib, his tiny hand closing around the ring finger of Tom’s left hand where it rested upon the crib’s gate.

Tom forced the image away, kicking the useless emotions it brought down with it, and continued his explanation, ‘It is why Fiendfyre is so hard to control. It is conjured by forcing Black energies to manifest as heat and the result is a very demanding and destructive spell.’

‘OK, so if I always layer the Black ether lowest… Looks like I will probably need to shift the connectors so that they align with the ones on the third circle, agreed?’

Harry didn’t wait for his confirmation before starting scribbling. Last dream they shared, Tom noticed that Harry seemed to skip over the trial-and-error process inherent to array and ritual development. Now, he was doing it again, not only correcting the parts they’d recently discussed, but making dozens of tiny adjustments to the whole array as he went.

‘How did the prison break go?’ asked Harry conversationally while he worked.

‘Splendidly, I must say.’ Replied Tom, puzzled as to why Harry moved a moderator-slot in his array.

A mix of anger and disappointment touched the link between their minds.

‘So now a bunch of blood-purist fanatics are back on the streets?’ Harry sniped, then apparently regretted it instantly, flinching at his own words.

‘Only five.’ Said Tom.

Harry rolled his eyes. ‘I don’t understand why,-‘

‘Why I bother with them? Or tolerate them?’ guessed Tom, leaning his chin in his hand. He had known this topic would come up sooner or later.

‘Yeah.’ Said Harry, putting his pen down, ‘if you know how messed up it is, how can you?’

Tom reluctantly scanned Harry’s eyes for a second. They burned fiercely with young idealism. ‘Before I turned fifteen, I legitimately thought I was pureblood.’ He began, watching Harry’s already incensed expression turn pinched. ‘I told myself that my mother had ended up in that orphanage by some disastrous event and that my father either did not know or had died… I would perform all sorts of mental gymnastics to make it fit – I believed Matron lied, I believed my last name was chosen by the Orphanage, anything.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I was told that magical power was inherited. And by all evidence, it was. Pureblood children did by and large better in school, and squibs are a rarity. Since I outperformed them all, I was convinced it was because I was a pureblood descendant of Salazar Slytherin, and my housemates reinforced my delusions. Despite the knowledge I was better, I too craved belonging and began adopting their worldview.’ It felt strangely refreshing voicing his hard-earned perspectives out loud.

‘So you began calling people Mudbloods and all that?’

‘Yes. I resented the Muggleborn students who tried to “Muggle-ify” others at Hogwarts.’ Tom said unapologetically, and Harry’s angered mask seemed to milden. ‘I was afraid they might ruin the special and wonderful magical world by polluting it with mundane Muggle things.’ Tom continued, and to his pleasant surprise, Harry nodded along. ‘And, truth be told, I knew my knowledge of the wider world was an advantage that I would hate for them to spoil.’

He paused to sip his tea (which tasted like orange juice), while also letting Harry stew for a few seconds.

‘I met my last, living wizarding relatives when I was sixteen. It was a wake-up call, truly,’ Tom sighed, pushing the image of the filthy hut from his mind, ‘Afterwards, I still held that magical power was bound to blood for several years… until disproven during my travels after Hogwarts… Now, I like to pretend I have freed myself from this particular bias.’ He gave Harry a small smile, fishing for sympathy.

Apparently, Harry still had his misgivings, protesting loudly, ‘But – That doesn’t explain why you still give bigots the time of day, I mean,-‘

‘Harry, they are my friends.’ Tom interceded, putting his cup down, ‘or my friends’ children. Or valuable political allies. And it is not as if all are fanatics. It is a spectrum.’

Harry responded with a frown. Anticipation and curiosity bled into the riled-up tone of the connection. Tom got the acute sense that Harry had never had any of this actually explained to him. Which was unsurprising, considering how long it had taken Tom himself to get a complete grasp on it.

Tom sighed, taking on the teacher’s role. ‘The worst, like Avery and Malfoy, believes that Muggles are mere playthings for Wizards and that the Muggleborns are Muggles that have stolen wands from Wizards,-‘ Harry made an incredulous grimace that nearly had Tom laughing, ‘-Malfoy truly believes that we are the gods Muggles used to pray to before the advent of Christianity and that we should take our rightful place in their world as those gods.’

‘That’s mad!’ exclaimed Harry hotly.

‘Completely, yes.’ Said Tom, lifting a placating hand. ‘Others simply believe Muggles are less intelligent and run by primitive instincts, which they pass on to their children, thus making Muggleborns unfit for many positions in society. Lastly, people like the Weasleys believe Muggles are crafty, but naïve beings who live simple emotional lives, but that these traits does not affect their magical offspring. Though it may seem benign, it is still on the spectrum.’

Harry’s expression was open now. Thoughtful and quiet.

‘I tolerate these people, because they share my desire for a revolution and they are a moneyed asset to have, but also because I understand them.’ Said Tom, listening to the turbulent emotions on the link. ‘And, I don’t care about Muggles. Or Muggleborns anymore, really. They are a tiny minority with uninteresting loyalties. And as long as the purists refrains from drawing unwanted attention to us, I care little for what they think and do.’ He finished with a shrug.

Harry eyed him acridly for a moment, then eased up again. ‘Well, do you at least agree that they should learn more about Muggles? That it’s stupid that they know nothing about, like, ninety-nine percent of the earth?’

‘Oh, yes. Wizarding kind is woefully out of touch.’ Said Tom, leaning back in his chair, glad of being out of the blood-purity-woods.

‘But you still want to separate us even more by having Wizarding primary schools?’

Harry was leaning closer, both elbows on the table. He had a confident gleam in his eyes, and Tom knew that the boy had absolute faith in own victory. It was almost a shame to burst his bubble.

‘Wizarding primary education is horrendously unequal Harry, along class lines.’ Tom explained, his tone perhaps a tad bit condescending. Then again, Harry was very young and immature. The teaspoon might be the correct tool to drive the point home. ‘Those who can afford a good governess will show up to Hogwarts with both a decent base education and an understanding of magic. Those who cannot afford a governess have to educate their children themselves, a burden that creates single-income households and perpetuates poverty. If I recall correctly, Rubeus could hardly read. His father had neither the means nor time to see to his son’s education.’

Harry’s gaze shifted around, not entirely convinced. ‘Then why not enrol everyone in the Muggle schools? Wouldn’t that at least save a ton of gold?’ he countered, the crease between his eyebrows stayed firm.

‘You already know the answer to that.’ Replied Tom sharply. ‘Not every child is adept at keeping secrets, the statute would be void in an hour. And the Blood-Purists would never agree. Besides, I believe we can build a better school than the Muggles – and it is not that expensive. There are less than thirty enrolled each year.’

‘But how will this school be any better at the Muggle-stuff than the best governesses? I mean, Malfoy hasn’t got a clue-‘

‘By hiring educators with Muggle backgrounds and designing a curriculum that covers it.’ Interrupted Tom before Harry could veer down his schoolyard anecdote, ‘the beauty of a centrally organized school is that the children can be introduced to the wider world despite their parents’ misgivings.’

He could see Harry’s sureness cracking, softening the fold between his brows. ‘You want the teachers to take them out into let’s say – Muggle London museums?’ asked Harry sceptically, tilting his head at a sharp angle for emphasis.

Tom smiled as he replied, sensing the victorious conclusion of this discussion drawing near, ‘Precisely. And I do not think that is too high of a demand of a typical Half-Blood teacher. They should all be introduced to the Muggle world in healthy portions and learn how to navigate it as adults without needing an Obliviation Squad after five minutes. And I do think most Wizards would visit for example Muggle restaurants if they felt they knew how to behave.’

Harry smiled a vicious smile, as if thinking “got you!” and drawled smugly, ‘Really? When was the last time you were out among Muggles?’

‘That would be yesterday morning.’ Tom said, feeling a pleased grin grow on his face at the flabbergasted look on Harry’s. ‘I never left the Muggle world, Harry. Not completely.’

It was a slight overstatement. Yesterday’s errand had been to steal smokes from a kiosk. But it was true that he’d never fully left. The Muggle world was the only viable place to meet others who shared his affliction that he could use to sate certain needs, which in turn had given him a handful of worthwhile acquaintances within that subculture.

‘Do your friends know?’ Harry asked bewilderedly once he finished his gaping.

‘Gods no, absolutely not!’ balked Tom, shaking his head at the mere thought. Thaddeus would have a heart-attack if he knew about the debauchery Tom had been up to in the Muggle world.

Harry laughed. A rolling, happy, and genuine laugh.

How strange…

Chapter 25: The Trials of a Friendship

Chapter Text

Two days later, the Daily Prophet announced Tom’s striking success. Hermione unfurled her copy over her breakfast and gave out a little yelp. The front page was covered by a mosaic of ten ragged faces snarling at the reader. Nine wizards and a witch, each with a caption summarizing their crimes. Harry and Ron craned their necks to read over Hermione’s shoulder.

MASS BREAKOUT FROM AZKABAN –
MINISTRY FREARS BLACK IS ‘RALLYING POINT’ FOR OLD DEATH EATERS

Some had serious crimes listed under their faces, like Antonin Dolohov, who had murdered Gideon and Fabian Prewett - Mrs. Weasley’s brothers. Others had only minor offences that by no means deserved fifteen years in Azkaban, like the pox-marked Augustus Rookwood, who’d leaked some Ministry secrets.

The lone witch among them, Bellatrix Lestrange drew Harry’s attention. She certainly didn’t look like Tom’s craziest, at least in this picture. Her hair was an unkempt rat’s nest and her face looked haggard, but she smiled a thin, disdainful smile at the camera, straight-backed and confident. She was far less gnarly than some of the men, particularly her husband, who looked like he ate bricks for breakfast.

Hermione flipped to the main article on page three and began reading. Harry leaned over to read with her. During last night’s conversation with Tom, he had wondered briefly how Fudge would spin this, and now he had his bitter answer. The outlook for Sirius having his name cleared was getting bleak.

‘Fudge is blaming the breakout on Sirius?’ said Harry aloud after reading the first paragraphs.

Hermione replied in acrid tones, ‘What other options does he have? He can hardly say “Sorry, everyone, Dumbledore warned me this might happen, the Azkaban guards have joined Lord Voldemort – oh stop it, Ron – and now the Death Eaters have broken out.” I mean, he’s spent a good six months telling everyone you and Dumbledore are liars, hasn’t he?’ She took an aggressive bite of her toast and continued to read the rest of the report.

Harry swiped a look around the great hall. Most students behaved as if nothing was amiss; very few read the Prophet every morning. The staff table, on the other hand…

Dumbledore and Professor McGonagall were in deep, grim-faced conversation. Professor Sprout was so absorbed in the article, she paid no mind to where she was directing her spoon of soft-boiled egg. Meanwhile, Professor Umbridge was scowling into her bowl of porridge, eyes twitching up to occasionally glare at Dumbledore and Professor McGonagall.

Hermione left to send a letter almost immediately after breakfast and rejoined them for class later, slightly pink faced and agitated.

‘She’s up to something again, isn’t she?’ whispered Ron as she raced ahead of them on their way through the corridors.

‘Definitely.’ Confirmed Harry.

The ten escaped Death Eaters became the hottest topic of conversation among the students as the day progressed. Outrageous rumours were spreading of Death Eaters being spotted in Hogsmeade, and the whispering that always followed Harry around swiftly kicked into high gear. Students who had relatives that were victims of the escapees suddenly found themselves almost famous, drawing the morbid curiosity of their classmates.

As a veteran of this circus, Ron was fantastically helpful in shooing people away. His status as Prefect came to good use, threatening detentions to whoever dared whine about their own newfound fame as crime victims, or pester Harry with questions about Voldemort. Some snuck around Ron’s vigilant watch, however.

While fertilizing Screechsnap Seedlings during Herbology, Susan Bones (whose uncle, aunt and cousins had all been murdered by one of the ten) took the spot next to Harry and found it prudent to share that she now believed she had a good idea of what it felt like to be him. Harry had to bite his tongue to stop himself from telling her to piss off. She could go to Diagon Alley without an escort if she wanted, a bloody pipedream for Harry.

The day after the breakout, Professor Umbridge retaliated against the teachers who’d been whispering together in the halls and at dinner by producing the most unhinged Educational Decree yet. It prohibited teachers from speaking to students about any topic unrelated to the subject they taught.

Naturally, Fred, George, and Lee put this new policy to the test immediately by playing Exploding Snap at the back of their next class with Umbridge, boldly proclaiming to Umbridge’s face that Exploding Snap had nothing to do with Defence Against the Dark Arts when she caught them. They were served with detentions, which she still used the Blood Quill for, as evident by their bandaged hands. Apparently, the Ice Quill was reserved for Harry.

Hagrid’s lessons were now all in Professor Umbridge’s company, and according to Ron, so was Professor Trelawney’s. Fortunately, Hagrid had finally seen reason and all lessons onwards featured divinely harmless creatures. Not the most interesting ones, sure, but Harry found the hour of cuddling Crup puppies and feeding frozen beetles to a tub of Mokes a welcome reprieve from his more stressful classes.

Not that Harry ever got the opportunity to tell Hagrid that. He was still distracted and nervous under Umbridge’s scrutiny, preferring to not talk much to the class or stop to chat with students during activities. Additionally, Hagrid had expressly forbidden them from visiting after curfew, so helping him cope had turned close to impossible.

DA-lessons picked up again, though Harry and Ginny were still not back on friendly footing. They weren’t unfriendly either, but they kept their mutual distance and conversations with both of them present tended towards a colder mood. He and Ginny were never close to begin with, and so far, Ron took Harry’s side whenever things got tense, something he was quite grateful for.

Part of it was Harry’s insistence that Ron should support Hermione, whose efforts with S.P.I.N.E had sustained their initial fervour, probably owing to the more encouraging welcome by her closest friends. S.P.I.N.E was showing more promise than S.P.E.W ever had, with Luna and Neville both sporting membership badges within a week. The first real opponent Hermione faced, had been Ginny.

‘You know “all entities” includes the really horrible ones too, right?’ Ginny had interjected in a conversation between Terry Boot, Hannah Abbot, Harry, and Hermione about S.P.I.N.E. ‘Like Dementors, Hags and Vampires?’

‘Yes,’ said Hermione with a smile, patting the cushion beside her as an invitation for Ginny to sit, ‘it includes everyone, that’s the point.’

‘Are Dementors intelligent?’ wondered Terry aloud.

Ginny crossed her arms, tipping back on her heels. ‘Intelligent enough to join You-Know-Who.’ She said in the voice of someone who was just trying to be helpful.

Harry made a mental note to himself to figure out if the Dementor’s actually joined Tom, and if so, where Tom was keeping them.

‘If they are intelligent enough to be people, they should be allowed basic personhood rights.’ Said Hermione, jutting her jaw up at Ginny, who was yet to sit down.

‘And what would that be?’ asked Ginny in a manner Harry interpreted as legitimate and benign.

‘The right to use public amenities like the hospitals and schools, to not be discriminated against by businesses and to vote in Ministry elections.’ Harry listed mirroring Ginny’s demeanour, thinking it all quite basic.

Ginny’s expression soured. ‘You want Vampires and Hags to go to school and vote?’

‘Yes.’ Confirmed Harry and Hermione in tandem.

Ginny's mouth fell open. ‘They eat people,’ She said, ignoring Hermione’s hand patting at the free cushion, ‘and you want them to decide who gets to be Minister for Magic?’

‘We want them to vote, yes, and perhaps if anyone would listen to them, we can find a way to coexist with them in peace.’ Argued Hermione, with Harry’s ‘yeah!’ as backup.

‘No thanks, I’d rather not live with things that eats babies.’ Said Ginny, lips curling.

‘No Hag has been convicted of that for over a hundred years, actually.’ Corrected Hannah Abbot, shifting to sit cross-legged on her cushion, ‘they only do it to change gender anyways, but there are potions for that now.’

She had to bend backwards to gain eye-contact with the still standing Ginny, who stared back silently for a second.

‘So, OK, maybe Hags are a bad example, but what about Dementors?’ said Ginny, this time with a supporting nod from Terry. ‘I mean, how do you know they won’t make soul-sucking legal or something?’

‘That’s highly unlikely, and besides, I’m not sure if Dementors are people or not.’ Said Hermione hotly.

‘I don’t think they are.’ Chimed Harry, mostly because he didn’t want them to be. Though that was probably hypocritical of him, now was not the time to examine that particular tangle.

‘I think it’s really naïve to think these things would even want to vote, and personally, I’m fine with dark creatures not messing around in the Ministry.’ Ginny said with a snide tone, looking down her nose at Harry and Hermione. For a brief moment she reminded Harry of Malfoy.

‘So you don’t think Lupin should be allowed to vote then?’ countered Harry crassly.

Ginny recoiled, then slowly, her hard face eased. She uncrossed her arms, and her reply had a softer tone.

‘I don’t get why you two obsess over votes. It’s not like most people know how to run a ministry. Dad says people get it wrong all the time. Lots of wizards are really stupid, and creatures are even stupider – and mean. Sure, Lupin could probably vote, but that’s because he’s brainy, but most werewolves actually aren’t that smart. Most creatures can’t even read. But you grew up with Muggles, so you didn’t know that, did you?’

‘They don’t get to go to school, Ginny!’ Hermione said fiercely, cheeks flushed pink. ‘Who would teach them? They’re completely ostracized!’

‘Their parents? I didn’t go to school before Hogwarts either, Hermione, that’s a Muggle thing!’ Hermione opened and closed her mouth a few times. Ginny’s expression lightened again. ‘I just hope you understand that you might be supporting a lot of really evil things. It’s kind of a shame that we don’t learn about them more I guess.’ She shrugged.

Hermione simply reacted. ‘Evil?’ she hissed in disbelief, face reddening further.

‘Yeah. I mean, if your only experience with non-humans is Lupin and some half-humans, then you don’t really understand what they’re like, do you?’ argued Ginny, maintaining her calm. ‘Have you ever met a Baobhan Sith? Or a Faun?’

Hermione shook her head, flush reaching its peak redness. ‘No, but I haven’t met someone from every nation either, but I still understand that they are people and deserve equal treatment.’ She bit out, then reclaiming her composure, countered. ‘Besides, have you met Fauns and Baobhan Sith?’

‘No, but, - It’s not the same, Hermione! They’re a different species!’ stressed Ginny, ‘they don’t consider us to be people, sometimes, we’re food!’

‘Hardly,’ added Hannah quickly, momentarily drawing Ginny’s ire. ‘I’ve met Baobhan Sith. They’re just women, mostly. Though they really love crows.’

Harry made an agreeing noise. ‘They have brains similar to ours, right? They are just people.’

‘And people deserve basic recognition and respect.’ Said Hannah, to Harry and Hermione’s delight.

‘I hope you’re right,’ said Ginny with a long sigh, leaving their little circle of silk cushions with a slow shake of her head.

They didn’t get Terry to buy in, but Hannah did.

***

The DA was burning through Harry’s material at an accelerated rate, spurred on further whenever Umbridge’s cruelty spiked, or a new Decree was posted. It was tempting to call for a break, if only to get ahead with the Exam.

Harry’s efforts on the Show-and-Tell array had, with Tom’s help, finally overcome the block that had been there since last term, and he was doing tests with it in the DA-room whenever he could.

Every third dream he had was now a shared one with Tom. Most of those dreams were spent either working on the array, planning their excursion to the Department of Mysteries, or discussing some political topic, often sprouted by whatever drivel had been in the Prophet the day before. There were more casual conversations, too, often revolving around the fabric of dream surrounding them and the amount of magic implicit in maintaining it.

Harry had shown him the rest of the house, plus the back garden and the park across the road from the house, which was eternally shrouded in the nightly pea-soup fog common in nineteenth century London. They never spoke about the soul-link directly, and whenever they skirted too close to that topic, Tom made sure to row them away to other, less troubled waters.

‘What is your end-goal for this array, Harry?’ Tom had asked one of the nights Diana didn’t materialize, and they were poking around the kitchen to make their own tea.

The ancient range was foreign technology to Harry, but familiar ground for Tom, who stacked and lit it shrewdly. They had put a kettle on to boil, set the tray with their crockery, and gone on to the next obstacle. Now, finding the tea was the main problem.

‘I was thinking of creating a – a sort of final exam for the illicit Defence Class I’m teaching,-’ Harry had mentioned Umbridge’s horrendous lessons, but not what they were doing to compensate.

‘You’re teaching an illicit Defence Class?’ Tom cackled.

Harry huffed heatedly, feeling his ears burn, ‘Well, we had to do something, or we’re not going to pass our Defence O.W.Ls.’ He opened a low cupboard under the window. It held one, singularly huge, copper baking bowl. He slammed the door shut.

‘Oh no – Understand me right, I wasn’t mocking you,’ said Tom playfully, opening a very colourful tin that had made a rattling noise when he took it off the shelf. ‘It is praise, Harry.’

Harry could feel heat rising up his neck and he got a sudden desire to crawl into the bowl-cupboard and hide until morning. Instead, he stood up and reached for the shelves above the cupboard and pulled down a bright yellow tin with black, unintelligible, swirly text to focus on it as if it was the most interesting object on earth.

He could feel the slick of smug, entertained thoughts seeping through the connection from Tom, along with some confusing emotion that Harry couldn’t name. After half a minute of that, Tom apparently got over his revelling in Harry’s embarrassment and resumed the conversation.

‘I will help you if you show me the results after. I wanted to teach Defence myself once…’ said Tom cheerfully.

Harry forgot his embarrassment and looked up. ‘Really?’

Sunlight had broken through the fog. The bright rays were filtering through the sheer, lacy curtains, casting a golden glow on Tom’s pale skin, turning his red eyes a deep, amber gold. Harry looked away with a jolt before he got caught.

‘Mhm. I even applied for the job. But by then, unbeknownst to me, Dumbledore had been made headmaster.’ Tom said, voice steeped in contempt at Dumbledore’s name. ‘I had been out of the country for almost a year with little news, so I assumed it was Dippet reading my application. The official reason given for the refusal was that Dumbledore thought my application fictitious.’

Harry realized he should probably take down the signed sheet that said “Dumbledore’s Army” off the wall before the exam, if he was to share his memory of it with Tom. He opened the tin he’d been holding for the last few minutes. It contained a single bay leaf.

‘Why did he think that?’

‘His brother had supplied him with the information that I was staying at the Hog’s Head and had visits from several of my friends. Dumbledore assumed they were sycophantic attendants and thus my errand at Hogwarts a sinister one.’ Answered Tom while Harry replaced the yellow tin on its shelf. ‘At least that is what he implied during the interview.’

Harry wasn’t sure what to make of that. If those friends were Death Eaters of a certain reputation, Dumbledore could hardly be faulted for thinking they were up to something. Were there Death Eaters at that point? When was Dumbledore made headmaster?

‘When was this?’ Harry asked.

‘1960’s, before there were Death Eaters, if that is what puzzles you. Those waiting for me in the pub were friends from my Hogwarts days.’ Tom said with a headshake. ‘They insisted on waiting, as they had celebrations planned for me after my year away.’

Harry nodded, wondering if Dumbledore might have had other grounds for his refusal that he didn’t share with Tom. It seemed awfully contrived to deny the application based on the presence of a person’s friends, which had such a high chance of being coincidental. That Tom’s friends wished to celebrate his homecoming wasn’t unexpected at all.

‘OK, I get it.’ Harry said simply, scanning the shelves for the next tin to pull. ‘I’d probably tick me off too.’ He chose a red and green, Christmasy tin. It contained a bar of soap.

‘I put a perpetual curse on the Defence classroom and adjacent office on my way out from the interview.’ Confessed Tom with a sharp smile, leaning in like he was telling Harry a dirty secret in a crowded ballroom.

Harry felt his eyebrows collide ‘What kind of curse?’ he asked, replacing the Christmas tin on its shelf clumsily. Tom was too close, casting a shadow over him that was somehow hotter than the sunlight.

‘It cannot accommodate the same occupant for longer than a year. A really woolly spell-based cruse.’ Tom half-whispered with a shark-like grin, straightening up to full height again.

‘That’s… Petty.’ Said Harry before thinking it through.

Mercifully, Tom just laughed a warm, low laugh, ‘I suppose it is. I think it was justified. I was a qualified applicant.’

Harry briefly imagined what things had been like if Dumbledore hadn’t denied Tom’s application. Would there have been a war? Would he still have been teaching when Harry got to Hogwarts at eleven? He stopped entertaining these ponderings before they could distract him further.

‘So that’s why…’ Harry muttered, thinking about the tedious yearly teacher replacements in Defence.

‘Do you want it gone? I can try to teach you how to remove it.’ Offered Tom loftily with an open expression, his insinuation obvious.

‘Not yet.’ Harry smiled, not letting the jab get to him. ‘Let it get rid of Umbridge first.’

Tom nodded with a face that said “fair enough”, before returning his attention to the shelves. They searched in silence for a few seconds, Tom reaching for the top shelves while Harry went low. The jaunty vibes on the link were influencing Harry’s mood as well. It was like there was a melody there, a hummed tune that could be felt by his heartstrings.

Finally, Harry couldn’t help but comment on it. ‘You’re awfully chipper tonight.’ He accused.

‘My man at the Department of Mysteries found the shelf-number to our prophesy.’ Grinned Tom.

‘Really!?’ Harry gaped. This was well beyond his expectations.

‘Yes. It is sitting on shelf ninety-seven. So, no complex point-me spells or any of that mess. We can skip all of that.’ Tom all but sang through his grin.

They had been discussing their options off and on for a while. According to Tom’s intel, there were 1692 shelves in the hall of Prophesies. There were no maps, and the room was warded against most search aids. Tom had tried to come up with a workaround, but until now, his efforts had yielded a whole lot of nothing. Worst case, they’d have to manually search the shelves with an army of Death Eaters. Something Harry dearly wanted to avoid.

‘Fantastic!’ Smiled Harry back, sticking his hand up to a shelf he could barely reach out of dumb optimism. He chose a small, lidless, blue, and white porcelain jar with a hand-painted picture of a chicken on it. ‘Ah, bingo!’ He called aloud, grinning at the three teabags stuffed inside it.

***

The DA meetings took off to new heights. Neville in particular was improving so rapidly it was almost scary, but he was by no means alone in making progress. As a consequence, material was running out, and they moved on to duelling each other outright, rather than practicing specific spells or techniques. At the first meeting of February, Harry gleefully announced there were going to be a final exam, and that it would be a practical one with three different challenges of increasing difficulty.

Fred and George whistled, Hermione looked like she was teeming over with excitement, while Ron paled.

‘An Exam! Here too? Don’t we have enough exams?’ exclaimed Ron.

‘You don’t have to study for this one, Ron.’ Harry said, then added jokingly, ‘I’m not going to ask you to list the twelve properties of moonstones.’

Lee tagged along with a loud, ‘I might!’ receiving a choir of laughter.

The first Hogsmeade weekend of the new year fell on Valentines Day. Harry contemplated staying in the castle, as Hogsmeade would no doubt be filled by couples on dates to an insufferable degree, and there was nothing he needed to buy.

‘I was hoping you’d meet me at the Three Broomsticks this afternoon, Harry.’ Said Hermione when he aired his thoughts the morning of February 14^th.

‘Fine, when?’ shrugged Harry. She’d been so secretive the last few days, something had to be up.

‘Three o’clock. I’ll try to grab one of the innermost booths.’

That left a lot of the day free for experimenting with the Show-and-Tell. With Tom’s continued aid, it had advanced to be responsive to Harry’s imagination almost as flawlessly as the dreamscape. He’d also figured out a technique for stacking the array with other arrays that functioned as presets, easing the load on his brain.

Additionally, he got the room to provide him with a magic-permeable glass lid for the array to let people move around the floor it was written on without disturbing it – and what’s more, Tom had furnished Harry with reconstructed memory-dreams of different Death Eaters’ fighting styles. For almost a week, Harry had been brought to Tom's constructed memories on the grassy cliff, where an odd assortment of Death Eaters prowled around like contestants in a violent beauty pageant.

With Tom’s guidance, he chose a handful to use as reference which he’d then made illusions of, and placed those on top of an enchanted dummy, moving by a puppeteering array in the ceiling.

What remained to be done was to create a series of enchantments to automate the behaviour of the dummies and make them easier on his magic core to puppeteer. He also needed to work on their spellcasting, and by extension, his own.

Because of the set-up, voicing spells aloud meant giving people several seconds warning (as Tom so kindly had pointed out. Repeatedly), and so Harry had reluctantly started the rather arduous task of leaning to cast everything silently. Luckily, there were only a handful of spells he had to perform unvoiced.

After a hasty breakfast, he waved goodbye to Ron and Hermione, who went off to Hogsmeade, and left for the Room-of-Requirement.

He ran a few tests on the first level enemy – Mortimer Crabbe, the moronic grandfather of Vincent Crabbe (which Tom had insisted that anyone could beat in a straight duel, adding ‘Without wands, blindfolded. He is cannon fodder at best’).

Then the second level – Charles Mulciber with his mask and long robes on (‘Mulciber’s not very elegant.’ Tom had commented on the man’s tendency to stumble over his robes during a duel) and Lucius Malfoy (‘A weak duellist to begin with, and those two can’t cooperate’).

And third level - Bellatrix Lestrange and her husband, who were apparently disastrously poor duelling partners (‘Don’t get too caught up with the madwoman, Rudolphus is no puppy, but they tend to sabotage each other’s efforts through selfishness. It should be achievable as long as your pupils have somewhere to hide, and they fight as duos as well’).

When the tests on the three real levels all went smoothly, he moved on to working on a secret, fourth level – Tom himself.

The tricky part to these simulations was faking the Unforgivables. Mostly, he made the dummy use real spells by first casting the spell into an ether-mirror off to the side of the main array, with outlets inside the dummies. Technically, the mirror only forced the spell to travel further, but it was more straining than casting without the mirror, and so lighter, look-alike spells would be welcome.

Yet, a part of learning to fight was learning to get hurt. They needed to know what getting hit with dark magic felt like, but that was a difficult approach with enemies that favoured Unforgivables.

Lightly exhausted from sixteen failed attempts at casting silent protegos and bombardas through the ether-mirror, Harry flopped down on one of the big, silk cushions to think this over.

What he needed was a spell that resembled the Avada or the Crucio and felt quite painful while being fairly harmless. The Imperio he was just going to cast for real. It wasn’t energy-hungry the way the other two were (it was a light cast, but a strain to maintain over time), and the emotional state needed was easily acquired.

After pondering the issue for a good ten minutes, Harry acknowledged that this was a prime question for Tom. However, there was a certain risk whatever alternatives Tom came up with weren’t as innocuous as Harry would’ve liked. Then again, that might not be a bad thing.

Well, let’s trust that the Lord knows his Dark magic, Harry thought cynically, giving up on this particular quandary for the time being.

The signed sheet on the wall caught his eye. He pushed himself off the cushion. It was better to take that down now, before he accidentally showed Tom a memory containing it. He removed it with a tap of his wand, then purposefully filled his inner monologue with repeats of, I need somewhere safe to store this… Somewhere the others won’t find it and put it back up again…

Slowly scanning the room, he suddenly noticed a black, ornate music-box that could’ve come straight out of a cabinet at Grimmauld Place, complete with a serpent shaped clasp and an uroboros on the lid, sitting innocently on a shelf among Sneak-o-Scopes and Probity Probes.

He swept it off the shelf and tried to open the clasp, but it didn’t budge.

Oh – he stared at the clasp for a moment, ‘Open’ he hissed at it.

The tiny, silver snake moved its tail out of a loop on the front. The lid sprung up to reveal a magically expanded interior clad in black velvet, a mirror under the lid and a couple of ancient Sickles tossed on the bottom. Harry stuffed the parchment in and slammed the lid shut.

With nothing else left on his daytime agenda, Harry figured it was high time he spoke to the tiara-soul. He trekked the long way back to the dorms, fetched the tiara and set out for the Room of Requirement again. The return journey was interesting. The Locket’s buzz grew into a forceful vibration, while the crown’s pulsing vibes tickled the nerves in his hip through the robe pocket.

Are they talking to each other? Wondered Harry, lifting his hand to the Locket to calm it.

The Room of Requirement seamlessly swapped to the Runes lab on his request, appearing right as he had left it last. The array from the previous time he did this was still faintly visible on the floor. He touched up the faded bits and placed the crown in the centre. Around his neck, the locket’s buzz had stilled, and it was turning chilly. Harry speculated that either it could sense his intentions off his free-flowing Mind, or it recognized the magical signature of this particular room. Or perhaps it was the crown’s fault. In any case, it wanted attention.

Focusing on the crown first, Harry activated the array. It glowed up as before, displaying Mind as silvery threads holding on to a wounded piece of soul much smaller than the one in the locket. Specifically, it looked to be about half the size, which fit the maths Harry had done when he first saw the fragment leeching off his own soul.

Carefully, Harry stretched his arm out, reaching to touch the exposed Mind swirling above the crown.

…Hello Boy… Please… When… ?

Nineteen ninety-six. How long have you been trapped in the crown? Harry answered and asked in return, hoping for a coherent reply.

…Thirty?... Perhaps… Thirty?... Diadem… Not Crown… Please… Out… Please….

The diadem’s begging was as heart-wrenching as the locket’s had been. And it was kind of sweet, that even in such an incredibly diminished state, this piece of Tom still found it in him to correct Harry’s mistakes.

I can’t. I don’t know how, he told the diadem with an as heartfelt, apologetic tone as he could muster. The diadem was quiet for a moment, then, in a pleading whisper, it said,

…Let me die… Please… Kill me…

Harry ended the ritual as if electrocuted.

For an indeterminate amount of time, he stayed petrified with his hand over the chalk-line, staring unfocusedly at the old piece of jewellery. Harry believed Dumbledore was right about one thing - Tom feared death above all else. He had torn his very soul to pieces to evade it. He had tried to kill a baby, simply because it could become a threat in the future.

The diadem asked to die. It was incomprehensible. Harry’s first instinct was that it had to be a trick, but what could it possibly gain from asking to be murdered? What sort of existence did these things suffer? Was it some cognitive loss that made them forget their purpose?

Very gently, Harry picked the Diadem up and put it back in its case. He had intermittently considered the option of warding the box to prevent the Diadem’s Mind from poisoning people around him, but now he hadn’t the heart to do so. The warded trunk would have to do as is.

He put the case in his bag and left for the dorms once more, thoughts reeling. If the mission to the Ministry of Magic didn’t kill him, he’d find a way to end the diadem’s torment.

Should the doomed trip meet its most plausible end at Tom’s wand-point, Harry vowed to tell him about the suffering of his Horcruxes, and pray he’d care.

***

At two-thirty, Harry trudged out into the drizzle and sludgy snowmelt towards Hogsmeade. It was still a bit early and to kill time, he took a detour around the back of the village, along the fence to the Shrieking Shack.

There, he could openly press the locket to his chest without fear of being observed by anyone who’d take note of it. It seemed to have forgiven his lack of attention from earlier, though it was yet to reach its normal temperature. He kept the hold on it until he approached the village proper, lowering it carefully down to rest on his sternum again.

Everywhere Harry went, there were couples. He accidentally startled a pair of fourth-year Hufflepuffs in mid-snog behind the bookshop, and almost jumped out of his own skin when two figures entwined in a dark nook by the florist made a sudden smacking noise. Madam Puddifoot’s was filled to the brim with duos on dates (all a girl and a boy, no exceptions), and Harry had no illusions that the Three Broomsticks wouldn’t be the same.

He was right. It was packed.

Mercifully, Hermione had kept her promise and secured the most remote table in the pub, tucked away in a corner by the stairs to the private lounges. ‘Harry, over here!’ she waved at him.

As he got closer, he realized she wasn’t alone. Luna Lovegood was sitting in the corner seat looking dreamily at the crowd. She was wearing a very hairy, teal and pink striped jumper and a pair of radishes for earrings. Across from Hermione sat a blond, thin woman in fuchsia robes clutching a crocodile-skin handbag. Rita Skeeter.

‘What is going on here?’ Harry asked, looking from Hermione to Luna and back, ignoring Rita.

‘Harry! How’s your Valentines Day? Been on a date with a special girl?’ drawled Rita, fishing an acid-green quill out of her bag.

Harry sat down at the very edge of the booth beside Hermione, ready to retreat whenever this mysterious venture inevitably went south.

‘We’re not here to talk about Harry’s love life so you can put that away!’ said Hermione authoritatively.

Rita took a sip of her drink. Something bubbly and pink served in a very tall, skinny glass. ‘Or did the girl of your dreams turn you down?’ she smirked.

‘One more word, and the deal is off!’ said Hermione irritably.

‘What deal? You just told me to turn up, you are yet to mention a deal, Missy. One of these days…’ said Rita with a dramatic shudder.

‘Yeah, yeah, you’ll write some horrible stories about us, who cares?’ scoffed Hermione.

‘They’ve run plenty of horrible stories about Harry this year without my help. How has that made you feel, Harry? Angry? Betrayed? Misunderstood?’ whispered Rita roughly, leaning over the table.

‘He feels angry, of course!’ said Hermione. Harry wished she hadn’t.

‘Hermione, what is this?’ asked Harry in a low voice before Hermione could say anything more.

‘Well, I was thinking – We should get the true story out. All the facts. You’ve never been given the opportunity to tell your side-‘

‘Yes, I have. I turned those opportunities down, Hermione.’ He muttered.

There hadn’t been a lack of offers those horrible last days of his fourth year. The school had been mourning Cedric Diggory, Harry had been suffering from unrelenting fear and guilt and the Prophet had sent him an owl a day with increasingly creative, goading letters. He had burned them all.

Hermione didn’t listen. ‘Luna’s father will print it in The Quibbler-‘ Rita recoiled, ‘-and Rita will get every detail – The undiscovered Death Eaters and their names, everything. This time, you tell it your way, Harry!’

Harry could hear how engaged she was in this plan; her hands had balled into fists while talking, but her plan was everything Harry did not want. ‘Um – No.’ he said plainly, ‘You can pack it up. I’m not doing this.’

He slid out of the booth, ready to leave. Frankly, he was quite angry with Hermione for cornering him like this.

‘What – Harry, wait!’ Hermione grabbed his sleeve. ‘Don’t you want to set things right… to – to do something about this?’ she held him down with a begging stare.

‘Can we talk about this outside, Hermione?’

‘Sure… Luna, could you stay here and make sure Ms. Skeeter doesn’t fly away?’ said Hermione.

They all threw a look at Luna, who was swinging her legs under the table. ‘Yeppsi-Pepsi!’ she said, returning to slurp her Paladin’s Pride Pumpkin Pop through a swirly straw. Harry doubted she knew what Pepsi was.

They made their way out through the crowd queueing by the bar, and around the corner to the quiet alleyway between the pub and the bookshop. Harry was trying to decide what to tell her. If he said he didn’t want the attention, he’d have to argue why when he had handled far worse press before. If he said it was because nobody would take The Quibbler seriously, or that he didn’t want to talk to Rita Skeeter or anything like that, Hermione would think that unimportant details, and they’d end up having a row.

He could try to play on the fact that she did this behind his back, and get angry (that was really tempting), but it would only postpone the inevitable. Hermione wasn’t going to let this idea go now that she’d put her mind to it and gotten this far – He had to give her a proper incentive. Something that was true, so he wouldn’t have to maintain yet another lie.

‘Really Harry? You don’t want everyone to know the truth anymore? I know Skeeter’s not exactly trustworthy, but it’s her name we need – and – and we’ll read everything she writes before anything gets printed, I promise!’ Said Hermione pleadingly, pulling him out of the rain and in under an awning.

‘I – I don’t handle it well, Hermione. This level that it’s at right now, with the Prophet having a go at me every other week or so – it’s manageable. I don’t want it back to the level it was last year… It – It really messed with me.’

Hermione’s face gained a concerned wrinkle between her eyes. ‘I thought you handled last year quite well.’ She said, as Harry had predicted. ‘I mean, it can’t possibly get as bad as it did last year.’

‘How do you know that it won’t get even worse? This is more serious after all, not some frivolous tournament.’ Said Harry, inwardly praying for her to let it go now… Let this be enough, please.

‘Yes, and a lot less personal! You’ve handled it well before, I thin-‘

‘Look. I wasn’t exactly at my best last time…in my head and all…’ Harry trailed off, abruptly deciding against continuing this line of reasoning. It felt scummy to use his own sorry mental state against her like this. ‘I don’t want any more attention from Fudge, Umbridge or anyone of those people. Voldemort’s not doing anything, and people already think I’m cracked in the head – I can’t…’ Harry tried his best not to sound angry, instead it all came out sounding rather sad.

It was all true, too. Harry was miserable enough as it was with the whispering and the staring. The concerned glances from the teachers’ table… He could feel his mood dropping as he thought about it.

‘Oh Harry… Ron told me – Just- wait here, I’m going to tell Rita and Luna it won’t happen.’ She hurried back into the pub.

That was unexpectedly painless… I thought she’d demand more of me… Perhaps it was too easy… Harry thought as he paced back and forth, waiting.

Hermione appeared a couple of minutes later, now with her coat and an umbrella. ‘Let’s go.’

They walked together under the umbrella to where the edge of the forbidden forest met Hogsmeade. Three stone buildings stood in a horseshoe shape. One of the buildings looked like a barn, clearly abandoned. An ancient well marked the end of the cobblestones and beside it was an empty woodshed where they found a dry spot to sit down.

Hermione let out a heavy sigh. ‘Ron told me… He told me, that when you were at Grimmauld Place he saw – He saw a lot of scars on your arms.’ She said it in a tone that almost made it sound like a question.

She put her hand over his where it was resting on his knee, expecting a response. Harry could feel his heart sink into his stomach. A cold feeling of dread spread from the cavity his heart left and Harry held his breath. The warmth of the locket burned against his chest. He couldn’t find any words for her.

‘He said it looked like – like y-you made them yourself.’ Hermione whispered.

An angry, impulsive thought shot through Harry’s head, imploring him to deny everything. To get up and leave, stomp away in rage. To say everything – anything – to discredit Ron. To protect the nasty habit.

She won’t believe it if you say you’ve quit. She’s going to take it away from you somehow, to protect you from yourself... No sharp objects, no relief. You’re doomed. Everything will get worse…

He tried his best to breathe out. It came out a little ragged, then hitched in his throat, slowly asphyxiating him. He couldn’t think, his mind was all static. Tom’s undecipherable mood in the back of his mind vanished, the locket’s heat became insignificant, the small voices scurried away into the brain-fog. He couldn’t really interpret what his eyes were seeing. The static was drowning out every coherent thought, burying everything that wasn’t fear.

‘Harry?’ said Hermione softly.

Like a shot through the haze, a furious voice manifested in his frontal lobe, warping through pitches into something resembling his normal inner monologue. Pull yourself together! This is not a big deal, McGonagall knows – Pretty sure Tom knows!

‘Harry?’

And didn’t you want people to know – truly? Deep, deep down, you know that you began doing that for attention in the first place, right? Go get the attention! You’ve worked for it! Revel in her sympathies, maybe, for the next five minutes, you’ll feel loved!?

‘Harry?!’ Hermione squeezed his hand hard.

Harry did his best to shove away the nagging, condescending voice in his head. He let out another shuddering breath, eyes fixed on the broken pully laying flat on the side of the well.

‘It helps.’ He managed to force out after a good minute of merely trying to breathe properly. The choked words echoed through the deserted little farmyard. ‘Sometimes… I get stuck in my thoughts… Just the worst sort of thoughts, and I - I have no control, they only get worse and worse in this – this spiral until I can’t- I – um… Pain helps. It clears my head.’

He heard a sniff coming from Hermione, and then most of her weight was resting on his side, swaths of her hair shifting in the faint breeze in his lower peripheral vision. He drew his arm up around her and pulled her in closer. He heard another sniff and a shaky exhale.

‘Hey – ‘Mione, don’t – don’t cry-‘ Said Harry while he rubbed her arm. His heart ached something horrible. His brain was screaming look, she cares! As if he should enjoy this – and (if he was completely honest with himself) in a twisted, shameful way, he did.

‘I’m alright, Hermione-‘

‘Oh, Harry, you need help!’ she pushed herself up enough to fix him with a desperate stare, her lower lip trembling with equal measures grief and frustration.

Harry’s eyes moved to hers before he could stop himself.

Don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry…

But tears, like yawns are infectious, and pressure was swiftly building up behind Harry's eyes. He looked away as fast as he could, choosing a stone on the well to hold his vision as it turned blurry.

‘Y-yeah… No, I – I’m fine for now… Just…’ he tugged off his glasses and wiped his eye with the heel of his free hand, pushing it in until it hurt, and stars danced over the sloppy, melting snow at his feet.

‘I think you should tell Madam Pomfrey… Or Professor McGonagall?’

‘Professor McGonagall knows… I’ve told her.’ Said Harry.

So far, she hadn’t made any fuss about it. Harry wasn’t sure if that was because she believed him when he said he’d stopped, or because Umbridge’s decrees were preventing her from doing much. Certain teachers were abnormally watchful, and he was sporadically followed by a few of them, but other than that, little had changed from telling Professor McGonagall.

‘Oh, good.’ Said Hermione shortly, ‘Why hasn’t… I mean, did she – Has she found help?’

‘Umbridge forbade it, remember?’ Harry said, watching her eyes narrow to angry, teary slits. ‘And I don’t want it, Hermione. It’s not – It’s not that bad.’ He added quickly.

She made a humming reply that Harry interpreted as sceptical. They sat in silence for a few seconds. Harry’s inner life had congealed into an unworkable mess of shame, regret, sorrow, and relief.

‘You know, there are potions-‘ Started Hermione.

‘Can we please talk about something else?’ cried Harry, cutting her off.

Hermione nodded, dried her eyes with her self-knitted scarf and sat up straight again. ‘Um… You know, Ron is convinced you’re into someone. He’s trying so hard to find out who.’

Harry groaned loudly. Hermione hiccoughed out a small laugh.

‘Blasted… Why – urgh.’ He said, exaggerating his outrage. ‘I’m not. I am really not.’ Hermione giggled. Harry smiled too. He wasn’t truly mad at Ron. ‘Who has he been considering anyway?’

‘He’s… He thinks it’s either someone in Slytherin, or somebody, uhm, close.’ Said Hermione, smiling at Harry’s eyeroll. ‘And he thinks you used to fancy Cedric Diggory, before.’

Harry tilted his head at her. She kept her smile as if nothing was out of the ordinary.

Dropping all pretences, Harry said, ‘Well, best of luck to Ron in pinning down this imaginary boyfriend of mine,’ Hermione laughed, and the sound refilled some air in Harry’s lungs. ‘It’s not like there’s many for him to choose from.’

He pulled himself up to his feet by the shed's support beam and reached his hand down to pull Hermione up after him. It had stopped raining.

Hermione raised an eyebrow at him, accepting the hand, ‘Oh? Who do you think might be-‘

Harry sucked in a deep breath. ‘Might be gay?’ The word burned in the back of his throat, but Hermione’s smile only widened. ‘Let’s see… Seamus. Definitely. I think he has a thing for Dean, it’s a bit obvious actually. Poor bloke, he’s got this burning hatred for Dean’s Playboy wall calendar, it’s weird.’

Harry was feeling better by the minute.

Hermione nodded and said, ‘You know, I thought so too! He’s so defensive too – remember when Luna pinned that butterfly in his hair-‘

‘Yeah, he freaked out!’ exclaimed Harry, recalling poor Luna’s face as Seamus aggressively tore the glittery, little thing off, probably breaking it.

‘Yeah! Who else?’ tittered Hermione.

‘Malfoy.’

Hermione gasped, her hands snapping up to cover her mouth.

‘I’m ninety-nine percent sure,’ said Harry with a smirk, slowly opening into a grin.

‘Hoh!’ laughed Hermione, bundling up her umbrella. ‘Harry, if you ever start dating Malfoy, Ron will actually murder you!’

Now Harry grinned properly too. Most of the terrible thoughts had gone. He felt a sudden, warm wave of affection towards Hermione – She’d managed to drag him out of a pit by bringing up this ridiculously inane topic.

‘Then it would actually be better if you fancied Ron’s lead candidate.’ Said Hermione cheekily, biting her lower lip as Harry rolled his eyes.

‘Who is…?’

‘One of his brothers. He won’t say which.’ Hermione replied, giggling at Harry’s next brain-numbed eyeroll. ‘No? You don’t fancy any of them? I thought so.’

Harry shook his head. Feeling bold, he decided to mess with her a bit. ‘Nah, I think I’ll end up dating someone much older, knowing my daddy issues.’

The image of a pair of red eyes turned molten gold in the sunlight flashed involuntarily into mind. It was gone before he could take note of it.

Hermione gasped. ‘HARRY!’ she slapped him playfully on the arm with a big, gaping smile. ‘Unbelievable!’

Harry laughed.

Chapter 26: A Spring in Dreams

Chapter Text

Winter ebbed out at a dreary pace. Patches of ice still clung to the shaded areas as the temperatures tipped above the freezing point, polished to a slippery shine by the constant downpour. The grey weather stayed for the first Quidditch match of the year, yielding low spectator turnout and an overall miserable game. They managed to scrape a narrow win against Hufflepuff, despite Ron’s abysmal performance, missing fourteen saves.

The homework was building up so fast, they were staying up later and later every night. Hermione hadn’t brought up their talk in Hogsmeade again, but Harry caught her giving him worried looks at times. She’d also taken up an annoying habit of physically stopping Harry from scratching at his arms through his clothes. It made him feel worse, but he didn’t have the heart to tell her that. He knew she was only trying to help.

As of the beginning of March, Harry had shared memories of his life with Tom up until his eleventh birthday. The vast majority of them doctored to allow Tom to cause some mayhem at the end. He could be quite creative, even with the very limited magical capabilities permitted by the dreamscape. Gradually, Tom’s actions developed a certain flourish that Harry suspected only served entertainment purposes but were aptly tailored to the very real personalities of Harry’s relatives.

So far, Harry’s favourite was the version of the morning of Dudley’s tenth birthday where all thirty-seven gifts were burned to a crisp before Dudley even got down for breakfast and Uncle Vernon had to let go of “Harry’s” collar in a rush to replace them. He didn’t manage to, of course, and Dudley unleashed the tantrum over all tantrums. All in all, a wonderful dream, crafted from the remnants of a terrible memory.

He and Tom kept “meeting” in the house almost every other day now, and Harry had begun looking forward to these dreams a lot. He felt mysteriously drawn to the man. Conversations with Tom were easy and engaging. They flowed through topics, and only ever stalled if the subjects became sensitive, and even then, the silences were rarely awkward.

Slowly, Harry grew comfortable enough to ask questions that had been bugging him since he first entered the Wizarding world as an uninformed eleven-year-old.

One February night, they had blundered into the thorny subject of loyalty when Harry had an impulse to ask, ‘Why do they call you “Lord” anyway?’

Tom took a moment to think before answering, leaning back in his chair. ‘Wizarding kind used to organize their societies differently. Most lived in covens.’

Harry sat up straighter. He had read about covens in relation to other wizarding societies in Parliamentarism in the Wizarding World, focused primarily on northern Europe, but the societies that fell under that umbrella varied widely in composition. And the book had said nothing of the tradition on the British Isles.

Tom sensed his inquiry and explained, ‘Villages hidden in the wilderness with no roads leading to the outside world. Each of these had a chosen head. A person or family responsible for contact with other covens, admission of travellers to the village and for leading the councils where the coven would debate and vote over their laws. The Lord or Lady. My group of friends wished to revive traditions of the old world.’

‘The ones who want to boot out the Muggleborns?’ Harry asked sharply, setting his teacup down with a louder clink than intended.

‘Yes. Their goal is to greatly reduce Muggle influence on wizarding society. Many of them fear the Muggleborn will eradicate wizarding culture if given the chance. If revitalizing the wizarding political life succeeds, they fiercely believe their ideology will prevail. They named me their Lord, partly because they believed I could bridge the gap to our allies in other revivalist movements and get the numbers needed to save the dying public forum.’

If there was anything Lord Voldemort had accomplished, it was to unite half the wizarding world’s squabbling factions under a common banner. Werewolves, Vampires and Nymphs stood shoulder to shoulder with pureblood gentry “traditionalists”, lower class bigots, enlightened democracy fighters and nature-minded isolationists. All following Voldemort’s torch.

‘They chose correctly then.’ Harry commented aloud.

‘Thank you, Harry. I think I deserve the title, too.’ Tom grinned devilishly at him.

Harry felt his face heat up. Tom getting him flustered was nothing new, and if Harry was to be brutally honest with himself, he kind of liked it. It made his belly flip and heart flutter in a way it shouldn’t, and that Harry would adamantly deny to himself in the morning.

‘So, does it come with any vassals? Rich lands?’ teased Harry, mostly to cover up his own embarrassment.

‘Sadly, no. Honour and glory is all. I am as desolate as a Lord as I was before, I’m afraid.’ Sighed Tom.

‘Well, at least you’ve got rich friends you can smooch off of.’ Grinned Harry, earning a displeased warning glare.

Thankfully, there was little Tom could do in the way of punishments. Magic did not exist in this dreamscape and Tom would never stoop to Uncle Vernon’s level by hitting him.

‘How does your silent spellcasting fare?’ asked Tom, changing the subject to one Harry found unpleasant instead.

‘Poorly.’ Replied Harry, thinking the moment was perfect for tea-drinking. ‘Protego, I can do.’

‘Ah, a spell that only the Mulciber-Dummy should use.’ Quipped Tom, making Harry scowl at him. ‘Oh, don’t give me that face, the next will be easier.’

The rest of the dream passed with spell-talk.

***

When Harry awoke the next morning, he dug out the Knights of Walpurgis pamphlets from his trunk. At the bottom of each, was a plea for donations.

“Help us fight for you! Donate now – Gringotts Vault 599, code 12 58877 – for anonymous donations, code 34 89669. Thank You!”

He pulled out a piece of parchment and a quill, some wax, and his Vault Key, then stopped mid-motion. It suddenly felt like too much, too soon. But then again, Harry believed he had good reason to do this.

Firstly, he actually wanted Tom to accomplish the goals he’d set for the Knights and for that they needed money. Secondly, he needed leverage. He had no illusions as to who held the power within their alliance, and becoming a source of funding could potentially tip the scales a lot.

Besides, Tom was prideful, independent, and weirdly shy. There was no way this wouldn’t upset him at least a little. With renewed resolve, Harry set quill to parchment and wrote:

I wish to make a one-time donation from Vault 687 to 599 of 15 000 (Fifteen Thousand) Galleons.

He folded it twice, dripped on the join with wax and used the back of his key to stamp its unique seal. On the front he wrote:

GRINGOTTS – CONFIDENTIAL and the code 34 89669.

He sent the letter off with one of the school’s tawney owls (gravely offending Hedwig).

***

The donation didn’t process in time for their next shared dream, and Harry was glad the subject of money did not arise again. It was incredibly difficult to lie to Tom, and Harry found that spotting Tom’s lies was deceptively easy. The link would rat them out to each other.

It created a culture of honesty between them that made Harry less averse to engage with Tom’s increasingly personal questions, including ones that addressed the emotions Harry was unwittingly sending him over the link.

That is why, when the topic of Valentines Day arose, and Tom commented on Harry’s wild mood swings of the day, Harry chose to answer.

They were strolling leisurely around the foggy park across the street from the house when Tom asked, ‘It has been a while since I was fifteen, but I cannot remember the mood swings being that bad. Had a fight with your sweetheart? Did she break it off with you on the Valentine’s Day?’

Tom’s tone was as mocking and slimy as it could get. Harry got the feeling he wasn’t a fan of Valentines Day either.

‘Wow, who hurt you?’ Harry joked, then turned serious again in the face of Tom’s raised eyebrow. ‘Sorry,’ he said, trying to sound casual while looking at the gravel path at his feet. ‘No, I wasn’t seeing anyone, but erm… I had a, um – minor breakdown… And Hermione cheered me up again.’

Tom stopped under a cast-iron gas lamp and turned to look at Harry, who’d been walking slower for the past few meters.

‘You’re getting worse,’ said Tom bleakly, looking away from Harry and into the fog. Harry followed his gaze.

There were dark shapes of people walking past the other gas lamps in the park. Top hats and trailing dresses briefly visible before vanishing into the haze again.

Harry sucked in a breath. ‘I don’t think so. Maybe you’re just getting better at noticing my dramatics.’ He said, still not looking at Tom.

There were no people under the lamps to stare at anymore. Suddenly, he felt a hand on his shoulder. He jumped slightly at the unexpected touch. Tom had taken a step closer, bending his neck trying to gain eye contact with Harry.

When he succeeded, Tom narrowed his eyes at him, not in an angry way… more like concerned, however absurd that was.

‘You know I can feel it right? When you hurt yourself. And lying is futile, as you very well know.’ He said dangerously, but with an air of unease hiding in his voice. ‘You are getting worse!’ he repeated, squeezing Harry’s shoulder and making Harry sway a little.

Harry had the surreal sensation of being pulled in, drawn towards Tom the way the edge of a cliff enticed people to jump. He took cautious step back. The feeling dissipated.

Another good thing about his conversations with Tom was that he never lingered on the bad things. The exchange under the gas lamp ended there, and they moved on to lighter subjects. Politics was a favourite. Though they agreed on most policies, they had differing views on methods.

Harry had actually managed to convince Tom that letting the Ministry dictate Hogwarts curriculums was a bad idea, while Tom had converted Harry to the idea of Wizarding Primary schools. It was the part where the Muggleborn children would be included that did it. It would even out their background in a way that Wizarding children attending Muggle Primary schools did not.

Another frequent topic was morality, but it was something of a mine field. One they discussed at length the first week of March while feeding Harry’s monstrously strange, fantasy backyard chickens.

‘I just don’t see why you think you have the right to-‘

‘I do not have a right, Harry. Rights are given by a power above oneself, and I do not acknowledge there being such a thing in Brittain at the moment.’

Harry rolled his eyes. Tom’s face stayed completely serious, carrying on as if it wasn’t an incredibly conceited thing to say.

‘The philosophical debate about who gets to choose who lives and dies gets a little tedious, and my stance on it is - I don’t care. Some people need to die, and I get to make the decision because I can, and have the power to.’ The corners of Tom’s mouth trended upwards as he said this.

Harry could feel in real time how the man enjoyed riling him up. The argument was bait, and Harry was poised to take it. He bristled, flinging feed at the birds. A nut bounced off the head of the neon-green one. It made a hollow thonk sound, like a tennis ball hitting an upturned zinc bucket.

‘What, you don’t think people’s lives are worth anything?’ jabbed Harry, watching the green chicken run after the nut. ‘Why do you even work for justice reform if that’s your ideology? Why not just have the death sentence for every crime, then?’

‘That is a bad-faith argument, and you know it. I am perfectly aware of my double standards here, Harry. I also think that the new justice system should apply to me eventually. Though I have no intention of getting caught.’ Tom grinned, completely relaxed in the face of Harry’s snarky inquiries.

They had been swinging by this topic a few times before. How do you attack the hypocrisy of someone who had no objections to being a hypocrite?

Tom continued his argument, dipping his hand into the feed-bucket again. ‘But who decides, pray tell, what gives a human value? The way I see it, apart from the case of land, value is entirely subjective. You don’t value the lives of some random Muggle in the street. I know, because you would sacrifice them in a heartbeat if it would save, say, your friend Granger, correct? Or do you seriously want me to believe you would roll dice to decide?’

‘Wah – I don’t know-‘

Tom sent him a piercing glance, reiterating his words, lying is futile.

Harry huffed. ‘Fine, yes, I would probably sacrifice a stranger’s life for Hermione’s, but-‘

‘And if you truly believed all human lives were of equal value, then your own life should be of equal worth to hers as well, agreed?’ said Tom with a confident flair, proud of having Harry waltz into his trap.

Harry’s brain seemed to have jammed. No counter came to mind, though his gut feeling told him he should be furious. If only because Tom had managed to sneak this highly personal topic in where Harry did not expect it.

Tom took advantage of Harry’s thought collapse to hammer his message home, ‘Don’t you see? I know you must agree with me, otherwise you would value your life as highly as you do the lives of others. Which I know for certain you do not.’

Finally, Harry found his tongue again and anger enough to spit some impudent questions. ‘Why am I listening to you about this anyway? How many people have you, directly or indirectly, killed now? Are you sure you’re not just looking for a way to justify that?’

Harry regretted his outburst almost instantly. He got an ominous feeling that the better retort would come to mind once he woke up. Flustered, he tossed a handful of feed in the direction of the timid, baby-blue chicken in the corner of the coop.

Tom only laughed, arrogant and annoyingly unoffended. ‘Hah! Why don’t you venture a guess, Darling – It is less than you believe, I promise you!’

Harry pretended to not have noticed Tom’s choice of word there. He supposed it was meant as condescension and not an endearment.

In his head, he counted out the murders he knew of, that came up to eight… so maybe around forty-five to fifty? The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts had put the total wizarding loss of the war to about three hundred, not counting any non-humans…

‘I don’t know… Around fifty? Counting those who’s been executed by Death Eaters on your orders.’

‘I have rarely ordered executions – Torture, yes –‘ he sent Harry a demonic grin. ‘But executions, hardly ever. There are nineteen people who have died by my hand, seventeen were intentional. One died of injuries that I sincerely thought they would recover from after they were released from custody, the other was Myrtle Warren. I killed seven Aurors in one go with Fiendfyre once, it is largely that incident that made me so feared.’

Harry’s eyebrows must have risen into his fringe somewhere. He has to be lying.

Harry searched the bridge between their minds but found no deception. He dropped the last of the chicken feed he had in his hands in a pile.

‘Do you regret any of them?’ said Harry loftily, imagining the reply to be a hard “no”. Even if there were fewer murders than Harry guessed, it was still a lot.

‘Yes. A few… Rash decisions, fuelled by rage and clouded thoughts…’ Tom shook his head slowly and threw the rest of his grains to the midnight-blue bird that looked more like an oversized crow than a chicken. ‘Mainly, those deaths have had consequences I would rather be without. It is hardly remorse, because most were strangers with no value to me, and the majority of the people I have killed were enemies that had to die for good reasons. As I told you earlier, I am fully aware of my hypocrisy, Harry, and I honestly do not care. It is philosophically interesting, but of no practical use to me. I have no intention of ever going to Azkaban for any of it.’ He finished with a smirk, though a bitterness remained in his eyes.

Harry smiled back. Suddenly, it struck him how any sane person would be appalled by the things Tom said, not to mention scared to share a mind with a mass murderer.

Most people would pretend to be appalled and scared, but really, they don’t care about people they don’t personally know either, added a murmur in the back of his mind. It’s not insane to be enjoying his company…

‘You do deserve Azkaban though.’ Said Harry matter-of-factly as they made their way through the kitchen door.

‘What I deserve is a public execution.’ Said Tom sombrely, his eyes dark and unfocused.

That sentence stuck with Harry. He hadn’t pressed it at the time, and he was too afraid to bring it up again, but sometimes he thought maybe Tom was prone to melancholy too.

***

The last shared dream of March, Tom announced that the plan for breaking into the Department of Mysteries was finalized, and the date set to 18^th of June. They celebrated by asking Diana for cake in addition to their usual tea and sat down with Harry’s drawings sprawled out on the coromandel dining table crammed into a narrow dining room adjacent to the parlour.

‘Harry… Did you by any chance send me money?’ asked Tom softly.

Feeling his blood heat up under his collar, Harry studied his drawings closer. They were supposed to be working on adding a barrier against stray spells to the Show-and-Tell array for the DA-exam.

When Harry didn’t answer, Tom pressed on. ‘A donation to the Knights’ coffers vault finished processing today. It was marked with a code we published in our pamphlets to the Quibbler, back in the day… Ring any bells?’

Harry attempted valiantly to assess Tom’s mood before answering. The link felt nervous. Very nervous, in fact, which didn’t fit Harry’s expectations at all. Was it even possible for this man to be nervous? How on earth should he handle this?

‘I may have sent you some money, yes… Now, will the poor friend of yours get their house back?’ Said Harry, trying to hide the deepening blush with cheek. It was impossible to lie to Tom in any case, so he might as well get this conversation over with.

Harry could feel Tom’s amused smile without seeing it.

‘Yes, the Notts will have their house back by the end of next week, because you sent me a f*cking fortune!’ It sounded like Tom wanted to shake him until he rattled.

Harry’s head shot up. Tom never swore. He prided himself on being softspoken and gentlemanly. Not “crude and vulgar”, as the man himself had put it. Only the most unintelligent of people had profanities as a staple of their vocabularies, in Tom’s opinion.

‘Erm… I sent you about a month’s worth of the incomes from the Potion Patents I inherited. It’s not that much,-‘ Tom stared at him as if he’d taken complete leave of his senses, ‘-I get a steady amount from renters and land-leases around the country too, and it’s not like I need it.’ Harry felt his flushed face cool as he talked. ‘I’ve squandered money on sillier things.’

Tom remained stunned, the emotions Harry could sense from him roiling up into an incomprehensible mess while his body language was curling inwards, defensive and tense.

‘But why?’

It was the most naked, honest question Harry had ever heard from Tom. No hidden agendas, no secret manipulations, nothing.

‘Because you need it.’ Said Harry, as if Tom was daft to not see that himself. But the sentiment was completely lost on Tom, who stared on as if waiting for the real answer. ‘And I offended you when I said you were leeching off your friends, right? Because the situation is sh*tty, and you hate depending on others? Hurts your pride?’ tested Harry.

Tom didn’t refute any of it, merely scowled.

‘Well, I have the means to help you, so I did. And like I said, it’s not that much.’ Ended Harry, returning his attention to the drawings for emphasis.

He wondered if Tom would spot his original intention to use it for leverage, though he admittedly had stopped thinking of it as such days ago. It had become a gift, and Harry’s initial plans for it had faded. And, once he got past that all of his interactions with Tom since last spring pretty much counted as treason, he really had no reason to be ashamed.

He wanted the Knights’ politics to triumph. And it was ultimately the Knights’ coffers that stood on the Gringotts ticket. And he rather liked Tom, and thus he was willing to make a few concessions morally and support the cause monetarily. And that was sensible, right? And it was his gold, he could spend it however he liked. Had he known the Weasleys wouldn’t simply send it back, he’d have done the same to them years ago.

Harry wondered what Tom had expected would happen when he brought this up. Did he think Harry would deny it? Did he think Harry did not understand how much money it was? What was his play here?

If Harry had denied it, all shy and embarrassed to be caught, what would have happened? Tom would have known he was lying instantly and gotten a confirmation that it indeed was Harry who sent the money…

But he could have pretended to believe you, and let it go… Harry realized, the pieces slotting into place. Now that Tom couldn’t sweep it under a rug, he had to know why, and Harry’s answer had disturbed him.

The look Tom was giving him was outright unsettling.

‘It’s more money than - than I have ever had, Harry… You gave me a bit of a shock.’ Tom’s voice trembled slightly, as if the man had no idea whether to laugh or cry.

Harry had an absurd urge to reach over and touch him that he squashed with effort. Once confident he could appear nonchalant; Harry lifted his head to look at Tom across the table. If Harry didn’t know better, he’d say Tom seemed to be having something of an inner crisis.

‘So, Thank you, Harry.’ Said Tom sincerely, ‘-and I am going to pay you back,-’

‘No, you’re not.’ Said Harry.

He’d played this game for years with the Weasleys. Tom had just admitted to having been poor his entire life, like the Weasleys – for him to give back as much as a Knut seemed incredibly distasteful to Harry.

This thing about paying him back came from most adults’ drive to be self-reliant, and Tom was a particularly independent person. He was also supposed to be selfish, the way Harry saw him, and false honourability didn’t suit Tom at all. In Harry’s mind, the fitting behaviour for Tom was to be smug about having duped Harry into giving him money or something the like. Not this.

Moreover, this talk hung on the assumption that the prophesy would favour Harry’s long-term survival. Which wasn’t all that likely.

Tom curled his lips in. ‘Yes, I am. I am capable of prov-‘

‘Would you insist on paying it back if it was the Malfoys who’d given it?’ interrupted Harry on a hunch, crossing his arms over his chest.

‘No, of course not, they’re toffs, and most of them very unpleasantly so.’ Said Tom as if Harry was insane to even ask.

Harry smirked, ‘Well, there you go. I am also a part of the rich, landed gentry, and I’ll never really need to work a day in my life – I just don’t look it.’

Tom glowered at him, but it didn’t seem genuine.

‘Aw, C’mon, Tom! I know you don’t really want to pay me back, so stop it!’ said Harry, satisfied.

Tom’s face turned a very, very, slight pink – Harry would’ve missed it if he blinked - and smiled abashedly at Harry. At that very moment, a dozen butterflies chose to dance a surprise quick ballet in Harry’s belly.

Harry shrugged and added lightly, ‘And, the prophesy might make the effort redundant anyway, right?’

Tom’s mood cooled instantly. ‘I suppose.’ He said, the link bubbling down towards anger.

Scrambling to prevent a bog from forming between them. Harry changed the subject. ‘By the way, I’m adding you as a secret final level to the Defence exam.’ He grinned, pretending not to notice Tom souring while taking advantage of his upper hand from the previous exchange. The dour mood lifted.

‘I am intrigued,’ smirked Tom.

The prospect of Harry frightening a bunch of his classmates with a very realistic simulation of “Lord Voldemort” must be stroking the man’s ego, figured Harry.

‘Though I do wonder how you plan to design that to be anything close to fair.’

‘Oh, uh – I think it is my limitations as the one running the simulation that will even things out a bit, and I’ll let them fight as a team. So they’ll be maybe three-on-one... I don’t necessarily want them to win… I want them to get a sense of their own limits…’ Said Harry, trailing off while searching for the right words.

‘What do you mean?’ urged Tom when Harry took too long to think.

‘I mean… There’s been some talk around the group... About “fighting Voldemort”, and I am leaning into that by using Death Eaters in the exam. But I don’t want them to fight. Not really. And for that, they need to know what it means to not be playing anymore… That being a clever student with an O in Defence won’t mean anything against a truly formidable opponent.’ Harry said while fascinatedly watching a happy glimmer emerge in Tom’s eyes. ‘I haven’t decided if I’m going to show your face or not though.’

‘Please don’t. I am able to walk out in public without a disguise now for the first time in thirty years. I appreciate it if you did not disrupt that.’ Said Tom with strained politeness, the kind where he was secretly formulating a threat as a follow up to whatever he was saying.

Harry had no trouble sympathizing with Tom’s plight there. ‘Alright. Will you help me make it realistic, at least?’

‘Of course. I cannot have you shame me. I will need to teach you a few spells, maybe.’ Said Tom with an almost fond smile. Harry’s heart made a leap of joy, rekindling the butterflies.
‘Though you will mostly be using a phony Killing Curse, I think. I rarely duel people I don’t want dead.’

The rest of the dream trailed off into a planning session for the secret fourth level, or final Boss fight, as it would be in Dudley’s Playstation games. They moved to the parlour and Diana delivered something that looked like tea but tasted like whipped cream to Harry and blackberry jam to Tom along with a cake that tasted gingerbread to Harry and salty liquorice to Tom.

***

Beginning of April, the DA lessons had moved onto the much-anticipated, extra-curricular activity of Patronuses. Harry had tried to impress upon them the humongous difference between conjuring a Patronus in a brightly lit, safe and Dementor-free room surrounded by friends, and producing one when you were anywhere near a real Dementor. Nobody paid him any mind, too preoccupied with the wonder of their Patronuses.

Hermione had a silvery otter bouncing in the air around them, while Neville was producing only whisps of white smoke.

‘I think you need a happier memory.’ Said Harry as he passed Neville.

‘I’m trying!’ said Neville frustratedly, sweat dripping from his face.

At the end of the class, nearly two thirds had managed a corporal one. Before they all left for their common rooms, Harry announced that the next one would be the exam. Excited murmurs broke out, and Hermione had to shush more than one group when ushering them out the door.

‘What are your plans for after that exam, Harry?’ asked Ron as the portrait hole closed behind them.

‘Focus on our O.W.Ls for a bit, and we can pick it up again after.’ Said Harry. Hermione nodded in merry agreement.

The next day, the nail-biting saga of who Umbridge was going to sack finally came to an end. Harry, Ron, and Hermione were studying in the library when a bug-eyed Collin Creevey came sprinting to their table.

‘Umbridge’s sacking Trelawney! The Entrance Hall!’ he wheezed, then moved on to repeat his message at the next table.

The three of them looked at each other for a split second, before shoving their things into their bags and hurrying to the Entrance Hall to bear witness.

Trelawney was standing smack in the middle of the hall, empty sherry bottle in hand. Two old fashioned suitcases had been flung haphazardly on the floor behind her. She was bawling audibly.

‘…I refuse to accept it!’ she shrieked when Harry, Ron and Hermione got to the balcony overlooking the Hall.

Half the school had crammed themselves onto the balcony or along the walls. Additional faces were peeking out from the Great Hall and the stairway to the dungeons.

‘You didn’t realise this was coming?’ said the high-pitched, almost juvenile voice of Professor Umbridge. ‘Incapable though you are of predicting as much as tomorrow’s weather, you must surely have realised that your pitiful performance during my inspections, and lack of any improvement, would make it inevitable that you would be sacked?’

Umbridge was clearly enjoying herself, standing three steps above Trelawney, relishing in her own power with poorly hidden smiles and a proudly puffed-up chest.

‘you-y-you can’t – y-you can’t sack me! I’ve b-been here s-s-sixteen years! Hogwarts is m-my home!’ Trelawney collapsed onto one of her suitcases sobbingly, her head retracting into her loose collar of colourful shawls like a tortoise into its shell.

‘It was your home.’ Said Professor Umbridge gloatingly.

Harry didn’t hear what she said next as Ron leaned in between him and Hermione and whispered. ‘I almost feel sorry for her. She’s batty, yeah – but the way Umbridge’s doing this is just evil.’

Harry and Hermione both mumbled their agreements and turned back to watch the scene below.

Professor McGonagall shot out from the crowd. ‘There, there, Sybil – Calm down… blow your nose on this,’ she withdrew a large handkerchief from her robes and handed it to Professor Trelawney. ‘It’s not as bad as you think… you’re not going to have to leave Hogwarts…’

‘Really, Professor McGonagall? On whose authority-‘ began Professor Umbridge when the large, double doors to the courtyard opened.

‘That would be mine.’ Said Professor Dumbledore, striding through the doors as casually as if he was merely returning from his evening promenade.

In a heartbeat, Umbridge's face reddened three shades. The edges of her smile trembled, and her stubby hands balled into small, round, baby-like fists.

‘As High Inquisitor, you have the authority to dismiss teachers. However, you do not have the authority to send them from the castle. That power still lies with the headmaster.’ Said Dumbledore with a relaxed, cheerful smile when Umbridge moved to argue.

Professor McGonagall gathered up Professor Trelawney from her trunk, now sobbing ludicrously, and together with Professor Sprout, escorted her back upstairs. Professor Flitwick trailed after them, levitating Professor Trelawney’s luggage.

It was then Dumbledore revealed what he had been doing outside. Professor Umbridge’s eyes could scarcely have bulged any more, less they’d fall out, than when he announced that the new Divination teacher would be Firenze, the pale centaur Harry once met in the Forbidden Forest during a first-year detention with Hagrid.

‘Umbridge is going to get so much worse, isn’t she?’ said an awed Dean Thomas from the corner by the stairs. He was right.

Chapter 27: The Exam

Chapter Text

The days leading up to the final DA-exam, Harry thought about little else. One of the things that occupied his mind was the stubborn conundrum of faking Unforgivables.

Tom had taught him a spell that could work as a substitute for the Crucio, and the problem was, it was too mild. Using it ran the risk of teaching the DA-members that Crucio’s weren’t as bad as they’d been told, and getting hit with one in battle in real life would take them completely aback like it had Harry.

‘You can always cast the real Crucio on them.’ Said Tom after Harry pointed out the issues he had after testing the fake Crucio on a willing Ron.

‘Er… no. First of all, I don’t think it’d be successful. They’re my friends, remember? I don't want them hurt, that's the point of all this. Secondly, it’s very, very illegal.’ Answered Harry.

Tom scoffed, leaning forwards with both elbows on the table. They were sitting at the dining room table again because of its size, and again with a large drawing of the current stacks of arrays for the exam between them.

‘To answer the first one, I think you will have no problems with, a-ah – don’t interrupt me – because the feelings you feed the spell with need not be real, and you are very good at lying to yourself. As for the second one, they are your friends, so you will get their written consent.’ Said Tom and made an open-handed gesture. ‘You must if you are to cast Imperios on them anyway. Speaking of Imperios, I hope you did as you were told…?’

Harry affirmed with a nod. He’d been instructed to try it on animals with a will of their own – not insects or spiders. His choice had been conjured mice, and Harry rapidly understood why Tom wanted him to use mammals. Having the Dark Lord teach you Dark magic meant that Harry had learned things about the Unforgivables that he doubted most Aurors even knew. For instance, that all three targeted the matter of “Mind”.

Imperio enslaved it to the mind of another, Crucio manipulated it to transmit only pain signals, and the killing curse severed it entirely, destroying the connection between “Body” and “Soul”. In theory, Crucio should be combatable the same way the Imperio was, and if you dug deeper – In theory – It should be possible to come up with a spell or enchantment that could block the Avada.

‘Written consent… That is probably a good idea. But, Hey! What do you mean I’m good at lying to myself?’ said Harry, mildly offended.

Tom directed a warm smile at him, then suddenly, his hand darted out lightning fast, pinning Harry’s left arm to the table. Harry instinctively tried to withdraw his arm, but Tom only strengthened his grip.

‘Are you sure you want me to answer that, Harry? The sentiments that you use to justify this habit of yours are quite certainly false.’

Tom’s eyes were boring into him. Harry’s brain was threatening with a breakdown if he couldn’t tone down the intensity of the situation. He jerked against Tom’s hold again.

‘So, the great torturer is saying I don’t deserve it, is that it?’ said Harry jokingly in an attempt to defuse the bomb within Tom’s statement, but Tom was dead serious.

‘That is exactly what I’m saying.’ He let go of Harry’s arm so slowly, it kind of felt like a caress. ‘And, that no matter what you think, that habit does not help you. It is making you worse.’

‘What do you care…’ Muttered Harry, shoving both arms into his lap under the table.

Tom shot him a blasé glare, then thankfully dropped it. ‘Anyway, for the Avada, use Minora Sulphadermia. It is a burning hex. It has the same green flash and is virtually unblockable by energy-based shields like the Protego. I think you can find it in most standard books of jinxes and hexes.’

***

Harry aired some of the Unforgivable concerns to Hermione too, especially the part about people not comprehending how debilitating a Crucio could be, depending on the caster.

‘Hmmm… I agree, Harry, but I can’t really see any way to remedy that.’ She said, crossing out a line on his Charms essay. They were bundled up in front of the fire in the common room again. ‘I mean, it’s not like any of us can actually cast one, so we can’t do what the fake Moody did…’ She squinted at his essay, ‘What’s it saying here, Harry?’

‘Um – “Refraction”, I think.’

‘But we can do what fake Moody did.’ Said Ron, stuffing another Ginger Newt into his already full mouth. ‘But it’s not going to be very effective – you have to mean it, right?’

‘Yeah, it’ll probably turn into a stinging hex.’ Said Harry, taking his essay back from Hermione. It didn’t look too bad.

‘Say what mate, you can try ‘em on me instead of the fake one if I get to the hard part of your exam.’ Said Ron thickly.

‘Really? Are you sure about that? What if I actually pull it off?’ doubted Harry.

Ron’s facial expression was conspicuously blank. Harry started to suspect he may have some morbid curiosity around the Unforgivables. He had been very excited about those particular lessons with Barty Crouch Jr.

‘Then I’ll be in pain. It’s not like it injures you or anything, and I trust you, mate – and all the others watching.’ Said Ron with a light, dismissive shrug.

‘Fair enough.’ Said Harry, observing Ron carefully. The apples of his cheeks had gone pink and the corners of his lips were twitching with excitement.

Hermione stared at them both with a stern face. ‘You’ll need to announce to everyone that you intend to try that, then. Both of you.’ She warned them.

‘Of course, I’ll have him and everyone I might try to Imperio sign a consent form.’ Smiled Harry promptly, inwardly thanking Tom for his wisdom.

‘Good thinking.’ Agreed Ron, face breaking out into a sunny grin.

***

The night before the exam, Harry and Tom sat down with the plan for the exam for the last time. Harry told him about his conversation with Ron about the Unforgivables while scouring the kitchen for tea as Diana had failed to spawn again.

‘Good. Then I am confident you will have no trouble. Your powers of imagination are quite vivid. Fabricate some injury or injustice from him in your mind and channel the anger out through the spell. Just wait until the anger cools, and you can think clearly. Pure rage will botch the spell. It could actually be easier since you know him so well.’ Said Tom mildly, poking around the pantry in search of more of the “Every-Flavour-Tea that Bertie Botts only wished he could make” as he’d once put it.

‘Is that what you do?’ asked Harry, though genuinely curious as to how Tom could forge strong enough emotions towards strangers and familiar faces alike to cast such powerful Crucio’s on them.

Tom answered with a half-truth. ‘Yes, and no, I hate almost everyone at least a little.’

Harry co*cked an eyebrow at him and was about to call him a lizard when Tom said, ‘Or, let me rephrase that – It is easy for me to find something to fuel the spell with, but to me it is easy to reach that coldness long before passionate hatred. My imagination is rubbish, it needs to be rooted in reality for me, but the offense need not be grave. I too started off practicing on people I considered friends, also with their consent. I always managed to find something…’

Harry thought Tom had implied that he was going to be casting more Crucios in the future, like this exam was nothing but a cover for Harry to practice Dark Magic and not for the benefit of the DA-members. Then it struck him that Tom probably saw it that way.

Tom picked up a big, shiny, wooden box with brass hinges and bold, golden lettering on the lid that proudly declared its contents to be “TEA”.

‘Aha!’ Grinning wide, he popped the lid off triumphantly and tilted it to reveal its contents. It was full of wingnuts.

Frowning, Tom put the box back. ‘Anyway, I have decided to try to teach you a shield spell I use a lot…Though we don’t really have the time… I was unsure if I wanted to share it – I made it myself, you see.’ He smiled haughtily.

Harry beamed at him and a shiver of excitement ran up his spine. So far, Tom had stuck to teaching him other people’s spell-work, all while bragging about yet undemonstrated spellmaker-abilities. To the contrary, Harry had exclusively shown Tom arrays he had developed himself. It was about time Tom repaid in kind.

‘It relies strongly on intent, and is meant strictly for non-verbal casting with a full-arm diagonal swish as wand movement. It only has a placeholder incantation in Parseltongue, Silver Disc, translated directly.-’

Harry listened intently, trying to commit it all to memory. Simulating magic in dreams was very straining, and there was no way Harry could imitate a spell he’d never seen. Additionally, they found making the parseltongue-sounds a bit of a challenge without the magically enhanced muscle memory.

‘-If there’s a dense rattle in the last word, then you have chosen the correct interpretation, not the shrill rattle you used when you made that god-awful word for “pets”.’ Berated Tom.

Harry shrank, inwardly admitting that stringing “animal” and “other” to create “pets” when talking to Nagini in the graveyard wasn’t his finest Parseltongue moment. Though she had understood what he meant, so Harry didn’t think it was that bad.

‘I recommend you do without the incantation altogether.’ Finished Tom, popping an eyebrow at Harry as a reminder to his dissatisfaction with Harry’s lack of proficiency in silent casting.

Harry ignored the barb. ‘OK, what am I aiming for?’

‘It is a semi-physical barrier shaped like an oval, silver shield, which means you must both conjure the metal and fortify it with a charm.’ Replied Tom.

‘Transfiguration-Charm hybrid. Brilliant.’ Said Harry with more than a hint of sarcasm. This sounded like exactly the type of spell he’d struggle to learn.

Tom smiled perceptively at him. ‘Good luck. I think most wizards your age could do it in ten tries.’

***

Harry spent the Saturday before lunch practicing Tom’s shield spell in the Room-of-Requirement. He got it down after twelve tries, and after that it took seven more to get the thickness of it right. Another six tries later, and he could drop the placeholder incantation. The process was frustrating, but he soldiered through it and was eventually pleased with the results.

The DA-meeting was set to an early start for the occasion. At three o’clock, everyone was seated along the walls around the giant, multi-stacked array, which Harry had drawn in magical paint the room had provided him with and covered with the protective glass. Another stack of arrays had been painted in the ceiling, and two human-shaped metal mesh dummies were standing in a sub-circle in the corner of the array.

Eight physical barriers had been put up inside it, transfigured by Hermione using the cushions. She had shaped them like stones or trees to match the forest background that would be erected around the combatants.

‘Welcome to the DA-exam!’ said Harry to the room.

The whispers and murmurs that had been hanging in the air faded away.

‘This exam has three levels, you need to beat the first to move on to the second, and so on. The first two are solo challenges. If you make it to the third, you’ll be paired up with someone. The dummies will – through me - cast real Dark spells at you, including Imperios.-‘

Over by the door, Cho Chang exchanged nervous glances with her friend Marietta. A few others shuffled their feet nervously as well.

‘-Which is what the form you signed was for. And, Ron and I have a deal that I may cast Crucios at him with the dummies-‘

Whistles and jeers broke out, primarily from the twins. Ron smiled comedically at the taunts, accepting a playful punch to the shoulder from Lee.

‘-should he get to that level.’ Continued Harry when it died down. ‘Erm - You don’t have to fear Crucios unless you’ve explicitly agreed upon it with me beforehand. And I’ve never cast it before, so most likely, it will be a dud.’

Some sparse snickering rose from the group. Harry carried on, smiling and keeping his tone light. Ginny was giving him dark looks.

‘I’ve found a substitute spell that represents the killing curse but is harmless. It is green, unblockable and uncomfortable. If it hits you, you’re out. I’ll be raising barriers to keep the spells in, and I’ll stay within a circle of my own to control all of this, don’t try to hit me with any spells, it won’t work.’ Harry gestured broadly at the arrays. ‘Also, I am largely guessing how these people act in fights, and they are probably much better at duelling in real life. Besting one of these dummies does not mean you can take on the real Death Eater! OK?’

‘Death Eater?!’ whispered someone in the mixed noises coming off the group.

Harry did a sweeping scan of the room. There were nods and affirming replies aplenty. Ron was practically teeming over with poorly hidden excitement, as was Neville. ‘Alright, Hannah, you’re up first!’ Harry declared with a smile.

He took his place in his channelling post in the corner. Hannah Abbot made her way inside the great circle and Harry raised the barriers around her. She looked around, probably apprehensive about the fake forest that cut her off from the spectators.

Focusing for a few seconds, the arrays glowed under the fake grass and one of the dummies sprang to life. Its metallic mesh body was immediately covered with an illusion of Mortimer Crabbe, hunchbacked, stout, and bowlegged with a crooked Death Eater mask and ill-fitting robes. He had a stubby little wand in his hand.

‘Hey girlie!’ growled the illusion, using its script.

Hannah shot a stunner at it, which Harry made it block clumsily. She shot a disarming spell which missed, and fake-Crabbe cast a bone-breaking curse at her. Recognizing what it was, Hannah yelped and jumped out of the way behind a boulder.

‘Come back here, little bird!’ barked the Crabbe-illusion and begun stubbing around the arena in search of his opponent.

Harry made him shoot wide-reaching cutting jinxes at the barriers, as they would splash over and hit anyone hiding behind them. Hannah saw one coming for her stone, and boldly shot a stunner over it. It hit, and Hannah finished the first challenge.

Applause and whistles broke out from the spectators. Harry gave her a few seconds to collect herself before changing the illusion from Crabbe to a masked Mulciber and bringing in the other as an unmasked Lucius Malfoy.

The audience howled in low voices. ‘Ballsy, Harry!’ yelled George.

Controlling two dummies at once relied on a lot of practiced memories and preset behaviours he’d enchanted into the ceiling array, but it was still a demanding task. Malfoy was a slow combatant who demanded a clear line of sight before Harry could make him cast anything. Mulciber, however, was all over the place, stumbling over rocks.

Hannah didn’t last long in this fight. Her tendency to stay rooted to one place made her an easy target. Dummy-Malfoy hit her with an Imperio, and Harry made her do some frog croaking before lifting it and letting her out to thunderous applause.

The next four participants also got taken out by the Mulciber and Malfoy duo, while Dean got overconfident with Crabbe, and got hit by his Bone-breaker which created a pause for Harry and Hermione to heal him before they could move on.

‘Oh, you meant real, real spells.’ Said Ginny to Harry, holding Dean’s hand while Hermione cast a Brackium Emendo on his ribs.

‘Yeah.’ Confirmed Harry, uncorking a vial of Quick-Mend and handing it to Dean. He drank it with a “thanks”.

‘I could probably still fight with this. Hurts now, but it didn’t at first.’ Shrugged Dean, surprisingly light-hearted. ‘And it’s not like Harry is casting Entrail-Expelling curses or Haemorrhaging Curses on us, Gin.’ He added at the sight of Ginny’s scathing glare.

The first to hit the Lestrange-Level was Zacharias Smith after managing to kite fake-Mulciber into the range of Malfoy’s slow-loading “Avada” and then rapid-fire stunning the both of them. He could stand proudly and wait for the next to get that far.

He was soon joined by Fred and George, who both used wide-ranged knockback jinxes to target both dummies at the same time, taking advantage of Mulciber and Malfoy’s inability to coordinate and tendency to stand too close together. Luna, Neville, and Ron were also added to their ranks, along with Hermione and Justin. Cho, the Creeveys, and Anthony all lost at Crabbe, while everyone else lost at Mulciber and Malfoy. By six o’clock, they were ready for level three.

Zacharias and Justin went first. There was a loud gasp when their opponents first materialized. Neville especially, paled at the sight of Dummy Bellatrix Lestrange and her husband. They were both in their normal clothes as Tom had shown them to Harry. Rudolphus in worn, but high-quality black tweed, and Bellatrix in what looked like three lacy, black dresses on top of each other.

The Hufflepuffs had the good sense to run for cover the second the dummies moved.

‘Itty Bitty Baby Badgers? Where aaaaare you?’ goaded fake Bellatrix when they huddled together behind a stone.

Harry had her throwing almost exclusively harmless “Crucios” and burning curses, which were loud and flashy, distracting them from the quiet and careful steps of Rudolphus, who favoured Imperios.

He got Justin, and Harry made Justin stun Zacharias while Fake Bellatrix howled with laughter. Despite the loss, the Hufflepuffs got a champion’s reception as they exited the array, which Justin encouraged with a series of flourished bows while the next pair took their places.

For a moment, Harry had a needling doubt that the Lestranges were actually beatable. For the next round, he took extra care to ensure the dummies behaved like themselves, and repeatedly had Bellatrix step on Rudolphus’ cloak while Rudolphus would send spells blindingly close to his wife’s face. Fred and George picked up on the clumsy dynamics and capitalized on it, but still got beat.

They split up, and targeted Rudolphus first, waiting for the moment Bellatrix bumped into him, which worked brilliantly. However, once fake Bellatrix was alone in the ring, she began using Bombardas to destroy barriers that eventually hit the stealth-loving twins.

‘Thanks for that, Harrykins.’ Said George, picking debris out of his hair.

The first to beat the Lestranges were Neville and Luna, mostly because Harry had no idea how to deal with Luna. Neville charged in with fierce determination, face screwed up in concentration as he shot stunner after stunner, and Harry had Bellatrix latch on to him immediately.

He jumped from stone to stone, and flung offensive spells over his head, while Luna first focused on defence, shielding Neville from most attacks with Protegos and conjuring fog. After a few minutes, she switched tactics, brandishing the oddest offensive spell repertoire Harry had ever seen with an endless stream of annoying jinxes that were light casts but debilitating to their victims.

Rudolphus got hit by a strange dancing-jinx from Luna which propelled him into his wife, knocking her over to be instantly hit by a stunner from Neville, which would have missed by a metre were it not for Luna. The crowd went wild, and Harry thought this must’ve been the proudest he’d ever seen Neville.

Ron and Hermione took the stage, bickering. Thankfully, the argument disappeared the moment the fight begun. They were surprisingly good partners. Hermione was, unsurprisingly, the strongest spell-caster. She had good aim, but she also had the tendency towards standing still to concentrate, which made Ron push and pull her out of the way on multiple occasions, while casting his own jinxes and shields.

Ron seemed to be picking his jinxes at random without thought to what they did, as if they were all stunners. He hit Bellatrix with a Bat-Bogey hex that she immediately dispelled, and Harry needed the dummy to retaliate realistically. He recalled Tom’s words about imagination and fabricated injustices, but now that he had come to this stage, no fantasy harms came to mind.

Instead, a multitude of little grievances melded together in his brain. Flashes of memories emerged, digging their way backwards in time until it recovered the mindset Harry had before the first task of the Triwizard Tournament. When Ron had believed Harry was relishing in the attention brought by Rita Skeeter’s horrible, mocking first article.

For a moment, Harry’s heart turned to ice.

‘Brat!’ spat the Bellatrix-Dummy, followed by a shout of ‘Crucio!’

Ron’s short, but very real scream of agony pierced the room. Harry snapped back to himself just in time to make Bellatrix dodge what looked like an overpowered Diffindo from Hermione – whose face had gone white.

Bolstered by Ron’s feeble ‘I’m OK’, she flung a stunner at Rudolphus while ducking under his Imperio. To her own surprise, the stunner landed. She then rapidly fired another cutting curse at Bellatrix, who cackled madly and blocked it.

Ron was getting his bearings, rolling behind cover. The Crucio had lasted less than three seconds, but that was more than enough to put someone out of commission for a minute. Bellatrix threw Bombardas and fake Crucios madly, focusing on Hermione, when Ron hit her with an Expelliamus.

Ecstatic cheers and applause broke out. Ron and Hermione left the array, fingers laced together, and arms raised in victory. Harry let one now plain mesh dummy sit down on a rock in the middle of the array and commanded the other out of the arena.

‘It wasn’t a dud!’ Ron said with a paradoxical grin on his face.

Harry decided an answer for Ron could wait until the exam was over. ‘Congratulations on beating all three main levels!’ He said enthusiastically while returning Hermione’s hug.

‘What do you mean main?’ called Ron.

Harry felt himself smirk evilly. ‘I made a bonus level if you’re up for it. All four of you can fight together.’ His smile grew to a grin while Ron’s face paled.

‘I’m in,’ said Luna dreamily, and promptly skipped into the arena. Neville shrugged and followed her.

‘OK, Harry, but this better not be who I think it is.’ Said Ron and trotted in after them.

Hermione shot Harry a look, then followed Ron. They took their positions along the west wall of the arena, while Harry took his place in the co*ckpit-array again.

Taking a deep breath, Harry began feeding magic to the arrays. The dummy shuddered and stood, growing taller. The porcelain white skin of Tom’s jaw became barely visible under the hood of a heavy, black, wool robe layered over a cotton one with the sleeves pulled up to his elbows. Peeking out under the robes were a pair of black, wide-legged, pressed trousers that narrowed down to a double-folded hem as was popular forty or so years ago, paired with nice, black, leather shoes of the same era. When he moved his head, the shimmer of red eyes sometimes glowed under his hood, like the eyeshine of a wolf prowling in the dark. His pale hand elegantly held his famous, bone-white yew wand.

The four champions in the arena eyed the illusion fearfully.

They are imagining a snake-like, scaled, and hairless monster with slits for pupils under that hood, and a cold, cartoonish, evil laugh, thought Harry.

He shifted his focus inwards for a second, drawing on his experience with Tom’s mood and demeanour. They were in for a surprise.

Harry didn’t waste any time. The real Tom never gave any warnings, and so he made Dummy-Tom send a wordless “Avada” straight at Luna’s chest, who took it with an oomph, and left the array. Neville, Ron, and Hermione split up immediately, diving behind cover.

Illusion-Tom chuckled at their antics.

Hermione sent a stunner at the same time as Ron sent a petrification curse. Harry let the dummy simply swat away the stunner with raw magic in the wandless hand, while blocking the petrification with a drab, silent protego. The difficult part of this bonus level was imitating the almost endless magic core Tom had without completely exhausting his own or voicing spells. The real Tom also had the added advantage of an almost mythically powerful aura that redirected low-powered spells like solar winds off the earth’s magnetic field. That wasn’t possible to mimic.

‘Why are you even bothering?’ said Tom’s smooth voice loudly, sounding bored.

Harry though, was having the time of his life. The acting was fun, the magic was challenging, and he had to admit he got a bit of schadenfreude out of terrifying his friends like this.

Neville began shooting spells blindly over the fallen tree he was hiding behind. This time, the dummy’s wandless hand created a thin shield while the wand hand flicked a Bombarda at the tree. Neville barely managed to roll out of the way, and then duck the “Avada” that followed him. Meanwhile, Hermione flung a powerful cutting spell and Ron sent something that looked like a Rictusempra.

Tom’s shiny, oval, silver shield materialized between them, and the spells bounced back at them with a loud noise like a gong. Neville tried casting something from a different angle, and the dummy swatted it away lazily.

Bending the spell’s trajectory to curve around the shield, the next “Avada” Harry made illusion-Tom send hit Ron in the head. Ron stomped off the array. Neville and Hermione both stayed in hiding, trying to get a grip. Neville was behind a rock in the northern sector, while Hermione was behind a tree in the western part. Grateful for the break in spellcasting, Harry let them have a few seconds. His own core was nearing depletion and a headache was threatening behind his eyes.

Illusion-Tom moved his legs for the first time since the battle started and padded softly around the central stone. ‘Come on, this is ridiculous. You know you cannot win, why not meet your deaths with some dignity?’ said the illusion, a hint of laughter in his voice.

Suddenly, Neville regained some courage, and poked his head out to throw a disarming spell, which was once again swatted away like it was nothing and immediately returned with an “Avada”, hitting Neville in the face. Hermione was breathing in tiny huffs behind her tree.

‘It is just you and me now, girl. Why don’t you come out, and you can see your friends again, hm?’ said fake-Tom sweetly, treading towards the southern sector, looking around to the west.

‘There you are.’

Hermione let out a startled yelp and hurled one last stunner at the dummy’s head that missed by a foot, before the “Avada” hit her. She got her breath back and stood, trembling. The rest of the DA were silent as the grave, looking at the dummy, still in Tom’s image, standing serenely in the centre of the array with hands folded over his wand in front of him. Harry let the barriers fall but kept the Dummy-illusion running.

‘How the f*ck did you survive this, Harry?’ said Lee gravely. Harry shrugged.

‘I ran for my life. I hid… and I had the advantage that he wanted to play with me before I died, so he threw Imperios and Crucios more than Avadas. That isn’t something he’d do in a four-on-one fight.’ Said Harry in a low, serious tone. And he let me go at the end, added his mind in silent confession. ‘And the real Voldemort is actually far, far worse, because he’s got this aura that will repel weaker spells, so everything you throw at him with just fizzle off.’

George had stepped into the array and was trying to peer into the shadow under the illusion’s hood, which Harry had magically darkened. Thinking it best not to encourage that, Harry left his station and the illusion fell.

‘Um – Harry, this was terrifying… But I’m glad you did this.’ Said Katie.

Anthony Goldstein added a ‘hear, hear’ and the tense air lightened.

Timid clapping broke out and gradually grew to a full-on applause with whistles and whoops. Harry turned to hug Hermione, who still looked a bit shaken. The action pushed the warm and happily vibrating locket in against his chest.

‘Thank you,’ said Harry shyly, releasing Hermione and shoving away an urge to touch the locket. ‘This was the last meeting for a while, because we’ve got O.W.Ls – and after today’s horror, we all deserve a break.‘

There were some approving murmurs around the room. Harry took out the Marauders Map to begin the usual surveillance of the convoys back to the different common rooms. ‘sh*t – Umbridge!’

Her dot was on the western stairway on its way up to the seventh floor, a mere two corridors away. With her was Malfoy, Parkinson and Goyle. Crabbe and Zambini were hiding out in an unused classroom by the eastern stairwell.

Ron was looking at the map over Harry’s shoulder and got the picture. ‘Oi – All Ravenclaws! Run as quietly as you can to the shortcut behind The Damned Doge! Now!’

They scrambled together and filed out the door. Harry threw his invisibility cloak at Hermione. ‘Go create a distraction!’ she nodded, took it, and ran.

‘Puffs! Run to the slide by the Choir classroom, but go around the way with all the curtains, not the small classrooms!’ bellowed Ron from over Harry’s shoulder.

Harry followed the heaps of friendly dots to the safety of the secret passages.

Now they just needed to get the Gryffindors to the secret stairway behind the tapestry of Helios the Holy, which was in the corridor Umbridge would get to any second. Fred, George, and Alicia were crowding around him and Ron. They needed to wait for Hermione’s distraction.

That’s when he noticed a dot marked Peeves the Poltergeist fading through the floor between the sixth and seventh floors, right by the dot marked Hermione Jean Granger.
Perfect.

‘Hey! Peeves!’ said Fred excitedly, having joined Ron in looking at the map. ‘Let’s go Forge!’

‘What? Where are you going?’ shouted Ron after them as they jogged to the door. Harry went after them.

‘To help Hermione.’ Said George.

‘We don’t care about Umbridge – Or getting expelled.’ Said Fred, opening the door. ‘Come on, Gred!’

They ran out down the hall. Harry caught the door before it closed and listened.

‘Argh! I WILL have you exorcized if you do not remove yourself, Poltergeist!’ he heard in the distance. Seconds later, loud, metallic crashing noises echoed through the hall.

Behind him, Ron was gathering up the Gryffindors.

‘Now!’ said Harry, pushing the door wide open and ushering everyone out.

Ron stayed behind with him for a moment as they watched their friends’ dots get to the secret passage. Harry muttered a quick ‘mischief managed’ at the map and tapped it with his wand. Ron was already out in the corridor.

Harry stuffed the map in his pocket and ran after. He could see the tail of Ron’s robes flickering around the corner-

‘AARGH’

His ankles had suddenly clapped together, and Harry fell to the floor hard, skidding along the stone on his side a few feet before rolling over to his back. Someone was laughing maniacally.

‘Tripping Jinx, Potter!’ said a giddy Malfoy. ‘Hey, PROFESSOR! I got one!’ he shouted behind him.

Umbridge came huffing around the corner, with what looked like ink in her hair.

‘It’s him!’ she said delightedly, wide, toadlike grin on her face. ‘Excellent Draco, very good – fifty points to Slytherin! I’ll take him from here…’

Malfoy preened, puffing his chest out while Harry got to his feet and brushed dust off his robes.

‘You hop along and see if you can’t find any more of them, Draco.’

Malfoy beamed at her and jumped to his task. Harry climbed to his feet, for once grateful of the warmth of magical healing working under his skin.

‘You’ll come with me to the headmaster’s office, Mr. Potter.’ Said Umbridge with her cloying little laugh tacked onto the end.

I'm doomed, Harry realized.

Chapter 28: The Array and the Phoenix

Chapter Text

Dumbledore’s office was packed with people. Dumbledore himself sat behind his desk, a picture of serenity in periwinkle robes with his hands folded peacefully under his chin, while Professor McGonagall stood on tense attention by the window, cold eyes gleaming out from the shadow of her large witch hat. Cornelius Fudge was tipping on his toes by the fire, looking as if Christmas had come early.

To Fudge’s left stood a stoic Kingsley Shacklebolt along with another Auror Harry didn’t recognize. Behind them, Percy Weasley was twitching eagerly, hands on the ready with parchment and quill to take notes from the first word spoken.

‘Well… well, well, well…’ said Fudge, ogling at Harry as he and Umbridge entered.

Harry had to jam his fingernails into his palms to keep his face impassive, while inwardly seething. The gentle heat of the locket was intensifying, likely spurred on by Harry’s rage. Soon, it would be smouldering against his chest if he couldn’t keep his temper under control.

‘He was heading back to Gryffindor Tower.’ Said Umbridge to Fudge. Her cruel excitement made Harry think of Dudley’s friend Piers, who loved to torment small animals. ‘The Malfoy boy cornered him.’

A pleased, buttery smile spread on Fudge’s face. ‘Did he? I must remember to tell Lucius. Well, Potter… I expect you know why you’re here?’

Harry was about to bark out something impudent when Dumbledore gave him a look of warning.

Ah, the question the police use to bait dim-witted criminals into confessing to crimes there isn’t any evidence of…

‘No.’ said Harry shortly. His heart was beating madly in his chest, an action mirrored by the locket.

‘I beg your pardon?’ said Fudge.

‘No.’ said Harry again, harder this time, confidence rising despite his heart rate.

‘You don’t know why you’re here?’

‘No, I don’t.’ said Harry, meeting Fudge’s agitated stare with a blank one.

Fudge exchanged incredulous looks with Umbridge before turning back to Harry again.

‘So you have no idea why Professor Umbridge has brought you here? You are not aware that you have broken any school rules? Or Ministry Decrees? Or laws?’ said Fudge sarcastically, getting louder and angrier as he went.

Harry shook his head lazily, clasping his hands together to keep them from flying to the locket. ‘No. Not that I know of.’

‘So, it is news to you then, that an illegal student organization has been discovered within this school?’ Fudge was on the brink of yelling.

‘Noo, Malfoy’s little “debate club” is well known, he’s had that one for months. Won’t let anyone but Slytherins in though...’ lied Harry as smoothly as he could, partly with a desire for revenge, but mostly to create chaos and make Umbridge’s life difficult.

‘What- are- you- talking about?’ snarled Fudge.

Harry raised his eyebrows innocently. Out the corner of his eye, he could see Professor McGonagall’s lips twitch.

Umbridge’s smile had loosened into a flabbergasted gape, tiny teeth hanging out to dry and eyebrows merging at the centre. ‘I think, minister,’ she said uncertainly, ‘It might be better if we fetch our informant.’

‘Yes, yes, you do that, Dolores…’ muttered Fudge, swapping back and forth between sending confused glances at Harry and death-glares at Dumbledore.

Umbridge left, leaving a tense atmosphere to thicken in silence. Harry shifted his weight around impatiently. Now that there was nothing to react to, impressions and sensations from his body started to tug at his attention. The heartburn-like pain of his Magic Core exhaustion made him want to hunch over, and his skin burned wherever it made contact with the ether-saturated air. Chiefly the back of his neck, his hands and face felt sunburned.

The agony only increased until Umbridge returned a few minutes later with Cho’s friend Marietta, who was hiding her face in her hands.

‘Oh, hullo Marietta,’ said Harry dumbly.

She was such a plain and unremarkable person that Harry hadn’t noticed she slipped out during the exam. But now that he thought it over, he couldn’t recall her having a go of the exam or seeing her leave with the other Ravenclaws.

‘Hi Harry,’ came the thinnest, most timid of voices, barely audible from under the hands and hair.

Umbridge told off some students who were waiting on the landing outside the office. Harry thought he saw some green-lined robes.

‘Don’t be scared, dear, it’s quite all right. You have done the right thing. The minister is very pleased with you, he’ll be telling your mother what a good girl you’ve been.’ Said Umbridge in a syrup sweet, condescending tone before going on a tangent about Marietta’s mother that only Fudge cared about.

Fudge gave Marietta his signature fatherly smile. ‘Well, now, come on, dear! Look up, don’t be shy – galloping gargoyles!’

Marietta had raised her head for only a second, yet everyone caught a glimpse of her disfigurement. The word “SNEAK” was spelt out in huge, inflamed, purple pustules across her face. Marietta whimpered and pulled the neck of her robe up over her face. Umbridge tried to talk her into speaking, but Marietta refused to say another word, or look up again.

‘Very well, you silly girl, I’ll tell him. You see, Minister, Miss Edgecombe here came to my office this afternoon and told me she had something she wanted to tell me. She said that if I proceeded to a secret room on the seventh floor, I would find out something to my advantage. I questioned her a little further and she said there was some kind of war meeting there. A battle exam of sorts. Unfortunately, at that point, this hex,’ she waved her hand in the vicinity of Marietta’s face, ‘came into operation, and upon catching a sight of herself in my mirror, the girl became too distressed to say any more.'

'Aha,' said Fudge, then followed up with new attempts to ask Marietta questions, undoubtedly the same ones Umbridge had tried hours earlier, but Marietta wouldn’t budge.

‘It doesn’t matter if she won’t speak, I can take up the story from here.’ Tutted Umbridge, depositing Marietta by the door. ‘You may remember, Minister, the report I sent back in October that Potter had met a number of fellow students in the Hog’s Head in Hogsmeade –‘

‘And where’s the evidence for that?’ shot Professor McGonagall in.

‘I have a testimony from Willy Widdershins, Minerva, who happened to be there, though at the time heavily bandaged, his hearing was quite unimpaired.’

Harry cursed Hermione a little again for choosing the Hog’s Head for that first meeting. It had been a major security problem. There was a small tap on the door. Umbridge stuck her head out briefly, presumably to beg the Slytherins there for patience.

She closed the door again and returned to her story. ‘The purpose of Potter’s meeting with these students, was to persuade them into joining an illegal society-‘ Harry thought “Illegal society” sounded pretty cool actually, but clubs and organizations weren’t illegal at the time, so then it was just a lame “society”. ‘-whose aim it was to learn spells and curses the Ministry has deemed inappropriate for School-age-‘

‘I think you’ll find you’re wrong there, Dolores.’ Said Dumbledore.

‘Oho! Yes, let’s hear the latest co*ck-and-bull story designed to pull Potter out of trouble! Go on, then Dumbledore- What was it? Is Widdershins lying? Or was it Potter’s identical twin in the pub that day? Or is it the usual hogwash about a dead man coming back to life? ‘

Dumbledore smiled benignly. ‘Cornelius, I am merely trying to point out that Dolores is quite wrong to suggest that whatever group Harry was gathering, was illegal at the time. If you remember, the Ministry Decree banning all student societies was not put into effect until two days after the meeting, and so Harry wasn’t breaking any rules at the Hog’s Head.’

Fudge looked like he’d been slapped.

‘That’s all fine and well, Headmaster, but we are now six months on from the implementation of Educational Decree number twenty-four. If the first meeting was not illegal, all subsequent meetings certainly were.’ Said Professor Umbridge.

‘They would be, yes, if they had continued after the Decree went into effect. Do you have any evidence that any such meetings continued? Miss Edgecombe here has only reported on one meeting tonight, correct? Or can she tell us of six months’ worth of meetings?’ countered Dumbledore, raising his eyebrows.

Professor Umbridge made a raspy sound in the back of her throat before trying to coax Marietta into speaking again to no avail.

Eventually, Umbridge found enough brain cells to formulate her inquiries as yes-or-no-questions. ‘Have meetings been happening regularly over the last six months? Just nod or shake your head, dear.’

Harry’s heart pounded uncomfortably, and his palms were sweaty. What was he to say if Marietta suddenly found the courage to speak or Umbridge managed to bully her into answering?

Before Marietta could respond, another, more insistent tap on the door usurped everyone's attention.

‘Why don’t we enquire what they want, Dolores, so that they may return to their common room?’ said Dumbledore calmly, tipping his head towards the door.

Professor Umbridge strode to the door in the two biggest steps her stubby legs could manage and flung it open, revealing a nervous-looking Pansy Parkinson. ‘Erm – Professors, sirs… You need to see this – I-I can’t explain it. Draco is staying in the room, so it won’t change, but it is curfew soon…’

‘Have you found something in their room, dear?’ said Umbridge, mood completely whipped back to glee.

Harry had a pretty good idea of what it was they’d reacted to in the room.

Parkinson nodded in a series of rapid, giddy twitches, a malicious smile opening up under her snout-like nose.

‘Well, then let’s go! Show the way, Miss.’ Said Fudge curtly.

Promptly, the entire office emptied of witches and wizards, and they all marched down to the Room of Requirement. Harry could have sworn he felt something feathery brush by his cheek as he walked down the spiral staircase. He entered the Room of Requirement last.

Malfoy left at once they got there, practically skipping out. He closed the door behind them, and Harry heard his footsteps recede down the hall.

‘Merlins Beard!’ exclaimed Kingsley, staring slack-jawed at the arrays of the Defence exam.

‘Ohoho, Professor Babbling said you had an aptitude for Ancient Runes, Mr. Potter… But this… This is something else.’ Gawked Professor McGonagall, impressed.

Thank you, the Dark Lord helped me, quipped Harry inwardly with a simultaneous wish to disappear on the spot.

‘I am sorry, but for those of us who never studied Ancient Runes, can anyone explain what this is supposed to be?’ said Fudge, coming to a halt between Umbridge and the unknown wizard off to the side.

Heads whipped around to Harry, who stepped around Marietta and up the array.

‘It’s something in between a Pensive and a Muggle television. It will project what the user has in mind, here-‘ Ignoring his own budding mana-burns, Harry strode over to his corner before anyone could stop him. ‘- I’ll just show you.’

He activated the arrays in turn and brought out a full-size image of the Hungarian Horntail, somewhat cramped under the ceiling. Umbridge shrieked, and Dumbledore gasped delightedly.

‘And there’s a barrier-array around it so that if the illusion produces any magic flashes, they stay inside the circle. The one in the ceiling makes it possible to put the illusions over physical cores like the Dummies, so that they can’t walk through each other like ghosts…’ Harry trailed off before he accidentally incriminated himself through “Runesplaining” as Ron liked to call it.

‘This could be quite useful for Auror training…’ Mused the unfamiliar wizard, gaping up at the ceiling array with his hands in his posh inner-robe pockets.

‘Indeed.’ Agreed Kingsley, bobbing and hinging his knees evasively around as Harry had the Horntail follow his movements with her eyes.

Dumbledore walked casually onto the array; Harry made the Horntail react by snarling a warning at him. He felt the energy use tug painfully at his core, but if he were to prove his innocence, it would have to appear as if he had only been tinkering with this alone, not hosting flashy duels in it for hours. A simple demonstration shouldn’t be too straining, but he’d have to be careful not to push his mana-burns to the point where they showed.

Dumbledore cast a quick, curious glance at the dragon before studying the sub-arrays in the western section. ‘This is most impressive magic, Harry… How long have you been working on this?’ He asked.

‘Oh – um, about a year and four months?’ answered Harry, trying to think when it first started. Technically, it was longer. He’d had the idea to create a “wizarding television” a month or so into taking Ancient Runes as a subject.

‘And you want us to believe you did this on your own, huh?’ said Fudge hostilely.

‘Well, my friend Hermione helped me, and I’ve had Ron test some of the games we’ve made with it.’ Said Harry in an as innocent tone as he could manage.

Fudge did not appear convinced. ‘Games, huh? At this scale? Over a year’s work for games?’

Kingsley and his colleague were still playing with the illusion, waving their hands through the magical projection.

Fudge harked. ‘This is preposterous – No fifteen-year-old could’ve done-‘

‘We can fetch Professor Babbling if you’d like, Minister. I’m sure she can testify to Mr. Potter’s prowess.’ Said Professor McGonagall proudly.

‘This – This is Dark Magic,’ said the Auror Harry didn’t know in an awed, airy tone. ‘Quite expertly done, too. Look, there’s the sequence for Mind transfer right there!’

Harry observed the man in pure confusion. He had gotten up on his tiptoes, glossy, lacquered shoes creasing horribly under the abuse as the man squinted up at the ceiling array. His tone sounded awfully impressed, bordering on reverent, which was a paradox, considering his profession and what Harry expected an Auror’s relationship with the Dark Arts to be.

‘Aha!’ Exclaimed Fudge, startling his companions. ‘Why is your golden boy practicing Dark Magic? Now, tell the truth of it! What is this for, boy?’

Harry tried to start a defence, ‘no it is just to make the Dummies mov,-‘

‘Some kind of weapon, is it? Or, or- it is to fake the return of a dead man isn’t it! Did the headmaster instruct you in how to make this?’ Fudge rapid-fire interrogated, scrambling for any opportunity to turn this fiasco of a visit to Hogwarts into a win.

Dumbledore squinted at the part of the array that withdrew threads of Mind from Harry and transferred it to the dummies, which was indeed a textbook example of a Dark Rune Sequence. Harry opened his mouth to start his defence of the array by directing them to use an Adder Stone, when Dumbledore did something that, in Harry’s view, seemed incredibly self-sabotaging.

‘Yes.’ Said Dumbledore cheerily. ‘Yes, I instructed Harry in how to design this with the intent of using it to show the world Harry’s memory of Lord Voldemort’s resurrection and incite rebellion. His academic use of Dark Magic was sanctioned by me.’

Harry could hardly believe his ears. It sounded completely coconuts.

What on earth is this old loon on about?! Said a voice in Harry’s mind that sounded suspiciously like Tom’s. Then it hit him that Dumbledore was probably trying to shield Harry from accusations of being a fledgeling Dark wizard.

‘Well, well, well – I came here tonight expecting to expel Potter, instead-’ said Fudge delightedly.

‘-You get to arrest me.’ Said Dumbledore with a smile.

Doom hit Harry’s innards like a dive into ice water.

‘Weasley! Are you writing this down!? His confession, everything?’ said Fudge, stepping into the array to circle Dumbledore. Harry let the Horntail illusion fade.

‘I think so, Sir!’ said Weasley, walking fast across the room to Fudge’s side, scribbling madly.

Fudge went on a rant about the Prophetthat Harry didn't listen to. Dumbledore remained in the same spot, leisurely studying the ceiling arrays like a visitor to an art museum.

‘You will now be escorted to the Ministry, where you’ll be formally charged with treason, and then transferred to Azkaban to await trial!’ declared Fudge with a tiny, excited hop.

Kingsley and the other wizard stepped into the array too, closing in on Dumbledore. They were nearing disaster fast. Marietta had her back to the wall right beside the door, while Professor McGonagall and Professor Umbridge were both marching towards the wizards.

Harry caught Professor McGonagall’s eyes as she was about to step into the array and shook his head slowly. She scrunched her face at him but stopped outside the first barrier line. Not that he had a plan yet, really. But from where he stood, he could raise the barrier and trap whatever magic was cast inside the array, giving Professor McGonagall, Marietta, and himself a chance to escape should all hell break loose.

‘Ah – I thought we might hit this snag.’ Said Dumbledore, hands folded behind his back.

‘Snag?’ laughed Fudge, still giddy with his achievement of having “caught” Dumbledore.

‘Yes – You seem to be labouring under the delusion that I will – what’s the phrase? – Come Quietly. I will not come quietly at all, Cornelius. I have no intention of going to Azkaban.’

Umbridge’s face was reddening towards purple in a way that’d make Vernon Dursley proud. There were some quiet exchanges between Fudge and his entourage that Harry didn’t catch the meaning of.

‘Don’t be silly Dawlish.’ Said Dumbledore. ‘I’m sure you’re an excellent Auror – I seem to remember you receiving O’s in all your N.E.W.Ts – but if you attempt to bring me in by force – I will have to hurt you.’

The man previously unknown to Harry blinked daftly at Dumbledore’s threat.

Harry was suddenly struck with the absurdity of it all. Here was The Minister for Magic ordering the arrest of the headmaster of a school, who was also the previous head of the High Court and Parliament known as the Wizengamot – which the minister himself had superseded – with no written order or warrant or anything at all, and “police” were complying with that order. On top of all of that, threats of violence were now on the table.

Why is the wizarding world such a loony-bin?

‘So, you intend to take on all four of us single-handed, do you, Dumbledore?’ sneered Fudge.

‘Merlin’s Beard, no – Not unless you force me to.’

Professor McGonagall attempted to join in Dumbledore’s defence, but he told her to keep out of it.

‘Enough of this rubbish! Take him!’ ordered Fudge, taking out his wand.

The second Harry realized that they might actually start flinging curses, he raised the barrier. There was a sudden, loud bang, and a flash of silver light like a lightning strike. Marietta screamed. The entire room trembled, and dust whirled around within the barrier.

The sharp spell of ozone stung in Harry's nose, his ears rang and green and blue after-images were blinking across his vision. Professor McGonagall had fallen on her backside and was now staring fixatedly on the wall of wobbling light a few inches from the tip of her nose with a look of shock on her face.

The worst of the dust cleared, and Dumbledore’s tall stature came into view, still standing. The four Ministry officials were laying still on the floor. Fawkes the Phoenix was circling the array.

‘Thank you, Harry,’ Said Dumbledore, casually observant of the shimmering wall.

Harry dropped the barrier, and as soon as he did, the phoenix flew to circle directly above Dumbledore’s head instead.

‘Unfortunately, I had to hex Kingsley too, or it would have looked suspicious. They will all awake soon, and it will be best if they do not notice that we had time to communicate – you must act as though no time has passed at all, they will not remember-‘

‘Where will you go, Albus? Grimmauld Place?’ said Professor McGonagall sadly, pushing herself up off the floor awkwardly.

‘Oh no, I’ve no intention of going into hiding. Fudge will soon wish he’d never dislodged me from Hogwarts, I promise you.’ Said Dumbledore, smiling darkly.

‘Why-?’ Harry was meaning to ask Dumbledore “Why did you sacrifice yourself like this?”.

However, Dumbledore cut him off an answered what he guessed Harry would ask instead. ‘Because the school is more than its headmaster-‘

‘No. No – Why did you say that about instructing me? I’ve checked the Dark ether in this thing a hundred times,-‘ Harry gestured to the array frustratedly, ‘it is too low intensity to be classified Dark, it doesn’t show Black, I know it’s not illegal.’

What I did in the array was, he thought, suddenly mindful of Marietta’s presence in the room. The array would stand up to any simple test, as the sum radiancy was blue not black. All Harry needed was a chance to explain the thing properly.

Dumbledore’s face adopted a baffled expression, then sank back to serious, ‘I could not take that risk, Harry. Fudge was looking for any excuse... I hardly expect you would be afforded the time required to convince them, when they are so unwilling to listen. I know this room cares not what ethers are used, and will use Dark in places that can be difficult for the users of the room to explain. Fudge sought personal accountability when he arrived, I doubt he would leave without a culprit being named.'

He keeps underestimating me… Wait a second! He doesn’t believe I made this; he thinks the room did! Like the flip of a switch, and abrupt surge of anger shot up the back of Harry’s neck and shoulders.

He was about to argue on and declare he could prove his words when Dumbledore whispered. ‘I have to go.‘

Dumbledore raised a hand towards the ceiling, catching one of Fawks’s trailing tailfeathers. There was a flash of golden fire, and both man and bird were gone. The people on the floor stirred. Harry and McGonagall hurried to their original positions while Fudge was clearing dust out of his eyes.

‘Where is he?’ yelled Fudge when he could see again, rising clumsily from the floor.

‘I don’t know!’ returned Kingsley, springing to his feet much more gracefully.

‘Well, he can’t have Disapparated! It is impossible from inside the school!’ said Umbridge, still trying to get her feet under her, the effort sabotaged by her own pink pencil skirt.

‘The corridor!’ shouted Dawlish, and he and Kingsley rushed to the door and disappeared out into the hall.

There was a tense, loaded silence as Fudge brushed dust off his robes and Umbridge straightened her head-bow.

Umbridge’s tiny eyes flickered to Harry. ‘Oh, and Mr. Potter, I have decided that in leu of all this, to be merciful with your punishment for participating in this conspiracy.’ She said, smile dripping with sugared contempt. ‘I think detention is in order. For the remainder of term, I believe is prudent.’

Harry opened his mouth to protest, as did Professor McGonagall, ‘Dolores, that should be quite unnecessary,-‘ she said.

‘But,-‘ tried Harry.

‘Not at all, Minerva. Are you saying Mr. Potter’s use of Dark Magic ought to be handled by the Ministry instead? In Dumbledore’s absence, I am sure the Aurors would want him in for a talk, no?’ tittered Umbridge, which had the intended effect of shutting them both up.

Harry had no idea how the Auror department would handle this, but from what he just witnessed and his experience with wizarding justice through Hagrid’s brushes with it, he’d rather not find out.

Umbridge leered, ‘No? I did not think so. My office, Monday at six o’clock, Mr. Potter. Oh, and one-hundred points from Gryffindor.’

She physically turned away from them and Harry sent Professor McGonagall a glance, hoping to communicate his growing sense of dread. She returned it apologetically.

Umbridge beamed an adoring smile at Fudge. ‘Now, shall we return to the headmaster’s office, Minister?’ she said, spelling some dirt of the back of her skirt.

‘Yes, yes… That’s where they’ll be taking him when they find him, I gather.’ Said Fudge, his face dazed as if he was yet to understand what had happened. They left the room without paying Professor McGonagall, Marietta or Harry as much as a glance.

‘What is this really, Mr. Potter?’ growled Professor McGonagall when they door closed behind them.

‘It is what I said it was-‘ Professor McGonagall raised a sceptical eyebrow, ‘-only it was used to simulate duels with Death Eaters as an exam for the secret, illegal, Defence Against the Dark Arts society I’m running.’ Deadpanned Harry.

A small smirk pressed itself forth on his face. Professor McGonagall smiled too, before turning her attention to Marietta.

‘Come here, Miss Egdecombe,’ she said, taking her wand out. ‘Now let me dispel this for you,-‘ she pried Marietta’s fingers away and gave the “SNEAK” letters a quick swish.

The pustules paled in colour and the yellow puss whitened until what remained was a few rows of what looked like completely ordinary zits.

‘Now, you merely must wait for the skin to heal itself fully.’ Said Professor McGonagall to Marietta, who hung her head, teary-eyed.

‘I’m sorry.’ Marietta whimpered. ‘I’m sorry, Harry.’

‘Why did you do it?’ asked Harry a little harshly, unheeding of Professor McGonagall’s disapproving stare.

‘Because… You were going to use Dark curses, and I was scared and,-‘ Marietta said and Harry instantly felt Professor McGonagall’s stare in the back of his neck. ‘-and I thought maybe you were doing it to get revenge on Cho and –‘

Harry flinched. ‘Why would I want revenge on Cho? What did she say to you?’ he asked at the same time as Professor McGonagall demanded to know what Marietta had meant by “Dark curses”.

‘That – that she turned you down and you were angry?’ Marietta answered Harry insecurely, then turned to Professor McGonagall and said, ‘and Harry was going to use the Imperius curse and stuff through the dummies… for the exam.’

‘Marietta… Cho came on to me. I turned her down.’ Stressed Harry, desperately wanting to shift focus onto the mundane personal drama and away from Marietta’s detail about the Imperius curse.

Marietta’s lower lip trembled, but no tears fell, ‘… I, she – Cho said… Anyway, Umbridge hates Cho, so I thought that – that if Cho and I were to go to her with this… Maybe she’d leave Cho alone… That she’d be pleased. But then Cho didn’t want to go, but Umbridge, she said that if Cho came forward later, then… Oh, I don’t know! I’m sorry!’

Harry gaped at her, rage accumulating in his throat. ‘What the,-‘

‘Now!’ Professor McGonagall cried, obviously fed up with Harry and Marietta’s nonsense. ‘Mr. Potter, is it true that you cast Unforgivables on your fellow students?!’

Harry, in a moment of exhaustion, cognitive weakness, and pure naivety, nodded, ‘yeah, with their consent, hold on,-‘ he ran to the table in the corner where the stack of signed consent forms was. ‘-here, look. You can talk to all of them. We agreed on what commands I could give and everything! Time limit…’

He handed Professor McGonagall the forms. She shuffled through them with narrowed eyes, the severe strain on her lips tightening as she read. It dawned on Harry that though the forms might protect against Ministry prosecution, it might not be so effective in defending against Professor McGonagall’s wrath.

‘Mr. Potter, what were you thinking?!’ she bit out, eyes flashing. ‘NEVER in my career has,- argh,- Did you believe our most forbidden of curses a plaything?! That they were good for a little Saturday folly, with no supervision or instruction!?’

Harry shrunk, finding a speck of dust on the tip of his shoe to stare at. He sent his best threatening glare out the corner of his eye to Marietta, inwardly promising hell should she dare mention his deal with Ron about the Cruciatus Curse. Marietta kept her mouth shut.

Professor McGonagall continued voicing her fury, ‘If curses of this magnitude are not properly cast, the consequences are dire! It is a miracle if none of these students suffered permanent damage from this, - now that curious Slytherin lads find dark texts in the restricted section and cause a tragedy, that happens now and then, but you, Mr. Potter… I expected better of you.’

The anger in her voice wound down, ending on a simmer that held enough disappointment that it physically hurt listening to it. A part of him wanted to defend himself, but he couldn’t very well tell her he had done this under the expert guidance of Lord Voldemort.

This is it. I'm getting expelled. Kicked back to the Dursleys... Wand snapped... Harry thought gloomily, his sense of doom devolving into a more resolute opinion that his life was over.

‘Considering this… And everything else that’s happened tonight – I will not add to your current burden of punishment, Mr. Potter,-'

Harry's eyes snapped up to Professor McGonagall's in surprise.

'-I daresay Professor Umbridge’s detentions are well deserved with this dreadfulness taken into account.’ Professor McGonagall said hotly, cramming the forms into one of her robe-pockets. ‘You should indeed count yourself lucky, that our relations with the Ministry is of such an abysmal quality of late, that involving them now is not an option, but I will report this to the headmaster! Consent form or no, it is against school rules to cast these spells,-‘

‘But,-‘ Harry said without thinking, but Professor McGonagall yelled over him.

‘I know you have it difficult, Mr. Potter, and I feel we have been quite lenient with you, but if I hear of one more incident of this kind, we will have no choice but to expel you! This is your only warning!’

Harry accepted his final defeat with a nod, nursing the glimmer of relief from having dodged expulsion yet again, while anger still roared in his lungs. He had an acute, raging urge to shake Marietta to pieces by her shoulders, amplified by the furious locket. Standing there was immeasurably uncomfortable. His skin felt stretched and itchy, his belly roiled with shame and anger. Once again, Harry wished he could evaporate. Disappear forever and be free of his own suffocating and conflicting emotions.

‘Now, off to bed with you, Mr. Potter!’ Professor McGonagall said to Harry, then laid a hand on Marietta’s shoulder, ‘we are due a visit to Professor Flitwick, Miss Edgecombe. I doubt any amount of tattling will ever redeem Miss Chang in Professor Umbridge’s eyes.’

Not able to stand human presence a second longer, Harry said his quick, ‘Goodnight, Professor,’ nodded to Marietta and left.

The night was terrible.