Title: Secrets
Kept
Team: Hell
Characters: Crossroads Demon,
Merope Gaunt
Crossover: Harry Potter, Supernatual
Word
count:1040
Summery: Voldemort's rise wasn't an accident. It
had been planned from his birth, at the price of a soul.
Warning:
none
Spoilers: HP 6
Rating: pg
Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot.
A vial emptied its contents reluctantly to swirl against the stone. A golden locket and a moving picture were being closed in a tiny metal box.
The tin clinked against the gravel. Her hands rushed around the shallow hole to cover the little box. The meadow was dark with flowers hiding from the night. Four endless gravel roads met at the crossroads under her feet.
Her swollen belly pressed against her legs as she kneeled on the forgotten road. She truly looked, as her name suggested, gaunt. Her dark hair lay dull and lifeless against her back as she pushed her thin face to the sky. She greeted the midnight rain with a mixture of relief and dread. London's dark cold clung to her thin garments. Another chilly night. She didn't have the energy to cast a spell.
She closed her eyes against the rain that fell like tears across her cheeks. Everything ached; everything was vividly alive to remind her that she had to live, for him. A shallow breath shuddered against her frail frame. She wasn't sure she could make it.
"Merope?" A sweet voice startled the kneeling mother. The gravel was undisturbed by the narrow leather heels. Soft hands met hers and the woman pulled Merope Gaunt to her feet with unnatural ease. The rain made her shimmer from gentle curls to deadly stilettos.
"Yes. I'm sorry. I didn't hear you approach." Merope fumbled over what the arrival of this woman meant; it had actually worked. She still gripped the woman's hands as if her own legs would give out without support.
"You called me, dear witch. You wish to make a deal?" The demon was still gentle, as if she knew Merope was fragile beyond harsh words. Thunder cracked under her question as the rain grew heavy around them. The meadows were enveloped in curtains of water and the crossroads became concealed and private.
"I did but-"
"You don't anymore?" Deep brown eyes glowed behind the falling drops.
"How can you help me?" Merope suddenly became wary of the deal she intended to make. Her inability to trust the demon was a sudden onset of her Slytherin ancestry. Emaciated hands released the soft ones and curled protectively around her stomach. He kicked gently in reply.
"I can give you whatever you need… for a price. The deal keeper can make Tom love you again. She can erase any error. She can make any future," the whispered words held power and conviction.
"What's the price?" Merope turned the idea that she might have a future over in her mind, that she might have a future with him. The book had mentioned a price, a steep price. She fought to remember the pages she read only a few years past.
"Your soul. It is a small price to pay for ten years of happiness, ten years of experience, passion, joy. That is what I can give you," she rested red nailed hands on Merope's shoulders. "Whatever you want."
She had already tired of the false love instilled by a potion. Merope would not force Tom Riddle to love her. Somehow, she couldn't see herself living without him. But what about her son?
"What if I don't want to live?" Her sorrowful eyes met the woman's and found sympathy long absent from her life.
"Whatever you want, dear," encouraged the woman.
A long pause allowed the rain to seep deep into Merope's skin. He would be the last heir of Salazar Slytherin, the final son of a great line. She wished she was strong enough to give her ancestors that. The line would not end with her. "Him." A bony finger traced circles over the rough fabric.
"Yes?"
"I want him to live. I want him to be great. I want him to be a true heir of Salazar Slytherin." Merope Gaunt felt a rough kick against her ribs. "Give him power. Give him knowledge. Give him the magic to live forever." Another kick against her hands. "Make him fearless of any man. Make him proud. Make him everything I am not." Soft hands caught her against the next kick.
Merope looked up into a devilish grin. "I can do that. Is there anything else?"
"Give me an hour to live so that I might hold him and know his face and feel the strength of his heart." Merope's words shuddered against the violence within her.
"Is that all?" A swift nod from the mother and the woman replied, "You will have an hour with your child. You must name him a Riddle. He will have all that you requested and more. You must take him to an orphanage in the city of London. Follow the west road until you see the bird on a post. Turn right and the orphanage will be on the left twelve houses in." Merope nodded again. "Now we must seal the deal with a kiss and everything will be set in stone."
The woman held the shivering mother up and moved closer.
"Wait," Merope paused as if momentarily questioning her decision.
"Merope. You don't have long, dear," she looked down to make her point. He kicked roughly in protest of his mother's actions.
"He shall be Thomas Marvolo Riddle, the greatest wizard the magical world has ever seen," she smiled down at her stomach. The woman bent in and gently kissed the quivering mother.
Pulling away, the shimmering figure blinked dark red eyes back to the deep brown. "Remember what I told you. One hour. Go now."
"Thank you," Merope asked to the rain around her. The woman was gone as she had appeared. Her support lingered for moments after, while he was still within her womb.
A shuddering contraction hit her and she knew that her journey was the most important of her life. Merope knew that she would make it to the orphanage despite the fire in her muscles; she refused to stop. Stumbling across the rocks, the last descendant of a proud family carried her only child toward a new and terrible future.
Dumbledore pulled the silvery memory from the pensieve with the tip of his wand as Harry Potter knocked on his door and entered his office.