Draw Blood, Just a Drop
Part One:
Voldemort respects nothing like he respects art.
Art is something other, something magic—as heavily intertwined as it is separate from the mundane, the common, the dull.
Always hidden just behind the scenes, it's the stream of sunlight shining through a forest canopy, and it's the orange overcast of city smog.
Present, prevalent, in every single thing, and yet only a few can take full advantage of it—only a few can appreciate it for what it is.
And Voldemort appreciates nothing like he appreciates the art of dying.
Death is Lord Voldemort's medium.
His modus operandi is watching the light fade from his victims' eyes and the blood spill from their veins. It's carving his signature, the Dark Mark, into their inner forearms, dragging a scalpel across the delicate arteries in their wrists, and watching as liter by liter their life fades away.
Death is eternal, everlasting, forever. It's all-powerful, unbeatable, inescapable.
Voldemort craves some of that power for himself.
…
The first thing Tom notices about him are his eyes: they're a glorious, breath-taking green.
It's a very unique shade—Tom can't quite place the exact hue. They're pale yet vibrant, dark yet light—both at once, somehow.
He sees those eyes, obscured by horrendous glasses as they are, and thinks of summer—of flourishing life and vitality.
But he also, inexplicably, thinks of death.
They make his fingers yearn for a paintbrush, a scalpel—something to capture and take and immortalize.
Tom is inspired.
…
Green, green, green haunts his dreams at night.
Tom is not inspired—no, he is consumed. Like a man possessed, he is absorbed in a single-minded focus, a single-minded obsession.
The color of those irises—so specific, so unique, so unlike any green he has ever seen— lurks in the corner of his mind, invading his thoughts every time he closes his eyes to so much as blink.
It's reflected in his paintings—the jade scales of a massive snake, the malachite light of a curse filled with death, the emerald flare of teleportation in a hearth…
None of them quite right. All of them— wrong.
Like a word at the tip of his tongue, like a song he just can't remember the lyrics to, it gnaws at him, an itch he can't scratch.
Inevitably, Voldemort's victims begin to reflect his obsession.
…
Tom Riddle does nothing by halves.
Within twenty-four hours of his fascination bleeding into his pseudonyms' activities, Tom has used all the resources at his disposal to dig out every possible scrap of information about the boy who started it all.
Harry Potter, nineteen-years-old, born the 31st of July.
He's been working as a janitor at Hogwarts Gallery of Artistry and Design for a little over a year.
Together with his roommate, an upstart sculptor by the name of Ron Weasely, he is able to afford an apartment studio in Hogsmeade Community, downtown London.
He's an orphan— taken in by his relatives, the Dursleys, as a small child, but never officially adopted.
It's a familiar story, reminding Tom of an orphan taken in by his father after years spent at Wool's Orphanage, but never officially adopted.
An interesting parallel, but certainly nothing of any real note. Tom doubts they'll share any other similarities—certainly not any that matter.
…
"You might feel a slight pinch," Voldemort warns, deceptively pleasant, and deftly inserts the needle.
The girl's pupils are dilated in terror, her breath coming out in sharp, short pants. But she doesn't jerk away, doesn't flinch—she can't, not petrified as she is by the neurotoxins running through her system.
He attaches the vacutainer tube to the needle, but, instead of watching greedily as it fills up with blood, his attention is on her eyes.
Darker than Harry's. Wide, tearful, staring back at him imploringly.
'Spare me,' they say, and Voldemort finds himself indifferent. Bored.
He's not inspired, not a lick.
…
Tom, as one of the most renowned artists of the 21st century, naturally has unrestricted access to Hogwarts.
He takes advantage of that access to study Harry. To note how he interacts with his peers. To examine his work ethic.
He doesn't have to worry about Harry—or anyone else, for that matter— seeing him, because if there's one thing Tom is adept at, it is subtlety.
He will not be seen if he does not want to be seen. His motives will not be revealed unless he sees fit to reveal them.
Harry, in contrast, wears his heart on his sleeve—every intention, every thought, betrayed. His face is too open. His eyes are too expressive.
When he looks at the art decorating Hogwart's walls, Tom can practically feel the admiration.
But it is not Harry's admiration that drives Tom to get a copy of Harry's schedule so that he can visit Hogwarts on precisely the right days, and precisely the right times, that Harry works.
It's his disdain.
It's the moments he has an antagonist encounter with Malfoy, Avery, Nott, Lestrange, or any number of the other high-end artists to walk Hogwart's halls.
Harry, in those moments, positively radiates contempt and resentment. Drips with distrust.
And his eyes.
Well.
There's something more than color that draws his attention to those eyes—something less tangible, but undeniably there, and undeniably significant.
Something that… reminds him of himself.
...
The Three Broomsticks is a quaint little café that Harry likes to frequent on his days off.
Tom will admit that their signature latte, the Butterbeer, is good, though the decor is much too plain for his tastes, and the crowd much too rowdy.
Honestly, if Tom didn't know any better, he'd mistake the café for a pub.
Harry seems to thrive in chaotic environments, though, and his ease amongst disorder stirs something in Tom, something destructive and ravenous.
It makes him want to destroy the world, to wreak havoc with Harry at the center of it all, and watch the younger male flourish as everything he loves crumbles around him.
Tom closes his eyes, savoring the mental image. Nothing would be more beautiful.
…
Harry is an artist… a talented artist.
Prowling the cramped studio, Tom hungrily eyes the watercolor portraits hanging on the walls and piled behind the couch.
He ignores Weasley's half-done sculptures, utterly unimpressed. They're neither eye-catching nor unique.
Harry's paintings, on the other hand, have a certain… flare to them. Each and every one is brimming with passion and life, stark in its potential and talent.
He can't help but notice the parallels between his art and Harry's. The style is remarkedly, staggeringly, similar.
And, yet, so different. A contrast.
Warm to Tom's cold; light to his dark.
Even the themes seem to align—magical and mystical, with an undertone of something more.
Each painting is something entirely unique, entirely Harry, and yet Tom can't shake the impression that each is a distorted reflection of his own art.
The art always mirrors the artist: Harry must, therefore, be a distorted reflection of Tom.
Tom can't help but find it fitting.
He can't help but think that Harry would complement him perfectly. An equal, if he ever had one.
For what is death, without life?
….
The summer day is unusually hot, and Tom is thankful for the air-conditioning in his car.
Observing Harry through his window, it is apparent by the dampness of his hair and the sweat on the back of his shirt that Harry's studio doesn't share the luxury.
Tom hums, amused, when Harry wipes the sweat off his brow for the umpteenth time, smearing paint across his face in a way Tom would find undignified on anyone else. With Harry, though, it's endearing.
Harry, so open and uninhibited, is doubly so in the two hours he's alone in the studio, before Ron, who works later into the evening than Harry does, gets home.
It's Tom's favorite time to study Harry—better than The Three Broomsticks, better than Hogwarts, and definitely better than a file.
There are no barriers. When Harry thinks he's alone he paints with exuberance, tongue out and face scrunched-up in concentration. When Harry thinks he's alone, he cries and rages— but he also sings and relaxes.
Tom gets to see the entire spectrum of Harry's private self, the self he doesn't want anyone to see.
And there are… other perks, which Tom is abruptly reminded of when Harry stands up, movements sharp and agitated, and pulls his shirt over his head, discarding it against the wall.
Tom freezes. Everything else seems to fade around him, a tunnel vision with Harry as the focal point.
Tom's dark, ravenous eyes wander down Harry's chest, drinking in the planes of his torso like a drowning man would water.
Scarred, relatively hairless, and retaining hints of malnutrition. Light perspiration glistens on his chest, shining like the holy aura of a God.
It is, above all, gorgeous.
Above all—art.
Tom wants.
Tom always gets what he wants.
….
Voldemort stirs the wax-resin mixture meticulously, a steady clockwise turn of the ladle.
It's almost ready for the pigment—and, with the pigment, he'll add the blood.
When he goes to retrieve a vial from the small fridge near his work station, however, he comes to the jarring realization that he's out of blood. That Voldemort hasn't killed in over two weeks—the longest lapse there's ever been.
He hasn't realized it, but it is apparent to him now.
Selecting victims, taking trophies— none of that matters to him anymore.
For many months now, his new interest has been Harry.
….
Harry is kind-hearted and compassionate. He's helpful, no matter the risk to himself.
Tom knows that the best way to charm him is to appear as kind-hearted, as compassionate, and as helpful.
Harry harbors a mild distrust of those in a higher social standing than him— he expects from them a certain degree of superiority and cruelty.
Tom's first impression will, therefore, be imperative. Harry must feel that he has been proven wrong.
Luckily, Tom can be very… persuasive.
He prepares to make his move.