Author's Note: To those about to read this I offer fair warning that this is a side-fic to the AU "Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus" and if you aren't a fairly decent way through that fic you won't understand any of this at all. That being said if you want to go on regardless be my guest.
"And… and… and… you th… think she will not… not destroy you as well?"
Aleksander, holy and supreme minister of wizarding Albania, looked across at the child who stared at him with such brazen disrespect for a little wizard. Of course, this boy was no longer a boy, had probably barely been a boy for some time. He'd most likely been left in a ditch somewhere by the look of him, somewhere amidst the destruction, and something had crawled its way into his head and was using him as a puppet.
The boy couldn't stop shaking and he stuttered whenever he tried to speak, a malfunctioning mouthpiece, the dark spirit would probably abandon it soon and try to move onto some other weak and dying body.
He'd had odd visitors now that he was more than a vampire rebel hiding in the depths of the woods, staying out of the way of the truly inhuman beings while flitting in and out of the wizarding villages and when he could the muggle ones as well. In some ways, in spite of the dangers, wizarding villages were easier.
(The wizards understood why his people stole from theirs, and they could be forgiving, but if they caught them feeding off the muggles then they would burn the great forests to the ground and slaughter every last one of his people.)
A number of Englishmen had come as dignitaries of one kind or another, not a wizard yet (they were still too horrified and shocked by the idea that a ministry might be toppled by a registered lesser being) but others. Fenrir Greyback had made an appearance early after he had taken the reins of the government, had walked into his office smelling of rancid meat with eyes like a rabid dog. He had all the brusqueness and savagery expected from a man of his reputation and had demanded that the new Albanian government help him to overthrow the British wizarding dogs and free his people from the shackles of slavery.
And now this child, who asked something very similar to the njeri-ujk Greyback, lacked the same understanding of why Aleksander could say nothing but no to any request of this nature.
He smiled thinly, staring into those dulled eyes, looking as if they were already the eyes of a dead fish rather than a boy's and wondered just what this false-child had expected from him.
"One does not spit in the eye of a war goddess, little false-human, not even if she might turn his kingdom into salt a glance of her eyes." Aleksander noted the way the boy's fist tightened slightly, almost as if against his will, and those sickly features darkened.
"A war goddess?" He asked, the stutter somehow disappearing, but the question was flat and held nothing in it.
"You disagree, spirit?"
The boy seemed to consider these words, saying nothing, but seething without words the dark magic coming off of him like smoke from a fire. Finally gritting his teeth the boy said, "No."
The false-child was interesting, had managed to meet him in this office before twilight, making his way past the wards restored by Riddle once the city had been sacked and taken for all she was worth. And when he had confronted the insomniac minister he had not struck, had not acted, but had instead presented the course he felt was best for this fledgling nation.
A dark spirit, such things existed, although Aleksander had run into few and far between. In this modern age there was only the whisper of them in the deep forest, old and nameless things that were not to be touched or trifled with, usually such beings did not trouble themselves with material affairs.
Yet this one sought out the realm of perishable creatures, had paid attention, and spoke of her. Somehow, in spite of everything, he was not surprised that such a being would seek news and be wary of Lily Riddle.
"But surely… surely… know…knowing this… you can't… can't trust her." The spirit insisted stuttering once more, eyes shining as it stepped forward, moving its puppet-like body towards his desk.
"Faith, little hjie, I choose to have faith without reason or sign. Perhaps she will choose to destroy my people, as she destroyed the wizarding country that existed here, or perhaps she will not. Either way if I act in fear, as you have chosen to do, then surely I will bring death to my kingdom."
"I am not afraid!" The puppet shouted, his voice clear and echoing everywhere, and Aleksander could feel the magic beating against him, wanting desperately to pushing him against the glass of the window and tear him to pieces.
"Then why are you here seeking my aid?"
And they both knew the answer to that question even if the spirit did not dare to admit it to himself.
"Have you seen her, hjie, as she walks through the fields and fires of battle? She glows, her eyes like neon from the cities, and her hair as if it is the fire itself in the moonlight. She walks barefoot through the suffering and in her wake her shadow stretches great and red. Yet even that is only a printed image of her."
The puppet said nothing, pointedly ignored the words, but he would not have come so far with such desperation and wounded pride if he had not seen her. No, this spirit had come across Riddle at some point or another, and he had glimpsed what she truly was and been shaken by it.
"You are a fool." The boy spat finally and without a word turned from Aleksander, leaving him to watch the back of that limping not-child as he made his way out of the old ministry building. Somewhere down that road, as he marched towards England (because how could he go anywhere else) that body would fail him but he would journey still.
"I am a king." Aleksander explained to the now absent spirit, but the words meant nothing, because no one was listening and no one had heard. Yet all the same, all the same they needed to be said.
Author's Note: So yeah, short interlude of what's going on in the other side of the world. You know the really sad thing about this fic is there's so many side characters that I like who never show up that much. Death, Frank, Aleksander now...
For the 2000th review of "Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus" by Tsume Yuki who asked for a fic where "Voldemort's spirit, having retreated to Albaina after the fight, takes note of the revolution, sees Lily at the head, and stars to readjust his priorities?" I don't really go into too much of this here but it can be assumed that Squirrel's had some character development from chapter 25 as well.
Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter