A Horrific Power
Disclaimer: I do not own the series of Harry Potter or any of its characters. To my knowledge, everything belongs to J.K. Rowling.
The first time it happened, every single one of his loyal followers had flinched and then stared at him in abject fear. The sound that had escaped from his lips was a cold, mirthless laugh that chilled one's very bones, and that laugh had come from the darkest, most evil wizard ever known. But why had he laughed? He usually didn't show such an emotion, if any at all, in front of others, but in every one of these particular instances, he could not hold in his glee.
Whenever the Death Eaters brought in a copy of the Daily Prophet, Voldemort got to read yet another article about how the entire wizarding world thought the Boy Who Lived, the great Harry Potter, was off his rocker. It was such a beautifully ironic thing that Cornelius Fudge was making the world's formerly most respected hero into a raving lunatic, and one of the best parts was that the very Minister of Magic, himself, was the one providing the most successful tool for the Dark Lord's next rise to power.
Cornelius Fudge was so afraid to admit to the reality of his return that Voldemort and his followers had to expend no effort to keep their movements a secret from the outside world. In fact, the Death Eaters could move far more openly, with more freedom than even Dumbledore's men, than ever before, because the Ministry wasn't watching them. It was so perfect, his evil army growing in broad daylight because one man was so terribly frightened by the mere memory of what Voldemort had done fourteen years before.
As he read yet another article about how Harry Potter was nothing more than a mentally and emotionally unstable, attention-seeking teenager, the Dark Lord let out another sharp bark of laughter, this one seemingly more cruel than any before. He fully intended to reward the wizarding world for its current ignorance. When he emerged publicly, he would bring a future a thousand times worse than anything any of them had ever imagined.
To even his most loyal followers, his laughter was terrifying, far more so than a murderous rage. And soon, the rest of the world would know the same fear the Death Eaters did, except to a much, much greater degree.
A/N: So, in my first Harry Potter drabble "If Only", I said I would be putting these out every few weeks, but then life happened. So, I'm just releasing them all at once. I hope you enjoyed them. Please read and review.
