Written For:
Quidditch Fanfiction League Competition: Round 8
Captain - finding out your loved one/partner/family hid something major from you and left you with that something (debt/a child/a cursed object etc) and what you do about it.
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry: Gardening
Task 4 - Daffodil: Write an Immortal!AU or Reincarnation!AU
Mirror, Mirror, What Do You See?
XX
"Hadrian, why didn't you tell me?" Tom demanded.
Hadrian rolled his eyes. "Because I don't want you going all alpha on me. I can handle it."
Tom looked down at the note clutched in his hand even though he didn't have to read it to know what it said. The foreboding words were imprinted on his mind.
You're not worthy of Tom Riddle. If you don't keep your distance, you will feel my wrath!
"They're threatening you because of me!"
Hadrian's smile was sad. "This person is infatuated with you. I don't blame him or her. I am a capable wizard. I can take care of myself. Trust me."
Tom grabbed his Hadrian's hand and pulled him into a long embrace. "You have my heart. I want you safe and with me for a long time."
Hadrian pressed a kiss to Tom's chin. "Don't worry." His bright emerald eyes warmed Tom's heart. Everything would be okay.
X
Tom stared down at Hadrian's lifeless body. He should have ignored Hadrian's wishes and hunted down the threatener. Maybe then, Hadrian would still be alive.
"Whoever did this to you will pay. I will hunt them down and kill them," Tom vehemently promised.
That night, after Hadrian's body was laid to rest, Tom dug under Hadrian's bed and pulled out "the box." It was the box that held all of Hadrian's secrets. Tom asked to see it before, but Hadrian always declined, saying they were his secrets, and Tom should respect that.
Now, there was no Hadrian to stop him.
When he had the intricately designed box, with its ornate cover, open on his bed, Tom peered inside. He pulled out a tattered photograph of his parents.
Tom smiled sadly. Unlike Tom, who loathed his father for being a coward and his mother's weakness, Harry loved his parents and never blamed them for his being in an orphanage. There were other things: pictures of friends, his first O in Potions (Tom worked just as hard as Hadrian so the raven-haired boy could get that O), a paper, and a mirror.
Tom scrunched his brow and took the piece of paper. It was folded into a perfectly straight square. When he unfolded it, Hadrian's messy scrawl was visible.
Tom, if you're reading this, I'm dead. I know you won't wait long before you go to my box. I hope you didn't suffer, watching me die a slow death.
Tom blinked back his tears as confusion swirled in his mind. He continued to read.
I never thought I'd get a Muggle disease. Cancer. It seems so ordinary, and if I should die, it should be because of a magical ailment. Like Dragon Pox.
Tom gasped. Cancer? What in Merlin's name… He went back to reading, eager for answers.
If you are reading this and hadn't known about my cancer. I guess my secret is out. If you hadn't known, it means I went fast before the disease took me. And I hope that's the case. The last thing I want you to do is watch me get weak as the sickness slowly drains my life.
I want you to remember me as I was: happy, athletic, and hopefully, funny.
I love you, Tom. I will always love you. You will always have my heart.
Take the mirror in the box. It's my gift to you.
Yours always,
Hadrian
Tom swallowed the lump in his throat. Hadrian's eagerness to handle the threats by himself made much more sense now.
He turned his attention to the mirror. "What's so special about this?" he asked out loud as he touched the glass, looking at his reflection.
His reflection billowed, like a wave, and then disappeared. Another face appeared. One with short raven-hair and skinny cheeks. Bright emerald eyes that were so familiar, but different at the same time, blinked. "Who are you?" the boy asked.
Tom's breath caught. The voice was similar, but there was a different quality to it. A different timber. More immature, but there was still so much warmth in the tone.
"Who are you?" Tom asked, instead of answering the mysterious boy's question.
"I'm Harry."
Tom leaned closer. "Is Harry short for Hadrian?"
"Um, no…" Harry answered slowly.
Tom's shoulders slumped. "Oh. You remind me of him."
"I'm sorry that you're disappointed."
"It's okay. He said this mirror was a gift to me, but I don't understand why."
Harry tilted his head. "Where are you?"
"Hogwarts."
Harry wrinkled his nose. "I'm at Hogwarts, and I've never seen you before."
Tom straightened his spine. "What house?"
"Gryffindor."
"Hadrian was a Gryffindor."
"I don't know a Hadrian," Harry said with a quick shake. "How are we both at the same school without knowing each other. I've never met a Hadrian, and Gryffindor isn't that big."
Thoughts were forming in his mind. "What year is it for you?"
"1997."
And that was when Tom knew it. Harry wasn't Hadrian; he was Hadrian's reincarnation. There were similarities, but even with their short conversation, he saw the differences because of how Harry was raised.
And Tom knew somehow, he had to get to Harry. He might not be Hadrian, but he was as close as Tom would get.
X
Tom studied. He learned about Horcruxes. WIth them, he could become immortal. He'd always live, and then he'd get to Harry. He'd be able to wait and get to his other half.
It was a nasty piece of dark magic, a type of magic that Hadrian would disapprove of. And if Harry shared Hadrian's personality, Harry wouldn't be thrilled either.
But maybe there was a way to do it without Tom losing his sanity, so he'd still be the same person that Hadrian fell in love with.
All the time, he continued talking to Harry. He learned that Harry's surname was Potter. Harry too was an orphan, but his parents were killed by a dark witch named Bellatrix. Harry, unlike Hadrian, didn't grow up in an orphanage. Instead, he grew up with Muggle relatives that hated magic. He didn't even know magic was real until he was eleven. Harry, like Hadrian, loved playing Quidditch. But whereas Hadrian chose to be a Beater, Harry was a Seeker.
Tom found it amusing when Harry told him about how his first Quidditch Captain commented that Harry could have been a Beater.
The more they talked, the more Tom fell in love all over again, and not just because Harry was Hadrian's reincarnation, something Tom hadn't divulged to the seventeen-year-old.
The fact that Tom was so in sync with Harry just proved that he was Harry, and Hadrian's, soulmate. It was the only explanation.
Tom also learned that Harry didn't have many friends, but he had two or three close Gryffindor friends. He didn't get along with most of the Slytherins, calling them Pure-blood bullies, but he did admit that a girl named Daphne Greengrass wasn't so bad when he was forced to work on a Potions project with her. And that was also the only O he ever got in the subject.
Ineptitude in Potions - another thing he shared with Hadrian.
X
Tom made it happen. It was a combination of grey and dark magic. He split his soul by killing criminals and then used a type of gray magic so he didn't lose himself to madness. He maintained his good looks as everyone around him aged. And after the Horcruxes were made, he never killed another person.
He kept an eye on all of the Potters. When James Potter was born, Tom kept a special eye on him. He watched from a distance, as Defense Against the Arts teacher, Tom knew Dumbledore still watched him suspiciously, but there was no proof of Tom doing anything illegal. There wasn't even any proof about his Horcruxes. He made sure to tie up all of the loose ends.
When James and Lily began dating, Tom knew it was only a matter of time. They got married shortly after leaving school and had a son. And then Bellatrix, a Slytherin who had been infatuated with Tom since she was in her third year, lost her mind to a bubbling insanity when she was betrothed to Rodolphus Lestrange.
She went on a spree, and James and Lily were two of her victims.
Tom could have stopped it, but he knew it had to play out the way it was supposed to. And when Harry came to school as a first year, it took everything in Tom to not approach the young boy.
The year 1997 came and Tom waited. He knew when Harry had the magical conversation because the next morning, Harry couldn't take his eyes off Tom, who sat at the Head table.
Tom had been patient, but the time had finally come. Now it was his time to reclaim his soulmate, and this time, he would never let his perfect match go.
XX
(word count: 1,489)