A/N - Warnings: Dubcon, Threesome, sixteen-year-old Harry, and mentions of dealing with grief. Beta'd by Redhorse.


Harry hated them.

Actually, Harry hated everyone. Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon, of course, but they were easy to hate. Dudley, who was ever so smug about his latest boxing tournament. The Ministry and the Daily Prophet, who were acting as if Voldemort being back was news, as if Harry hadn't been saying so for months.

And Dumbledore. The Headmaster who had left him here at Privet Drive for weeks and weeks, while Harry waited impatiently, thinking: it'll be soon. He'll come and pick me up, and I'll be able to spend the rest of the summer somewhere else. The Burrow. Hogwarts. Fuck, even the Leaky Cauldron.

But there was nothing. And as the days wore on, through a warm June and a sweltering July, past his sixteenth birthday and into August, it finally dawned on Harry that Dumbledore wasn't coming.

He'd waited long enough, he told himself as he dragged his trunk through the front gate and out onto the pavement of Privet Drive proper. No one could expect him to stay. He shrugged his jacket on, took one last, loathing look back at the dark house, behind whose unlit windows his aunt, uncle, and cousin slumbered on, and then held out his wand arm into the road, thumb up.

BANG!

It was instantaneous. The bright purple bus popped out of midair, fell two feet onto the tarmac, bounced twice, then came to a halt in a cloud of lavender smoke. Harry coughed and held his arm in front of his eyes to shield them from the brilliant glare of the bus' headlamps.

"'Ello there! Oh, well I never!"

Stan Shunpike's familiar pockmarked face had appeared in the doorway. He gaped as Harry pushed past him onto the bus.

"You didn't blow up your aunt again, did you?"

"No," Harry said shortly. "How much to get to London?"

"Diagon Alley?"

"No. I want to go to Grimmauld Place."

"Where's that then?"

"I don't know," Harry replied, feeling a little stupid. "London somewhere."

Stan rolled his eyes. "'London somewhere', he says." He held onto the stair rail for balance, leaned back and called up to the driver.

"Hey, Ernie! D'you know any 'Grimmauld Place'?"

"Yes," came the gruff reply. "Now can you stop gossiping for long enough to get his fare and his luggage?"

Stan grumbled under his breath but tapped away into the ticket machine secured around his waist regardless. It sparked, clunked, then spewed out a single purple ticket.

"That'll be eleven sickles," Stan said, handing it to Harry. "And we're all out of hot chocolate."


The bus was almost empty. Harry hauled his trunk to the back of the first deck and sat, arms folded, as the stopped in Dover, Clacton-on-Sea, and Westminster. Each time, a witch or wizard stumbled out the door in a bleary 2 a.m. fugue. Harry amused himself by making up stories for them. The portly witch was visiting family. The elderly gentleman with the stove-pipe hat was returning from a night on the town.

Finally though, it was his turn. They sprang into existence on a dark Muggle street lit only by flickering streetlights. Harry nodded to Stan as he dragged himself off the bus, which promptly disappeared again in another cloud of smoke.

The long line of terraces loomed over him. There was no one about, other than a black cat, watching him from under a car. Its eyes gleamed.

Harry drew his wand and approached Number 12. At the door, he took a deep breath, then reached for the handle.

It turned on the first attempt.

It wasn't surprising, Harry chided himself. What use were locks on a dwelling protected by the Fidelius Charm? Even so, it left him with an uneasy feeling, like missing a step on the stairs.

It was dark inside. Cold, musty air wafted out of the hallway, a familiar cocktail of candle smoke, mildew and mould. Harry stood there on the doorstep.

He had not planned past this moment. There had been, he realised, some vague thought that he would go to the Headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix, whether they wanted him or not, and somehow convince Dumbledore to let him stay. But now doubt was creeping into his mind like fog through an open window.

Was anyone even here?

The house was unseasonably cold. There were no coats on the hooks in the corridor. The orange glow of the streetlights behind him picked out a thin layer of dust.

A little noise rose in Harry's throat, like a stillborn sob. Should he call the Knight Bus back? Ask Stan to take him to the Burrow instead? But what if he was sent straight back to Privet Drive?

No.

Harry swallowed hard, then crept into the hallway. He wasn't afraid of an empty house. He would stay for the four weeks that remained of the summer, and if anyone wanted him to go back to the Dursleys, they could come here and physically drag him back. Closing the door behind him, he felt his way up the flight of stairs to the room he had once shared with Ron. Inside, he opened the curtains to let in the light of the moon, then collapsed down on the bed, falling swiftly to sleep.


The main problem with dramatically running away, Harry decided two days later, was that there wasn't much to do while you waited for people to notice. He had cooked a little - luckily there was plenty of food stockpiled in the kitchen cupboards - and picked unenthusiastically through the bookshelves in the drawing room. Unfortunately, Dark Arts books were less interesting than he might have hoped. Harry cracked open a promising volume on creating plagues of rats and frogs but quickly found himself bogged down by long equations, endless minutiae, and frequent lengthy paragraphs mocking the work of someone called Fiamandus Strollop, who was apparently something of an academic rival.

Kreacher wasn't there. Harry had checked the upstairs rooms, half-hoping to find the elf, half-glad not to. He did not know how he'd react, not after hearing from Dumbledore about the part Kreacher had played in Sirius' death.

Stop thinking about it.

Harry closed his eyes and breathed in deeply through his nose. He needed to stop stewing over it. It wasn't helping anyone.

Except maybe it was. It was good to have someone to blame other than himself.

He was stood in the basement kitchen, in front of the boiler closet where Kreacher had once slept. It was the only place he hadn't checked. Harry readied himself, then seized the handle and flung open the door.

A nest of fetid blankets, a few pewter mugs and a collection of photographs in smashed frames. And no Kreacher.

Harry sighed. He turned and took a poker from next to the fire and used it to push the blankets out of the way. Nothing.

Or was there?

Something glinted in the far corner, tucked away in the deep, dark space under the boiler itself. Harry knelt and gingerly felt around until his fingers encountered a fine chain.

It was a locket. Harry straightened and inspected his prize. An oval of lovely antique gold, warming quickly in the heat of his palm. He turned it over, admiring the workmanship that had gone into engraving the snake that curved across the surface.

There was no clasp. Harry sat down at the kitchen table and felt around the edge for a seam in vain. It didn't even have visible hinges. He held it next to his ear and shook it, listening for a rattle.

Nothing.

What a strange object. Harry sat back in his chair and stared at it in mingled admiration and frustration. It was Kreacher's habit, he supposed, to steal things from around the house. Perhaps he had taken it last summer when they were cleaning out the drawing room.

He should have got up then. Put the locket back where he had found it or in the bin. After all, what did some gaudy trinket that had probably belonged to one of Sirius' bigoted ancestors mean to him? Everything about it screamed Slytherin.

But for some strange, unfathomable reason, he didn't. He sat there, holding the thing, transfixed by the way the snake's green eyes winked in the low light of the house's oil lamps. It seemed to pulse in his hands with the same rhythm as his heart.

Thrum . . . thrum . . . thrum . . .

Without even thinking about it, Harry pulled the chain over his head, letting the locket hang around his neck.

Then stilled, amazed at himself. Why had he done that? His hand rose to touch the locket as an uncertain grin formed on his face.

A bit of bling, eh? Who knew Harry had been missing gold in his life? Perhaps he should go all around the house looking for hidden treasure, then strut about like a pirate?

His grin widened at the image, and he kicked back in his chair. The locket could stay, for now.


It was far from his mind for the rest of the day. Harry cooked lunch and then dinner, tried and failed to reread his fifth-year Herbology textbook, then sat upstairs and watched the clouds go by. There was an occasional trifling thought; an awareness of the weight of the object when he ran up the stairs, the warmth of it against his bare skin (it had somehow found its way inside his shirt), but nothing sinister, nothing strange. He scrubbed his teeth, fetched a glass of water, then turned in for an early night.

And woke, fifteen hours later.

Harry checked his watch again, mind whirling in disbelief. Had it stopped? Surely it could not be past midday? But through the grimy windows, the sun was high in the sky. Two Muggle women were chatting outside. A man further down the street was unloading groceries from his car.

How could he have slept for so long?

Harry puzzled over the question as he trotted down to the kitchen to make breakfast, locket bouncing on his chest. It was true, he reflected, that he had spent most of the early weeks of the summer asleep or wishing he was. In those first awful days, when Sirius' death was raw in his mind, he had kept his curtains closed and spoken to the Dursleys only when absolutely necessary.

But he had been feeling better, lately . . .

Perhaps it was being back in Sirius' house. There were reminders of his godfather everywhere, a silent, ghostly impression that both comforted Harry and left him terribly sad. More than once, he had caught himself running his fingers over the burn mark in the tapestry where his name had once been, and looking through family photos and portraits for resemblances.

Maybe it wasn't so bad. He could at least grieve peacefully here, and go back to Hogwarts healed.

That afternoon, Harry did what he'd been putting off since he'd arrived. He climbed the stairs again, but did not stop at his bedroom. Instead, he went up, one more flight and then another, until he was at the very top of the house.

The attic landing was tiny. Harry swallowed, then pushed open the door to Sirius' room.

The ceiling was lower than in the rest of the house. It sloped down towards the windows. Harry sat down on the springy single bed and gazed around, drinking in the sight of the ancient broomstick lying on top of the wardrobe, the row of barely-touched textbooks, the school trunk. There were posters on the walls, lots and lots, showing Muggle fighter jets, motorbikes, and the kind of softcore porn that was probably more common in the seventies.

It must have been so strange for Sirius to come back to his adolescent bedroom. What did it mean that it was still here exactly as he'd left it some twenty years earlier? Had his parents kicked him out, then simply locked it away like a dirty secret? Or was it a memento of their missing child?

Harry lay down on his side, letting his eyes rest on the thin sliver of sky he could see through the window, over the tops of neighboring houses. It was nice, being here. He felt connected to Sirius for the first time since he'd died. He breathed in slowly, allowing melancholy to fill him, then leach out on the next breath.

When sleep finally reached up and took him, Harry let it happen, knowing the unnatural tiredness would pass, with time.


But it did not pass. Harry woke, ate, slept again, and on and on and on. As the weeks passed by in a haze, alarm grew inside him, slow and terrible, like a stone in one's stomach. Something was wrong, but could not put his finger on what, or why, or what he could do about it. At times he woke with the locket pulsing in his hand, a comforting golden heat. At others, too exhausted to drag himself down to the kitchen for food, he stopped on the landing instead and fall asleep on his side, too tired to go on.

How long had it been? Harry was sure he could not have missed the start of term. After all, if he didn't show up at Hogwarts, the Order would check Grimmauld Place eventually. In fact, shouldn't they have come sooner? Someone needed to take him to get his Hogwarts book list - there was no chance he would be trusted to go to Diagon Alley alone.

Perhaps he was misremembering the time. It really was hard to tell how long it had been since he had arrived in the house. Harry rarely checked his watch anymore - in fact, he thought, frowning, it wasn't on his wrist anymore. Where had he put it?

But then this worry too was lost, ripped away from him like a log in a flood. And gradually, so gradually, the long periods of sleep, fourteen, fifteen, seventeen hours at a time, began to fill with vivid dreams.

Flying. Drifting through the Hogwarts corridors like a ghost. The cheers of the crowd on the Quidditch pitch. The snake Draco Malfoy had conjured during their ill-fated duel in second year. There were stranger things too. People in old-fashioned clothes. Boys selling newspapers on street corners. The sound of aeroplanes flying overhead at night, hundreds and hundreds, without lights and very low.

Sometimes though, his dreams were less innocent. At first, they were just hazy impressions of warmth, skin, bodies moving, but they gradually became more and more specific, and invariably ended in sticky underpants.

Harry was not greatly concerned. They had first started two years ago, after the Quidditch World Cup. Ever since then, they'd come in phases; three months with nothing, followed by a period where they seemed to fill up his entire life.

And his laundry basket.

He had told Ron about them once. But Ron had only laughed and said it was normal, that Fred and George had told him so. He clammed up hard, however, when Harry asked who had been visiting him in his dreams.

. . . For Harry, it was Cho. And then Parvati too. And Hannah Abbot, even though Harry had barely said five words to her in a row and never thought of her in the daytime. And then, to his amazement, Cedric.

Harry did not tell Ron about Cedric.

But then the third task came, and the confrontation in the graveyard. And in the summer that followed, that horrible summer, Harry had begun to dream about Tom Riddle.

It was his darkest secret. Snape had seen once during a particularly vicious Occlumency lesson, but luckily he had not recognised Tom. There had been a smug little quip - " well well, Potter"; and that was that. Harry also tried very hard not to think about it. Except when he was in the shower, or drifting off to sleep, or had a hand around his cock and Fleur just wasn't doing it for him . . .

Ahem.

And so it continued, a long, inexorable slide into dreams that Harry didn't even think to fight. The waking world around him became less real: a dull, grey place, punctuated by hunger and thirst. And through it all, the pulse of the locket around his neck, matching his own.


The voices woke him. A pleasant tenor, with the slightest edge of a London accent, complaining.

"-don't see why I should go along with you!"

"Who sheltered you when you allowed your vessel to be destroyed by a twelve-year-old? You owe me everything, you ungrateful little parasite."

Harry tried to raise his head, and, to his surprise, succeeded. The terrible lethargy was gone, like swimming out of a cloud of silt into crystal clear water.

There were two men standing at the end of the bed.

No, that was wrong. One man in his mid-twenties, one boy of about Harry's own age. They looked strikingly similar to each other; both dark-haired, with familiar handsome features. The younger one was angry, gesturing wildly as he made his point, while the older one watched with condescending amusement. His long fingers tapped a wand - Harry's wand - against his thigh, the only outward sign of irritation.

Tom Riddle.

Two Tom Riddles.

Oh dear, Harry thought. This was going to be a particularly kinky dream. It made sense now, why he felt so clear headed. He always did, when he was asleep.

"Someone needs to take the Horcrux out of him-" said the older one.

"Don't lie! You're making me do it because you think it's dangerous!"

"Difficult child."

"I'm you !"

"I know, and it's very embarrassing."

What did it say about him that there were two of them, Harry thought with dread. Why would he be imagining such a thing? Normally his dreams involved only one, down in the Chamber of Secrets. There was no Basilisk, just the memory from the diary holding Harry's wand, and Ginny lying still and pale on the floor. Tom would look him up and down and Harry - a teenager now, not the child he had been - would flush. And that's where the dream always devolved into a mess of sensory input: hands, fingers, cold water seeping through the back of Harry's robes as he was pushed down on the Chamber floor, helpless to resist as Tom straddled him, ground his cock against Harry's stomach, came-

"He's awake."

It was the older one again, speaking with that familiar condescension. The tone made Harry's cock twitch. Not that it mattered. He had been hard almost from the moment he'd opened his eyes.

Riddle's dark eyes were drawn to the movement. There was a single moment of pure surprise - his mouth opened a fraction, and he stilled, speechless.

Then recovered.

"What do we have here?"

"Don't mind me," Harry squeaked. His face was burning, but the humiliation was only making it hotter. "Keep having your conversation."

Riddle did not keep having his conversation. His eyes raked over Harry's body; a slow slide from his bobbing Adam's apple to his knees. Harry swallowed, intimidated. He didn't know many people that age other than Tonks. Riddle's shoulders were broader than the younger version's and the sleeves of his white dress shirt were rolled up, revealing muscular forearms.

Riddle strode around the side of the bed, gripped Harry's chin firmly and stared down into his eyes. There followed a slight tug, then, invasive and intimate, the sensation of gentle fingers pressing into the folds of his mind. They searched for a moment, perusing his surface thoughts at leisure, then released. Riddle stepped back with a smile in his eyes. The corners of his mouth twitched as if holding in a laugh.

"What?" the younger one, Tom, demanded. "What is it? What did you see?"

"He thinks he's in a dream."

"I am in a dream," Harry said, surreptitiously looking the teenage version up and down too. He was lovely - gangly, but in a way that just worked. He congratulated his subconscious on its job; it had really outdone itself on this scenario.

Even if he was going to regret it terribly when he woke up.

The bed dipped as Tom sat down. His long, pale fingers ghosted over Harry's chest.

"Really?" he asked. "You think this is a dream? How do you know?"

"Because you're dead," Harry breathed. "I killed you."

Tom's face twisted in anger, and he pinched Harry's inner thigh viciously.

"OW!"

"See? Still think you're dreaming?"

"You can feel pain in dreams, idiot."

"That's good, because you're about to feel a lot more," Tom said. He kicked off his shoes and climbed full onto the bed with Harry, all elbows and knees. Harry fought him, more for show than anything else, until Tom grabbed his wrists and pinned them to the mattress above his head. It was hot. So hot. Harry jerked beneath him, delighting in the feel of the leg between his thighs.

"You're such a slut," Tom said, delighted. "Can I fuck him?"

"Yeah," Harry breathed.

Then realised, with mortification, that Tom had been asking Riddle for permission, not him.

"HEY! Rude!"

They both ignored him. Riddle made a show of checking his watch. "I was hoping to kill him and be out of here fairly quickly," he said.

"But he's already so hard!" Tom pleaded. "It would be a shame to waste it. I promise it won't take long."

Riddle's mouth twitched again. "It won't take long? Now that I can believe."

"Not like that!" Tom complained. But Riddle only gestured for him to move back. He waved his wand and cast a succession of spells that made the bed Harry was lying on jolt and quiver, then suddenly grow two feet wider. Ron's bed popped out of existence and was replaced by a burgundy armchair. Worst of all, chains sprang from nowhere to wrap around Harry's wrists, thick iron manacles, secured to each other and to the headboard.

Apparently satisfied, Riddle settled himself in the armchair. He paused to consider the wand in his hand, tracing his fingers lightly up the length of it.

"This is nice," he said conversationally, as if he had not just bound Harry to the bed to be fucked. "Phoenix feather, I presume? It has that feel about it."

"Y-Yeah."

Riddle smiled at him, a cruel twist of the lips, then waved the wand once more.

"Evanesco ."

And just like that, all of Harry's clothes were gone.

His face was on fire. It wasn't fair, wasn't fair at all that Riddle should do that, not when they were both fully clothed and he couldn't even cover himself. His cock sprang free, fully hard, with a bead of pre-come glistening at the tip.

By contrast, Tom - the teenager on top of him - was delighted. "What's wrong?" he mocked. "Aren't you naked in all your sexy dreams?"

Harry snarled, but with his hands bound there was nothing he could do. He pulled at the shackles, mostly for the pleasure of feeling them cut into his wrists. Chains. Actual chains.

It was not lost on Tom. "You like being tied up?" he asked softly. "I was never expecting you to be this kinky when we were draining the life out of you. Thank you for putting on the locket, by the way, and for wearing it so faithfully - I thought I'd never have another chance after you killed me."

"You mean in the Chamber of Secrets?" Harry breathed, canting his hips up. What Tom was saying made no sense at all. "You deserved that."

Tom smiled, but there was no humour in it. "You think so? We're going to kill you too after I've fucked you."

Harry only nodded. Tom normally threatened to kill him in these dreams.

Tom seemed dissatisfied with his lack of fear, but let it go. He touched a finger to the hollow of Harry's throat, feather-light, then trailed it down, over his heaving ribcage, his belly button, down down down, until it stopped, mere inches above his cock.

Harry shivered, pinned. Tom smiled, then wrapped his hand around his cock.

Harry arched off the bed, biting his lip to suppress a groan as Tom stroked him, once, twice, three times. It felt so good; pleasure like a trickle of cool water in the desert.

Tom's pupils were blown black. He let go of Harry's cock - Harry let out a little mournful whimper - then pulled up one of Harry's knees so that his leg was bent.

If it was possible, Harry's flush deepened. So they were doing that, were they? His dreams occasionally went that far; on one particularly memorable night, he'd imagined Cedric fucking him in the Prefects' Bathroom.

Tom too, seemed a little lost. He hesitated, thumb pressing into the entrance of Harry's hole but going no further.

"Turn him over."

They both turned to look at Riddle, who was lounging in the armchair as if it was a throne, legs elegantly crossed.

"You'll be able to go deeper if you put him on his front," he continued.

"I know what I'm doing!"

" Really ?" Riddle asked. "It's not the same as fucking a girl. I remember our first time with Abraxas in sixth year. We had to rush him to the Hospital Wing in the middle of the night. Very embarrassing for all concerned."

Tom scowled, but gripped Harry's leg anyway and used it to heave him over. The long chain twisted and rattled against the headboard.

"Now pull his hips up."

Tom obeyed. Harry had to scramble to get his knees underneath himself. The position left him stretched out on the bed, naked chest against the cotton sheets, arse in the air. He caught Riddle's wand movement out of the corner of his eye, and, a moment later, felt something . . . wet.

"That should make it easier," said Riddle, matter-of-factly. "Put a finger in him, Tom. Feel how tight he is for you."

A hand smoothed over his hip, following the curve of the bone. Then, hesitantly, something brushed against Harry's hole. This time it didn't stop; it pushed inside him, slow, exploratory, and horrendously intimate. Harry whined without meaning to, clenched around the finger and - oh fuck, it was so hot. The sense of having no control over it, of being unable to expel it, unable to do anything, except lie there and take whatever Tom wanted to give him-

Tom laughed, a light, breathy sound. Harry squirmed, hot all over. It felt so real. How could a dream feel like this?

Then the finger was withdrawn and Tom shuffled behind him. Harry realised what he was going to do a moment before he did it, but before he had a chance to protest, something much larger pressed against his arsehole.

And pressed in.

It hurt. An unforgiving stretch, done before Harry was even slightly ready. Tighter, tighter, and then scant relief as the widest part of him was inside. Tom rocked forwards, opening him up inch by inch with his cock while Harry panted, fingers twisting in the chains. He could hear Tom hissing behind him in absolute pleasure, " fuck, fuck, fuck- "

And then he was fully seated. It was terrifying, feeling something inside of him. Harry tightened helplessly around it, feeling how big it was, how hard it was. He relaxed by increments, the stretch becoming gradually more comfortable, although always there, at the forefront of his mind.

Then Tom began to move. He pulled out a few inches, then thrust back in, rocking Harry forwards on the bed. It was rough and perhaps a little sloppy; Tom slipped out once, thrust twice between his cheeks before finding his hole again. Inexperienced but eager.

Harry didn't care. His own cock was tight and hot between his legs, and the angle was incredible. Tom was fucking down into him, grinding against his front wall with every single thrust. The world narrowed until Harry could hear nothing but his own breathing, feel nothing but the harsh grip on his hip, the cock fucking into him.

And then a hand, closing around his cock.

Harry couldn't have stopped himself even if he'd wanted to. He moaned as he came, filthy even to his own ears, and clenched vice-tight around Tom. It hurt, but the pain only made the pleasure sharper, drove him higher into a long, drawn-out orgasm.

When Harry became aware again, his mouth was open against the sheets, breathing in little gulps of air. Arse sore, thighs wet. Tom's cock was still moving, faster and faster, in a quick, staccato rhythm. Then, seconds later, he stilled all the way inside.

A burst of heat. Harry flushed as he realised what it was. It was so filthy, the idea of someone coming inside him, using him like that.

When Tom pulled out and released him, Harry couldn't hold himself up. He collapsed on his front in the wet patch while Tom flopped down beside him. There was a bright flush riding high on his porcelain cheeks and his curls were a riotous mess. His cock was still visible, hanging out of the fly of his trousers. Harry stared at it, stunned somehow by the thought that it had been inside of him.

Tom smiled when he caught Harry looking. With surprising tenderness, he reached up and brushed the sweaty fringe away from his scar.

The bed shifted. It was Riddle, positioning himself between Harry's spread thighs, apparently no longer content to watch. Harry tried half-heartedly to wriggle away, but Riddle only laughed, wrenched him up by the hips, and pressed inside in one long, devastating stroke.

Fuck, it hurt. Riddle was thicker than Tom, and longer too, maybe. Harry jerked and mewled as Riddle set a brutal pace, overstimulated past endurance. He couldn't tell if he wanted to move away or push closer - instead, he wriggled like a fish on a hook, until, with a spark of power, Riddle broke the chain between his wrists and the headboard and pulled Harry up by the hair.

"You like that?" he hissed into Harry's ear. "Does pain get you hot, Harry?"

"N-No-" Harry lied, before realising, with mortification, that he was hard again.

Riddle had noticed too. He huffed a laugh into his shoulder.

"Oh, to be a teenager."

The hand in Harry's hair released, but before he could fall forwards again, Riddle wrapped a strong arm around his waist and levered him up so he was sat astride his knees.

"I enjoyed watching you with Tom," he continued. "You look good together, all long, thin limbs and dark hair. Was that your first time too?"

Harry only whimpered. He couldn't bear being talked to like this, the lazy, unaffected tone of Riddle's voice as he ground up into him, stretching his rim, filling him almost past endurance.

Riddle laughed again and bit along the shell of his ear in a way that was hideously arousing. The hand that wasn't holding Harry trapped skated down to play with his cock. Riddle cupped his balls, squeezed, just to make Harry shout, then circled his thumb and forefinger around his length. He stroked Harry, applying more and more pressure, until Harry was shivering in his arms, clenching helplessly around him-

And then stopped. Harry sobbed in frustration.

"Let me, let me-"

"Let you what? Shouldn't you be asking nicely?"

Harry trembled at his tone. Dark. Needling.

"Please," he said, shy. He tried to buck his hips forwards into Riddle's grip, but the arm around his waist was like iron. "Please."

"So sweet, under that prickly exterior," Riddle whispered into his ear. Then his hand tightened and he gave a hard, merciful tug.

Harry spasmed again. It was almost as much pain as pleasure - the orgasm coming too soon after the first one. He shuddered through it, rode it out, then went limp as the energy and tension drained out of him. His head lolled back against Riddle's shoulder.

Riddle let him. He bucked up into Harry, slow and leisurely, edging himself now. When he finally came, he bit down on Harry's neck hard enough to bruise.

After, he let go, and Harry dropped onto the bed again, on his side, chained wrists in front of him. Utterly fucked out and exhausted.

Tom wanted to go again. Riddle waved him on, indulgent, as he zipped up his trousers and fixed his hair in the small mirror screwed to the wardrobe door. Tom, now shirtless, flipped Harry full on his back and slid inside.

It was warm. Tom was slower this time, less frenzied. His curious eyes roved over Harry's face. Harry too, wondered about this particular figment of his imagination. He wanted to touch Tom's chest with his bound hands but was too tired to move them from where they lay over his head. His whole body was limp other than his cock, which was half hard, dribbling on every other thrust.

He didn't come again, but it didn't matter. Harry lay there, high on the endorphins in his bloodstream, letting Tom do as he pleased. He finished, finally, pulled out and did up his shirt, his trousers. His hair was a mess, but otherwise, he looked like any other Hogwarts student fresh from the Quidditch pitch. By contrast, Harry was still naked, with come drying sticky on his thighs and stomach. Thoroughly fucked.

He gathered himself, but his voice came out a rasp. He coughed and tried again.

"Are you going to kill me now?"

That would wake him, Harry was sure.

Riddle considered him, holding his wand speculatively between his hands. There was no expression on his face.

Tom tugged his elbow.

"Can we keep him?" he asked.

Riddle turned to him with an indulgent smile on his face. "You want a pet? You'll have to clean up after him."

"Don't make fun of me!"

"I suppose it will keep you busy," Riddle said thoughtfully. "You're a Horcrux. My Horcrux. I don't need you running around and getting in the way."

He rubbed his chin, then nodded, coming to a decision and raising the wand. Harry waited for the green light of the Killing Curse.

" Somnus ."

The brief flash of surprise was replaced by a great lethargy, seeping through his skin into his bones. Harry's eyelids were unbearably heavy. He let them slide closed with a sigh.

Dimly, he could feel Riddle wrapping him up in a bedsheet, heard chains clinking as he was pulled into strong arms. He nuzzled into someone's chest, feet dangling free.

"Hold my elbow, Tom," the person said.

Harry passed out with the crack of Apparition.


His tongue was dry. That was Harry's first conscious thought. He groped around for the glass of water he normally kept on his bedside table, but was surprised to encounter more mattress. A double bed.

His eyes opened. The room was blurry.

And bright. Very bright, compared to the dim bedrooms at Grimmauld Place. Harry squinted, trying to make the blurry scene resolve itself into something that made sense. He could hear the harsh cries of seagulls, the swell of waves. And in the air, the tang of salt.

"Finally!"

The bed dipped. Harry turned his head and a boy came into view. Handsome, with a head of dark, silky curls.

"It took ages to finish draining the energy we needed out of you," Tom Riddle said cheerfully. "We had to go very slow, or else you'd have died. Do you want some water? I bet you're thirsty."

Harry was thirsty. But more importantly, he was frozen in place. Was he still dreaming? It was all a dream, right?

Tom turned away, then returned with the promised glass of water in his hands. Harry got his elbows under him, sitting up far enough that, with a little coordination, he was able to drink when it was placed against his lips. It was cool and wonderful, sweet relief as it went down his throat.

"W-Where-?"

He couldn't finish his question, but Tom understood anyway. "Cornwall, apparently," he said. "I don't know; he doesn't let me go outside. He's so unreasonable - I can't believe I grow up to become that."

Harry moved his hands. They weren't chained anymore. He tried to sit up further but halted when the world spun around him. He needed to piss very badly.

"M-My glasses?"

Tom huffed and passed them to him. Harry slid them up his nose, and the world came into terrible clarity.

This was not his room. This was not Grimmauld Place.

Panic was clawing up his insides. The textures. The pine bed frame. The gauzy curtains. The sheer level of detail. The way his body felt. The fact he hadn't woken up yet.

"The toilet is through there," Tom said breezily, gesturing to a low wooden door. He flopped down on his back next to Harry and pulled a book off the nightstand. One thousand and one curses, the cover read. "You should take a bath too - you were beginning to smell. Can we fuck again when you're done?"