July 30, 1992

It was the ominous Latin chanting that awoke him, ripping him unceremoniously out of a familiar dream of green light and red hair and cruel laughter. For several long moments he laid there in the dark, tangled in sweaty sheets and staring up at the finely textured ceiling as he listened to a multitude of different voices speaking in rhythmic unison. He couldn't tell what they were saying (he didn't speak Latin that well) or even what spell it was (if he did know, he was too tired to remember), but it was occasionally punctuated by agonized screams or Bellatrix's wild, insane laughter, so he came to the conclusion it couldn't be anything good.

This went on for quite some time—him lying there, largely unblinking as the voices lulled him into a state somewhere between sleeping and waking, still aware but not really conscious. However, around the third time he suddenly came physically jerking back away from sleep, his entire body jolting of its own accord, he finally found the will to throw the covers off and sit up, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed.

The charmed clock on the wall of his bedroom told him that it was much too early for anyone decent to be awake, but he knew very well that Lord Voldemort and the Death Eaters never had and never would qualify as 'decent' and therefore could care less about whose sleep they interrupted during the course of their dark rituals.

Harry decided to follow their lead and go and bother Draco, stumbling out of bed and across the room towards the fireplace, the cold wood floor uncomfortable against the bottoms of his feet. It was the middle of summer and, as of the last time he had been outside a matter of hours ago at twilight, rather warm, so he could only guess that the Death Eaters were currently performing some extremely black magic.

It was even chilly by the fireplace, the atmosphere around the flickering flames almost feeling like a draft coming off of cold water. He quickly picked up the powder and threw it in, flinching as the flames snapped upward and turned green.

"Draco Malfoy's bedroom's antechamber," he rasped, tucking in his elbows and stepping through. The world spun rapidly, fire and grating flying past, and then he was stumbling out onto Draco's marble hearth, narrowly avoiding banging into a set of gold plated fireplace tools.

Shaking ash off of himself, he stepped down onto the hardwood and tiptoed across the room to the nearest door, which he quietly pushed open. Draco's bedroom was huge, larger than Harry's, and full of expensive furnishings, the largest of which was a canopy bed off to the left hand side. Draco was sleeping soundly, the covers pulled up to his chin and his face mashed into the pillow.

Harry took another door, which led into a massive bathroom. The pristine tile floor glittered pleasantly at him in the dim light of the candle burning on the sink's counter, as did a half-empty glass of water sitting next to the gold faucet.

He picked it up, emptied it, and because he was feeling particularly vindictive, turned the tap to cold. Soon the glass was full and he was back in Draco's room, standing at the head of the bed.

Unceremoniously, he tilted it over.

Draco made a high, shocked, strangled noise and shot up, throwing the covers off and falling out of bed, where he proceeded to flail wildly. Eventually, however, he calmed down and just stood there, staring at Harry through the wet bangs plastered to his head.

"Beauty sleep's over," said Harry, grinning maliciously.

--

Draco paused, letting the towel lay on his semi-dry head, and clapped his hands. Instantly, a House Elf dressed in a ragged old pillowcase appeared, cowering.

"Yes, yes, what can Dobby do for Masters?" it asked, fidgeting nervously.

"My bed has water on it," he said tersely, throwing his chin up. "Make it so it's dry. And Harry and I would like food."

"Um, what kind of food would the sirs be wanting?"

"Chocolate," said Harry, bouncing eagerly in place on an overstuffed chair. "And pancakes. And eggs, don't forget the eggs. Maybe fried potatoes and butter? And sausage. Lots of sausage."

"Breakfast, elf," snapped Draco. "And be quick about it."

"Dobby be quick!" He promptly disappeared.

"Why are you here?" Draco demanded, his eyes flicking over to a window. Outside, it was pitch black, the only light coming from the moon. "What time is it?"

"Early."

Draco smiled, though it wasn't a very nice one. "Yes. Early. That's why I was in my bed, you see, because in England, this is the time when people sleep."

"Tell that to my father. And, most probably, your father. And mother. And aunt. They're up chanting some spell or something. Maybe they're trying to summon up a demon again? I don't know. The whole house is freezing and the noise is carrying so clearly it's like they're a room away. So I can't sleep."

"And so you decided to wake me up?" he hissed.

Harry sniffed. "When I'm the Dark Lord one day, Draco, you're going to have to get used to not getting enough sleep. We'll be the ones off performing dark rituals in the middle of the night."

"I'll probably be forty by then. I won't need as much sleep!"

Dobby chose that moment to pop back into the room, bringing with him several trays of food. Harry dug in eagerly, salting the potatoes and then spearing them with his fork.

"Are Masters pleased?" asked Dobby.

"Yes, you irritating little thing," said Draco dismissively, waving him away and removing the lid from a box of milk chocolates. "So you're just here for breakfast, then?"

Harry shrugged, giving a long suffering sigh. "I suppose. Though Bellatrix's laughter was getting on my nerves."

"She was laughing? They must've been doing something really sadistic, then."

"Probably."

They finished their breakfast in relative silence, both of them trying not to picture what, exactly, Bella had found so amusing.

--

The Malfoy Family Library was nothing short of impressive. A huge room, full of towering bookcases, with row after row of books of all sizes and shapes. There were books about every subject one could imagine (save muggles, of course) and even a few books about absolutely nothing at all.

However, despite an exhaustive, summer-long search, Harry had not been able to find a book on Horcruxes, nor even one that mentioned it. He wasn't sure how that could be, how there could be absolutely no information on something, but as he finally reached the very last bookcase in the room, he was on verge of having to accept it.

"Why don't you just ask your father about this Horcrux thing?" Draco drawled, tilting his head up to gaze at Harry, who was standing at the top of an extremely tall ladder and perusing the books on the highest shelf.

"Because then he would know I've taken a personal interest in it, and that is not good."

"Why not? I mean, wouldn't it just be natural to be curious? Making a Horcrux means immortal life, right? Almost like drinking from that bloody Stone?"

"Right."

Draco paused, tapping his foot against the ground and looking thoughtful. "Does this mean the Dark Lord is immortal?"

Harry shrugged. "Grindelwald said my father had a Horcrux, but I doubt he actually knew for sure. After all, Dumbledore . . . did whatever it was he did . . . to him in 1945—my father was just a teenager then, and hardly a Dark Lord. And I think Grindelwald was probably too busy possessing people and murdering Unicorns to go haunt him when he did finally rise to power in the 1970s."

"You bought a history book, didn't you?"

Harry sniffed. "So what if I did?"

"But you've got a—a primary source sitting in your living room! Just go ask him!"

"Would you go ask the Dark Lord anything?"

That did quiet Draco, who took to opening the array of wrapped chocolates sitting out on the tables on either side of him and staring with longing out the window. It was raining heavily, which had put a damper on his Quidditch plans and ensured that he would spend the entire day moping around doing nothing.

Harry continued looking, skimming past twenty seven books on the Unforgivable Curses, another three devoted solely to the Killing Curse, and five more focused on the Cruciatus. There were books about the History of the Ministry, books about the various attempts to get Muggle Hunting legalized as a sport (Harry found himself disappointed that they had all failed, as it sounded rather fun), books about notable ancient Dark Wizards and Witches, and one book—

That threw him off the ladder when he attempted to touch it.

He landed hard, his body slamming painfully into the stone floor, while the book fell directly beside his head, making a sharp smacking sound as it impacted.

He was unable to stifle an agonized groan, unintentionally curling in on himself as he tried to ride out the waves of stinging pain washing over his body.

Draco looked over at him with one eye, drawing his tongue along one of the candy wrappers. "Are you okay?" he managed, his voice garbled.

"If I had a wand, Draco," he gritted out. "Merlin, if I had a wand . . ."

"You'd what?"

"I'd Cruciatus you to death," he spat, tentatively attempting to lift his arm. It moved as well as it usually did, if he could get past the (thankfully receding) ache. He didn't think anything was broken, though there was no doubt going to be a very large bruise all over his body.

"If it knocked you off the ladder then why is it now able to be so close to your head? It's in direct contact with your hair."

Harry was up in a flash, stories he had heard of wards that burnt a person to a crisp or ripped off body parts flashing through his head. Spinning on his heels, he took a few steps backward, cautiously eyeing the book.

It looked innocuous enough—thin and bound in black leather, with the edges of yellowed pages visible along the side. There was no subject on the spine or cover, but there was a name on it, one that Harry read and reread several times, just to make sure he was seeing it right:

Tom Marvolo Riddle.

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Author's Note: WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN, WOMAN?

*cowers* I-in the Resident Evil fandom, killing off a main character and helping the villian destroy all life on earth with a virus.

So yeah, can you tell I got sidetracked? Because I did. And I'm so sorry! You all gave me all these nice reviews and I made you wait for so long! I'm really, really sorry!

So, thank you all, so much! I'll try really hard to get the next chapter up sooner!

Anna