Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or Game of Thrones
Warning!: Living!Horcrux!Tom!, Smart!Harry!, Obviously AU!
Pairings: undecided at this time
NON-Pairings (under no circumstance will these characters be a couple): Tom x Harry
Chapter 2: Ties of Blood
There was no telling what time it was when Harry finally returned to the world of the living again. In his hazy-waking state, Harry allowed his last encounter with the young Dark Lord wash over him. Tom wasn't as cold and cruel as Harry had imagined him to be, but that might be a combination of shock, horror, and guilt in the older teen. It was funny, really, how easily they could get on so long as they weren't trying to kill each other. The younger male snorted at this thought before giving a wry smile. Startling his companion who thought him still asleep.
When Harry finally opened his eyes it was to see that Tom had raised his brow in a very familiar manner that had Harry falling into a delirious fit of giggles. He was still quite tired and weak even after his impromptu healing and subsequent nap.
"Snape does that! He must've learned it from you. Oh, Merlin! The terrible Severus Snape mimicking the Dark Lord's facial expressions in a mirror!" The image was too much and Harry couldn't get enough oxygen in his lungs to stave off the laughter. Fawkes swatted him with a powerful wing while Tom just stared bewilder, amusement seeping into his features, almost casting him in a softer light. Harry spluttered for a moment before he regained his breath and just continued to lay there on his side where he had fallen.
After a few moments that could've well passed into hours, Harry took on a somber mood and slowly sat up, his bruised emerald eyes meeting the shadowed olive across from him. "I don't hate you, Tom." His declaration startling the older boy. "My hate is reserved for the Dursley's." Tom nodded his acknowledgment and Harry continued, "Am I mad you killed my only family? Hell yeah, but you didn't plan for me to end up with those stupid muggles." It was true, as much as Harry wanted to hate Tom he just couldn't. He just didn't have it in him.
"I-" Tom couldn't find the words to describe the odd feeling forming in his chest, it was warm and light and it scared him. It was almost as if a heavyweight he hadn't even known he'd been carrying had been lifted from his shoulders. It scared him how a little boy's words could affect him so much, so he screwed up his face and darkened his features as much as he could and still resemble a pureblood. "Are you sure you're a twelve-year-old? You sound much too jaded for someone your age." That wasn't what he meant to say, but the insult he had planned sat much too heavy on his tongue.
Harry laughed and the warmth inside his chest grew. What was this elation he was feeling? It didn't make any sense! Was he really so bloody grateful that this child who had every reason in the world to hate him didn't? But why? Just because Harry didn't hate him didn't mean that others could grow to care for him. Dammit, all! He thought he had outgrown these feelings after he had murdered his father and framed his uncle! Surely these desires couldn't be so deeply rooted within him?
"You're the odd one, Tom." Harry gave a lopsided grin, his fingers reaching out to brush against Fawkes' feathers. The action brought a surge of warmth to his body and he thanked the bird by gently rubbing his chest. "You know, I was almost a Slytherin." This admission had Tom's darkened eyes widening again, "Malfoy was such a spoiled twat though, I couldn't bear the thought of sharing a dorm with him for seven years. He reminded me too much of my cousin, Dudley." It was Tom's turn to snort before he realized what the child had said.
"The Great Harry Potter a Slytherin?" This time Harry snorted, his head lolling back to hit the wall. He just felt so weak, but here he was bonding with Tom, bonding with the memory of the man who had murdered his parents. He didn't want to blame Tom for it though, that just felt wrong. Voldemort was the bad guy. Tom still had a chance to be somebody good, especially since they were now two separate people.
"I know, but at the time I was just Harry." The twelve-year-old sighed in a manner much too old for his short years. "Still am, really. I never cared for all this fame." Here his face screwed up as if trying to solve some difficult puzzle. "Why would they think I want a moniker that reminds me I'm an orphan?" Harry could see Tom shift uneasily at that term.
"The people of Britain, specifically the Light, have always been merely sheeple." Here Tom refused to look the younger boy in the eye as he made his admittance, "You aren't the only orphan who was hailed only to be abused. Though I must admit mine wasn't on so grand a scale as your own. Dumbledore never quite liked me. He learned of my ability to speak to snakes and thought me evil incarnate." Harry wanted to shout, to rave that Dumbledore wasn't like that. He wouldn't treat a child like that. Still, hesitation clogged his throat. Hadn't Dumbledore tried to distance himself when he learned that Harry could speak to snakes? He did nothing to discourage the rumors or the attacks.
Harry was under no delusion Dumbledore could've stopped Tom, otherwise, the man would've, right? No, he meant the upper students attacking Harry under the misguided illusion they could stop the petrifications if they 'put an end' to him. Needless to say, that didn't work. It was only when Snape made a derisive comment about Harry not being smart enough to be the Heir that the bullying stopped. Harry hated how grateful he felt to his most loathsome professor after that.
"Yeah, Dumbledore's no saint. Still, I thought my father was a pureblood, isn't that supposed to mean I have lots of family hiding out somewhere? How come my only living relatives are bloody Muggles?" This is what really didn't make any sense to Harry. Arthur Weasley explained what he could about the Potter family. What he taught Harry only caused more questions to arise. Who were Harry's godparents? Why didn't they get custody? It all made Harry's head begin to pound in time with his heart, a throbbing echoing inside his head to a strange rhythm only he could hear.
"Not alone, hatchling. The red-eyed-one is one of your nestlings. Peverells you both are." A low musical lilt filled the air and turned to words inside Harry's head. The translation magic agitated the boy's headache, and he swung his head around to identify the speaker. But there was only himself, Tom, and Fawkes within the small cave.
"Did you hear that?" Tom raised an amused brow at Harry. The younger quickly scowled at the other, this was not funny!
"Yes, I heard the bloody bird sing, what of it?" Tom was cautious now. He'd clearly angered the boy, though he knew not how. He had just begun to win the boy's favor, though he was never truly aiming for it, he was reluctant to lose it all the same. There was a sense of kinship arising between them.
"But did you hear what he said?" Tom's face froze and Harry could see the older boy's mind working a million miles a second behind his eyes. It was at this moment that Harry realized that no, Tom had not understood Fawkes.
"You mean to tell me you can understand him?" Harry gave a shaky nod. It was bad enough he could understand snakes, but now flaming birds too? He was a freak among freaks. No, he couldn't think like that. That was his Muggle upbringing talking. Magical abilities were praised back in the Wizarding World. Ron had said as much.
"Of course hatchling hears my song! I have claimed him, and he is mine!" Fawkes trilled angrily and unraveled his wings in a show of dominance over the two foolish hatchlings. Harry flinched back from the pissed off bird, not quite able to stop the reaction. It was something Tom noticed immediately, and Harry tightened his jaw before he allowed himself to translate the first message, ignoring his humiliation as it simmered beneath his skin.
"Fawkes says I'm his hatchling. He also says the 'red-eyed-one' and I are both Peverell nestlings, whatever that means. Cousins, maybe?" Tom just stared mutely at the younger male as his brain tried to process the words coming from the boy's chapped lips. Harry's cheeks took on a red hue that had little to do with the cold. It appeared he had given the older boy one too many shocks because at this point Tom seemed incapable of verbal responses.
"Red hatchling is sick, but tears not work. Green hatchling needs food. Will return." In a brilliant flash of flames, Fawkes was gone and Harry was alone with a slightly less murderous version of the dark lord. He knew he should be panicking, but maybe he was in shock. All Harry felt was cold acceptance, same as he had felt many times in his short life.
Tom's lead-like gaze lingered on the spot where the phoenix once was, the cold olive orbs observing the lingering scorch mark. "He said the 'red hatchling' was sick, something about tears, and that he'll be back with food. I assume I'm the green hatchling, which makes you the red." Tom's head snapped up at that, his brow scrunch in confusion and irritation.
"Pray tell, why would the lion be green and the snake red?" Harry rolled his eyes at the question until he realized something with a bolt. Tom's eyes were green, much like his own. It was Voldemort's eyes that were red. Fawkes and Harry might know this, but Tom didn't. Tom didn't know what he'd become.
"It's our eyes." Tom's irritation and confusion become more evident when Harry hesitated. "When you become Voldemort -or became rather- your eyes turned red. They were also slit like a snake's or a cat's."
"That's impossible! Eyes don't just change!" The exclamation was little more than a whisper, and Harry could barely hear it had it not been for the rather impressive acoustics of the small cave.
"I saw it myself when you possessed Quirrell. You wanted to look me in the eyes before you killed me. Obsessed, crazed, red, snake-like eyes." Tom had gone pale and considering he was still a memory he matched the snow outside. Harry could easily see his shock, though the younger couldn't quite understand it. Weird things happened all the time in the magical world, how was a change in eye color so significant?
"That means something went wrong, but how? I was so careful! The ritual was perfect!" The older boy was muttering to himself, and Harry was quite sure Tom hadn't even realized he had spoken out loud. It was in that moment that Harry was reminded that Tom was merely a fifteen, almost sixteen, year old boy. He wasn't even much older than himself. They weren't so different, especially since this was the Tom before he really became Voldemort.
"I don't know what you're freaking out about, but is it really even important?" Harry hadn't meant to make it sound so much like a taunt, but there it was. Tom's head snapped up again -when had he dropped it?- only to glare at Harry.
"I do not freak out."
"Sure could've fooled me. Doesn't matter. Whatever happened to make your eyes turn red doesn't matter because it won't happen. Not here. You've already done it, and you don't need to do it again. What you need to do is help me come up with a plan to keep us both alive." Man, it felt weird to be the voice of reason. He sounded just like Hermione, but maybe that's what he needed to get through to Tom before he really started freaking out.
"Us? You do realize I'm not really alive, right?" Oh, that's right. Harry kept forgetting that tidbit. Tom was just so tangent he kept forgetting the boy wasn't fully there, yet. Harry did realize he would need Tom's help if he was going to stay alive though. He had no idea where they were and Tom was his only ally (although not exactly a trusted one at this point) besides a mythical creature whom most normal people would freak out about if they saw it. Harry sighed as he made his decision.
"Yet." Olive eyes narrowed with suspicion before Tom sat a bit straighter, attempting to use his added height to intimidate the smaller boy.
"What do you mean 'yet'?" Emerald orbs glared across the small confined space, teeth clenched tightly to prevent them from clicking together, the cold was really starting to set in now that Fawkes had gone off to Merlin only knew where.
"Exactly th-that. You're sssurvival is part of th-the plan t-too. Look, I know you're sssmarter th-than me. And-d I'm bett-tter at adapting th-than you. You th-think long-term plans, I'm good at ssspontaneousss. We'd work well t-together, ssso long asss we're not-t trying t-to kill each other." It was risky at best, but this is what Harry excelled at. This was his skill, persuasion and spontaneous plans that only ever worked by the skin of his teeth. But he was a survivor, they both were. If the Dursley's couldn't kill Harry he'd be damned if he let a blizzard do the trick.
"You want to work together, with your parents' killer?" Tom's voice was soft but filled with astonishment. This young boy, who looked even younger still and yet acted much older than he was, had to be insane. Why would anyone want to put themselves in that position? Then again, even though Tom knew after a while he could survive on his own, Harry most likely wouldn't last the winter with him shaking like a leaf as he was. Fawkes hadn't even been gone an hour yet Harry had gone pale and was quickly showing signs of hypothermia. Tom was immune thanks to his not-living status. Harry genuinely needed Tom to survive, and the boy realized this. He was even willing to admit it!
"Asss far asss I sssee it, I can't-t blame you for sssomething you haven't-t done yet-t. Your future ssself, Voldemort-t, and your current self, T-tom, are t-two different p-people. I will do what-t is necssessssary to sssurvive."
