Part Eight

The laceration in Elizabeth's scalp had been easy enough to mend, but she had not regained consciousness yet. Voldemort hadn't thought he'd pushed her that hard, and he was worried now that he'd really injured her.

He had lain next to her in their bed with his arm around her waist and his chest against her back. The rise and fall of Elizabeth's belly reassured him that she was still with him and that she was not in distress.

After mending her scalp he had examined the shocks of white hair that had begun to appear on her head. They had caught his attention even before he had noticed their increased abundance earlier that day in the music room. He had examined the affected locks and found that from root to tip they were not gray, or even silver, but a snowy white...almost if the hairs themselves were drained of any pigment whatsoever.

He had first met Elizabeth in her earlier twenties; she was not now even nearing her fortieth birthday. He had first mistaken the shocks of white hair for signs of aging...but upon close examination had felt some alarm at their uniformly white quality.

"And your eyes Elizabeth...why did they shine like they had?" He mused softly against the back of her head. She did not answer him, and he could find nothing when he attempting to penetrate her thoughts, nothing of any discernable form anyway. Her subconscious was only white and cold and structure-less. She was deeply asleep, so much so that she was not even dreaming.

He nuzzled the back of her head, smelling still the faint coppery scent of the blood that had matted some her tresses to her skull. He closed his eyes and squeezed her tightly. She would be so angry with him when she woke up, so angry that she might even leave. A tightness appeared in his chest at this thought and he knew he would not let her leave, even it meant -

He felt her stomach cave and her back arch. Elizabeth sucked in a deep, rasping breath as she returned to consciousness abruptly and without grace. Voldemort sat up immediately and leaned over her. Her eyes were wide and unfocused.

"Elizabeth, it's alright." He spoke softly to her, running the back of the fingers of one his hands down her cheek. Her eyes focused on him and for a moment, he sensed that she was frightened, but in an instant that fear was gone and her eyes closed, the lids falling as her body relaxed and she exhaled slowly.

"My head..." She muttered and raised one hand to the back of her head, her fingers prodding for the wound he'd already repaired. For a few moments he thought she did not remember what had happened and that perhaps he could lie to her about how she'd been injured and she would never recall that he had been responsible, but these hopes were quickly dashed when her fingers found the repair site and she winced. "You hurt me." She whispered factually. There was no accusation in the tone of her voice.

"Why did you hurt me Tom?" She asked, taking her hand away and moving to sit up. Voldemort placed a hand on her shoulder and gently pressed her back down to the pillows. He looked down at her and ran through the multitude of excuses he had thought up while holding his vigil over her. Now that she was looking up at him, awaiting an answer, none of them seemed to contain a respectable amount of fortitude befitting her just deserve.

"I got angry with you. I mishandled you. I hurt you. It was an accident though, I swear Elizabeth." He confessed this to her in a lame voice, looking away from her eyes as he spoke. He thought he was feeling shame and it was very unpleasant, yet he felt it was appropriate and he registered a queer desire to feel in such a way. Feeling shame seemed part of the due that was owed to Elizabeth for what he had done to her.

"You repaired my wound." She said and he looked back at her. She wasn't looking at him anymore though, her brown eyes only rolled unfocused in their sockets. "But you really jostled my insides Tom." She moaned softly and then whimpered as she tried to sit up again. He barely even needed to touch her for her to give up the effort of sitting up.

"Should I prepare you an opium draft?" he asked. What he wanted was to take away her pain, but she did not answer him.

"I'm sorry Elizabeth. I'd say that I'd never hurt you, but I've already gone and proven myself a liar." He tried a smile, but she was not looking at him, her eyes were closing again. One of her slender hands lightly clutched his which he'd lain on her shoulder and she pried it easily off of her.

Elizabeth pressed his hand to his own chest but continued to push, rolling him onto his own back as she followed. She was weak and he slipped an arm under her to help her roll her upper body onto his chest. She had once told him that the sound of his beating heart was calming to her and helped her to sleep when she was troubled. He settled his chin atop her head and began to run the fingers of the hand that had held her waist through her hair.

He noted that the white shocks were even softer and lighter than her coloured hair. He would have to ask her, since she would know most about the aging process...but he did not think the shocks were a sign of aging. For one thing, her hair had been a uniform mahogany on the night he had sought her out and while he would admit that he occasional failed to observe things...his focus that night had been on her, on taking in every bit of what was still familiar about her and what had evolved since he'd left her and such signs of aging had not been present. It was not until the morning that he had seen the first shock of white in her hair.

"I'm really, really mad at you Tom." She muttered into his chest. "I'm really sorry Tom." She muttered even more softly than she had muttered about being angry. She whimpered delicately as she nestled closer to him.

"Why are you sorry my dear?" He asked taking a hold of the hand she had used to push him onto his back. Her fingers were soft, slender, and unlined. They were the hands of a doll, whose small, jewel-like nails had been painted a luminescent shade of obsidian. He pressed these fingers to his lips and felt her stir against him.

In his head he did the math. She had been only eighteen when she had accepted his offer of courtship. He had left her when she was only twenty. It had been only thirteen years and thus she was only approaching her thirty-third birthday in the coming month of September. He'd been about fifty-five the night he'd left her, though like she had said earlier, his age was even less of a matter now, than it had been then.

"I shouldn't have mocked you. You love me." She was whispering now and he had to keen his ears to hear her correctly. He wanted very much to hear what she had to say. "We both have weaknesses. Mine is a lack of trust, especially when it comes to love and especially love from you." She yawned and even the intake of her breath against his chest was warm and full of life.

She was just a child in comparison to him, she always had been. He had washed her blood from his palm but he felt ill having hurt a child so dear to him. Perhaps that was it though, one of the active ingredients in what made her his choice female. Perhaps it was her childish insolence that allowed her to be honest with him and allowed her not to fear him as others did.

"Maybe you can't love like other men love. But who is to say that generic love is best of all. You love me the way that you love me...and I do love you, that way that I love you." She spoke softly and he could feel the gentle movement of his lips through the fabric of his gown. Voldemort kissed her fingers again; he didn't want her to fall asleep again, not yet.

"You don't love like other women love?" He asked softly, splaying her small fingers with his own and examining them.

"If I did...could I love you?" She asked. He contemplated her response and found that it was a response that deserved a well thought-out reciprocation. By the time he had decided upon a reply she had already fallen asleep again, but he didn't mind. She needed her rest.

"You told me once that like-prefers-like. If I am a monster than you must be one as well, but not one of the generic variety." He knew she could not hear him but he spoke anyway as he intertwined his fingers with hers and brought them again to his lips.

"What have you done to make you a monster?" He asked softly, whispering into her hair. As she continued to sleep he continued to contemplate what could make her like him enough so that she could offer him the privileges of love: sacrifice, devotion, acceptance, and forgiveness.

While he contemplated what love was in the terms of the things she had extended towards him, he felt a reinforcement within himself that he had not been lying or made a claim under false pretences when he had told her that he loved her.

Everything she was to him, he was to her, even the ugly things. They had both angered each other in the music room and while he had hurt her physically she had cast an arrow into his Achilles heel; his emotional heart. Had not read once, at some time in his life, that you hurt worst the ones you loved the most?

Neither could ever offer a sufficient excuse to the other, but perhaps they could be content in forgiving one another for their misdeeds. If that wasn't love in the traditional sense...it was what passed for love between the two of them. He fancied this idea that they shared a special kind of love unlike the love others had to settle for.

As she slept he hummed one of the tunes she had played for him in the music room. Eventually he too fell asleep and dreamed that he was a small child again and so was Elizabeth. They were playing in the cold snow, looking over a rabbit that they had both killed, though in the dream he did not know how they had done it. They both sniffled and wiped their noses on their woollen scarves. Elizabeth began to cry and he hugged her, embracing her shivering form with the dead animal's carcass between them. In the dream she wanted to tell their parents but he had shaken his head and covered the dead rabbit with snow.