Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter.
Feathers and Fireballs
Chapter Twenty-Eight
When Harry woke, he was briefly disoriented. He was laying on something warm and soft and so, so comfortable, surrounded by warm forms on either side of him. It took him a few minutes to connect this new place to his bedroom, mostly because he felt like he'd only just been in the hallway staring at the corpses of Fred and George Weasley.
He didn't want to think about the fact that he'd watched them die. That Salazar had killed them on his behalf. That they were casualties of a war that he'd chosen to ignore because he felt too broken to fight. That their deaths were his fault.
He let out a small, shuddering cry, and immediately felt Regulus curl closer to him, almost like it was instinctive. Regulus didn't say anything, though Severus muttered a quiet, soothing sound that Harry couldn't quite catch. It was pretty clear that both of them were asleep.
That was fine, he didn't begrudge them their rest. He hoped that they were sleeping well, that they'd be well-rested when they woke up.
"Are you awake?" The voice was unexpected, and familiar though Harry had never heard it in this room before.
Harry's eyes, which had just started to close, snapped open. "Yes," he said, his voice soft and hesitant. What was Voldemort doing in his room? Why had Severus and Regulus… well, that was a foolish question, wasn't it? Of course Severus and Regulus wouldn't be able to bar him from the room. He was their Dark Lord.
"Can we speak?" Voldemort asked, his voice oddly diffident. "Face to face, I mean. If you don't mind."
Harry wasn't sure if he could extricate himself from Regulus' and Severus' grasps without waking them, but he figured that he could try. "I'd rather not wake them," he muttered. "But we'll give it a shot." It took some maneuvering, and some careful shifting around, but Harry eventually managed to slip from their arms and out of bed. He found himself wearing his pajamas, his softest pair, and he smiled at the idea of them choosing them for him so that he would have the most comfort.
His mates took such good care of him, and he truly felt lucky to have them. Even if the circumstances leading up to their mating hadn't been… ideal. And wasn't that an understatement?
"Shall we go out into your sitting room?" Voldemort suggested. He gestured with one hand towards the other room, and Harry nodded once and followed him out of the bedroom.
There was a small bowl of fruit out on the coffee table, there always was. Even though Harry wasn't sure if he was hungry or not, he grabbed a pear from the bowl and fidgeted with it, shifting it from hand to hand as he settled on the sofa. "What did you want to talk about?" Harry asked finally, as the silence between himself and Voldemort stretched.
Voldemort cleared his throat and shifted, visibly uncomfortable. "I owe you an apology," he said finally, and settled into the chair across from Harry. While Harry was still trying to recover from the surprise that came with that statement, Voldemort clarified with, "For bringing the Weasley twins here. I should have thought more about what effect it would have on you if they escaped."
Harry frowned and looked down at the pear in his hands. "Are you apologizing for capturing them, or are you apologizing for bringing them here where I would know that you captured them?" He wasn't sure, and he thought that was an incredibly important distinction.
"I shouldn't have brought them here, but I will not apologize for capturing them in the first place," Voldemort said firmly. "The Weasley family, much reduced though it is, has been incredibly prominent in the war. I know that they're your friends, but I cannot excuse them from the war just for that reason."
Harry closed his eyes against the weight of the words. "I know that," he said quickly, quietly, his voice shaking. "I know that you can't just… just let them… I know. But I can't… you killed them. I mean… I killed them, and I don't think that you're sad about it." Harry stared down at the pear, turning it over and over in his hands. Looking for flaws in the skin was serving as a good distraction so that he wouldn't have to look up at Voldemort.
"Of course I'm not sad," Voldemort said, sounding almost confused. "As soon as I brought them to the manor, their fates were decided. I can't bring people here and then let them go, Harry. That rather defeats the purpose of a secret hideout." Then he let out a small laugh, the sound chilling. "Besides, I already got all the information I needed from them."
Harry shivered at the flippancy in Voldemort's voice. Because the Dark Lord had been so kind to him in his time here at Black Manor, Harry had found it easy to forget that Voldemort was, in fact, sort of a psychopath. In fact, there was probably no sort of about it. Voldemort was a psychopath, a mass murderer, and a terrorist. And Harry was only safe here because Voldemort liked him, and because he was Voldemort's horcrux.
"Lives shouldn't be expendable like that," he whispered, before he even knew what he was doing. Then he made his voice strengthen. "Lives shouldn't be thrown away just for a few bits of information."
"It wasn't a few bits," Voldemort said. He sounded slightly irritated now. "It was significant information. I now know where the Order is headquartered, or have a general idea of it."
Harry shook his head. "I could have… well, I couldn't have said, because it's protected, but I could have found a way, and nobody would have had to die!" He looked up at Voldemort and found that the Dark Lord was looking more confused than anything else, like he genuinely couldn't understand the source of Harry's frustration. Maybe he couldn't; Harry didn't know.
"I'll make sure that my… that no prisoners ever make their way into your presence again," Voldemort said firmly, nodding once. "I was already thinking about it, given that I suspected that you would be distressed if one of them managed to find you, but I never imagined that you would be this upset about it. It won't happen again."
"Because you're going to stop hurting people for information?" Harry asked hopefully, even though he doubted that was the case.
"Because I'm going to move our headquarters," Voldemort countered. "Granted, most in the Ministry seem to suspect that we're working out of Malfoy Manor already, but they don't know for certain. I intend to take most of my Death Eaters to Malfoy Manor over the next few weeks, making the transition gradually so as not to arouse any suspicions with a sudden influx of people. And then you'll be safe here, in Black Manor, with Regulus and Severus to keep you company." Then Voldemort smiled and nodded towards Salazar, who had come to sit on the couch beside Harry while Harry had been focused on what Voldemort was saying. "And Salazar, of course."
Harry shook his head, even as he reached out to stroke his snake. He set aside the pear and invited Salazar into his lap. The snake came willingly. "I don't want you to do that," he said quietly. He focused on running his fingers over Salazar's crest, focused on the wordless hisses that Salazar let out in pleasure with every stroke.
"Don't want me to… what, leave?" Voldemort let out a small laugh, the sound filled with disbelief. "Harry, I can't stay. Not when running the war is going to put you in danger. You hold something… something immeasurably precious to me, and I cannot allow you to come to harm if I can prevent it."
"Then stop taking prisoners!" Harry snapped, the words coming out far louder than he'd intended. "Find another way."
Voldemort let out another harsh laugh, this one far louder. "Stop taking prisoners? Little boy, do you have any idea of how war works? I cannot simply stop taking prisoners, as you say! I need the information that they provide. So we'll move to Malfoy Manor and—"
"What if I don't want you to go?" Harry asked, desperate. He could tell, he didn't know how, but he knew that he was at a turning point in everything. If he let Voldemort leave Black Manor, then things were going to change, and he didn't think that they were going to change for the better. He'd ignored the war for too long. How many people had died while he'd been playing house with Regulus and Severus? What could he have done differently to change the tides of the war from this side of things?
"That isn't your choice to make," Voldemort snapped. "I do this for your safety, Harry. Surely you can appreciate that, can't you?"
Harry shook his head. "Gryffindor," he said sharply. "We're not… we're not as concerned for our own safety as we should be." Except for when they were broken by multiple rapes, not that Harry wanted to think about that very much.
"It's my job to be concerned for you," Voldemort said. And then he shook his head. "But if you really want me to stay, I suppose it won't hurt for me to do so for a handful more days."
Harry let out a small sigh of relief. He had a few more days. A week, hopefully, but probably no more. He just knew that he could do something to convince Voldemort to do… something differently. He hoped. "Thank you," he breathed.
"Don't thank me," Voldemort snapped. "I'm only staying for a handful of days so that you don't damage yourself further, psychologically, torturing yourself for my decisions. Narcissa says you've been making great progress, and I'm certain that it's already been set back by this unfortunate incident today. I wouldn't want to set it back further by making you feel even more helpless."
With those confusing words, before Harry had the chance to respond, Voldemort stood in a fluid motion and stalked out of the room, his footsteps loud on the floor. The door slammed behind him. If Regulus and Severus hadn't been awake already, if they hadn't woken up when Harry had shouted, they were probably awake now.
Harry sighed, stood, and went back into the bedroom. He was unsurprised to find that Regulus and Severus were both sitting up, leaning against the headboard, their heads close together. They were talking softly, but both fell silent when Harry entered the room.
"How are you feeling?" Regulus asked him quietly. "Do we need to call Narcissa?"
Harry swallowed. It probably wasn't a bad idea, but… "I think I'm okay for tonight," he said quietly. "I'll talk to her tomorrow, during my normal session with her." He wasn't sure if he would sleep again, of course, but he didn't think that he was on the verge of freaking out again either.
"Did you eat anything?" Severus asked. He shifted away from Regulus, leaving just enough room for Harry to slide into bed between them if he so desired.
Harry did want to, and did so without a word of protest. Once he was snuggled between the two of them, safe and warm, with Salazar curled up on his lap, Harry said, "I held a pear while I was talking to Voldemort, but I didn't manage to convince myself to eat it. I'm sorry, I tried."
"It's okay," Regulus said, although Harry knew that it really wasn't. "Just promise that you'll try to get something down in the morning?"
Harry shrugged. "Can't," he said honestly. The chances of him being able to eat after what had just happened… he shivered, then pressed his face into Severus' shoulder, trying to block out the image of the twins and their lifeless stares.
"Okay," Severus said immediately, the words soft and soothing.
Harry felt gentle fingers begin to toy with his hair, and didn't know if they belonged to Severus or to Regulus. But they were soothing, and so was the sound of Severus' voice as he murmured things quiet and low into Harry's ear, and Harry found himself drifting off to sleep almost before he knew what to do with himself.
