No Beta
Ner words in this chapter: 2,493
"Talking"
'Thinking'
{Talking on the fireplace/Two-way mirror}
–Parseltongue–
Thinking in 3rd person POV/Dream/Memory/Flashback/Others
Letter/Journal/Book/Newspaper
Time change/Date of time
Change of POV
To anyone about to read this chapter: get ready for heart break and a massive need of tissues (I sure did)
Chapter XXI
–Cousin Reggie–
Wednesday, July 26 1995
HJP's POV
Harry arrived Lestrange Manor and was about to get up to go to the loo when his door opened. He put on his glasses to find Voldemort entering in fast strides.
"Wha…?" He started to ask but Voldemort arrived his side and pulled his face up into a kiss.
"It's okay. You are safe now. They won't ever hurt you again." The older promised.
Harry groaned and hid his head into the older's chest.
"You think that was what had me worried for all these decades?" Voldemort hummed affirmatively as he held Harry protectively. "Let's get two things straight. I'm in love with you." Harry raised his head to glare at his lover. "But I am Grey because you are Dark. In case you have forgotten, I was originally Light!"
"Serpens…"
"I might have accepted that I will never be on the Light Side ever again because the man I fell for is the head of the Dark, but do not think for one minute that my morals accept killing. You want to know what got me so pissed? The fact that I sentenced that poor man's life for doing what he had been ordered to do! He was not at fault that he had been ordered to do me a thorough check-up. Because I knew that the only way you would show to the World that you are back was if I gave you a reason. And what better reason than me being hurt by someone?"
Voldemort's lips thinned and took hold of Harry's cheeks, leaning his forehead on Harry's.
"You played me knowing exactly what it would imply and it still ate at you."
Harry hummed affirmatively and was surprised to see Tom smile.
"Why are you smiling?"
"I've known you for so many decades and yet you still manage to trick me. You still manage to control me. To use me against myself. Because even if only one night a year, you know me better than anyone." Harry scoffed at what was making his lover happy. "If it makes you feel any happier, the Healer survived with all his mind." Harry gaped. "You asked me to come out, didn't you? I couldn't kill all the witnesses." The Dark Lord argued with a smirk. "And like you said, he was only following orders."
Harry jumped into Voldemort's arms, hugging him around his neck and kissed the older hard. Leaving both of them breathlessly.
"Thank you." He whispered against the older's lips.
Voldemort nodded and Harry freed him from the uncomfortable position with his back curved forward, to then smile shyly back before he hurried to the bathroom. He really needed to pee.
–SYiaS–
LV's POV
Voldemort breathed through his nose. Serpens was the worst tease and he didn't even know it! Sirius Black Junior showed by the bedroom door in his Animagus form with a clear look of 'Do I need to have a talk with you?'. Voldemort scoffed and left the room, needing yet again another cold shower. He groaned at the reminder that he had to wait another entire month of this innocent teasing until Serpens was finally truly his.
"My Lord." Jeremiah bowed his head as Voldemort passed through him in the corridor. "I take it that my new son and you have made peace?"
Voldemort frowned and took a hand to his lips, only to remember the massive kissing.
"Indeed and I need a shower."
Jeremiah smiled amused but nodded.
"Want me to talk with him over it?"
"And then he'll start doing it fulltime." Voldemort argued. Which really? Couldn't his lower-self be any less hard? It was getting really hard to move.
Jeremiah chuckled under his breath and Voldemort just knew how desperate his voice had to sound.
"Warn Winky to send lube instead of a cold shower." He warned and Voldemort raised an eyebrow. "Sometimes it helps to get it out of our system instead of holding it back." His Knight offered, before bowing his head and walking down the corridor into Serpens' room.
Voldemort breathed down his nose and then walked the rest of the way to his bedroom, the old Winky already popping in two new flasks of lube for him. One on his bedside table and another in the bathtub.
–SYiaS–
HJP's POV
Harry nodded at Lord Jeremiah as the older arrived, Sirius and Nagini camping around the bed ready for sleeping time.
"Can I have a talk with you before you go sleep?" Harry nodded. "You remember that even though my Lord located you before his timeline, that he is holding back until you remember, correct?"
Harry nodded.
"Yes, why?"
"Massive kisses? It turns any grown men horny." Lord Jeremiah put in amused. Harry frowned, only to turn deep red. "I'm not telling you not to kiss him. I'm telling you that you need to remember that the more you tease him the more your back will pay when he can have you fully."
Harry stuttered.
"I… I didn't…"
"We know you don't do it on purpose. But we both know whose back will pay when he really can take you." He put in. "You better than no one know how big he is. And he tended to wait a year… but not a whole year of teasing mind you."
"Got it." Harry agreed deep red.
Lord Jeremiah approached and kissed Harry's forehead, just like a parent would've.
"I'm sorry having to tell you this, you are my new son, Harry… but your lover is also my friend."
"I know. You are looking over both of us." Harry agreed.
The older smiled back and then signalled at the bed.
"Go sleep. We'll talk later."
–SYiaS–
Sunday, July 26 1959
Tom took Harry out the bedroom to the drawing room that night. Cousin Walburga was older than last time Harry had seen her tracking Tom's every move. Pregnant.
Harry smiled sadly.
"Have you decided on a name for him?" He asked her, making all the Blacks look at him by the entrance as Harry looked at Sirius' pregnant mother.
"Him?" A male that looked too much like Harry's godfather asked, Orion by the looks of it. "We don't know gender yet, and who are you?"
"Serpens Lynx Black." Harry put in. "The late Lord Sirius took in Tom because of me."
Orion stood in outrage.
"Don't lie. Serpens is older than me and…"
–I see why my side of the Blacks refuse to be acknowledged as part of the family.–
"Behave, Serpens." Tom argued and Harry rolled his eyes.
"Why should've I?" He retorted before he nodded at Walburga and approached, kneeling before her and smiling at her belly. "Nice to meet you, Sirius." He whispered to the pregnant woman's belly.
"Orion, be quiet!" Harry looked up from his kneeling position, to find Cousin Arcturus who nodded his head back. "Pleasure meeting you again, Cousin Serpens."
"Lord Arcturus." Harry bowed his head. "My late condolences for Lord Sirius. Tom told me."
Lord Arcturus nodded.
"Condolences accepted." He agreed. "After my father's death, my mother told me and my wife all about your parents."
Harry went to stand, but a hand on his shoulder stopped him. He looked to the owner, to find Walburga who then grabbed Harry's hand and put on her belly just before the baby kicked. Harry's eyes watered, he leaned forward and the woman let him put his ear on her belly as baby-Sirius become quite active. As if guessing that his future-godson was present.
"Where's Cousin Regulus?" Harry heard Tom ask. "He'd want to see Serpens."
"I'll get him." One of the many that Harry didn't know the name offered and left.
"So, you believe it will be a boy?" Walburga asked and Harry nodded.
"A troublemaker." He agreed. 'A little marauder' he mentally added.
"Sirius." She put in. "If it's a boy, we'll name him after Lord Sirius."
Harry nodded, while feeling Tom's eyes on him. He turned to see Tom's pained expression. At Harry's raised eyebrow Tom hid it.
–Tom-tom?–
–Do you want a child that much?–
Harry frowned and took in his position mentally, before he snorted.
–Let's just say that my parents and godparents are born during the next year.– He offered before he smiled as Sirius kicked his hand yet again. –But yes, one day I'll want children.–
Tom got ready to reply when someone entered the room.
"Sissy!"
Harry stood, nodded his head at Cousin Walburga before he turned and faced Cousin Regulus. The older man grinning ear to ear at seeing him.
"Nice to meet you, Reggie. You haven't changed at all. That personality will one day put you in danger."
Regulus laughed and approached, pulling Harry into a bone-breaking hug.
"I keep complaining to your Tom that he keeps you all to himself, but does he listen? Of course not. Last year during your visit after promising me to let me see you, then held you all to himself, that bastard."
"It was my fault. I wasn't proper for visits."
Regulus scoffed and pulled Harry at arm's length taking a good look at him. He smiled sadly.
"Promise me one thing." Harry raised an eyebrow. "Don't ever let yourself turn into a Pureblood with a stick up your ass like Tommy there."
Regulus shrieked as Tom hit him with a stinging hex for calling him Tommy.
"Don't worry. I'll always remember you and how I don't need to be like the norm."
Regulus grinned back.
–SYiaS–
Thursday, July 27 1995
Harry arrived his timeline to find Voldemort sitting in the bed looking back.
"What?"
"Today was the meeting with the Blacks, correct?" Harry nodded confused. Voldemort picked an orb and gave it. "Cousin Regulus' last Will was left in your name and only your name."
Harry's eyes grew, his throat tightened and then his eyes watered.
"Wha…?"
"He never married. Not for lack of male proposals. He never had a Heir. He never had someone. Yet he never tried something with the one he wanted-to which always will puzzle me." Harry's tears were raining down his face now. "He left everything to the only Wizard he really wanted but never really tried to have when he died. He left you everything in his name. His place, his accounts, his company that is still going strong and that is still filling your accounts with money."
"Tom…" Harry tried to speak.
Voldemort nodded sadly.
"First-time you kissed me in this timeline you asked me why I am still jealous. This is why. I know exactly what your friendship with him meant to Him. And how unlike me he was capable of living without you. Because he knew you were there for me, he gave you up. I wouldn't be able to do the same if you had chosen him – and it completely puzzles me how he did it."
Harry accepted the orb, Regulus' young face inside. Really? That many years ago he made his Will?
"How… how did he die?"
"We were in the late '50s. A gay was not accepted in the Muggle World. They found him while he was shopping something for me to gift you next year." Voldemort held himself back, his mouth thinning in anger. "You don't really want me to finish."
"Tell me… Bollocks, Voldemort! Stop thinking of yourself for once and just tell me!"
The black in Voldemort's eyes irises turned barely a line in the man's anger.
"An anti-homosexual group beat him into a pulp until his magic went ballistic and killed them and himself included!" Voldemort snapped.
Harry nodded, his throat refusing to work and his eyes burning. He could feel himself starting to hiccup.
Voldemort huffed and stood, starting to walk out the room. Harry grabbed his arm to stop him.
"Not now, Serpens. He is dead and there's nothing I can say or do that will change that. And…" Voldemort shut up at the punch, he looked at Harry surprised.
"Can you stop being an ass and understand that Regulus accepted that he'd never have me and even FREAKING TAUGHT YOU HOW TO PROPERLY STRETCH ME FOR IT, YOU JERKASS!"
"Serpens."
"No, you listen. Regulus never even once tried anything with me. Not even when I first met him. It was always just friendship. He knew the moment he met me what you felt. And really? Are you freaking being jealous because a friend left me everything in his Will? Are you that dumb? I love you, Tom, but sometimes your inability to understand feelings really pisses me off." Voldemort frowned confused. "You really think that if I didn't love you above everything that I would be here? For fuck's sake! I have your bloody Horcrux on my ring finger! Even when I argued about the romance, I already loved you above even my own morals. You think I couldn't have delivered this and all the other Horcruxes to Dumbledore? You think that I didn't have the opportunity to turn this war unto the Light Side's?"
Harry set his orb on the bedside table carefully.
"Serpens…"
"The moment I gave you to the Blacks was the day I accepted that being Grey meant that my morals were last plan. You would win the War. The way you see the world would be the way it would end. Because I love you that much. I always did. You are my world. Regulus, you dumbass, is my freaking friend. And he bloody knew that. He teased me only because he knew it pissed you off! It was never serious. I'm going to miss him, of course I will. Hell! I miss my parents and you don't see me whining at you for killing them, do you?"
Harry stopped in his tirade at seeing a tear run down Voldemort's face. He groaned and then pulled the older into a hug.
"I'm sorry."
"You're lucky that I need someone to cuddle because my friend just died after I spent a whole night talking with him. Or you'd be at Malfoy Manor seeking refuse from the anger that I'd still be throwing at you!" Voldemort didn't argue and Harry pulled him back onto the bed, laying down with him and letting Voldemort hold him as he let his tears fall. "That idiot… why didn't he freaking move-on!?"
"Because you are unique." Voldemort supplied.
Harry groaned and then cried, Voldemort holding him as he did.
(TBC)
To all of you who hasn't realized how this fic works yet:
· when a chapter ends in Tom Riddle's timeline then next chapter is the next day.
· when a chapter ends with the next morning the next chapter is a time jump
And *sniff sniff* one of mine this fic's favourite character is dead on the year he canonically died *sniff sniff*
~Isys