Previously:

Harry tells Tom about his conversation with Dumbledore. Following further discussion, the boys decide to face Dumbledore together. With their combined efforts, Harry and Tom manage to seal the wards for good.

year one

Following the defeat of Dumbledore, life under the wards returns to normal. As normal as life can feel, given the circumstances. Tom does not experience immediate relief knowing that his existence in this timeline is sealed—the world around him has that soft air of surreality, a detachment from both the past and the present.

Tom exists here, with Harry, but he only exists here. He does not exist in his original time, and he does not exist in the future that Harry is from.

Here under the wards, Tom exists wholly on his own. He is a unique entity, an anomaly pulled from the natural timestream and marooned at a farmhouse in the middle of Europe. The strangeness of his environment relentlessly occupies his thoughts. Even at Hogwarts, Tom had never known peace. There were constant obstacles for him to overcome: his blood status, his lack of parents, his poverty.

Now, none of that matters.

Every morning without fail, Tom wakes with the sun and takes early breakfast in the domed dining area with Harry. There are no difficult decisions to be made. There are no pressing issues for him to resolve. Tom eyes the spread of his belongings in his room—the books, the potions kit, the bloody broomstick he'd asked for—and spends time thinking of all the dreams he'd created for himself.

Dreams of when he was old enough, when he was powerful enough, when he was immortal and wealthy and safe.

Living here fulfills many of those requirements. Tom wants for nothing, worries for nothing, and he can do magic as he pleases. Though he loathes to admit it, the selection of books that Harry's Muggleborn friend had chosen prove to be suitable to his tastes. The books are detailed enough to properly educate and well-written enough to provide a solid foundation for original research.

So Tom isn't bored. In fact, he's enjoying himself immensely. He has time to pursue his preferred subjects without the rest of the world weighing him down. Without his peers weighing him down and squandering his valuable time with their politicking and petty social games.

At Hogwarts, Tom had learned to thrive in the environment he was given, to charm and manipulate, but the sourness of falsity never dissipated—it remains a bitterness in the back of his mouth, the foundation of his upbringing, always lacking, always lesser.

What Tom desires is recognition of his excellence in spite of everything else that society dictates. What Tom desires is that the world be shaped to his honest view, that people be judged by the traits and talents he values. The traits and talents that should be valued.

Tom does not forget his early days of being a Muggleborn orphan in Slytherin house. He does not forget, he does not forgive. His dormmates may tolerate him, may simper at his powerful displays of magic, but it is not what Tom wants. It is not enough.

He might win their favour and their shallow friendship, but they will never see him as an equal. They will never acknowledge him as superior because of his magic or his intelligence— they will forever look down upon him for his dirty blood, for his non-existent lineage.

Compared to that, Harry's honest, straightforward ways are like a cool salve, patching over the damage done by those who came before him. Harry is different. Harry sees him in a way that Tom is sure no one has ever seen him before.

Maybe it's because they now spend all their time together—Harry's perception of him is a picture composed of all the little facts they've learned about each other. Maybe it's because of their similar upbringings that Harry empathizes so strongly.

Or maybe, Tom thinks, maybe Harry looks at him and sees possibilities.

"I'm bored," Harry announces one day over lunch. "We should do something."

"We do plenty," Tom replies. They look after those blasted chickens, and sometimes Tom even helps out in the garden. "But what were you thinking of?"

Harry shrugs, hand rising to ruffle the back of his head in his typical, hesitant gesture. "Something to break up the monotony."

"You could go flying." Harry's broom goes faster than any broom from Tom's time period. Tom can concede it must take skill to maneuver the broom the way Harry does.

"I already do that," Harry says, mild frustration laced with the words. "I would usually play Quidditch, but—" He glances over at Tom, expression guilty, then drops his face back to his plate.

Quidditch is a game for more than one, and Tom is not much inclined towards broomstick sports. But Tom doesn't feel guilty about not liking it, and so Harry shouldn't feel guilty for wanting to play it.

Tom has tried, quite a few times, to engage Harry in more scholarly endeavours. But Harry is convinced of working at the regular pace of his peers, following the meticulous outlines which had been supplied to him by his professors.

The rest of Harry's time, Tom has noted, is spent making chores out of thin air.

Harry can't stand to be still, to be idle. When he is bored of schoolwork, he always finds some task to do in the house. Or even out in the yard, and never mind the cold weather.

"Did you have something else in mind?" Tom presses, hoping that for once Harry will be convinced to study.

Just last week, Harry had demonstrated some spells from their textbooks, spells that Tom had yet to learn at Hogwarts. Tom learns easily, faster than most everyone he knows, but watching Harry cast spells aids his self-study process considerably.

"What do you do for fun?" Harry asks. Then, as if he's been reading Tom's thoughts, he adds, "Besides studying."

Tom had never given much thought to doing things for fun. He does things for reasons. Fun is a concept held in line with positive feelings; he achieves positive feelings with his scholarly accomplishments, with his impressive magical abilities. But Harry doesn't view fun the same way, and so Tom is at a loss for what to suggest.

"No, you should pick," Tom says, smiling. The better if Harry thinks his offer is borne of kindness rather than indecision. As Harry continues to be silent, Tom elaborates, "We're here on our own. No rules, no adults to control our actions. What's something you have always wanted to do?"

Harry blinks, then appears to take the question under consideration, a thoughtfulness stealing across his face. "I don't know, honestly. I usually just do whatever other people feel like doing."

Suddenly, Tom knows exactly what he needs to say, the words coming to him with shocking ease. "Well," Tom says, matter of fact, "it's time for that to change. Make a decision, Harry. What would you like for us to do? We have all the time in the world. We have magic itself at our disposal."

Harry sucks in a breath, eyes distant. He turns towards the colourful stained glass above their heads, to the clear panels that look out at the garden outside. "It's not really the right weather for it, but…"

"But?"

"I've always wanted to build a treehouse."

So that is how Tom finds himself outside in the dead of winter, using his magic to levitate boards of wood to the top of a tree. Harry is wrapped up in two jumpers and a Warming Charm, thick scarf covering half his face, hands at the ready to catch whatever Tom floats up to him.

"This is going to take forever," Tom complains. The tip of his nose is numb and vaguely snotty, and his hands are stiff inside a pair of thick dragonhide gloves.

Harry pauses his work, brushing invisible debris off of his trousers and straightening up. "I mean, it is cold outside. We can go back in and come back to this in the spring—"

"Shut up," Tom advises. "If you fall from that height I'll be hard pressed to catch you, magic or not."

Harry gapes like a fish for a second, mouth opening and closing, so Tom takes the opportunity to levitate another plank of wood. Swish and flick, then up it goes. Harry plucks the plank out of the air and sets it in place on the tree.

It had taken them a while to locate spells that would help them level the floor properly, but from there it had been a simple matter of creating the materials and putting them in the correct place.

Harry derives great enjoyment from climbing trees—maybe because the elevation reminds him of Quidditch—and so Tom had volunteered himself for the task of crafting wooden boards and floating them up. With all the firewood that Tonks had left them, Tom has plenty of wood to duplicate and alter into the correct shapes.

"Maybe we can stop after we finish the floor," Harry says.

"Sure," Tom agrees, just so Harry will stop talking.

"Okay," Harry says. "So we'll stop after we finish the floor."

They stay outside another two hours. The floor is only partially finished by the time they stomp into the house, faces pink with success. Tom sheds his coat and hangs in the closet. As he does so, his eyes catch on the top shelf, on the items he'd once noted then forgotten all about. The boxes look old, worn, and well-loved. They remind Tom of their counterparts, of the game boxes that sit in Wool's Orphanage, fifty years in the past. Games he had rarely played, toys he had looked down upon because he'd decided they were beneath him.

"Dinner?" asks Harry.

Tom doesn't startle, but it's a near thing. "Sure."

Harry's eyes trace a path towards the objects holding Tom's attention. Something flickers across Harry's face, then, so fast that Tom doesn't have the chance to decipher it.

They walk into the kitchen. Tom heats leftovers from lunch while Harry makes two steaming cups of hot cocoa. Since their tasks are hastened by magic, it's not long before they're once again seated at the dining table.

Tom warms his hands on the mug that Harry passes to him, then lifts it to his lips. The taste of cocoa on his tongue is always rich, nearly overwhelming. Tom savours the flavour, the tinge of chocolate bitterness mixed with the sugar and cream. He won't tire of this, even as the sweetness settles like rot in his mouth. Having the luxury reminds him of where he is, of who he is, and of all the things he deserves to have.

Harry cups his own mug, blowing delicately over the surface of the liquid. His glasses are fogging faintly with steam as he takes a sip. The cloudiness fades after a while, leaving Harry's eyes clear and green once more.

The rest of the evening is spent quietly in the living room. Harry's restlessness must have been appeased by their outdoor excursion, because he doesn't pester Tom for company or conversation.

Tom tears through half a textbook before he decides the hour is late enough to get ready for bed. The warm crackling of the fire is enough to put anyone to sleep, and the afternoon's exertion has Tom feeling more tired than usual. Tom sets his book aside and rubs his hands over his thighs and knees to get the blood flowing again.

The motion draws Harry's attention. Green eyes trace over him like invisible beams of light. Tom removes his hands from his knees and sits up. Harry's gaze is a gentle touch, like the heat from the fireplace that Tom can feel all the way down to his toes. Unsettled, Tom rises to his feet and bids Harry a hasty goodnight.

Out in the hallway by the staircase, Tom looks at the entrance, at the closet where the board games are located.

Tom washes up for bed, but once he is in bed, he doesn't fall asleep right away. Time trickles in dribs and drabs while Tom tosses and turns, trying to get comfortable. This bed is just as nice as his four-poster bed at Hogwarts, if not more so, and Tom had not experienced any problems sleeping since arriving here. Tonight, however, his mind seems determined to keep him awake no matter what.

After some hours have passed, Harry's footsteps come and go, creaking quietly up the stairs and across the floor. When the sound of Harry's door finally shuts, the house falls still and quiet. Something in Tom unfurls, relaxing, and in the familiar silence, Tom finally allows the fatigue of the day to send him into a sleep free of dreams.

Winter has always been a painfully slow season for Tom, who associates the winter holidays with an empty common room and dreary corridors. But the house he lives in now is constantly warm, constantly bright. Tom has all the material items he needs to thrive, all the books required to keep his mind stimulated. He has Harry to fill his passing hours with companionship.

Tom no longer feels a pressing need for an audience, for a witness to his success and magical prowess, but Harry obliges most excellently anyways. And even aside from that aspect of it, Tom finds himself glancing over during the day to catch Harry's reactions, waiting for the little tells that signify Harry's amusement, or surprise, or irritation.

Tom categorizes all those minuscule responses, slowly building the mental model of Harry in his head. He is scraping back that genial exterior to uncover the distinctive, compelling depths that lie underneath.

Sometimes Harry will go too far in his excitement to share, to talk to the only other person in the house. Tom welcomes the conversation, encouraging it, but Harry continues to catch himself before anything too interesting spills forth. He'll pause mid-sentence, adjusting his words, censoring the content of his thoughts. It doesn't irritate Tom as much as it used to, though, so Tom lets it go.

On his birthday, Harry gets him a present—a fine cloak of high quality that befits any high class Slytherin scion. It is, in fact, the nicest piece of clothing Tom has ever owned. It does not fit with anything in his current wardrobe. But what's strange is that the cloak doesn't fit with Harry's wardrobe, either. Tom's opened the downstairs closet enough times to know that all of Harry's cloaks and coats, while nice, are nowhere near the same caliber of quality as this birthday gift.

Harry is able to afford the kind of lavish articles that Tom has only ever dreamed of. Harry had guessed correctly, in advance, that Tom would appreciate the finery, the craftsmanship, and the luxury of a ridiculously expensive cloak. Harry, in a bizarre act of intuitive kindness, had seen to combine those two threads of truth into a birthday present.

So Tom doesn't worry about what Harry thinks of him. So long as Harry likes him, trusts him, Tom has no doubt that someday Harry will tell him everything.

When Tom wakes in the mornings, he watches snow drift down upon the frozen garden, covering the stained glass skylights, blanketing the fields in white.

The snow keeps them indoors, keeps them occupied with each other, and so Tom grows used to the shape of a classic chess piece between his fingers. Smooth, enchanted stone that is cool to the touch. Harry is terrible at chess, but Tom lets him win once and sits through the teasing afterwards. It's a small price to pay for Harry's goodwill.

They play other games, too. The play Snakes and Ladders while Hyperion slithers around their ankles. They play Scrabble and argue over the validity of incantations as allowable words. They play Battleship, which results in a very long argument about psychological warfare that somehow ends in laughter.

Harry says they're friends; he says it without hesitation. He speaks of Ron and Hermione and Neville and Ginny and Luna as his 'other friends'. Tom refers to Harry as his friend, once, just to try it, and is promptly bemused by the way Harry's eyes light up in response.

Tom becomes fond of the oversweet taste of hot cocoa, of the weighty feel of the fireplace poker in his hands, of the glow of the fire draped like sheer silk across Harry's peaceful, sleeping face.

On the coldest nights, once Harry's gone to bed, Tom eyes the star-strewn sky, his hot breath misting the air. He is making new memories, drawing new associations. He is reinventing himself in the absence of the relentless, revolving world.

Tom discards the past and looks, instead, to the brilliant, unending future.

They finish their treehouse in spring. Harry immediately dubs it the Treehouse of Secrets, which Tom doesn't find half as amusing as Harry seems to.

They fill the space with cushions, blankets, and Transfigured furniture; Tom considers it as an extension of the house despite the physical distance. There is even a perch for Hyperion to lounge on that Harry paints bright green with silver stripes.

The painting doesn't stop there. Harry digs out more paints from the basement, all sorts of types and colours. Then he proceeds to capture, on canvas, the panoramic sights around them: the brilliant, fiery colours of dawn, the cool spring afternoons when they picnic out in the field, the deep shadows of their treehouse that dance across the ground on a windy day.

There's something mesmerizing about the paint strokes, the hues soaking into the canvas, the mixing of the paints to produce just the right colour.

Then one day, Harry asks him to give painting a canvas a go.

"You're doing fine on your own," Tom says. "I don't need to paint anything."

"It's fun, though, Tom. Even if you're just mixing colours around."

"Save the paints for yourself."

Harry waves his paintbrush dangerously close to Tom's face, dangerously close to accidentally splattering paint on his shirt. "I've got plenty of paint. And I can just make more if I need it."

Tom shifts a slow step backwards, out of arm's reach. "I said I'm fine."

"C'mon, Tom. Just one painting? You can't tell me you're having fun with all that reading you do." Harry squints, paintbrush paused in midair.

"I'm learning magic, which is plenty of fun."

"Uh huh," Harry says, then goes back to his canvas, which is sporting a half-finished portrait of Hyperion lounging out in the garden, surrounded by potato plants.

Harry's done an excellent job of capturing the way the sunlight bounces off of Hyperion's scales. The black contrasts beautifully with the vibrance of the surrounding garden, Tom muses.

There's a softness to the way Harry paints, to the way he portrays the world. To the way the lights and colours and shadows translate into acrylics. It's not the act of painting that interests Tom—it's the unique process of it. It's the way Harry paints that makes it different.

Tom stares at the canvas and its owner for a few minutes before he goes back inside, some excuse or another tumbling from his lips in his hurry to depart.

Tom doesn't want to paint, but he does wonder what he would look like on a canvas, the colours and curves of his face coming to life under Harry's paintbrush. The gleam of his narrowed eyes, the curl of his dark hair, the slant of his half smile.

How does Harry see him?

Tom might not admit it to himself, but the truth of it is that he's too afraid to ask.

As the weeks and months pass, Tom spends less time overthinking and more time simply observing. It's just the two of them in this space, walking paces and spinning circles around each other.

Tom is hyper aware of Harry's presence in the house. He knows the pattern of Harry's footfalls on the staircase, the sound of the backdoor shutting when Harry comes in from the garden. Tom knows the wordless tune of Harry's humming—he's humming songs that don't exist for Tom just yet. Songs from another time.

One day, Tom walks into Harry's room—the door is open, a clear invitation—and finds Harry staring at the wall. The blank, eggshell-coloured wall. All the surrounding furniture has been pushed away from it, leaving the room a disastrous mess. Tom has to maneuver around a box and a side table to get to where Harry is standing.

"I'm going to paint it," Harry says, determined. He's still facing the wall and not looking in Tom's direction.

"Okay," Tom agrees. It's not his bedroom, so why should he care what Harry does with the walls?

"I was thinking about drawing some kind of mural. I'm going to sketch it in pencil first, though."

"Have fun."

Finally, Harry shifts around, and he's looking Tom in the eyes as he asks, "Will you help me paint it?"

Tom blames a lot of different things for what he says next. He wants to put an end to the nagging about painting. He wants to find out more about the future from Harry, and this is a good opportunity for that. He wants… he wants to watch Harry paint some more.

"I suppose," Tom says.

Harry grins, wild and bright. Tom feels warm at the sight of it.

Spring is a season of beginnings; so this, too, feels like an excuse for a fresh start.

Summer creeps up on them. The cheery weather takes a sweltering turn as Tom sheds his jumpers in favour of lightweight shirts with the sleeves rolled back. The hot sun feels like a heat press on his pale skin whenever he ventures outside.

Harry, tanned-skinned and seemingly unbothered by the humidity, wears t-shirts and shorts every day. Tom observes Harry tromping around in the backyard, tending to the feisty, noisy chickens, and mooning over Hyperion whenever the snake drags a new bloody animal carcass to their doorstep.

Tom's outdoor activities consist of holding an umbrella and watering the plants with his wand. Occasionally he'll help Harry feed the chickens, but the bloody things are insane. Two chickens had gotten into a fight during the spring, and one of them had died. Tom wants nothing to do with them.

Most of them, anyways.

One day, Harry happens upon Tom in the Treehouse of Secrets. He gives Tom a disapproving look, then shifts his attention to the fluffy white bird currently hopping its way around on the wooden planks.

"What did I say about chickens in the treehouse?"

Tom jerks his head in a negative. "Cluckers is a good chicken. She doesn't make messes like the others."

"She's going to flap out the window by mistake and die a tragic death on the forest floor."

"Don't be ridiculous. She has wings." Tom scoops Cluckers up and deposits her on his lap, where she settles after a minor cluck of protest, feathers ruffling in irritation at being moved. Tom had named her in a fit of petulance after Harry had bothered him about spending time with her. Not all creatures need fancy names like 'Hyperion'.

"Hyperion's going to get jealous at this rate," Harry remarks.

"Hyperion and Cluckers are friends."

Harry shakes his head. "You have an answer for everything, don't you?"

Tom smiles. "I do. Glad you've finally gotten that fact into your thick skull."

Harry snorts and flops down onto his usual chair, legs sprawled carelessly. "No feathers, Tom, or else I'm going to look up how to carve anti-chicken runes into the tree bark."

"You wouldn't dare." Tom smooths Cluckers' feathers, intent on ignoring Harry's threats. But he does level his chicken with a look. If she sheds a single feather, there will be consequences for them both. "Do not shed," Tom instructs her. If she does, he'll be the one who has to clean it up.

"You speak to snakes, not chickens," Harry teases. "Unless I'm missing something?"

Tom scoffs and wraps his arms around Cluckers. "We have an understanding, Cluckers and I."

"And the rest of the chickens?" Harry asks.

"The rest of them are horrible. I want nothing to do with them." This is his stance on the matter, and he is sticking to it.

"So you have one chicken you like, and the rest can go hang, is that it?"

"Yes. Precisely that."

Harry widens his smile so much that his face dimples.

"What's so amusing?" Tom says cautiously. Cluckers squirms out of his lap and proceeds to strut towards the window. Tom keeps half of his attention on her, and half of his attention on Harry. The both of them are ridiculously distracting.

"Nothing," Harry says. His grin softens out into a gentler expression that makes Tom's stomach twist. "Just a stray thought."

Tom wants to ask what that thought is, but then Cluckers makes a bid for the window and his attention is otherwise occupied. Harry laughs as Tom summons the hen back into the treehouse, the sound ringing loud and clear through the forest around them.

By the time they walk home, the comment is forgotten altogether.

The project of painting Harry's bedroom wall ends up more complicated than Tom had expected.

Harry has a very specific vision for what he wants, and so the project is spaced out in sporadic one-week periods while Harry continues to plan more details. The sketching alone takes ages, and even after that is done, Harry isn't satisfied with all of it.

Eventually, though, they start to paint. They leave the windows open to air out the smell while they work. Tom tries casting a Bubble-Head Charm, but it distorts the air around him, warping Harry's voice like they are separated by thick glass, and so he gets rid of it after a few hours.

After some discussion, they settle on an agreement: Tom will paint base colours while Harry paints the details.

Once his assigned painting is done for the day, Tom sits atop the dresser and asks Harry questions. Anything to get Harry talking, especially while he's distracted. It doesn't matter exactly what Harry talks about, either. If the answers are interesting in other ways, then that's still an added benefit.

"What new inventions are there in the future?"

Electronics, mostly. Improvements on things that Tom already knows. Improved phones, improved cars, improved everything. There are so many things that sound fascinating to Tom, but unfortunately they need to be experienced firsthand. Here in his house they are far removed from the modern, urban living spaces where such technology is found.

"Who is the Minister of Magic?"

A derisive laugh. Cornelius Fudge—an idiot, according to Harry. A figurehead for the agendas of more powerful men. A spineless leader who cowers in his office. A wizard, Tom guesses, that would bow easily to the right pressure. Harry is evasive about the details of his dislike, but Tom can gather that Harry would gladly see the man out of office if given the chance to make it happen.

"What did you plan to do once you graduate Hogwarts?"

Harry pauses on this question, paintbrush held back from the wall as his eyes scrunch around up. "I don't know. I never really thought about it."

"Never?" Tom allows his disbelief to colour his words. "You are taking your OWLs this year, aren't you?"

"I am—" Harry makes a sound of frustration, torso shifting as he squares his shoulders. "I am. But I've had more important things to worry about, yeah?"

Tom's mind does a whirl. For him, the future is always at the forefront of his mind. All that he learns, all that he teaches himself—all of that is for that future. For plans he's made, for the connections he's gathered. Tom's done his research on the Ministry, on the politics of magical Britain, and what he'd discovered were the same attributes that Harry sees in Minister Fudge. Tom looks at magical Britain and sees a nation that will bow to the right pressure.

A nation that will bow to him, if he is clever enough to try.

"There's plenty of time to think about what I want to do now, anyways," Harry adds into the cool air of the bedroom, his jaw firm with defiance.

Upon hearing that, Tom's thoughts settle, and through his confusion emerges a solid, unspoken answer:

Harry had been busy with important things prior to coming here. Harry had been busy with this house. With him—Tom.

"Of course," Tom says, his words distant to his own ears. "I'm sorry I pushed for an answer."

Harry squints, thrown by the drastic change in tone. "Yeah," Harry says after a moment. He turns back to his bedroom wall, to the tall shape of a stag that he'd been adding highlights to. "I'm sure I'll figure it out eventually."

Harry is surprised when Tom wants to celebrate his birthday. Which is offensive, given that Tom has gone out of his way to be nice this entire time. Not to mention Tom does believe in reciprocation. Harry had given him a nice present, and so Tom has taken it upon himself to return the favour as best he can.

"A picnic," Tom says stiffly, leading Harry into the kitchen. A prepared basket sits on the counter, full of fruits and lunch foods.

"This is… really nice," Harry mumbles. "You didn't have to do this for me."

"You do it all the time," Tom feels compelled to point out. "This is hardly a chore in comparison."

"Well, alright." Harry flushes and makes to grab for the basket. Tom swats Harry's hands away and snatches it up instead.

"You're an idiot," Tom tells him, irritated. Then he adds, "Happy birthday."

Harry laughs a little, though the euphoria is watered down by self-consciousness. "Thank you," Harry says, ducking his head the slightest bit.

"You're welcome," Tom says, smug, then begins a march towards the door.

After lunch, they lie on their backs and watch the clouds. It's a lazy type of day, and so Tom is content to listen as Harry describes the shapes he sees.

As his mind wanders, Tom ponders the choices of the strange boy next to him. Do the shapes of Harry's clouds have meaning? Does a dragon-shape cloud have some subconscious explanation behind it?

"That one's a chicken," Harry says suddenly, pointing. "It's Cluckers."

Tom's eyes follow the line of Harry's arm. "I don't see her there." Harry must be poking fun at him again for only liking one chicken out of their many, many chickens.

"It is!" Harry insists. "She's right there, right there in the sky."

Tom shakes his head. "Next you'll be saying that I'm up there in the clouds."

Harry rolls onto his side, propping his head up on his elbow. "You're too complicated to be a cloud."

Something about the way Harry is looking at him prompts Tom to ask: "So what am I, then?"

Harry's face grows oddly serious given the previous levity of their conversation, and his breath passes in and out for long moments while Tom waits for an answer.

"You once said that we weren't so different," Harry says, sitting up. "Do you still think that?"

Now it is Tom's turn to think about a response.

He and Harry have a lot in common, more than Tom had ever expected to have in common with anyone, certainly. But Harry is… Harry is something else. Someone else. There are parts of Harry that make him smile, just as there are parts of Harry that he still doesn't understand.

There is a connection between them, between their wands; a mystery that Tom is no closer to unravelling than he had been when he first set foot on these lands.

Tom had thought that he liked Harry because of their similarities. The traits he admires in himself are traits he can admire in Harry, too. Tom has only ever been self-reliant and self-confident, he has never had reason to trust anyone else—

And yet here Harry is: trust earned and friendship built.

"I think," Tom says, "having things in common helps us get along. But we're not exactly the same, if that's what you're asking."

Harry leans back onto his elbows, his head turning back towards the sun. "Yeah," says Harry. "I think you're right."

Tom turns and stares at the glaring sun and the puffy clouds. The pause in their conversation stretches on like the endless sky.

It is only then that Tom remembers that Harry is not the same age as him, that Harry is now sixteen years old. No one would think they were the same age from just looking at them. Tom's always been gangly, too tall and too serious for his age, and Harry has a youthful look about him, an innocence that is difficult to shake.

"What about my question, then?" Tom says. "What am I, if I'm too complex to be a cloud?"

Who am I to you, Harry? When you imagine me, what do you think of?

Harry tilts onto his side for the second time. His expression is calm, peaceful. Tom stares into pools of green, mesmerized. Tom knows what he thinks of when he imagines Harry.

This very spot in the middle of the field, for one. The gentle sound of feet pattering in the kitchen. The glint of sunlight off of round lenses. The smell of the freshly dug soil and garden herbs. The softest of smiles directed his way.

Harry hums under his breath, then says, "Clouds are… they're distant. Unreachable. You only notice if the clouds are there or not. If they block the sunlight or not. We can't change anything about them—we can only change what shape we think they look like."

Tom wants to protest, to demand a proper explanation, not this nonsensical one. He very nearly does, but then Harry shakes his head. All attempts at speech die sharply in Tom's throat at the look on Harry's face: so determined, so resolute.

"You're a person, Tom. You're a real person, with thoughts and feelings and hopes and dreams. You could change, if you wanted to. That's why you can't be a cloud."

The resulting emotion burns deeply in Tom's lungs. He can't tear his gaze away from the honesty, from the odd eloquence of Harry's words. Clarity burns through him like a fever, more dangerous than any dark magic he has ever attempted, more potent than any self-indulgent fantasy he has ever entertained.

How does Harry see him?

Harry sees him as someone worth saving.

Even after the day is over, this sentiment lingers in Tom's head, an echo of Harry that never leaves him. It prompts a question Tom had never thought to ask himself: who will he be once this strange respite has passed? When he rejoins the rest of the world, where will the new path of his life lead?

Tom doesn't know. He doesn't know what his future holds, and this knowledge no longer scares him like it ought to. Whoever he is, wherever he ends up, the moments he has lived here, with Harry, will remain constant. These golden memories exist only in this space, a space safe from the distant reality of a world where he had been destined to die.

A/N:

this took a turn for the Soft^tm. expect further chicken shenanigans in the future. cluckers is best girl!

reminder to find me on tumblr at duplicitywrites, or in my discord server with invite code 6jcu8qM