I'd never planned to come back to this house. Site of my earliest victory over my past and my blood. Subject of dreams – nightmares, pleasantries, raving laughter forcing me from sleep to consciousness. One event in the cacophony of past time that stands out clear, hard but not sharp, throwing childhood and victory into focus. I cannot deny that there is a certain irony in taking up residence here – an irony I embrace. Just today I ate dinner in the downstairs parlor.
The same chairs are still in it.
I'd been here since last July at least – June perhaps – time is of little meaning when one has only a rudimentary body. At first we kept to the upstairs. It was pleasant, and only once were we disturbed in the months we stayed here. Yet now, as a human, pacing these halls so familiar and yet so alien, I feel a weight settle upon me.
Perhaps it is the irony of having come here, to Tom Riddle's house, in search of shelter and healing in my hour of need. I did not think such thoughts before, so consumed was I with merely staying alive. You have no idea what it is to have to concentrate on living – no idea of what it feels like to labor under the knowledge that the only thing keeping you alive is the concentrating on it. The body is largely a container for the soul. Much as a jug is a container for water. Once the body is broken the waters of the soul and the life-force wash out, disperse, are gone.
Only I, in my dark knowledge of death and immortality, knew what spells to weave, what thoughts to focus upon to keep my meager spirit-waters in one place. A container of the mind.
Living, having a body, is making me lazy. Or so I fear.
I wonder what it is like to die. Is that strange? I, who hope never to die, who have witnessed more death than most wizards the world over? Who have caused much of that death? I nearly died. And still I don't know what it is – what dying is. Knowledge is power. But death is the end. And if there are limits to knowledge, then power is also limited.
I can't have it both ways, I realize – I'll take the immortality and live on without the knowledge.
I have power enough. I can feel it within me. The magic itself moves within me, though to feel it is impossible (doubts dutifully recorded). The magic has taken over this house, even. I don't know what it is – the enchanting effects of a triple-murder? – but I know power in this house. What was once a place that left me feeling exposed, the only solid thing in a world of liquid, clawing at water, is now a place where I feel the dull thrum of life and reverberate with it.
The world is real here.
If only Harry Potter were dead, it might be cause for celebration.
Maybe that's the reason for the heaviness which sets upon me now, which bids me sit down on a bed, rest myself. I am real; the house is real; the magic is real! It was always real, you understand, but it was hiding under the illusion of…I cannot explain it. But Harry Potter is still alive, Dumbledore knows of my return, and my best-laid plans are coming to naught. (My hip hurts too.)
Or perhaps, and I realize the probability much as I might like to deny it – it is being here in the house of my father. Green-eyed, red-haired brute of a man. Man dead fifty years, in death donating to his son a bone and with it new life.
I wonder if it was the left leg bone. My hip hurts so.
No, I'd never planned to come back to this house. I knew that for the dark spells to work, for me to be brought back to life, I must travel here to perform the needed ceremonies…but once Wormtail, fool as he is, had gotten us back to England we'd ended up here permanently. Living (or the nearest equivalent). The house was abandoned, after all, with naught but an old Muggle gardener within a mile of it.
I came here seeking shelter. I came here seeking life. I came here seeking…
What a reversal of fortunes has taken place! In the midst of my ponderings, I cannot help but laugh. Wealthy Riddles, destitute grandson come to pay a visit…dead Riddles, with a grandson who is now the most powerful wizard in the world. Irony sweet and lulling.
Lucius visited tonight. We'll be moving to new quarters soon, I and my Death Eaters will. We daren't meet here more than a few more times before finding other graveyards to haunt. But he came, and we ate a cursory dinner in the downstairs parlor. Wormtail is an able cook when put to task, if not gifted. Lucius brought news – Dumbledore's conviction that I had returned, the Ministry's denial, the Daily Prophet's campaign of words against Harry Potter and Dumbledore…good news most of it. I enjoyed especially the notion of Dumbledore looking the fool to the greater Wizarding world – as I have known him to be for decades…
This summer is extraordinarily dry, and not a cloud marred tonight's sunset. Wormtail scuttered back and forth, bringing food, and, after dinner, tea. I questioned Lucius, and Lucius answered, and by and by we settled into a pleasant silence. Lucius looking uncomfortable, me settling back into my chair. Home at last.
"I do wonder at the décor these Muggles indulge in," said Lucius at last, casting a sneering glance around the parlor. The sun caught his hair and made it a flame of silver colored red. "Cheap. Tawdry. I do wonder how they put up with that door," he said, pointing at the ornate entrance to the room. His face bore an expression of old-money snobbery. "If this were my house, it would have been gone years ago. Gold plating, I say, gold is the way indoors." He glanced at me in sudden anxiety. "Not that I am criticizing, my lord – I realize you will be leaving this house soon, that it is not yours…"
I let him trail off, the sun staining his face in blood. I took another sip of my tea, and found that somehow, in the course of several seconds, it had become old and bitter.