Harry didn't see Nagini's searching look towards him as he left. /Oh, Harry.../ she thought, wistfully to herself.
/So these were your friends.../ she looked over the bodies. /Was he perhaps with one of them, before... Maybe that was why he couldn't allow her to become closer to him, regardless of the spells. She had thought that it would have been fun to be with him, to have him as hers. She had wanted for Harry to love her, and her father had consented to her spell, reluctantly, as long as she didn't force herself onto him. He doesn't want his 'precious boy' to be hurt. Sometimes I think he loves Harry more than he loves me! He has even asked me to remove my spell, of late. He won't even tell me why.
But maybe I did the wrong thing. He thinks he loves me, but he ends up hurting me, even if it isn't on purpose... He breaks my spell sometimes, on his own, somehow. But, I still want him!/
Harry was oblivious to his would be 'lover's' inner battle as he wondered around the house. He passes by a room, with the other boy, who was also strangely familiar... But not Vernon Dursley, just the son. He wondered into the living room where he saw a woman tending to a man on the couch. /Bingo/, Harry thought.
He pointed his wand at the couple on the couch. Voldemort wouldn't mind if he killed one more than told. Harry smiled and started the spell when the women yelled for him to stop.
"Harry! You don't want to do this!" she begged, tears were running down her face.
"Of course I do!" His smile faded. /Don't I.../
"This isn't like you, Harry. I beg you not to do this!" Tears began to fall.
"How do you know me!?" Harry yelled back, he had yet to have lowered him wand.
"Please, you won't regret it. I swear, you won't!" She ran forward and grabbed Harry and pulled him into her arms. "Harry, I love you so much." She said this before passing out, everything had become too much for the woman.
"Petunia..." He had no idea where the name came from.
He picked up the woman and placed her beside her husband. /As you wish./(1) He placed a kiss on her forehead and left them there. Voldemort would have to understand.
"Let's leave. We're done here." Harry said once he had reached the room. Ignoring the fact that Nagini looked as if she had been crying.
"You killed him?"
"No. Let's just leave." He started to change back before he felt Nagini put her hand on his shoulder. "What is it?" he asked her.
She put her arms around him before answering. "Nothing. Just hold me for a second."
Harry complied with her wish and placed his head on her shoulder.
"I want to bring them back with us." She whispered.
"Why." He asked her.
"They are important. Besides, they may help Voldemort."
"Yes." Harry kissed her cheek before pulling away.
They levitated the bodies and left the house. Then they apparated with the bodies.
/To tell or not to tell/ That was the question that had plagued him of late. /I'll tell him soon.../ he told himself.
The door slammed, bringing him out of his thoughts.
"They are back, my Lord." Durmail bowed when he entered Voldemort's study.
"Good. Did they complete their mission?" Voldemort looked up from the book he had been reading.
"No, sir."
"What did you say!?" Voldemort slammed the book down.
"Th-they d-didn't do i-it." Durmail would have ran, from the look on his lord's face, but, he knew that it would only be worse for him, in the end.
"Crucio!"
Voldemort sat back, thinking about the situation before him. Why hadn't they completed their task?
He looked over at his subordinate, who was tossing himself around on the floor, and making a real spectacle of himself. He rolled his eyes before muttering, "Finite Incantatum."
Durmail picked himself up from the floor and dusted him self off, jerking every now and then.
"Anything else?" Voldemort raised an eyebrow at him.
"They brought prisoners. Possible recruits. There's something wrong with one of them. And another has a slight injury. I think it was the young master."
"Very well, see to them. Now leave."
/They must be his friends. That's it, I have to talk to Harry/ He sat. Once again. Brooding to himself. How to break it to him without traumatizing him?
Harry had finished locking the door when Durmail found him.
"Durmail." He nodded.
"Young master, our lord wishes to see you. He said that I was to take care of the prisoners."
The boy nodded and made his way to the study.
He found Tom reading one of the many books that littered the room. He knocked softly before entering the room.
"Oh, yes. Harry, come in." He waved the boy to the chair in front of him. He paused for a moment before speaking. "I'm glad that you are alright."
Harry nodded, looking at his feet, some of his confidence earlier vanishing. He had failed his mission. Tom would have to punish him now. As he had seen him do to several others when they failed a mission.
"Harry, it's alright. I would never hurt you. I sure that there was a reason."
"I don't know."
Harry still looked like he didn't believe him, so he rose from his chair and sat beside the boy in his chair. He than wrapped his arms around the boy, who relaxed into his embrace.
"Everything will be ok?" Harry replied quietly.
"Yes." He drew back the boy before returning to his own seat. "I called you here because I have something to discuss with you." He noticed that Harry still looked uncertain. "It's about you Harry."
"What about me?"
"Please forgive me, Harry." Please forgive me. He picked up his wand from the desk and pointed it at the boy in front of him. "Finite Incantatam."
He watched as Harry's eyes clouded over than saw Potter looking back. Potter. He was not Harry.
"What the fuck did you do to me!?" Potter jumped up and brandished his wand from his pocket.
"What I had to do. Listen to me. Please." Tom begged.
"Why should I listen to a bastard like you!?" He glared at the man in front of him. How dare he!
"It's important that you hear me out. Why don't we put the wands away." He took in the slight glow around the boy. A silver colour. Cold.
"You first." Potter spat. Tom hated the flat look in his eyes, like he really wanted to kill him. He nodded before he placed his wand in the drawer, trusting that HE would not pull his wand on him now that he was nearly defenceless, and the boy placed his on the desk.
"You aren't in danger here." Tom pleaded. "Please sit."
He stared at Voldemort for a second before taking the seat behind him. He didn't trust him; he just didn't seem to have much of a choice. If he tried to run he would just be killed by the deatheaters outside the room. He might be able to take down a few. But the numbers would get him eventually.
"You used me." Tom felt the power leaking from the boy and pushed his chair away from him, warily.
"Harry, please. I have to tell you. I couldn't wait any longer. James Potter was not your father."
"What! And you are? Do you really expect me to believe that?" Potter glared at him. The glowed brightened, unknown to the boy himself.
"No! I'm not." How do I explain this, he thought to himself. "I'm not your father. No one is." Voldemort tried to catch his eyes, to make him understand.
"How can no one be my father? That isn't possible."
"Dumbledore tricked your mother. He has blood from the all school founders locked away. His family has held it for emergencies. He used it, Salazar's blood, and Rowena's, to make a potion and gave it to your mother, impregnating her. She never knew that you weren't their child. She convinced her it was a sleeping potion to take a way her bad dreams as she slept."
"Why would Dumbledore do that?" He would never do anything like that.
"He wanted someone he could control. Like he tried to do to me. Only he had a slightly different goal this time. He hates me more than you can possible imagine. From the moment I entered that school he knew that I was Slytherin's heir and he exploited that. He controlled me, made me open the chamber of secrets all those years ago. He wanted Slytherin's power, and didn't care who died in the process, as long as he wasn't suspected. I eventually broke free, and tried to find proof of what he tried the do. I found it in his journal. He had grown so cocky and arrogant that he didn't even bother to spell the pages. I tried to steal it so I could turn him into the ministry, but he was ahead of me. He found me in his office and I forgot the journal as I ran. He wanted to kill me. I was the only one who knew of his plans. I went into hiding after that. He made me lose everything! Everyone I cared about!" Voldemort cried out. His anguish was clearly shown on his face. It hurt for him to talk of this, but Harry needed to know!
"I will not obey you!" Tom grunted. His dark eye's glaring at the man.
"You will. Impirio!" A smile twisted across to old man's face as he watched the young man struggle.
"Nnn-o!" He clutched his head as he tried ward off the thoughts that weren't his. OBEY ME...LISTEN...the thoughts swirled around his head, penetrating every crevice. "...can't...NO!"
"Yes!" Dumbledore hissed. He watched the boy in front of him collapse. The heir was his.
/so His is the voice that I used to hear/
"He made me leave everyone I cared about. You mother." He saw Harry's eye's grow wide with shock.
"She would never have wanted someone like you!" None of this can be true!
"You never knew her!" Tom snarled, before calming himself. It wasn't his fault. None of this was Harry's fault. "And I was different then... After she graduated she went in search of me. She couldn't have before than. Lily suspected that Dumbledore was somehow involved in my leaving, and bided her time. She caught up to me in France. I didn't think that she would try and find me. I figured that she would believe I had opened the chamber of secrets just like everyone else, but she didn't. Lily loved me that much! Almost a year later, your sister was born." Tom watched Harry's face pale considerably the further he got. The boy seemed to have crumbled into himself, and his eyes had fogged over. His energy slowly dieing as well.
/What if he's right/ Harry thought. His mind was racing. He remembered so many things, Tom holding him. Being consoled by Dumbledore. Other memories as well. Hidden and unpleasant. A flash of blood-red hair. Woods. The smell of pine. What was real and what was the lie? He didn't notice that Tom pulled him around the desk to the larger chair on the other side. He didn't notice the tears streaming down his cheeks, as he held him. Didn't notice the compassion and pain on Tom's face. Didn't notice... Wait. He said sister... "Sister?"
"Yes. Nagini. That's why I was worried, terrified, when she proposed. I had hoped that you would resist her. From her frustrations, she has not been successful, I take it." He smiled slightly. "I had only agreed to make the two of you happy. She doesn't know about you." He repositioned Harry to get comfortable before continuing. "Anyway, Lily went out one day for a walk, and never came back, leaving Nagini with me... She seemed perfectly happy before she left. I never knew why she left. I was overcome with rage, in my search for her. I was so sure that someone had stolen my only love from me. Gradually, I started to live up to my reputation for being a killer; I was so desperate to find her. There was no going back for me. It wasn't possible after everything that I had done. I eventually found her in Godric's hollow. With James Potter.
"I confronted her and she said that she never loved me. My sweet Lily had changed, drastically. Said that she only loved James, and could never have loved me, or my 'spawn'." He spat the offending word out. "I tried to kill him, for stealing my life from me. That bastard who tortured my one true friend for fun. Lily jumped in the way and my spell went through her body, and instead of just killing Potter, she had died and I was left so weak I could hardly move. Black got me out just in time, from the decimated house. We never knew that you where there. Sirius had been told that Pettigrew had been taking care of you. That rat knew that I was coming there to kill Potter. He decided that he would get a larger reward with all the Potters gone and never came to get you that night. Sirius, who was with me that night, confronted him soon after and killed him." Tom sighed before continuing.
"Years later I found out about you through Severus. Dumbledore had admitted everything to him after my supposed death. He told Severus all about you, gloating. He thought that he had leverage over my trusted friend, but never knew that Severus was still working for me. When he thought I was dead he decided that it would be best to forget about you. You were of no more importance to him than any other child. But, right when he started to suspect that I was still alive he called you to Hogwarts. He tried to bind you to him several times, but they always broke down. Finally, he used a form of the imperious curse. The same one he used on me. It was more taxing to his strength, but stronger. It worked for years before it broke away. Until your fourth year. Most of it dissipated during that confrontation almost two years ago.
"Only a few lingering thoughts where still under his influence. I realized that there was something about you, I felt it, and I urged Severus to find out for me. You have been acting without the restraints he placed on you since then. Your magic started to show through, your true self. Dumbldore knew about you and Draco. Also, that he knew that Draco's father still works under me. He no longer understood what you were capable of. He couldn't have. You and your friends had become an unknown variable. It was only a matter of time before you found spells that could kill even him, if you chose to do so. You became more than he could control at some point and expelled you and them. Them because they were all under your influence, loyal only to you, and therefore a danger to him. Which brings you to where you are know you are now."
"Why did you cast a spell on me?" Harry whispered. His eyes were drooping further.
"I didn't want to watch you struggle with yourself, and the pain. It seemed better at the time. I didn't want for you to have to face all this, and I wanted to take care of you. Like I should have in the first place. I knew that you wouldn't have come with me of your own choice. Then the chance to finally have you was presented to me by Weasly, though in the most undesirable way possible. Still, I can never say how sorry I am..." He spoke softly as he cradled the small boy.
"Bastard." Harry slowly relaxed as he listened. Nothing seemed real to him anymore. He slowly drifted off to sleep, let his brain shut down. /Draco help me.../
Tom watched over his young charge. Before lifting his into his arms and carrying him to his rooms.
-,---, -,---, -,---, -,---,
I'm so tired of being here
suppressed by all of my childish fears
and if you have to leave
I wish that you would just leave
because your presence still lingers here
and it won't leave me alone
these wounds won't seem to heal
this pain is just too real
there's just too much that time cannot erase
when you cried I'd wipe away all of your tears
when you'd scream I'd fight away all of your fears
and I've held your hand through all of these years
but you still have all of me
you used to captivate me
by your resonating light
but now I'm bound by the life you left behind
your face, it haunts my once pleasant dreams
your voice, it chased away all the sanity in me
these wounds won't seem to heal
this pain is just too real
there's just too much that time cannot erase
when you cried I'd wipe away all of your tears
when you'd scream I'd fight away all of your fears
and I've held your hand through all of these years
but you still have all of me
I've tried so hard to tell myself that you're gone
and though you're still with me
I've been alone all along
My Immortal
-Evanescence
-,---, -,---, -,---, -,---,
Harry woke alone in his room.
He wondered where he was before he remembered the night before. So much pain... Old memories were resurfacing. Nothing was right.
He slowly eased himself off the bed, wondering for a second where Nagini was. Then he remembered that Voldemort had probably told her now, too. /It won't be fun the next time I see her/ he thought, to himself. He was grateful that even if his mind didn't know that his body reacted against everything she tried. /Shit! She is going to be mad/ It would have been bad if he had actually slept with his sister, even if he did think of her that way. Harry shuddered. In fact, he didn't know what to think about her,
Harry shook his head, to clear his mind, and headed to shower.
Afterwards, Harry made his way to Voldemort's study. He still needed a question asked, and he needed to find Draco.
It surprised him how quickly he made it to the study, but, then again, he had learned the castle inside and out, during his last few months. Harry shuddered again, inwardly.
He found the study empty, when he arrived there. Where could he be? Then he thought about the Dark Mark on his arm. It was so a Deatheater could find their master. Then he would have to use it that way, as well.
Eventually he found Voldemort in the thrown room. Harry berated himself for not thinking of that earlier. He was usually either in his study or the thrown room. He should have known.
Harry found him talking to Lucius. They were arguing over Draco.
"He is my son! I will not allow him to be with that-"
"Watch what you say, Lucius! It is not your choice to make!" Voldemort glared at the man, daring him to be insubordinate again.
Lucius just glowered at his lord. But he knew better than to argue further. He was lucky that Voldemort hadn't cast Cruciatus on him yet. Then he saw the boy in one of the mirrors around the thrown, and turned around. Potter.
"No. He isn't." Lucius jumped at the seemingly random comment. /I hate it when he reads my mind. But what did he mean by it?/ Lucius pondered to himself.
"It's none of your business, Malfoy. Now leave us." Voldemort shooed him away with the shake of his hand.
After the door closed Harry moved forward, still not completely comfortable with things. He knew that Voldemort wouldn't hurt him, but there was still too much between them.
"Harry, you can call me Tom." Harry looked at him sharply in the eye before nodding.
"And did you read my mind, Tom?"
"No. Your emotions are clearly written on your face. Besides, I always get a feeling for what people are thinking around me."
"People? You mean your 'Deatheaters'."
Tom looked away before agreeing.
"Why did you make me a Deatheater? Why did you control me?" Harry asked, looking at Vol-Tom's face, searching for an answer.
"I want to make the transition here easier. By making you a Deatheater, I could watch you more closely. I could feel you emotions that way. I never out-right read your mind though, I care about you too much to do that. Even if it doesn't seem that way. You might not entirely remember what happened to you, but all your memories will return soon."
"There's something else that you never answered. Why did He choose Ravenclaw and Slytherin? It seems that the most logical choice would be Gryffindor and Salazar. Wasn't Gryffindor know for his bravery and... well, for generally being good?"
"Dumbledore knew that the Gryffindor and Slytherin temperaments would clash, possibly making you mentally unstable. He could not take that chance. Besides what better to fight a Slytherin than another Slytherin. He also wanted for you to be smart, creative, which was what Rowena had been known for. And honestly, who would want to be related to Hufflepuff?" Voldemort smirked at Harry when the boy gave a tiny laugh. "Sure they are loyal and good and all, but they're a very boring lot. You don't want them in a fight. Now, you were looking for me?"
"Yes. Where's Draco?" /It's been so long since I've seen him./ "I need to see him."
"I've been wondering when you would ask. I think Nagini somehow knew to bring them."
"She said that they were important, before."
"There're in the room across the hall from yours. I have kept then unconscious until this morning. I thought that they would be easier to deal with once you knew the truth."
"I won't turn them over to you." Harry replied, still looking a bit reproachful.
"I don't want you to, Harry. I just want for you to be happy. Go ahead, now. Dinner will be in a couple hours."
Harry nodded before leaving the room.
/now, time for Weasley's 'punishment'/ Tom thought slyly.
Chapter 9
Chapter 11
