Title: Dark Heart
Pairing: Harry/Voldemort
Content Notes: AU, violence, present tense, underage kissing
Rating: PG-13
Voldemort meets Harry Potter in battle for the first time six months after he regains his body with the help of Neville Longbottom's blood.
Voldemort knew that Harry Potter was alive and being trained, of course. The boy vanished from the ruins of the house where Voldemort met the backlash of the Killing Curse. Albus seems to have done something smart and ruthless for the first time since Voldemort knew him, spiriting the boy away to be trained.
Voldemort never expected this, however.
He is raiding a Muggle town, leading his Death Eaters down the bland and boring street, when something strikes at his back. Voldemort whirls around and sees that it is a fanged serpent made of indigo light, its fangs pure white flame.
Voldemort lifts his wand and fights it back, then stares around hungrily for the caster. He encountered that spell once before, on his travels after Hogwarts, when he entered an ancient Egyptian tomb and discovered such a serpent guarding the corpse. Who here could have learned to cast it?
The answer reveals himself without Voldemort having to call out. A slender figure steps from behind the nearest house and walks towards him.
Voldemort is entranced. Even before the boy gets close enough for Voldemort to make out his features—the rumored scar on his forehead and the green eyes that Voldemort has never forgotten—he can sense the Dark magic around him. It treads beside the boy, as ravenous and obedient as a pet werewolf.
The boy halts a few paces away from him and studies Voldemort for a moment. His eyes show no fear. The Dark magic sits up next to him and manifests itself as a dragon, a half-size Hebridean Black, jaws pointed at Voldemort.
"You are Harry Potter." Voldemort cannot blame himself for how he sounds, breathless and enchanted. Potter is the first person he has ever met to wield Dark Arts as deftly as Voldemort does himself.
"Yes." The boy doesn't bother denying it, or explaining why he's there. He simply strikes at Voldemort again, this time with a Dissolving Curse that would turn his skin into bloody slush if it landed.
Voldemort fends it off, and the duel is on.
His Death Eaters don't interfere, although, from what Voldemort can see from the corners of his eyes, not for lack of trying. They don't move quickly enough to interfere. He and Potter circle, moving faster by benefit of magic enhancing their bodies, tossing spells at each other too swiftly for lesser minds to contemplate.
Voldemort blocks all of Potter's spells, but Potter blocks his, too. And the way that he does it catches Voldemort's attention.
He doesn't cast simple shields. The one that goes up in front of him when Voldemort launches the Entrail-Expelling Curse, although obviously a product of Protego, has spikes on the outside and reflects Voldemort's spell violently back at him. And the shields that Potter digs beneath the earth in response to Voldemort's Cruciatus grow jaws that snap like the dragon's.
Voldemort wonders if Potter can use magic that's not Dark, if even his defensive spells react like this. Perhaps not.
It is the most exhilarating experience of Voldemort's life, his battle with his match, his equal. But it is not resolved. Potter moves back a dancing step and rests his hand on the air. The Hebridean Black forms again, and Potter leaps lightly up to fling a leg over its back.
"New tactics," he tells Voldemort, and his dragon takes to the air, neck twisting as it sprays fire. At least five of Voldemort's Death Eaters are down and dying in agony. Voldemort lifts his head as the dragon turns towards him.
Voldemort stands fearless in the wash of its fire, and laughs as he watches it circle back, the boy peering down, his eyes wide.
They vanish. Voldemort ignores the groans of the wounded and dying, and listens only to the soft buzz of his own magic, the warmth of his blood rushing through his veins. It already seems wrong that it is doing so without Potter being there to lift it in combat.
He has to see Potter again.
A fortnight after their first battle, Potter attacks Malfoy Manor.
The first Voldemort knows of it is when the wards ring as though someone has kicked them. Lucius goes white and sways. Voldemort quickly gets to his feet and glides through the Manor towards the front door.
He knows who is likely there, the only person who could be there, who could make the manor's wards respond like that.
He bursts into the open and finds Potter standing there, a cloak of dusty grey drifting around his fifteen-year-old form. As Voldemort watches, the cloak speeds up and turns sideways and it is obvious it is not a garment at all. Voldemort is looking at an incipient sandstorm, which hurtles straight towards him.
Voldemort steps through it. The grains sting his skin, but they cannot flay it off as a sandstorm might on someone with a normal hide. He need only hold his breath, and he can move through the worst of it and not worry about his sight or hearing.
And then he's in sight of Potter again, who's considering him as though he's a fish Potter has caught on a baited hook and is considering throwing back.
"Potter," Voldemort breathes. He can see him more closely and clearly this time, since they are outside in daylight, even if it's cloudy daylight currently, thanks to Potter's storm assaulting the Malfoy wards. "You are enchanting."
"Somehow, I don't think you mean able to overcome you with the Imperius Curse."
"No." Voldemort moves a sliding step nearer, pleased when Potter doesn't retreat. His magic stretches and snaps in the air around him, although not yet taking on a visible form this time. "However did you learn so much Dark Arts?"
"Well, after your little adventure with the Killing Curse and my parents' deaths, my magic won't perform defensively."
Voldemort nods in satisfaction at his theory proving true. "And yet, I have not heard of the Order of the Phoenix or Dumbledore performing them. Did you get special permission? Would you not rather fight on the same side as someone who will always use them and never question your right to do so?"
"Dumbledore doesn't question my right to do so." Potter draws his wand and begins sketching a complex pattern in the air as he talks. Voldemort watches him obsessively. He thinks the pattern looks rather like a Celtic knot. "It's a sacrifice, you see. I don't have a normal life, but I was never going have one after that Halloween, anyway."
"I would give you better than a normal life. I would give you magic."
"I have that without you," Potter says, and finishes sketching the pattern. It glows for a moment in the air, bright blue, a color that is rare in spells, and which Voldemort stares at with curiosity. Then it flies straight at Voldemort.
He lets it hit him because he is curious about what it is, and nothing that affects mortals will affect him anyway—
He gasps as something grabs his heart and seems to constrict it. He crashes to his knees, his hands scrambling frantically at his chest. Is this some form of heart attack? How has Potter induced it in him? Why does it feel mortal?
Then he understands, as Potter smiles at him in a bloodthirsty way. It is not physical; it is emotional. Potter has filled his mind with pounding guilt and crashing remorse, and they are bearing down on Voldemort like twin waves.
Voldemort bows his head and fights through them. It is true he is not used to these emotions, and they make effective weapons. But he cannot give in to them. He cannot. If he does, then he will likely retire from the war or die, and then he will never see Potter again.
In the end, that thought forces him back to his feet. He keeps one hand over his chest, where his heart labors, and hisses at Potter in Parseltongue, "I am not to be so easily defeated."
"I never thought it would be easy," Potter replies, although he looks a little disturbed.
Voldemort feels as if he is falling, tumbling, spiraling through the air. And as if he has wings that he never knew he had. His heart is racing again, but not with guilt or remorse this time.
Potter is a Parselmouth.
Voldemort wonders if this is what falling in love feels like.
Their duel at Malfoy Manor was inconclusive, with Potter Apparating away after just a few exchanges of spells. Voldemort searches for him obsessively, using every scrap of information Severus can give him, but he doesn't find Potter in any of the Order's usual haunts.
He meets him, instead, on the battlefield at Hogwarts.
Voldemort has gathered more Death Eaters than he had before, despite the burning of some of them in the attack where Harry rode a dragon made of his magic (so wondrous); he has promised them that they have only one major opponent, given that Dumbledore and the Order of the Phoenix often refuse to fight, and once he is defeated, they can do exactly as they like, including Muggle-hunting. Voldemort does not say that Potter will be dead, of course. He will be spending time with Voldemort in a location he can't run away from.
He is magnificent.
And he's more so on the battlefield at Hogwarts, splitting and dividing his magic into glowing creatures of pure light that guard the students, actually leaping into the path of flying spells. That doesn't stop him from summoning snakes to attack the Death Eaters, unleashing rains of acid and poison that seem to come from his bare hands, and conjuring flames that stalk specific victims.
His eyes are not only for Voldemort, which infuriates him. Potter's eyes should be upon him! They should be focused on him, as worshipfully as—
As the way that Voldemort looks at him.
Voldemort finally breaks through the last wall of screaming Death Eaters who are all afire, and catches Potter's attention. Potter half-tilts his head, as if about to nod acknowledgment, and then simply springs into the battle instead.
He is breathtaking, and Voldemort finds himself laughing wildly as they fight, never still, moving to dodge spells and the effects of magic already unleashed, using their power to make themselves able to drift through the earth or leap higher than their own heads without a care. Potter fights steadily, grimly now, without a hint that he feels an echo of Voldemort's laughter in his soul. He must be certain that this is their final confrontation.
It is, Voldemort promises silently, but not for the reasons that Potter thinks.
Potter steps back and for a moment clenches himself like a fist, as if he's about to give his next spell all his effort. Voldemort is barely aware of the fires dying elsewhere on the field, of the animals that protect the students shimmering out of existence. His eyes are all for Potter, and his loud panting fills the air.
Potter stabs a hand upwards.
The air around him thrums and turns yellow. Voldemort feels an immense strain, as though Potter is drawing strength from some source of magic far away. He gasps aloud as objects storm towards Potter, a flying whirl of them, and then a force snatches Nagini from the battlefield where she has been fighting in support of the Death Eaters.
The objects circle Potter's head in imprisoning bubbles of golden light, and Voldemort recognizes them. They are his Horcruxes.
Potter opens his eyes and turns to look at Voldemort. His gaze is cool, remote, but his body trembles with the strain. Voldemort knows that Potter will probably fail at holding the Horcruxes here in a moment, and he prepares to catch them.
Then he realizes a golden glow is emanating from Potter as well. More specifically, from the scar on his forehead.
Voldemort stares at Potter. His thoughts feel like they're moving beneath heavy, stifling air. He quickly replays the memory of the Halloween night that he attacked Potter and his parents through his mind, and his body trembles with shock.
He thought he was safe. He thought he had six Horcruxes and the seventh, the piece of his master soul, and all the while he had seven Horcruxes. A magical number. It is no wonder that Potter speaks Parseltongue. It is no wonder that he is so skilled at Dark Arts, so wildly attractive.
There has never been a human Horcrux, to Voldemort's knowledge. Potter is unique in all the world.
Desire rocks Voldemort, when it has been years since he felt it. There is fear, too, that Potter knows his method of keeping himself immortal and has the pieces here and could destroy them, but a far greater fear that Potter will harm himself, and take this wild, blazing reason to live away from Voldemort.
He drops his wand at Potter's feet, and kneels.
Potter stares down at him, green eyes flooded with even more color by the golden light. "What are you doing?" he demands in Parseltongue.
"Sparing the only person I could ever love," Voldemort answers, stretching his neck a little so that it's completely obvious he's baring his throat to Potter. To Harry. He has to think of him like that now, when he knows he's been fighting himself, when he knows a piece of him has been inside Harry, knowing him more intimately than a body can know another. "I surrender. I will swear whatever vow you wish to never act against the intentions of the Ministry again, to stop trying to take over Britain, to disband the Death Eaters. Only do not harm yourself, and leave me alive to enjoy your days with you."
Harry appears baffled by this. He takes a step closer to Voldemort, ignoring the flames and the shouts and the spells around them. Voldemort is not surprised to see that the golden bubbles surrounding the Horcruxes provide their own kind of shield.
"You aren't—you aren't lying."
Of course Harry would have some skill in Legilimency, too, at least the kind that allows its practitioners to detect obvious lies. Voldemort meets his gaze, rejoices in the strong emotions that appear to be there. It's about time that someone besides him felt them. "I am not."
Harry takes another step towards him, and then stops. The golden bubbles around the Horcruxes glow and swarm closer together. "I am sworn to kill you."
"We can all swear something else."
Harry comes a step nearer still, and reaches out with an exploratory hand to touch Voldemort's face. Voldemort turns his head so that his mouth brushes against Harry's fingers. Harry doesn't jump or retreat. He appears pensive.
"I thought I would need to die. Once I realized that your constructed body couldn't be destroyed by normal means and that there really wasn't any means of attaining your death other than destroying all the Horcruxes."
"You have the power to vanquish me. Where does it need to say destroy?"
"Dumbledore always says that love is the most powerful magic of all," Harry says.
Voldemort doesn't know if he would describe what he's feeling as love. How can he, when he doesn't know what love is like? But he knows that he's fascinated, that he desires Harry, that he covets him, that he feels more distress at the thought of Harry dying than he does at the thought of dying himself.
"Be mine, and you need not learn what the most powerful magic of all is on your own," he says, as he holds out his hand. "We will discover it together."
Harry remains silent for long moments, eyes traveling between Voldemort's face and his hand. Then he steps closer and bends his head curiously. Voldemort realizes what he wants at the last moment, and holds still so that they can feel it together.
The kiss is aching and sends long spirals of yearning tracing through Voldemort's body. He reaches up and cradles Harry's face, and holds him to his side, to the beginning of this, to the start of something new.
And around them, the world is silent in awe.