Chapter Six: Voldemort's Hero
"…A childhood hero of yours truly."
His words cascaded down her ears like cold rain. She felt her stomach lurched violently as the reality of what he said settled on her.
At some point, Ariel blacked out and came back to in an opulent goth kitchen she'd never seen before. She was sitting alone at a long, sleek, black table. A stray ray of sunlight broke through a nearby window and caressed her back of her neck. For a split second, everything felt so serene and surreal, as if she had just awakened, safe and sound, after a horrible dream.
To her surprise, a black iron tea kettle came down from the sky followed by two porcelain teacups. The steamy teakettle poured out a generous serving into each cup, using its spout to nudge one in front of her and the second to the other side of the table before settling down in the center, hopping down on a black doily like a frog returning to its Lilypad.
She wrapped her index finger around the handle when she felt the presence of someone looming over her. When she looked up and saw Lord Voldemort joining her, she had to stifle out the primal urge to scream, vomit blood, and have a heart attack.
A childhood hero of yours truly…Her eyes, head, and stomach swirled as her brain forced her to relive those words. She fought down visceral shame and abject despair when his voice finally broke through her, asking, cheerfully, "Sugar?"
"No, thank you." She replied, biting back bile and forcing out a smile.
Voldemort scooped himself a generous spoonful of sugar stealing a surreptitious glance or two at his guest as he stirred his tea. Ariel snapped out of her reverie long enough to catch one of his jackal-like grins.
"You look terrified," He observed as he drew the cup to his curled lipless mouth.
"I am," Ariel confessed with a nervous laugh. She saw no point in lying. Everyone knew the wizard could sniff out a lie the way sharks could sniff blood from miles away. She continued laughing as she said, "No offense but you're a terrifying individual."
Voldemort touched his hand to his clavicle, charmed. He had a look on his face like she had given him the highest compliment he had ever received in his life. "That means a lot coming from you."
"Really?"
He laughed, took another sip, placed his cup on the table, and said, "You're kidding right?" When the look of incomprehension didn't change in her face, he explained, "Do you know how long it took me to learn how to make another wizard rip his own dick off against his will? I'll tell you. Twelve years. It took me twelve years of practicing and studying and that was with the use of my wand. You did it with nothing more than your voice and then you killed four other people afterward like it was nothing! Do you have any idea how stupendous that is to me? Hell, I'm terrified of you!"
Ariel chuckled, half-shocked, and profoundly flattered. "Really?"
"Absolutely." Voldemort insisted.
Ariel's body eased as a relieved breath escaped her lips. "Wow…I don't know what to say." She paused for a few heartbeats then added, "You know, it's funny. I often wondered what happened to that little boy in the cave…"
"You thought of me?" Voldemort asked his turn to sound surprised and touched.
"I did," Ariel said, pensively as the boy's phantom appeared in the kitchen and climbed onto an untaken chair to join them. Ghostly scenes of their time in the cave together passed by her eyelids. Him, nine and full of baby fat. He, a few years older, showing off his school uniform. Him, a preteen, handing her a drawing, explaining to her, his prepubescent voice soaked with haughty pride, the difficulty of pulling off an animation spell on a drawing for his age. She still remembered him telling her when she tried to give the sketch back to him, 'No, I made it for you'. She remembered being so touched by his thoughtfulness she had to wait until he left for Wool's to cry. But those sweet memories crumbled to dust as her thoughts turned back to the headlines from the last decades of his murders, his bloodshed, his cruelty. "Meanwhile…I've heard about He-Must-Not-Be-Named every day for the last forty years and I had no idea the two were the same person."
Voldemort listened to her with the brightest, widest-smile on his disfigured face. "The fact that you know of my accomplishments means the world to me." He said. "I am…so thrilled that you are alive to see what I have become. When we met, I was nothing. A little nobody with nothing. No family, no skills, no focus, no purpose. But then you—you came into my life and you inspired me! You made me into the person I am today. Ariel, you're my origin story."
His words shook Ariel to her core. Within seconds, she was convulsively sobbing into her hands tormented by the overwhelming, contradictory emotions that coursed through her.
"I didn't mean to embarrass you," Voldemort started looking extremely uncomfortable by the wild display of emotions.
"You didn't." She stammered out as she used her sleeve to dry her face. "I just—I didn't—I didn't realize how much an impact I've made on you."
"Not just on me," He replied, almost awed. "But in the world. Ariel, you made history. And you realize once I rise to power, and they start writing about my life's story, you're going to be one of the most famous creatures to ever walk to the planet? There will be songs sung about you and your influence. Historians will fight each other to the death just to get a word from you. You will be a living legend."
With that, he reached forward, tapped Ariel on the hand, and said, his voice soaked with sincerity, "I can't thank you enough for what you've done for me." Then he paused and she noticed a realization cross over his eyes. "Hm. I just realized…I think you were the first person to actually give a shit about me. Hm." Then he let out a dismissive laugh as he took another sip of tea.
"But, enough gushing," he replied using his wand to pour them both another cup of tea, "Tell me about you. What have you been doing for the last sixty years?"
"Oh, nothing much," Ariel replied. "Kinda drifted around for a while, excavating sunken ships, making potions. Other than getting my legs back, the most exciting thing that's happened to me in the last six decades was getting one of my recipes published."
"Oh, I saw your copies of Potions Heads Monthly. That reminds me, I really want to introduce you to one of my followers. Good guy, kind of boring but I think you'd hit it off. He actually edits for that magazine."
"No shit," Ariel replied, barely listening for a nauseating numbness had begun to erode her insides.
"Yeah, he used to teach the subject too," Voldemort said in-between sips. "Oh, that reminds me…I need to call a meeting soon. I got to introduce you to the troops." He nudged her with his elbow playfully and said with a laugh, "Can't afford to lose any more followers to you now."
Ariel made herself laugh as the sickness in her stomach grew denser. You are bottom of the ocean floor putrid whale shit, Triton's voice sneered in her ear. Suddenly, he was at the table too. Only he was glaring at her, piercing her heart with unyielding contempt. I know, she thought sadly as she shared a laugh with Lord Voldemort.
"I'll make the meeting for tomorrow," he informed her.
"I can't tomorrow. I have a date." She said without thinking.
Something in his face changed. She felt her throat tighten and the air thin from her lungs as images of her torture, her drawn-out murder, flooded her mind.
But then he blinked and he gave her the oddest, closed-lipped grin. "Oh," His voice rumbled with mock scandalization. "Gross."
Ariel let out a hearty laugh in spite of herself. "Well, I see your views on sex and love stayed the same."
"Some things never change," he snickered and for a heartbeat, they were giggles. Until Voldemort said, with all seriousness, "So tonight then?"
Ariel hesitated but the coward in her spoke first, "Tonight? Sure. Why not?"