Chapter Five

"My, what a dilemma you've found yourself in."

Crap.

Tom was gazing up at him with fury in his eyes.

"Do you want to know what happens to disobedient brats?"

Harry's breath caught in his chest. The expression on Riddle's face, his dark, dark eyes – it was far too similar to Voldemort. For a split moment, Harry quailed under it, wordless with fear in the face of a greater predator. That was his first instinct.

His second instinct was to open his mouth and blurt out: "Shit."

"Shit indeed." The corner of Tom's lip twisted.

As if by some strange telepathic connection between Riddle and his goddamn wards, the rope clenched down on Harry's wrist, hard, right to the bone. He gasped. Pain thrummed through his wrist to his shoulder and it fucking hurt. Maybe it was just his imagination but Harry swore Riddle's expression got smugger.

"Look" – and Harry thought his tone was pretty damn reasonable for someone in his position – "why don't we talk after you've let me down, yeah? Because right now –"

"Please be quiet."

Any somewhat intelligent person with a sense of self-preservation would have listened. Anyone who understood what a young Dark Lord was capable of would have listened. Harry was both. But he was not going to shut up.

"Right now," Harry drove on, louder, over Riddle's words, "my shoulder is killing me and I would appreciate it if you can let me down."

Silence dawned upon them. Tom looked like he had just been slapped.

"Please," Harry added with false cheer.

He needed to probe at Riddle's boundaries. Test the waters, so to speak. The most dangerous enemy, after all, was an enemy you didn't know. And Tom Riddle was a different kind of beast to Voldemort, making him – if anything – more dangerous. Hence, Harry needed to know the line that separated Tom Riddle's control from murderous rage. And this, unfortunately, involved sending him into a murderous rage.

Harry's skin prickled with a sense of ill omen as Riddle turned slowly towards him and smiled. A flash of sharp teeth from behind red lips. Something out of a child's nightmare, Harry thought ironically, or a bad romance novel.

"And here I thought a part of a father's job," said Riddle sweetly, "is to teach his son responsibility. What was it? Spare the rod, spoil the child? You put yourself in my office. It's up to you to take yourself out."

That bastard.

Tom Riddle, Harry suddenly realised, was very different to Voldemort. When Voldemort got angry, he dissolved into hisses, torture and maiming. When Tom got angry, he became annoying.

"But it's a bit much, isn't it?" Harry said. Pain and heat was building up in his wrist and shoulder with alarming speed. The longer he dangled, the more it burned. "With that level of paranoia, people will think you have something to hide."

It was too much. The pain. What an unusual torture to use in warding – using his own body weight against him. Bloody typical of Riddle. Harry reached up with his free hand to grab onto the rope and lifted himself up, trying to alleviate the strain on his left wrist.

They made for quite a picture. Harry – dangling from his wrist in mid-air and writhing in pain like a dying insect. And Tom – the bastard – was leaning casually against the door, head tilted.

"And with your level of rudeness, as to break into my office and search through my files, people will think you were looking for something," Riddle said conversationally. "Did you find what you were looking for?"

"What?"

"I asked you if you found what you were looking for."

Out of nowhere, the rope jerked Harry up like a rag doll and swung him, head-first, into the wall. White, hot pain. His neck snapped back from the force of it. It happened so fast that Harry's teeth tore a gash through his inner cheek and a metallic taste swelled inside his mouth.

"Oops. The wards have a mind of their own, you see. Are you quite all right?"

The prick knew very well that Harry was in pain. Harry didn't know what he expected when he was caught by Riddle, to be honest, but he didn't expect the bastard to cross his arms and watch while Harry was chucked all over the room by the bloody wards.

"Let's get down to business, Harry. Who sent you to taint my reputation?" Where Voldemort's voice had been cruelly high, Tom's was low. "Who dared to send you to search through my house? What were you looking for? Something to incriminate me with?"

Harry tensed.

Riddle was furious. And Harry didn't know how to answer him. Shit. An excuse. A believable, realistic excuse. Or at least a way to stall for time. It was almost a relief when the ward whipped across his shoulder a second time, in the place it had already landed before, and lit another line of fire.

"Why do you hate me?" Harry finally choked out when he'd finished squirming.

If he could dance around Voldemort, then he could dance around someone who was forty years his junior.

"Excuse me?" Riddle was blind-sided.

Tom Riddle was used to dealing with his Death Eaters. Adults who bowed beneath his power, whom he could punish as he liked. He was used to people who could take his abuse without a fuss. Dinner with Tom gave Harry enough time to observe and gauge. What Tom Riddle wasn't used to dealing with – obviously – was children and emotions.

"It's one thing to not want someone but it's another to deny their whole existence." Harry turned, fighting against the throbbing in his shoulder, to look Tom Riddle in the eye. With vehemence that surprised even himself, Harry proclaimed, "You are my father, whether I like it or not, so I'm here to stay."

Riddle opened his mouth.

Rushing forward, Harry seized his chance before Riddle could take another breath.

"I don't understand why you want to hurt me," Harry said. Here, he deliberately made his voice crack. "I'm not trying to ruin your career – and I would have thought that you, of all people, would understand."

The emotional spew turned sour before it even left Harry's mouth but from Riddle's expression, it seemed to be souring his ears. This made this somewhat worth it.

It took longer than expected for Riddle to respond, and when he finally did it looked like the young Dark Lord was humouring him.

"And why is that?"

Harry had been looking forward to this question. He had tried to guide Riddle to this question like a chess-master. Hook, line and sinker. It felt sweet, glorious, the words like honey on his tongue when he opened his mouth to slap Tom Riddle in the face –

"Didn't your father abandon you?"

The ensuing silence was like the calm before the storm. Harry watched Tom Riddle's expression shift from indifference to utter disbelief and to finally settle on cold, hard rage. With bated breath, Harry waited for Tom to snap out his wand and curse him.

When it didn't happen, Harry couldn't help but give another small push.

"Because you are a mistake like me."

Harry felt, rather than heard, the crackle of Tom's magic charging up the air around him. Powerful in its fury. There was a dark, suffocating sort of pressure as Riddle's magic spread to every corner, and Harry could feel it against his throat.

Yet Tom hadn't yet reached for his wand.

"Except my mum was just drunk while yours had to trick your father into it."

It took only a fraction of a second for everything to happen.

The wards came alive around Harry. The ropes around his wrist tore through flesh as they tightened further – Harry cried out – cutting to the bone, jerking him up. And then there was something at his waist, crushing him. And he was blasted backwards, pulled backwards, Harry wasn't sure – the floor was spinning. Somehow he caught a glimpse of Riddle whose wand was nowhere in his hand.

And then all he knew was a sickening crack. Then mind-crushing agony. It flooded half of his body. Someone screamed in the distance – was it him? And his face was wet. His mouth was metallic. His legs were slipping on the floor. Excruciating pain.

"Open your eyes."

He started. The sound was too loud, grated against his ear. Too harsh. Too close. He couldn't. Didn't want to. His eyes felt heavy, and there was something wet on his face.

"You have to open your eyes."

The voice was back, softer this time.

"What the hell?" Harry tried to say. It came out a slur. His tongue felt numb. Had he bitten it?

When Harry finally managed to crack open an eye, Tom Riddle was there. Right in his face. Crouched beside him. Harry recoiled. Or he tried to. The moment he put his elbow down to propel himself backwards, there was another sickening crack. The pain was astounding.

"Stop moving."

For some reason, the voice grounded him. It was quiet but very matter-of-fact. Left little room for doubt, and so Harry stilled. Suddenly there was a hand fluttering on his left shoulder. The cold fingers felt good there, and Harry inhaled.

But then they were pressing down, harder and harder.

It was hard to breathe again through the pain.

"You've dislocated your shoulder."

It was Tom. Tom Riddle. Tom Fucking Riddle broke his shoulder.

"No," and there was a sigh. Was Riddle actually exasperated at him? Really? "I dislocated it. There's a difference. And if I might remind you, I do have a middle name that isn't 'Fucking'."

Oh, did he say it out loud? Oops.

Everything hurt.

Harry cracked open his other eye.

Riddle was still there, kneeling, fingers flying everywhere. Under his neck. On his wrist. His ankle. Along his ribs. Did Riddle break his ribs too? Harry was going to kill him.

"It wasn't intentional," Tom said, pausing in his movements. "By the way, do tell me where it hurts. It wasn't clear from where I was standing if you knocked anywhere else."

"What?"

"The wards," said Tom, drawing out the words slowly as if talking to a small child. Harry hated the bastard so much. "They were susceptible to strong emotions. I think they … reacted when you baited me like an idiot child. I'm going to have to change them."

God, Harry wished he could chop Riddle's fingers off. And if that was too grisly, it was only because Riddle deserved it. There was another heat pulsating through his veins. Anger. Harry couldn't believe how easily he had been crushed. All those hours of training. All the sweat and misery. All the deaths. His parents. Sirius. Because of –

– Tom Riddle's fingers were on his temples now.

"You may have a concussion. Turn your head to the left."

And as Harry did, he saw his wand. Still lying quietly where he had left it when the wards were activated. Now just a hand's length above his head.

Perhaps it was his concussion, perhaps it was his anger, perhaps he wasn't thinking. But Harry saw an opening and he went for it. In one beat, his wand was in his hand. And in the next Harry had it in Riddle's face.

Tom's eyes widened –

Harry didn't wait for the surprise to settle in.

"Confringo."

All Harry could hear was the shattering of bones in Tom Riddle's shoulder as it exploded.

Hey guys, it's been a while, hasn't it? :) Hope you enjoyed and that my writing hasn't degraded too much in its rust. Do review; I always enjoy reading what you think xD