Chapter 13: A Landscape of Hands

Memory is a landscape of hands too afraid to make fists
Memory is a tall smokestack bleeding out ghosts
Memory is a needle hidden in dandelion roots
Memory is a wishbone rattling inside the altar box

— memoria by keaton st. james

It was, once again, Halloween.

The veil between life and death was thinner than ever, and so was the veil between him and dark magic. He could also feel the border separating him and Harry shimmer, blurr and shift. Samhain was a crossing of seasons, a crossing of realms, a crossing and a blurring of lines. A time when nothing was certain and everything was powerful.

Voldemort didn't even feel tired, not the way he usually did after exerting himself. And he had, definitely, exerted himself way past his limits the day before. Or at least the limits he used to have. Despite the agony, he still gained more strength every day, and on days like Samhain, other equinoxes, Lammas, Lithas, and others, he gained even more.

The day before he'd been forced to use a confundus and a keenly precise obliviate in quick succession. Vernon Dursley had been about to break Harry's arm for god knows what. And he'd acted without thinking. The boy wouldn't have been able to heal himself. Not that he couldn't, because he definitely could, but because even Dursley wasn't stupid enough to think a broken bone could heal in less than a week. Especially without medical care.

Voldemort had been able to keep Harry's bursts of accidental magic down enough that Vernon probably thought they'd succeeded in beating the magic out of the child, but Voldemort suspected Petunia knew better. She was smarter than her husband and son by far, and knew something was going on.

Of course, this didn't mean she was any more pleasant to deal with. It actually made her a little more dangerous, because she kept a closer eye on Harry. Growing up with a witch, she also knew exactly what entailed as accidental magic. And how you couldn't really 'stamp the freakishness' out of anyone. Unless you wanted to create an Obscurial.

He wondered if that's what would have happened to Harry if he hadn't been there. If Voldemort's prophesied demise would have been an uncontrolled obscurial. Or perhaps the boy would have just died. Or maybe he would have persevered, somehow. Harry could be remarkably stubborn when he wanted, after all.

For now, he just allowed himself to be grateful that he was here, that he had managed to figure out the fact that Harry was a horcrux, and that Voldemort retained enough of his faculties to take as much control of the situation as he possibly could.

Control that he could see was closer than ever.

With the thinning of that which kept Voldemort and Harry as separate entities, he could see a trail that led to himself. His own horcrux, closer than ever and yet so far intertwined with Harry that they were inseparable, and with that, making Harry and Voldemort inseparable as well, no matter if Voldemort left Harry, no matter if he found his own physical body; this intrinsic, essential part of him, a piece of his very soul, will always remain attached to Harry until the boy either died or he managed to somehow muster up enough remorse to reabsorb the soul piece back into himself.

And he had absolutely no intention of indulging in either.

He wondered if he could take over Harry's body. Perhaps not permanently, but maybe a possession of sorts?

Now, that's an idea.

Especially with Samhain boosting both their magics like this. It could end up being extremely painful for Harry, or the boy could remain completely oblivious and wake up remembering nothing of what happened.

Possessions were finicky things, with strange effects on both the possessor and the possessed.

But Voldemort hadn't gotten where he had, hadn't made unprecedented breakthroughs in the field of magic, by not taking a few risks. And besides, it's not like he could die.

Perhaps if he informed Harry of the process, and the boy consented to it, the experience would be smoother. Voldemort felt almost… giddy, at the thought. Of being able to have a body, if only temporarily, even if it weren't his own. But he could exist in the material plane, even as a thief, even as a pretender. He would be able to take in a deep breath, fill up his lungs, maybe even manage to eat something.

He had been doing that on a semi regular basis in the dreamscape he often met Harry at, the unreal, distorted nature of everything in that place was a constant reminder, a constant nagging at the back of his head that stopped him from experiencing it well. He could always tell it was nothing but an illusion, that he wasn't really there, that it could all be swept away like sandcastles under waves. Even more fragile than sandcastles, really.

But this, if he managed to possess Harry, this would be the real thing. Not a manufactured reality, but the real one, a tangible existence.

He just had to convince Harry of it as well. He didn't think it would be hard, the boy was always trying way too hard to please Voldemort, if one didn't count the brief moments where all rational thought left the boy and it seemed like he was actively trying to see just how angry Voldemort could truly get.

Harry had no idea of what, exactly, he hadn't seen yet.

"Mr. Lord?" Harry interrupted his musings, sensing Voldemort's turmoil. "Are you okay?"

This was a little inconvenient, but he was starting to grow used to it. Perhaps a fair deal– almost. He had access to almost every one of Harry's thoughts, and now Harry could sometimes sense his feelings. He'd also realised that some of the more negative, extreme emotions would sometimes hurt his scar. Which was interesting, but not entirely unexpected. The scar was clearly a ritualistic leftover from the killing curse, and had significance.

It also meant that Voldemort was getting quite good at anger management. He didn't know why he bothered, really. But the Dursleys hurt him enough as is, if he could take away a little bit of that pain, why not? It's not like Voldemort had better things to do.

"I'm thinking," Voldemort said slowly, trying to figure out the best way to convey the idea of possession to Harry, before deciding that maybe bluntness was the best way, "Of possessing you."

Harry's eyes widened, and he sat up from where he had been lying down on the bed with Nyx in his lap and Iris preening at his hair. Both the creatures managed to look disgruntled at the abrupt shift, and Harry quickly soothed Nyx with scritches while Iris hopped up onto his head.

"Possession? Like, uh, controlling my body?"

"Sort of."

Maybe. He really had no idea how this would go about. Before… before his discorporation, he'd been toying with the idea of making a living horcrux. A magical snake, to be precise. A familiar that transcended the usual bonds of magical pet relations. And he'd given thought of being able to possess the horcrux, since being a horcrux essentially made them a vessel, and a vessel could be taken over.

But that had been an animal. A magical animal with more sentience than non magical ones, but an animal nonetheless. Or reptile, in his case. Either way, a human could prove some complications, especially a magical human. They had their own magical cores, a sentience and intelligence that was nearly unparalleled. He thought this might feel akin to trying to possess a dragon, or another one of the highly intelligent creatures that would decidedly not allow him control over their bodies.

Eve peeked out from the sock Harry had put her in to keep it warm, and it hissed lazily at the bird nibbling on Harry's hair before going back inside into the warm darkness.

"How will that work?"

Harry sounded more excited than off put. There was barely any hesitation. This was going a lot better than whatever Voldemort could have hoped for. There was barely any trepidation from Harry, and Voldemort thought perhaps he should be a little concerned about the blind trust he had in Voldemort, but why look a gift horse in the mouth?

He was a Slytherin, in house and in blood, and a Slytherin always took the opportunities presented to them. And besides, it wasn't like he would actively try and hurt Harry. The entire reason he wanted Harry's permission was so he could minimise the chances of something going truly wrong.

"Since today is Samhain, our powers are at their peaks. That's why I was able to do that to your Uncle yesterday, without tiring myself out too much."

"Yeah, you even healed up the bruises on my stomach today!"

"Exactly," Voldemort said, "And so, due to this, and because we're both already connected, it shouldn't be too hard to be able to possess you."

"What would it feel like?" At least he was asking some questions instead of blindly and eagerly agreeing.

"I don't know," Voldemort confessed. He had to say it now or the boy might panic badly when something unexpected happens. He could still panic with the warning, but at least it won't culminate into a fight about how Voldemort lied to him. That would be tedious. And also, perhaps warning for the unexpected, it would also serve to mitigate some of the knee jerk panicked reaction. "I've never done this before, it's a theory."

Harry frowned, his fingers still moving through Nyz's dark, fluffy fur. "Will it hurt?"

"I don't think so, but it could. I'll withdraw if that happens." And he would, however much it pains him. If the possession caused Harry extreme physical distress, he'd withdraw. As for emotional distress, he'd probably try to calm the boy down first. He wasn't going to let his chance at experiencing reality go just because the boy didn't have enough mental fortitude. If Voldemort could exist as a wraith for six years, Harry could certainly handle it for a few hours. But he'd withdraw if he were truly hysterical. He didn't want to break all the trust he'd spend literal years developing.

The things he did in the name of trust. This was the exact reason he'd kept himself away from forming personal bonds. One had to sacrifice their own needs and comforts to provide for the others. It would only breed resentment and frustration.

But this was an investment. He, whether or not he wanted it, needed Harry's help, and in turn, needed his trust. He couldn't do anything for himself, not with the way he was. And especially not now that the Wizarding world thought he was dead. Not when none of his Death Eaters had tried contacting him, not when he'd felt nothing from his connection to the dark mark.

And it could be just because he didn't have a body anymore, of course. Perhaps the dark marks had gone dormant, but that didn't really help, because in the end, he still had no one but himself and Harry.

"Have you ever been possessed?" Harry asked next.

"No."

"Okay, well. Uh, when will you do it? What will it feel like? Like, will I be asleep? Would I know what you're doing when you're– when you're possessing me?"

"I told you, Harry, I don't know."

"Right." Harry raised his left hand almost instinctively to put his thumb in his mouth, and Voldemort only had to make a warning noise for him to drop it down immediately, looking sheepish. At least the boy was learning. "Sorry," he said. He let Nyx purr contently in his lap as he wrung his hands, biting down on his lips at the lack of a thumb to chew on.

"You promise you'll stop if it hurts?"

Harry's trepidation was… not exactly warming, but at least the boy had concerns, like he should. He could be entirely too naive sometimes. And while it worked in his favour currently, it had the potential to backfire drastically on Voldemort's plans. "I said I would."

"Right, yeah okay. So, when will you do it? Right now? I can't really go out today, you know. Aunt Petunia won't let me."

Voldemort would have preferred going out, actually. Feel the sunlight on his– borrowed, but his, just for a moment– skin. Maybe touch some grass with bare feet. Maybe even sit on the swings in the park. Childish, yes, but then again, it's the body of a child. He should be allowed to indulge after six years of abstinence.

No one said he wouldn't do it, though. And he wasn't going to follow some asinine instructions set out to maximise the misery of a child. "When do we ever do what your relatives want you to do?"

"Well, yeah you're right. Just, like, be careful. Aunt Petunia doesn't like Halloween, so she's in a bad mood."

Voldemort could take a guess at why the woman didn't like Halloween. He didn't either, for the most part. Every year this day brought with it not just a surge of power, but also a surge of memories and grief. A double edged sword. He didn't think the day would have been a good one for Harry either, if he had remembered his parents at all.

"I doubt she's going to want to look at you today," Voldemort said, and Harry grimaced.

"Yeah, you're right. She never wants to look at me. None of the Dursleys do. Well, except maybe Dudley. He wants to see me just so he can chase me." Harry's lips twisted, a frown marring his features as he thought about the last time Dudley had pushed him into a puddle of mud, kicking him in the side.

Voldemort had told him about a mild curse that had made at least half the hair in Dudley's head fall off, along with giving him a truly awful cold. It had, of course, also been instrumental in giving Harry better control over his magic, rather than just directing accidental magic. Harry had still been punished for getting his clothes muddy, though.

Sometimes there was just no winning.

Even Voldemort, with all his powers, hadn't been able to make his stay at Wool's Orphanage pleasant. Bearable, yes. But never pleasant.

"You should close your eyes and try to sleep," Voldemort said. That was the easiest, and safest way of possession he could come up with. Sleeping left the untrained mind vulnerable, sleeping was when Voldemort found it easiest to enter Harry's mind on a fundamental level, hence the dreamscapes where they could meet and interact. Possessing him in this state would also lessen the chance of him accidentally damaging Harry's mind, which was his biggest concern at the moment.

"I don't think I can. I'm not sleepy," Harry said, but obligingly let his head fall back against the wall the bed was arranged against, letting his body relax and closing his eyes.

"I can cast a mild sleeping charm, if you want." Voldemort was fairly certain he would be able to. It was Samhain, after all. A day of possibilities, a turning. Excitement bubbled within him, a kind of happiness he hadn't felt in a long, long while.

A possession wasn't anything close to having his own body, but it was the closest he could get to that right now. A sweet taste of what he'd had and lost, and what he would have again.

"Okay."

If Voldemort had a mouth, he'd have smiled as he cast the charm. And he would, soon, be able to do that. Just for a while, just for a moment.

As Harry fell asleep, Voldemort felt the connection between them deepen, and a whole new world of possibilities opened up to him.

Voldemort opened his eyes.

The world hit him like a storm, a riot of colours, smells, and sounds. Everything that had been muffled before, like he'd been underwater, was stark and sharp edged now. Everything was real now. He could feel the bed under him, the hard, poking mattress, the rough, scratchy blankets. He could feel Nyx in his lap, stirring and meowing. He could feel Iris pulling at his hair.

His hair. He reached up a hand– a hand– up to his hair, feeling the soft strands slip through his fingers. Iris hopped onto his hand as he brought it back down, staring at the little bird. He'd known, theoretically, that its eyes had been green, but that had all been filtered through the lens of Harry's experiences. None of it had been his own.

But now it was. He was seeing the bird with his eyes, was looking at her, her green green eyes. He could feel the warm, solid weight of Nyx.

He wasn't looking at Harry, he was looking from Harry. For once, Harry wasn't his focal point, he was the focal point.

And the warmth. He'd forgotten what that felt like. Some of the rituals he'd done had left him unable to retain much of body heat, so he'd been left almost perpetually cold most of the time. A type of cold that couldn't have been helped with any number of warming charms, pepper up potions, or physical things like cloaks or blankets. Standing under a hot, summer sun in the afternoon, he'd never felt a shred of warmth.

But now he did. He felt warm, the warmth of body warmed blankets under him, the huge sweater he'd been given, the closed windows that didn't let heat get out of the house. He felt warm.

His eyes stung, and he was horrified to realise that he wanted to cry. He raised his free hand to scrub at them. He wasn't going to cry. He wouldn't.

He shifted, pushing Nyx off himself gently, watching as Iris fluttered away to perch on the table, watching him with a cocked head. Eve chose that moment to peak back out of the sock, flicking her tongue out and hissing.

"... Harry?"

Voldemort blinked at it, "No."

Could Eve sense it? The change in persons? He wouldn't be too surprised if she could. After spending so long with Harry, a distinctly magical human, and two creatures that functioned on magic, the snake was bound to have altered as well. And animals were always more receptive about these things than humans.

Eve hissed some more, wordlessly, before crawling out from the sock and towards him. Voldemort reached out a hand to let her wind her way up and around his wrist. "Who then? I know you."

"I suppose you might. I'm Harry's other friend, the one he talks to you about."

"Oh, I see." Even sounded utterly unbothered, and went back to laying its head against Voldemort's skin and closing its eyes.

"So you are my friend?"

Voldemort startled badly, an entire body flinch escaping him as he heard Harry's voice. It hadn't been loud, it had felt like a thought. But it'd still managed to startle him badly in its unexpectedness.

Harry went on without waiting for an answer, "Whoa, this is weird. Is this how you feel? I can see like I usually do, I feel like. I dunno, like I'm normal but also I can't control my body. Like I'm pala- paralysed. Like someone else is controlling my body."

"I am," Voldemort said, amused now that he'd recovered. He couldn't stop looking at his hands. He'd felt Eve sneak up his skin, her scaly body against him, not warm, but not cold either. He could feel it. He could feel everything. And Harry didn't sound distressed, just bemused. Which meant he could have this. He could have this for a while. For longer than a while. Perhaps the whole day.

He decided to address the other things Harry had said, "Haven't you proclaimed me as a friend about a thousand times before?"

"Uh huh, but you've never called me your friend," Harry replied, sounding quite gleeful.

Hadn't he? Really? He didn't quite pay that much attention, but it didn't sound impossible. Strange, but if it makes Harry happy, then why not?

"Well. I suppose you are," he said, momentarily blinded by the sheer delight Harry felt at the simple words. Dear god, he knew the boy was deprived, but he hadn't known just how much of the boy's happiness hinged on words like these from Voldemort.

It was dizzying, the power he had over Harry. And a little sad, the reason he had this power over him. Also pathetic, that he had this power over a literal child and no one else, not anymore.

Voldemort lifted the free hand he had to touch his face, again. He couldn't stop himself, touching things with his hand.

He wanted to walk. He slowly shifted himself over the bed, unbothered as Nyx crawled off him with a yawning stretch, as he peeked over the edge of the bed. Dear Merlin, had the floor always been this far away? Was Harry really that tiny? He couldn't remember being that tiny.

Gingerly, he swung his legs off the bed. Legs he had. Legs he could swing. He looked up at the ceiling, feeling the way his neck bent

He shivered in delight. Even in a body that felt fundamentally wrong from the one he'd called his own for decades, it was still a body, a real, physical body.

"Can you hear my thoughts?" he asked suddenly, realising that Harry had gone silent.

"What?" Harry responded, "Oh, um, no. Should I be able to? That'd be so cool. You can always hear my thoughts but I never know what you're thinking. Also, this is so weird. I can feel my body, I just can't control it. So it's like. Like, uhh, like…"

"Like you are possessed?" Voldemort supplied drily, amused and relieved that Harry couldn't hear his thoughts. He did have active occlumency to stop stray thoughts he didn't want Harry listening from escaping, but he'd much rather divert his attention to the absolutely delightful sensation of having a body.

Ah, the things people took for granted.

He slowly, carefully, pressed his feet to the floor, hissing in pleasure when he felt a shock of cold go up him through his bare feet. He didn't like the cold, no, but this kind of sensation just told him he was alive, and had a body that could feel the floor.

He opened his palm and let the combined magic of Harry and his own rush up there, making his fingers tingle with a static, a bubbling warmth, and a small lumos glow appeared in his hands. It was dim, and barely visible in the daylight. But it was there.

He had been using magic quite often, lately, but there was something about the heady power rush that using Harry's magic gave him. He noxed the flame, got to his feet, testing the floor, testing his legs, like they might give away from under him at any moment. They didn't.

He walked towards the door, unlocking it with another wave of a hand. Harry could do it quite easily as well, but not as much as Voldemort, not as easily as he could with the vast magical reserves of a child as powerful as Harry at his fingertips, along with the tattered remains of his own. He silenced his footsteps, and thought about casting a disillusionment charm on himself, but then refrained.

He would conserve energy for other, more enjoyable things. He made his way over to the stairs, and thought about the way Harry had jumped off it.

"Are you tempted to jump off too? Wait, can you fly now? You can jump off! You won't even have to float, you'd be able to fly properly!"

"Hush," Voldemort said under his breath, "I'm not going to jump." He started descending the stairs, his movements a little uncoordinated from the sheer novelty of the situation, along with being in a body so much smaller than the one he'd grown used to even before he'd been discorporated.

As he got to the step a third from the bottom, he paused, a smile taking over his features. A small burst of magic, a simple hex. Something he'd perfected even before he'd known he was a wizard. People would trip more often than not on that particular step now. If they were lucky, Dudley might end up breaking another couple bones. Perhaps Vernon as well. Maybe all three of the Dursleys could end up with a few fractured bones, or dislocated joints.

Perhaps, if they were exceptionally lucky, one of them might even die.

One could only hope, after all.

He made his way down, the now trick step letting him through easily, no tripping to be seen except any that Harry might do to himself in his hurry.

"What did you do?"

"You'll see. Soon."

He made his way to the kitchen, then. He had a lot of ideas now, bubbling within him with unholy glee. It was a little petty, perhaps. Childish, even. All these little jinxes and hexes, the bad luck curses. Things that witches did to nosey neighbours, or wixen got fined over in some ridiculous Muggle Protection Acts. These had been the kinds of spells he'd used at Wool's. Of course, it just increased the matron's suspicions about him being the devil's child. But it's not like exorcisms hurt. They were just… unpleasant. And after a while, even Mrs. Cole with her hatred and cleverness couldn't find ways to implicate him in things. Especially not when they kept happening even when he was at Hogwarts.

His spells were powerful, even at that age, and wouldn't be gone for anything short of death, or an actual wixen going through every single spell and undoing it. And Harry was just as powerful now as Voldemort had been then, even more so now with Voldemort casting them.

And he would make damn sure they stick.

So, he cursed half the food in the fridge to go bad. The house was also now completely bereft of sugar. The microwave would randomly electrocute people who used it– which would mostly be Petunia, but it's not like Voldemort had any less contempt for her than the others, not like soft hearted Harry.

After a while, he moved onto the living room. While magic often didn't mingle well with electronics, it was quite easy to make these things malfunction using magic. Magic and electricity often worked together to create the malfunction.

Of course, it could backfire on Harry, but it's not like they let him watch the television anyway. He was also glad he'd looked into the charms that made photos move, and portraits magical. And while a lot of them required special things like a certain kind of charmed liquid the film reel had to be dipped in, simple charms like a very short looping image, that only loops randomly and at infrequent intervals– that could be arranged via a single spoken phrase and a bit of finesse.

Voldemort was forever rediscovering the sheer magnificence of magic, and he'd never get tired of it, not even if he managed to master every single branch of magic possible.

Harry was starting to catch onto what he was doing, and sounded quite happy about it.

He also had quite a few good suggestions to give.

The day was winding down, and so was Voldemort. He did end up putting on a disillusionment charm over himself though, especially when Petunia started moving about the house. Her dismayed shriek at the state of the fridge had been a delight to hear, and he couldn't wait to see how everything else would play out.

But for now, it was getting dark out, and his body– Harry's body— their body, was aching fiercely, every limb weighed down, even as Voldemort felt lighter than he had in years. A decade. Maybe even longer. He'd forgotten so much.

Harry's relentless chatter had died down quite a bit as well. He still didn't sound like he was distressed, so Voldemort wasn't worried. But if he went overboard now, Harry might not be amicable to a second time. And Voldemort did intend for there to be a second time. Possibly more. Right up until he had his own body to return to.

He settled down on the bed, watching with heavy eyes as Nyx came over to curl up beside him. Iris was nowhere to be seen, but Harry could call her to him whenever he wanted anyway.

Eve slinked off back towards the sock it'd been given, saying Voldemort had grown too cold. Over exertion of magic could do that.

Perhaps he'd gone a little overboard. Harry would be tired the next day as well. Not ideal, but a small price, really. The boy should just be grateful he had a body in the first place. And Voldemort had just made things easier for him anyway.

"Mr. Lord?"

Voldemort hummed to show he was listening, staring up at the ceiling even as his eyes burned with exhaustion.

"You did have a body before this, didn't you?"

"Yes."

Harry was quiet for a while, and then he spoke, "Do you miss it?"

It was clear the boy already knew the answer, not just because Voldemort could sense his thoughts, but also because of the way he'd spoken it. With so much sympathy it made Voldemort sick. He finally closed his eyes, letting exhaustion drag him under, knowing when he woke up, Harry would once again be in possession of his own body, while Voldemort drifted, half real, untethered.

Right before the world darkened into the intangible, he whispered quietly, "Yes. Terribly."