CHAPTER 16
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The pain was overwhelming.
His ribs ached and each time he took a deep breath, he had to stop until the needle-sharp stabs let him go. His skin was on fire and the action of holding his arms up strained his trembling, fatigued muscles.
But with the pain, came the silence.
The thought that if he did this right, took this well enough, then he could rest for a time.
Free.
Unburdened.
At Voldemort's command, Harry dazedly pulled off his last item of clothing and dropped it to the floor.
He was naked.
Beaten. Weak.
"Stunning," Lord Voldemort whispered from behind him, and Harry smiled.
Stunning.
"Climb onto the table, Harry."
It hurt to move. Harry carefully manoeuvred himself onto the wood and then let those cool hands guide him to lie on his back.
"It pleases me to see your discomfort, boy."
Harry closed his eyes. Discomfort. Yes, he felt that. From his wounds, but also from his aching cock. He knew it was straining awkwardly and a twinge of embarrassment cleared some of the hazy clouds around his head.
Don't make this about yourself. You're disgusting. This is about punishment for all you've done, all you've failed to do.
He brought a hand up to cover himself, trying to will away his erection, but the Dark Lord grabbed his wrist.
"Do not hide from your Master. I want to see it."
Harry felt his face heating. Merlin, he was ugly. He knew that. Scrawny and small. His uncle had always told him so. No one would ever want him.
Oh gods, Voldemort is going to laugh at you, think you're disgusting. Perverted.
He moved his other hand to shield his obscene display from the man's eyes, but the Dark Lord growled and pinned both of Harry's wrists to the table.
"You are mine," Voldemort hissed, leaning down into his face, his red eyes flashing. "Do not move."
That imposing body abruptly disappeared. Bewildered, Harry shifted to sit up when a sharp slap struck him on the face.
Harry froze.
"Be still."
Harry waited, the numbing sting on his skin distracting him from his worry.
Voldemort returned with a length of rope. He lifted Harry's arms above his head while pain shot through him as the muscles in his back shifted. When it was done, Harry's wrists were crossed and bound tightly.
"I should not have to rely on rope, boy. My command is enough. My words are rope."
Voldemort held his gaze until Harry wanted to cower and beg for forgiveness. Before he could decide if he was allowed to speak, Voldemort's hand closed around his still-aching cock.
"Now," the Dark Lord said, squeezing him painfully. "This is uncomfortable, is it not?"
Harry held his breath.
"I may grant you release."
Oh fuck, please.
Harry closed his eyes. It felt like he could do nothing, nothing at all to help himself. He was at the Dark Lord's mercy, completely.
"Beg me."
Harry threw his head to the side. He hated begging, knew he wasn't supposed to do it. He could do things himself, and asking for help made him too vulnerable. It meant that he could be controlled, that he was indebted to someone.
"You will beg, boy."
Harry exhaled slowly.
It's okay. He said you were safe.
"Please," he rasped.
Voldemort hummed enticingly.
"You have not yet earned it."
Harry's eyes flew wide in disbelief.
The sadistic bastard.
Those punishing, delicious hands moved off of his cock, which slapped against his stomach when released. Harry groaned.
"You will eat now," Voldemort informed him. "And when I am satisfied, I may reward you."
Harry waited miserably while Voldemort left to retrieve their plates.
The Dark Lord ate first, putting his plate right next to where Harry was laying naked on the table top. He sat down, with Harry's hard cock almost at eye-level. It was mortifying and indecent— exciting. One of Voldemort's hands fed himself, and the other idly fiddled with Harry's cock. The touch was absent and frustrating. He wasn't trying to get Harry off, just torture him, keep his attention locked onto those teasing digits.
When he was finished, Voldemort lifted a single noodle between his thumb and index finger and brought it to Harry's closed lips.
No.
"Open," that menacing voice demanded, and Harry didn't know how to disobey.
He caught the pasta before it could choke him and began to chew. Saliva welled up in his mouth— he felt nauseated, panicked, I can't do it, I—
"Swallow, boy," that voice ordered, and Harry's throat relaxed.
When he reflexively opened his mouth for more, Voldemort stroked his face before giving it to him.
"What a well-trained pet you are."
Pride flared up inside of him. He was doing something right.
He ate more than he felt he could handle, but it was okay, because when Voldemort finally deemed him done, he was praised and held like he was treasured.
"Now," Voldemort said, his hands caressing Harry's chest, "before I grant you release, you will tell me why you deny yourself food."
Harry shifted. Laying on his back aggravated his injuries.
"It's just something I do sometimes," Harry replied stiffly.
Voldemort's gaze roamed his body.
"Is it aesthetics?"
Harry screwed up his face.
"Gods, no. It's— it's... I can't explain it."
"You can," Voldemort said. "You will."
Harry bit into his lip desperately, his cock pulsing at the dark threat.
"It just feels right. It's uncomfortable. Sometimes it hurts."
"You need to be hurt, do you not, boy?"
Harry winced and then nodded, closing his eyes.
"It helps. The guilt. It's... awful. It makes it hard to breathe. I can't sleep."
"Explain this guilt."
Harry looked up at him in confusion.
"I... I shouldn't have survived," he said, wondering how this was not obvious. "Dumbledore hadn't meant for me to."
Those eyes flashed dangerously, but he ignored them.
"I shouldn't be alive in the place of people more deserving. It's my fault, all of it. I wasn't quick enough, or smart enough to..."
He glanced up at Voldemort with guilty apology.
"To kill you. Before you killed them."
"So, you starve yourself as self-flagellation."
Harry nodded, pretty sure he knew what that word meant.
"Some days, it's all that lets me keep going. If I'm feeling weak and miserable, it lets me... pretend. Do what I have to. It helps me act normal."
Harry looked away, feeling awkward and exposed.
"I don't like feeling good," he whispered. "I don't know what to do with it."
When he glanced back, Voldemort was studying him.
Harry looked away, sure that the Dark Lord would find him lacking.
"Here is what is going to happen, Harry Potter," the man said at long last. "I will grant you release."
Voldemort's large hand fisted his bollocks roughly and Harry keened.
"Oh fuck, yes," Harry groaned, banging his head back onto the table.
"And then, going forward," Voldemort continued, rolling Harry's tender sac in his fingers, "you will eat normally. Three meals a day."
Harry felt acute panic surge through him.
No way, that's impossible—
"Enough," Voldemort said sharply, his voice like a whip. "On your knees. Head to my feet."
Harry lay there reeling, unable to move. He was in pain, horribly aroused, and he had no idea what to do.
I can't, I need that, I need to pay—
"On your knees, boy," Voldemort commanded, his voice becoming lethal, and Harry jolted.
Struggling with his still-bound wrists, he managed to sit up, then achingly manoeuvred himself to the ground, assuming the required position. His heart was beating furiously.
Three meals a day, three meals a day—
He closed his eyes, tucking his arms underneath himself and curling into a ball.
"Let it go, Harry," Voldemort said above him. "Give it all to me."
Harry exhaled slowly, trying to calm his breathing. It was easier like this. On the floor. Insignificant.
He wasn't Harry Potter; he was just boy.
"You will eat. Relax," Voldemort commanded, as Harry's body jolted again in panic, his eyes opening. "I am aware that you need temperance. I will manage that from this point forward."
A cautious hope was blooming inside of him.
He wants to take care of me.
You can have this. If anyone can handle you, it's the Dark Lord.
Harry allowed a small sigh of relief to escape.
He wants me.
"In exchange for my assistance," Voldemort went on, "you will return to me my magic. It is my responsibility to protect you, Harry, and I cannot do so as I currently am."
Harry's head tilted minutely in sluggish confusion.
In exchange.
Another trade.
Another act.
A wave of disappointment, of bitter resignation crashed over him.
No...
Harry closed his eyes in miserable defeat.
I'm a fucking, pathetic idiot.
It hurt to stand, but he did so anyways. His limbs were uncooperative. Shaky. He used magic to vanish his restraints.
Voldemort looked unpleasantly stunned at Harry's defiance, and it felt wrong to defy this man, but he wouldn't sell this part of himself for any price.
"I should have known this was a lie," he rasped, hating the tears blurring his vision. He shook his head in irritation. "You just don't get it. I can pay for this shit if that's all I wanted." He laughed self-deprecatingly. "Or, I probably wouldn't even have to. There'd prolly be a lineup of people wanting to dominate me."
The image that conjured, how it made him feel, that he was just a commodity, loot to be bartered but never treasured, hurt tremendously.
He pushed it aside.
"I thought you wanted me, Voldemort," he breathed, his chest feeling scooped out and stuttering. "I thought you were different."
In the thundering silence that followed, Harry hardened his heart.
Enough of this.
Lucius was right; he was compromised. Voldemort was only in it for himself and Harry would forever fall for his lies. What the man offered was too compelling. He knew Harry's heart and would bleed him to death getting what he wanted.
And he doesn't want me.
This blow hurt more than the physical ones.
Harry was a fool for believing Lord Voldemort could help him. Would want to.
Before the Dark Lord could twist Harry's mind with promises and orders, Harry determinedly left the house and made for the Ministry. It was late at night, but there was much work to be done.
He had failed at everything he'd wanted to accomplish with his prisoner. He was not in control here.
It was time to start the process of surrendering Lord Voldemort to Azkaban.
.
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Voldemort watched the boy leave.
He was baffled.
Everything was in order. Harry Potter wanted him, wanted to submit to him. He recognised Voldemort's claim.
And yet, every time Voldemort broached the topic of an exchange, the boy balked.
Perhaps Potter wanted to prosper while not permitting Voldemort to as well.
Maybe the boy was far crueller than he had first imagined. He wanted to make a deal where Voldemort received nothing in payment for all that he could offer.
Harry Potter was selfish.
Voldemort frowned, leaning against the kitchen countertop.
No. That was not true.
The boy was a martyr, desperate to kill himself for the chance to be absolved.
Therefore, it must be something else.
The boy wanted him. So then why would he not take what was offered? It was a reasonable trade. A mutually-satisfying physical partnership in return for the restoration of his magic.
Voldemort paused, slotting the pieces into place.
Perhaps that was how to reach him. Couch it in terms Potter understood: guilt. Convince him that Voldemort was hurting and that only Harry Potter could save him. Tell him that since the boy had robbed him of his powers, viciously condemning him to his fate, then Potter must make up for his weighty crime.
If he commanded it as his Master, the boy would be helpless to comply.
Pleased with this conclusion, Voldemort pushed off from the countertop and climbed the stairs, his mind eager and rapacious.
He was close.
The way to lead a Gryffindor was by their heart. And Lord Voldemort was intimately familiar with what made Harry Potter's heart pound.
.
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Harry slammed the book closed.
The laws really didn't go into this shit.
There was no precedence for it. And he'd been looking for days. If a prisoner couldn't be killed, but had been sentenced to death— as was sure to occur in this situation— it was most likely that they would just be held indefinitely.
Or, in Voldemort's case, until Harry could find his Horcrux.
Because even if he was Kissed, the soul piece inside of Voldemort might get ingested by the dementor, but his essence would just transfer to his other soul piece. He wouldn't be killed.
So the best they could really do was hold him. He had no magic. He wasn't much of a threat to anyone. They would just have to wait for Harry to figure out where his last shard was hidden.
He crossed his arms, trying to picture it: Lord Voldemort in Azkaban.
As great as that sounded, he knew what fate would await the man in there. The Prophet would go mental, and soon everyone would come to gawk at the former Dark Lord.
And they wouldn't stop there.
It wasn't difficult to imagine how Voldemort would be treated. Harry had wanted to claim his own vengeance on the man when he'd first learned of his survival as well.
Yeah. Brilliant work with that.
Voldemort had bene right, in the end. Harry was weak and couldn't make anyone suffer. Not really.
Not even the Dark Lord Voldemort.
It's not my problem anymore. I have to send him to Azkaban and whatever fate awaits him, it's his own fault. He deserves it.
It was right that his victims would make him pay in a way that Harry had been unable to. He deserved stronger-willed punishments doled out by worthier citizens.
Harry had failed.
He had failed Cedric. And Colin and Fred and Marius and Neville and Ron and Hermione.
He hadn't been strong enough.
Hermione would hate him for what he'd done. For what he'd been unable to do. She had sought his help with the snake Voldemort and he had betrayed her by letting the man manipulate him.
Letting him make me come. Make me kneel. Make me beg for rescue from a man who understood me. Who could handle me.
My equal.
Harry's hands clenched at that. At the agonising truth of it.
Don't think about that.
It had been a lie, anyways. It had all been an act.
Harry picked up the book he'd been reading with a sigh and placed it in the pile with the others.
He was exhausted. It was the middle of the night and he'd been at this for days, yet he'd learned everything he'd needed in the first few hours.
Taking the next step was the part he was caught on.
He'd have to go home and tell Voldemort. Admit that he was giving him up. That Harry wasn't capable enough to handle him.
And then Harry would have to live with the guilt of whatever came next for Voldemort.
He rubbed his tired eyes, trying not to think about that either.
This was the Dark Lord Voldemort, after all. He deserved what he got.
Harry's weary body yearned for rest, but he couldn't go home and face the man's penetrating stare. Voldemort would see through him right away. And he also couldn't risk the man convincing him to change his mind, or pushing him so deeply into his submission that he just did whatever Voldemort commanded.
Harry leaned back in his chair. He'd just sleep here for a few hours and then get back to work.
Today was Saturday. He would give it until Monday and then drop the news to Kingsley. He'd then have to bring some Aurors back to his place to help him escort the Dark Lord to his final residence.
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When the clock on the mantelpiece struck midnight on the sixth night, Voldemort picked it up and threw it against the wall. It shattered, breaking into a shower of pieces, but it did not quell his fury. Livid without his magic, he swiped his arm along the wood, knocking all the boy's pictures and decorations onto the floor.
It did not help.
Potter was not coming home.
Something about their last encounter had upset the boy and now he was keeping away.
But why?
Voldemort could not make sense of it. The boy had taken umbrage at being asked to return his magic. Obviously Potter did not want him to reclaim his summit, but to overreact to this degree was incomprehensible.
And Voldemort could do nothing to bring him back, trapped as he was inside this tomb. He could do nothing but wait to starve to death. Which would send him mercilessly back into wraithhood for the third, agonising time.
Why is the boy so offended?
It defied logic. Perhaps if—
The unmistakable feeling of wards being plucked apart silenced those thoughts.
Harry would not enter thus.
Voldemort moved from his position by the mantelpiece and walked to the threshold of the drawing room. He peered over the banister to see who would emerge.
The protective structure around the house shuddered and buckled under the onslaught of magic being thrown against it.
This was not the boy's counterparts.
Whoever it was, they were powerful. The wards were snapping back, retreating under the assault.
He would not cower. He would face this, whatever was about to occur. Perhaps it was one of his, a slippery Death Eater or a loyal acquaintance.
This could be a rescue.
When the last of the house's defences fell away, the doors banged open and a familiar man swept into the room, looking harassed.
Voldemort scrutinised him carefully.
The man stalked into the dining room downstairs, lighting the lamps with a wave of his arm. The display of effortless magic twisted his stomach with hatred. How could it be that this coward retained his powers and yet Lord Voldemort was forced to live as a Squib?
"My Lord?" the man queried, coming back into the foyer and peering over at the stairs to the kitchen. "Are you here?"
Voldemort took a moment to ponder the unlikely possibility that Lucius would be of use to him.
"I've come to get you out."
Voldemort narrowed his eyes.
"Is that so."
Lucius spun, his ridiculous hair fanning out, and looked up in shock.
They stared at each other. The man looked scared, but also amazed.
As he should be.
"My Lord," Lucius whispered, his gaze lowering, and Voldemort watched that arrogant back bend into a bow.
"I am pleased to see you alive again."
Voldemort moved from the banister to the top of the stairs. Lucius's eyes darted up to meet his.
"Now is our chance, Master."
Voldemort considered the seemingly serendipitous circumstance he found himself in.
His former servant, arriving just when he needed one. It was perfectly timed. And that was one of the many reasons why his suspicion increased.
"We must hurry," Lucius insisted, and Voldemort cocked his head.
"Hurry. Where?"
The strange reluctance he felt was not solely because he did not forgive the man. There was more to it, but Lucius spoke before he could ponder it.
"My manor. I can keep you safe until—"
"Lord Voldemort does not require your protection, Lucius."
How dare he.
Voldemort studied the man. He appeared cowed and eager, yet this was Lucius. Voldemort had been fooled once before by his performance and right now, so much depended on him reading this correctly.
"Forgive me, Master. I merely yearn to help."
The irksome memory of this man begging for a chance to serve him loyally mere hours before he had betrayed him in battle solidified Voldemort's instinctual warnings.
He felt a repulsed smirk twist his features.
"Lies."
Lucius bristled, but it was enough. Those grey eyes looked away and then darted back.
"We don't have time," the fiend pleaded. "Potter is at the Ministry, but he could be back at any moment."
He has not come home all week. He will not be returning tonight.
"Why are you here, Lucius."
The man's gaze flashed up again in trepidation.
"My Lord?" When Voldemort remained silently waiting, Lucius replied, "To rescue you."
"Lies," Voldemort whispered again, dropping a foot onto the staircase, drawn to the man's obvious ruin. "Why have you really come."
A slow frown overtook that aristocratic brow.
"To help."
The tone was clipped. No, my Lord, this time.
He was getting closer.
"Yes, of course," Voldemort said, inclining his head once, though the blonde was not meeting his gaze. "But you seek only to help yourself, do you not?"
There was a charged silence. Voldemort wondered what Lucius would do: drop the act and draw his wand, or push ahead with this farce.
Those broad shoulders straightened, his posture correcting itself.
Ah, this will be interesting.
Lucius raised his head and his gaze, his expression resolved.
"I learned from the best, my Lord," Lucius replied, but this time, Voldemort's rightful title was spat mockingly.
Voldemort raised an eyebrow.
"How foolish you are."
The blonde had the audacity to laugh.
"How foolish I am? You're a child's prisoner!"
He is the Head Auror. The Chosen One. My equal. He is hardly a child.
Lucius took a moment to scour Voldemort's body.
"You're not even injured," the man marvelled quietly, meeting Voldemort's gaze with mocking incredulity. "Potter managed to capture and keep you, and you're just letting him. Why have you stayed?"
So he does not know.
"I do not answer to you, Lucius. Watch your tone."
The man scoffed, but his eyes continued to rake across Voldemort's form.
"Potter said he was torturing you," the man went on contemplatively. "I had assumed you'd be incapacitated with magic or injuries, yet here you are. Healthy and with freedom of movement."
Lucius expelled a short, scathing laugh.
"This tells me all I need to know." The man insolently met his gaze. "Potter is yours now. He cannot be trusted." Lucius glanced away. "It's a shame because I had not wanted to work against him after his assistance to my family after the war." Those cold eyes returned, meeting his brazenly. "But I will not allow you to regain power."
As if you could stop me. As if anyone could.
The man's verbal assault was infuriating, yet Voldemort could do nothing to cease it at this distance. He took another step down the stairs.
Let the man talk. I will feed the traitor his tongue soon enough.
Lucius's expression grew wary as he drew nearer. Voldemort enjoyed the man's fear.
"You're not attacking me," Lucius stated, his head minutely tilting. "That must mean that you can't. I have seen you kill men for less."
The blonde's victorious smile rankled.
"At least Potter was smart enough for that. But it won't save him from Azkaban. After I take you, I'll tell the Minister what he's done and he'll be finished."
Voldemort's slow progress down the stairs halted.
No.
No one would be touching Potter.
"This plan of yours has holes, Lucius," Voldemort said, trying to infuse his tone with amused disappointment. "You will be joining us in Azkaban if you attempt it. You forget, I have information that will bury your family."
Lucius glared up at him with defiance.
"So be it," he said. "Try and take me down. I suspect that the Ministry will be so overcome with gratitude for my capture of the former Dark Lord and the unmasking of Potter's new allegiance, that they will forgive me my past transgressions."
The truth of that was unmistakeable.
The government had a history of criminal action being sanctioned in the name of the greater good.
Hypocrites, all of them.
They would forgive Lucius and happily unleash their vengeance on the boy.
Voldemort fought to rein in his murderous rage.
His head swam with the need to eviscerate the man, but as he was, there was only one type of pain he could deliver. Only one way to avoid Azkaban.
"I see you are following in your father's footsteps," Voldemort commented heavily, taking another leisurely step down the stairs. "He, too, was a traitor."
"He saw right through you," Lucius said with an ignorant, gloating smile.
Voldemort stared at him, lost in memories for a moment. Abraxas had held similar ideals and visions of the future. Although the man had been a pure-blood, he had never been unkind to Tom Riddle.
"Incidentally," Voldemort went on, pushing aside the memories, "your father did not perish from dragon pox."
Lucius's face blanked, his body suddenly still.
"What is that supposed to mean."
Everything about the man's carefully controlled aura pleased Voldemort. Lucius was afraid. He had suspected.
"He knew information about me that I did not want shared," Voldemort confessed, coming down two steps further. "There is a reason all of my contemporaries met untimely deaths."
The name Tom Riddle had needed to be wiped from living memory. Along with any connection of Lord Voldemort to his past life and upbringing. To his Muggle father.
"Are you..." Lucius began and then his expression contorted with his inability to comprehend. "Did you kill...?"
"And it was easy," Voldemort breathed. "Your father begged me not to, a coward until the last. A typical Malfoy, some would say. I—"
"Crucio!"
Voldemort slid out of the way easily, getting closer still. If he could just get within touching range, he could incapacitate the man as he battled with his shock.
"Yes," he whispered cruelly. "Abraxas had to go. He was a liability. Just like his son."
He was close. He could see the muscles twitching in Lucius's jaw. The tension from hatred and fear.
He pushed farther.
"And, if your daring attempt at my capture is an indication that your own son is likewise enlightened to my existence, then he too will be obliged to join his grandfather and fath—"
Lucius lunged, forgetting all about his wand and his magic in his eruption of protective fury.
Voldemort grabbed him around the throat and slammed him against the wall. Lucius fought him, raining vicious punches and kicks against him, but Voldemort's will to live was stronger than anything else.
He took the impacts, gritting his teeth each time they landed, though he would not let go. As he crushed those delicate tendons with both hands, he found amusement in the fact that this man was a pure-blood, and yet his instinct had been to brawl like a Muggle when overcome with protective love.
It was just too easy.
Voldemort was glutted on satisfaction, prepared to win, when Lucius's magic, perhaps sensing his diminishing life, struck out and cracked against Voldemort, knocking him back.
He fell, hitting the floor heavily, and was not quick enough at regaining his feet. He looked up to see Lucius fumbling in his robes and then pulling out his wand.
"Crucio!"
He was not fast enough this time.
The curse hit him and agony ignited his nerves, his body burning and seizing as bolts of fire shot through him. His mind was struck empty as he contorted, trying to escape, trying to master the pain, the assault that was ripping him apart, searing him—
Then it stopped.
The inferno receded and Voldemort drew in air, clenching his fists with the abrupt recognition that he was on the ground. That he had just allowed his servant to curse him.
That this man would dare...
"Who knew you bled like the rest of us," Lucius whispered in a strange tone.
Voldemort picked himself up and wiped at his mouth where he could taste that he had bitten through his lips in the effort of locking in his screams.
When he met that grey gaze, Lucius seemed floored.
"I can't believe that worked," he muttered, a frown narrowing his eyes. "I've never seen you injured."
Voldemort's back straightened and he worked to tower over the other man.
"You must have no magic," Lucius breathed in awed bewilderment. "How can that be?"
Rage thrashed inside of him.
"You know I will hunt you down for this," Voldemort promised dangerously. "I am immortal. I will come for your family at my first opportunity."
The man slowly focused on him, his face hardening.
"Then I'll have to make sure you have none. Besides, Potter will soon find your Horcrux."
Voldemort's stomach twisted. That was a blow.
Harry had told Lucius about his theory. What else had he told him?
"It would be unwise," Voldemort cautioned tentatively, "to put too much faith in the boy's theories or his resolve."
Lucius's lip curled.
"On that, we agree. Potter is yours now, isn't he?"
Mine.
Yes he is.
"He will have to go down with you, then," Lucius remarked, his eyes promising bitter vengeance.
Everything in Voldemort locked. He felt rage pulse through him, his desire for violence burning avidly.
You will die first.
He needed to avert this.
"You never were a leader, Lucius," Voldemort remarked, forcing his jaws to unclench. "Always so eager to please Lord Voldemort or the Ministry. And here you are, risking your life to obediently present a gift to those who despise you. You have no shame, no proper respect for yourself."
He watched expectantly as Lucius's face grew indignant. The fool even raised his chin.
Pathetic.
It was calming to manipulate those around him. Lord Voldemort did not require magic to triumph.
"You have an unprecedented chance," Voldemort went on, certain of his victory, "to hold me as your prisoner, and instead, you subserviently lick the hands of your enemies. You insist on helping them, when they wanted to throw you in Azkaban after the war."
Potter would come for him. He would work out where Voldemort had been taken, and fix this before Lucius could ruin everything.
"Keep me in your dungeons," Voldemort insisted, pushing aside his revulsion at the idea. "Potter will continue his search for my immortality and while he does so, you can safeguard your reputation."
Voldemort took a step towards him, lowering his gaze.
"Touch the boy, though," he warned gravely, "and the deal is off."
Lucius took a step back, but his expression was calculating.
"Deal..." he repeated slowly, considering the word. "Yes, let's make a deal, shall we? You provide memories of Potter helping you, and I won't curse you within an inch of your life for what you did to my family before I drop you off."
Voldemort clenched his fists in impotent fury. The vulnerable state that Harry had left him in was unendurable. He needed to slaughter Lucius and yet instead, he was forced to entertain a bargain.
"One week," Voldemort began, hoping to buy time. "Come back then, and I will have what you need to—"
"We leave now. The only question is if you will be wise and help me."
Out of items to trade, he took what he could.
"I will come with you. Leave the boy alone."
The man scoffed.
"You are coming with me regardless. I need those memories."
Voldemort was not about to be intimidated by this sycophant. He needed to ensure that he got what he wanted.
"Your son has a child, does he not?"
He watched the blonde's face blank again. It was so easy to motivate people who loved.
"Scorpius," Voldemort continued, his eyes piercing Lucius, who was still frozen. "His only heir. Your only heir."
He watched the man's throat bob on a swallow.
"If you mean to—"
"I will make him my prime target when I get out. And I will get out, Lucius. You know this. That is why you are here, is it not? Because you know I cannot be held indefinitely."
"I will never serve you again," Lucius said bravely. Stupidly.
Voldemort inclined his head.
"Perhaps not. Though that is not what I am suggesting. Leave me here with Potter—"
"I do not trust him," Lucius interrupted, and Voldemort paused to stare him down, letting him feel his displeasure.
"Forgive me, my Lord," Lucius muttered, and then seemed to catch himself. He glared at Voldemort angrily. "You're coming with me. That is non-negotiable. I will... leave Potter be for now, though if you do not cooperate, I will expose him for who he is."
You will not touch him.
But Voldemort knew to focus on his victories. He had gotten what he wanted. He would have the rest in due time.
"Agreed."
Lucius seemed irritated. He nodded his head towards the door, indicating his desire to leave.
Voldemort ignored him and turned away, glancing back into Harry's home.
He did not wish to leave.
As far as prisons went, this one had been bearable. The boy had been fascinating. Voldemort had been making great progress with him, and he still had not discovered what had upset the boy so thoroughly.
Perhaps now, he never would.
No.
Harry was relentless. He would—
Ever unwise, Lucius hit him with a Petrificus while his back had been turned. Voldemort fell, livid, yet could do nothing but allow the craven dog to float him out the door.
He would enjoy making Lucius pay in blood for his audacity.
Goodbye, Harry. Come find me.