Chapter 130:
"You're kidding," Harry stated, numbly, wishing desperately for it to be true, and knowing somewhere inside that it wasn't.
Tom simply stared at him.
"Consider it an investment," The Slytherin Heir said quietly. "A confirmation that you're not replaceable to me, and that I'd be willing to spend the rest of my life with you."
Harry swallowed, feeling vaguely hysterical, panic-stricken, sliding to sit against the wall.
"Careful, you're beginning to sound like you're proposing to me," he joked faintly. Tom's eyes didn't leave him, intent in their scrutiny.
"If it helps you to think of it like that," was all he said. "Though don't expect a wedding or a ring or anything nearing tradition…it's just an analogy."
Harry laughed, pretty sure his voice sounded strained and choked.
"You're asking me to abandon every single moral principle I have!" he snapped. "I, Salazar, you know I think they're wrong."
"Morals are such oppressive things, I dare say you'd be happier, freer, without them," Tom replied, as if this argument was nothing. Harry's fists clenched.
"You're asking me to split my soul!"
"I'm fully aware of specifics of the process."
Harry closed his eyes, feeling a headache building incessantly in his temples.
"And you don't see anything wrong with it?" he questioned.
"Psychopath," Tom reminded, with a tone of long-suffering patience, "wrong and right mean nothing to me as moral concepts, and morality is itself merely another limitation by which I don't and won't abide…as you well know."
"I-no," Harry stated, incredulous. "I can't agree to this."
Tom continued to look at him,
"I see. Is spending an eternity with me really that repulsive to you?"
Harry felt a pang of horrendous guilt, before he gritted his teeth, struggling to banish it along with the lost strain in Tom's tone. Emotional manipulation.
"Stop it," he growled. "That's not fair, and you know it's not true…I just…it's not you it's me."
Tom's eyebrows arched at the phrase, and Harry resisted the urge to crawl into a hole and hide their for the rest of his life.
"What I mean is," he continued, tightly, "you'rethe one who wants immortality, I never have, and it's Horcruxes that are repulsive to me! Sure, I'm happy to spend time with you as long as I live, Salazar, do you think I'd be dealing with Lestrange or trying to fulfil my plan which, just in case you hadn't gathered, saves your life, if I didn't? But what you're suggesting? No. I refuse to prolong my life that way. It. Is. Sick."
"Well, neither of us are going to live very long if you don't," Tom said, reasonably, the lost strain vanished as a discarded act. "The timeline implodes in four months if neither of our plans come to play. I can't ever complete my plans if you refuse to do this, and you can't move on with yours if I don't play ball either."
"Sounds like a stalemate," Harry remarked.
Tom crouched down, coming to his level, hand reaching out, lifting the Golden Locket around his throat, tugging so the chain cut into his skin, but showing no intent to remove it from around his neck.
"Indeed, and yet…take this, for example, I could destroy it and you'd have no chance. You're already always going to be missing one piece, you can't afford to lose another, can you?."
Harry narrowed his eyes.
"You know, it's funny," he said, coldly. "You claim your plan saves my life, but is it really me you're interested in saving and spending the rest of your life with…or is some amoral ideal of me, because, I'll say this now, I'm never going to be able to live up to that expectation. Sorry to disappoint."
For the first time since Tom had made his condition, a genuine emotion flashed across the other's face, too quick to be deciphered, but there nonetheless.
"Do you really think I'd be the same after it was done?" Harry asked, somehow trying to comprehend Tom's convoluted thought patterns.
"Most people would kill for what I'm offering you."
"Yeah, and I dare say it would have to be literally too...I can't kill someone in cold blood, I can't make one, Tom, even if I agreed to this, I can't."
"I'm sure you could," Tom dismissed. "And even if you truly couldn't, we have a soul bond between us, I'm sure I could use that and edit the enchantment and do it for you."
"What, kill someone and tear my soul instead of yours?" Harry was horrified.
"Exactly," Tom surveyed him darkly, appearing mildly irritated. "So take it as a sign of mercy that I even offered you the choice, I could just do it behind your back."
"I'd never forgive you," Harry spat, reeling back. "Friends don't do that to each other, Tom."
"Friends…" Tom gave a bitter, smile. "You expect me to be friends with you, open myself to that type of vulnerability, only for you to grow old - or ill - and abandon me? No chance. I'm not stupid or masochistic enough to put myself through that."
Harry sighed, suddenly exhausted, sensing somewhere that the last line hadn't been a pretence, that it was a large part of Tom's more personal motivations for this.
"That's life," he murmured. "Dying is a part of life. You can't just…preserve and pickle people, freeze them like a photograph…it doesn't work like that. I'm sorry, but it doesn't. We're not supposed to be immortal."
"Supposed to be," Tom laughed. "We have magic, and power, and our whole lives ahead of us, 'supposed to' is just another bar in the prison society creates for us. If there's a means, we can do whatever we want, damn what we're supposed to do."
"And yet, being immortal with you - which I fundamentally disagree with - I'd have to do that a thousand times over." He'd outlive all his friends, survive in a cycle of goodbyes. It was hell.
"Think carefully before you say no," Tom warned, silkily, dangerously. "I will get my way regardless, at least this way you get your concession too and at a time when you need it."
Harry swallowed, nauseous. Could Tom really give him a Horcrux, without his permission?
"If you make me one, I'll destroy it," he stated.
"As if I ever planned on letting you keep hold of it," Tom returned, meeting his gaze unflinchingly. "I'd never allow you the opportunity."
Harry pressed his lips together.
Everyday and never.
These were the times and words that made it so easy to hate the other, but they were always entwined with the actions and motivations that made it simultaneously so difficult.
He could, to some extent, understand Tom's reasoning behind this, but he couldn't condone the method and the end result. Remorse.
He'd feel remorse.
True, deep, genuine remorse that would undo any Horcrux.
Could he make one - the thought alone appalled him - and then unmake it promptly afterwards? He was sure he could. It wouldn't take the blood off his hands though.
Yet, his hands were going to be stained by blood anyway, weren't they? And Tom's hands too, because the other was so ruthless and insistent regarding this. Tom was going to do everything he could to make him a Horcrux; it was, as horrible as the notion was, more a matter of what he could gain from going so against his morals, even temporarily.
Absently, Harry suspected that had been the olive branch of 'mercy' Tom had been getting at. For the young Dark Lord, it was almost kind…and that cut deeper than any cruelty the other could have shown. Still.
"You never answered by question," he said, watching the floor rather than the other. "Do you really think I'd be the same after?"
"I believe the core aspects of your personality would stay the same," Tom replied without hesitation.
After a moment, hands cupped his face, pulling it up to lock their gazes again, thumbs dragging against the nail marks.
"Whatever you think of me, Harry, I know you. You're strong enough to handle it…" the young Dark Lord paused. "And I swear I will not let you spiral, let you become that which you hate and what you're not…Voldemort had seven, you will have one, it's vastly different. I won't let you fall."
"And you?" Harry questioned, gripping Tom's wrists tightly, tight enough to know his hold must be painful to the Slytherin Heir. "If I agree to this, you must give me the condition that you will never make more. Don't…I can't watch that happen to you."
"Does this mean you're agreeing?" Tom's eyes were sparkling, no smile on his face, but happiness seemed to be radiating from him. True happiness.
Harry wanted to cry, to scream. To say "no," that he would think about it…anything but "yes."
"I will let you make me a Horcrux if you never make more and agree to reinstate Lestrange into your circle immediately, and give him frequent positive attention."
Tom studied him for a moment, and Harry resisted the urge to hold his breath.
"If you let me make you a Horcrux as soon as possible, and don't try to destroy it thereafter, I will not make you anymore Horcruxes, and will not have more than one Horcrux at a time myself."
"At a time?" Harry questioned. 'Try' didn't rule out succeeding and remorse.
"If one is somehow destroyed by my enemies, I'm not going to leave myself mortal," Tom replied flatly. Harry took a deep breath, despising himself, inwardly cowering, terrified and sickened.
"Than I accept. Deal."
"Deal," Tom agreed. There was a flash of magic.
Tom's smile was dazzling, brilliant.
"You won't regret it, sweetheart…I suppose I need to see Lestrange? Stay out of trouble, will you, and heal your face…"
"See you later," Harry replied softly.
Tom looked so…happy. Happier than Harry had ever seen him, thrumming with life. He stood slowly.
He would regret it. That was the point.
And it broke his heart.
Tom would never forgive him.
Tom Riddle was many things, but stupid was not and would never be one of them.
He knew Harry's side of the deal was vague, try instead of succeed…but he couldn't allow his terminology to be more precise, on the off chance that Harry's remaining morality would drown him in remorse and reverse the Horcrux.
If that was the case, he didn't want harm to befall Harry for something the boy couldn't actually help.
There was a good chance remorse was what Harry was planning…but, there was also a good chance that Harry's ability for the (overall useless, honestly, if you're going to be remorseful something, you just don't do it in the first place!) sentiment would be greatly hindered, to the extent that he couldn't summon the necessary regret to stitch his soul back together.
And if he could - if anyone could, it was Harry - well, he had plans for that too.
He suspected he would be doing editing of the spell, simply because he knew on some level Harry would resist the thought of what he was creating and so not kill in cold blood (even though Tom was sure he could) and with the editing of the spell, he could add in a constraints.
Most Horcruxes could flitter around possess the things around it, but with Harry's, he would lock the piece of soul within its container.
Therefore, even if Harry did feel remorse, his soul would be prevented from coming back to him.
The process of stitching a soul back together was quite often fatal anyway, so it was really a measure for his friend's own good.
Not being able to create more than one for himself was limiting, but it didn't cripple him.
Besides, soon enough he would have all eternity to find a better method of ensuring his and Harry's immortality. He'd have all the time in the world.
Of course, aging during that time would be a problem, but he was sure he could solve it…as the Master of Death? He smiled indulgently at the thought.
Lord Voldemort would be a great, renowned title…but Master of Death was better, and would be his own to keep in private. He'd kill Dumbledore for the wand (two birds with one stone) and track down the Invisibility Cloak.
Surely an all powerful wand could summon its sibling artefact?
Over all, he was extremely happy with how everything was working out.
Harry would be…unfortunately distressed, he was certain, but he'd meant it when he said Harry was strong. Did that Lovegood girl honestly think Harry was weak enough to break?
His golden boy had a will of iron, unyielding to anyone, including him. Harry would survive Horcruxes, and he would survive moving to the past. Tom was certain of it.
Harry had to survive, because Tom didn't know what he would do if he didn't.
He was a few corridors away when he felt it.
Pain, crippling pain.
His eyes widened, his feet halting. Not physical…he had no wound…mental.
Harry
. He almost sprinted back, before catching himself. Still not physical.
Emotional.
Harry's mind was in turmoil.
He staggered to sit, head in his hands, somewhat in awe. He wasn't sure if he'd ever felt Harry's emotions so strong, his Occlumency barriers were up and everything, so…what was wrong with him? What had happened?
He surely couldn't have got in too big a trouble or fight in two minutes…so it was the conversation they'd just had. Horcruxes.
This was Harry's reaction to their deal.
Nausea bubbled in his gut, his mind struggling to rationalise the sudden, foreign sense of sickness. He scrunched his fingers into his hair, breathing deeply.
It would pass, soon enough, and no one would be around to see how it was affecting him. Damn it.
His nails pricked blood in the palms of his hands, fisted so tightly.
Harry felt so much, it was incredible. Was this normal, or a Harry thing alone?
He blinked, his head pounding against the onslaught.
A second later, it was gone, a dull ache.
Harry had regained his control, reeled his feelings back in and clamped them down in his own thoughts. He could breathe again.
He stood, shaky, half wondering if he should go back.
No.
He swallowed, brushed down his uniform, and carried on walking.
Surely Harry wouldn't break?
He would never let him break.
Cygnus Lestrange stared at the Owl swooping out the window, soon a mere speck on the distance. A shadow on the horizon.
He smiled with grim satisfaction.
Soon, Tom would be his, Potter would be gone, Voldemort would prize him above all others and Dumbledore would rue the day he ever thought to discard his value.
How could he not be happy?
My Lord Voldemort,
I can soon give you the date that Potter is outside of Hogwarts, and Tom's, protection.
Be ready, and await my owl.
Yours, your most faithful friend and follower,
Cygnus Lestrange.
A/N: Thank you very much for the reviews - onwards on the 3000 reviews, ja? 133 to go :) So if it pleases you (it pleases, me, Tom and Harry very much :P) keep 'em coming! Haha.
I thought I'd continue with my practice of updating as soon as I've finished writing the chapter because I personally hate waiting for fics to get updated, and, as always, so I hope you enjoyed the chapter. :D
ANNIVERSARY: Fate's Favourite is, on Tuesday, going to hit the anniversary of 'Fictionist has been writing it for two years.' As such, I feel we must celebrate. Anyone got any requests for a DD celebratory oneshot? Please send your ideas to me, cause I don't have a clue.
PS: It would be fabulous to have 3000 reviews for the anniversary ;)