Chapter 134:

Staggering slightly, Harry had picked himself up from the cobbled Hogsmeade streets, ignoring the bewildered looks of the residents there and made his way back up to Hogwarts…fast.

He wouldn't put it past Voldemort to 'hunt him down' in the same manner Tom threatened to hunt down Voldemort. It wasn't the pleasantest thought, so he'd rather get into the relative safety of Hogwarts wards.

Nagini hissed at him, violently from her cage.

"Let me go, you stupid boy, you cannot cage me like this! Where is my master? What are you doing?"

He ignored her. He wasn't completely sure why he had taken the snake, it had just been a feeling but…Voldemort was very snake like, wasn't he? And in all the memories Harry had seen, he wasn't showing hints of snake-appearance either, just blurriness….so Nagini was somehow causing it.

Had she been part of the ritual? Except, that, alone, wouldn't be enough to make Voldemort so serpentine. Horcrux? He felt sick to think about it, yet triumphant that if Nagini was a Horcrux, he had four Horcruxes in his possession, the ring in close vicinity with Tom, and one left to find. The diary was destroyed, and the seventh piece was Voldemort himself.

Therefore, if Nagini was, somehow, impossibly, so luckily, a Horcrux…he only had one more to find.

He stumbled across the grounds, and into Hogwarts. He was barely a couple of steps inside before a force was crushing him. Brown hair.

Hermione.

"Harry, thank goodness you're alright, we thought you were dead! How did you manage to get away? Are you hurt? You should go to the Hospital, oh you could have been killed-"

"-I'm fine," he interrupted her, not unkindly. "Breathe. I'm okay, really."

"I'll believe it when I see it."

Harry's head whipped up, and Hermione's arms slid away from their bear hug to reveal Tom, standing a few metres away, seeming somewhat frozen. He assumed Hermione had ran in front of the other's approach to hug him.

That expression was too calm. Deadly.

Oh crap.

He set Nagini's cage on the ground, still ignoring the furious creature - though everyone else (barring Tom, who so far hadn't even glanced at her that he'd seen) was eyeing her, aghast - but didn't remove either Cup or Locket from his person.

Tom took a several steps closer to him, and by contrast, Hermione backed away as if to give them space, suddenly looking nervous.

His gaze cast cursively across all his friends, each showing some signs of distress, and then Lestrange's unconscious form. Fury burned through him at the sight of the other boy, momentarily, before he snapped his attention back to Tom.

Tom.

"…Hi to you too," he greeted, somewhat lamely. The other did not look amused. In the slightest. He attempted a smile.

Violet eyes seemed to search every inch of his soul, raking across his form, seeing stories and explanations written in every line of his posture.

"The screen went black."

Harry swallowed, his chest suddenly tight.

"T-"

"You spent the whole conversation saying goodbye to me, and then you cut the screen," Tom stated, very softly. "Everyday and never, really. Harry? Really?"

"You're angry," he pointed out the obvious. He didn't seem to be particularly talented at this…it was just…the other's words, the conversation with Voldemort, kept playing through his head.

He had been saying goodbye. He hadn't known what would happen, and he knew luck ran out. It was just…was he supposed to not say anything? Act like there wasn't a good chance they'd never see each other again if Voldemort had his way? He couldn't.

"Oh I left angry back in the bloody kiddie pool, darling."

Harry winced inwardly.

"Er…no harm no foul?" he tried.

Tom smiled, disarmingly.

"Always."

The next second hands were manoeuvring his arms relentlessly. Harry looked down, for the first time, to where the pad of Tom's thumb traced across a rather nasty looking red welt on his wrists. Oh. The chains.

"Would you look at that, harm-"

"T-"

He was spun, in an unforgiving manner, Tom methodically pointing out every single injury he had that the other came across, not even including the cruciatus.

It wasn't that bad, he'd had worse…but duelling Voldemort and numerous Death Eaters didn't, naturally, leave one wholly unscathed. He bit his lip.

"-Ah," Tom yanked up his shirt. "Bruised ribs, harm-"

"-Okay!" he hissed, trying to tug the material down again. "I get the point, alright?"

"Do you?" Tom questioned icily. "What is it?"

"That you're going to lecture me for something that wasn't my fault! Salazar, you try duelling Voldemort and his inner circle all at once and see if you come out any better than me when they're allowed to actually cause damage."

They glared at each other, ferociously, for a moment, but neither moved, and Harry didn't yank his pulse away from Tom's searching fingers either.

"I'm sorry," he said it barely above a whisper, after a minute, but he knew Tom heard it perfectly well, even if nobody else did.

"My lord-"

Lestrange had woken up. Without giving it much thought, Harry flicked his wand out and shot a pain curse. A glance at Tom showed the other had done exactly the same.

Lestrange dropped to the ground, trying, and failing, to hold back screams.

"For once in your miserable, treacherous life, Lestrange," Harry said coldly. "Hold your tongue, because for once in my life I'm not sure I can resist the temptation of removing it."

"You won't torture me-"

"I've had a pretty shitty couple of hours," he laughed, almost hysterically. "Try me."

Lestrange fell silent, whimpering in pain, and he didn't look at the rest of his friends to gauge their reactions. Tom arched his brows at him.

"I'm sure you're fine," the other said, quietly, sarcastically.

Harry's lips twitched into the beginnings of something, be it a smile or a frown he wasn't entirely certain. He knew he wasn't anywhere near out the danger zone, but…

" I will be," he amended, in a second of devastating honesty. Tom's hand squeezed his wrist in response, barely noticeably.

"Lestrange said you went to Gringotts."

"The urge to remove his tongue is growing," Harry deadpanned, not particularly caring to ask himself how much of that was a joke and how much was a brutal truth.

"I'll check if history says he has a tongue, if not, feel free."

He didn't need to ask to know that Tom wasn't joking. The appropriate reaction probably wasn't to feel touched though. He couldn't bring himself to care about that, either.

"Find what you were looking for?"

"Yes." Harry smiled, genuinely that time. He glanced at Nagini. "And maybe a little more."

"I presume you were plotting your escape during our conversation," Tom stated. He nodded.

"Among working on freeing my hands, yes," Harry agreed. The other's fingers tightened fractionally.

"You didn't know if your plan would work though."

Harry was getting an awful feeling of forbidding.

"I had a pretty good idea," he dismissed.

"Then why were you saying goodbye?" Tom hissed. Harry swallowed, again, but met that familiar, inexorable gaze evenly enough.

"I needed Voldemort to give up on retaliation from me-"

"No." The grip became painful, shifting to the front of his shirt, one of the knuckles pressing against his heart. Those eyes grew even more piercing, intent, demanding, unforgiving of his evasion.

"Tom-"

"Do not presume to lie to me, not now, and not again."

Again. Right. Sneaking to Gringotts.

"The prince of liars is getting sick of his trade?" Harry returned.

Tom simply stared at him in response. He sighed, inaudibly.

"No I didn't know my plan would work," he admitted, continuing before the other could speak. "But nor was I going to watch you concede to him on my behalf, so, my plan it was. Besides," he muttered, looking away, marginally uncomfortable. "No plans are foolproof. It worked out."

"I never concede to anyone for anything but that which I want, I'm not you, I don't play the hero."

"Could have fooled me earlier," Harry replied, suddenly bold. "I don't know how many times you've stood up on my behalf now."

Tom shrugged, lightly, but his eyes flickered slightly.

"It would be a nightmare trying to replace you, far too much effort."

"Right," Harry smirked. Tom smirked back, the smallest, barest smile, but there nonetheless. There was a moment of quiet. "Thank you." The words came out as softly as the sorry had, just as uncomfortably in its sincerity.

"I thought…" Tom never finished his words, shaking his head dismissively, tone coloured by a paradoxical combination of brightness and dark, close to his ear, menacing. "If you ever pull a stunt like that I will have you privately institutionalised for your own safety."

Harry's eyes widened.

Abraxas studied the two of them closely, looking for hints on how he should be reacting.

There was anger between them, that much was clear, but that was a mere surface emotion. He had no doubt that his lord was furious, his words alone consolidated the emotion and sent shivers running down his spine in fear.

A wrathful Tom was never a good Tom to be around.

The more…potent emotions were those veiled beneath the layers of callous fury and argument. In the time between the screen cutting black and Harry's arrival the Slytherin Heir had turned ashen, magic blazing like white hot flames, posture all too still and casual.

If Tom had even been rigid, it would have been better than the indifference that had overcome him, the mask of nonchalance.

He'd only seen Tom like that once before, the night he solidified his claim within their house and crushed all those who had sought to torment him for his dubious bloodline.

Abraxas still had nightmares about that night.

Tom torturing someone on emotions was terrifying, for his emotions powered his magic and stoked that dark aura until all the lights in his vicinity seemed snuffed.

Tom, apparently devoid of any and all emotions, utterly lost to any strain of humanity (for emotions were an all too human thing, weren't they?) was a thousand times worth.

Everyone had known the emotions had been there, but the young Dark Lord had been removed from them. Emotions didn't fuel the pain he inflicted, pure will did.

It hadn't been torture for Tom's sadistic love of torture, it hadn't been torture born out a temper snapped, it had been a means to a goal. Ruthless determination. That had been all which was visible on Tom's face.

Ruthless determination.

Harry had managed, where all others failed, to reach his lord's heart and force him to feel.

And then Harry hadn't been there, and none of them knew his fate. Tom had simultaneously closed off all feeling for apathy. Maybe it hurt him too much.

He suspected if Harry had…died, or not returned when he did, that his lord would simply have self-destructed, metaphorically torn out his heart and survived only for the completion of his next goal.

Going through the motions.

Dead inside.

It was…horrifying to imagine. He was so glad Harry had returned. The consequences of him not doing would have been devastating, for all of them.

Now, those emotions were returning.

He realised, with a sickening clarity, that Harry had come to be Tom's humanity.

Concern; there was concern in the way that Tom's fingers seized and didn't let go, and relief too. Harry wasn't as blasé as he struggled to appear either, for he didn't move back.

Normally, he'd noticed, Harry would back off and a fight would ensue, now, he was staying as close to Tom as Tom was to him, soaking in the other's presence like a plant did the sun.

Abraxas felt…awkward watching to two of them, even if he couldn't hear everything they were saying, merely because of the raw intimacy he could sense between the two of them.

In the common room, around them, Harry and Tom tended to play a role and dilute their - obviously overwhelming, consuming - intensity for banter. Games were twisted to be verbal and mental ones, accentuated by the push and pull of physical contact.

There was still an element of that, but the dilution had dropped, everything combining to something fiercer. This wasn't a game. Abraxas' mouth felt dry.

He knew many assumed that Harry and Tom…wanted each other, but he could see now that was a stupid thing to say. This wasn't a matter of want and desire.

This was need.

Everything else was just secondary, side effects. Someone of a more romantic nature would call them soul mates.

Their voices dropped even lower for a moment, before they finally turned and acknowledged the rest of them, still standing side by side.

Harry explained how he had managed to escape (though not, he suspected, in detail) tossing him a crystal weight, and requesting he return it with subtle thanks to his son.

He himself was uncertain of the ramifications of Lucius' actions.

He didn't want to see Harry hurt, both for the merit of what the loss would do to Tom and simply for Harry's sake (he did actually like the man). However, he knew there would be a fallout. He thought things might be beginning to settle down.

Then Dumbledore strode into the entrance hall, and he knew, with a sinking heart and a thrill of anticipation, that it was not.

As the old man entered, Tom felt a savage burst of hatred, and tightened his grip on Harry, yanking him nearer, till the other was practically pressed against him, tugging hard with the anticipation that Harry would resist the increase in their - already quite close - physical proximity.

Harry didn't, and in return, smacked into his chest with a somewhat surprised sound, clearly not having been expecting it like Tom had thought he might.

His friend twisted his head around at him, eyebrows raising slightly in something like admonishment, before he switched his attention back to the Headmaster who had frozen before them.

"Harry," Dumbledore breathed. "I heard - my boy, I came as soon as I heard - I was at the ministry in a war conference - there were reports saying you'd been kidnapped by Voldemort?"

He took a vindictive pleasure in the man's confusion.

"Yes," Harry said, offering no more. Dumbledore's gaze cast across them, stopping on Nagini with a frown.

"I presume you had a reason for being outside the castle walls?"

"Yes," Harry said again. "And I'll discuss it with you in due course."

Privately, he meant. Tom's eyes flashed…did Harry really think he would let him anywhere alone? After today?

"My office door is always open to you," the man replied.

Tom's fingers tightened once more, and he felt Harry shift to accommodate the hold, his finger tapping against his grip in a sign that he should be loosening it, a signal to relax.

He didn't know how he knew what Harry meant, and didn't care to analyse how he knew exactly how to interpret the gesture either.

"You know," he said, instead, addressing the aged Headmaster. "He might not have been outside the castle walls at all if you didn't practically encourage his urge for danger, and apparent desire to get himself killed."

"And yet," Dumbledore returned, coldly, "if it wasn't a danger addict, I highly doubt he'd tolerate your presence. You are, of course, correct, I should have instilled a stronger desire for safety within him."

"Now, now boys," Harry said dryly. "Play nicely. Headmaster, don't presume to think that your manipulations have any hold upon the shaping of my personality…Tom…don't blame him, and don't be a hypocrite. You are, I believe, the one who hates limitations and thus encourages me not to follow them."

The words were mild, not designed to wound, only, he assumed, to put him at ease with its discreet teasing.

"I encourage you to question the unnecessary societal and moral limitations you impose upon yourself," he returned, "I don't believe I've ever encouraged your appalling hero complex and passive suicidal tendencies, indeed, one could argue I've fought - and, it seems, failed - in curing you of them."

He was fully aware that Harry picked up on the dangerous bite in his tone, for the other tensed marginally.

"His morality is what makes him human," Dumbledore stated, apparently offended by the blunt declaration, the air around him chilling. Tom was unimpressed.

"And yet, morality is a subjective thing which changes depending on culture and individual. One would think something so essential would be more objective. No, what makes him human is his capacity for emotions, memory, reason and general above animalistic intellect. Or, if you want to be biblical about it, his soul."

"Animals have no moral conscience," Dumbledore began.

"Fear is the mother of all morality. Humans create their morality because they're scared of chaos, and the lack of rules that no morality would bring. I could get into an argument with you about it, old man, but it would be a stupendous waste of my time and I have better things to be doing. Harry - with me."

He sent a curt signal to his Slytherins to make sure they kept Lestrange secure, and took him to the Common Room.

He'd deal with the traitor after he'd dealt with Harry.

He spun, pushing the other boy in front of him and in the direction he wanted to go, sending a light warning thrum through the mark.

If Harry really, desperately, wanted to talk to his friends, he should have done so on his 'Gryffindor day' instead of almost getting himself killed. His throat tightened at the thought, uneasily.

That could never happen.

Harry turned to face Tom as they reached the room of requirement, steeling his nerves, setting Nagini's cage down again. He was going to have to watch his Parseltongue around her.

"Are you alright?" he asked, softly. He'd have asked the question earlier, immediately, but he'd known there would be no chance of an honest answer in such a public setting. Tom looked at him sharply.

"No."

Harry's barely caught his shock.

Despite that they'd moved out of public eye, he hadn't expected him to admit it so openly, and he'd already kind of seen the signs for the lack of being 'alright'. Tom stared at him, barely any expression on his face.

"Alright indicates pleasantness, a general feeling of satisfaction or of things being good. What part of this is alright?"

"The part where I'm not dead, presumably," Harry replied.

"Not dead now, what about next time you go off on one of your reckless plans - Lestrange, really? He tried to kill you, golden boy! - will you be dead then, sometime in the future, will you be dead then?"

"I didn't just trust Lestrange, I'm not that stupid," he growled. "I got him to swear an oath first."

"Not good enough, apparently-"

"-Everyone dies sometime, Tom-"

"Not. You," Tom hissed. "I won't allow it."

Harry swallowed.

"I don't want to live forever," he said quietly.

"Then I suppose you'll have to kill me, prophecy boy, because I'm not planning on letting you die anytime soon."

"I don't want to kill you!"

"I don't want you dead."

Harry sighed, running an aching hand through his hair.

The whole Voldemort thing was starting to take it's toll now, he was so tired. Magical exhaustion, physical exhaustion, mental exhaustion. Tom's head tilted.

"There are healing potions on the cupboard behind you," the other stated.

Harry looked around for the first time, taking in the room Tom had conjured.

It showed his preference in that there was a crackling fireplace and that it opened up to the sky - a sunny day, despite that in truth it was dark and cold outside. There were an assortment of chairs, sofas, and entire rows of healing equipments on shelves.

It was also a big room, despite that only a small portion of space was necessary. Seeing it, he suddenly realised how much he didn't want to be in an enclosed space right now, after that dungeon.

He walked over, picking out a pain potion, a bruise balm and a general healing potion for minor cuts and bruises.

"Snape will be pissed if these came from his personal stores," he said. "And I daresay Pomfrey would miss hers too."

"Drink."

Harry unscrewed the flash, downing the pain potion and the general healing potion. He'd save the bruise balm for a later date, though he was fully aware that Tom had carefully noted which healing implements he was picking up. He glanced up.

"What are your plans for Lestrange?"

"If you dare tell me not to punish him-"

"Don't kill him."

"I wasn't going to, unfortunately, that must wait until the time line is stabilised and sorted. Do you want to help?"

"Help you torture him?" Harry questioned, lowering his eyes to the empty bottles in his hands.

"Yes."

"I'll deal with him," he said.

He didn't agree with Tom's methods of torture, but he couldn't deny that something needed to be done about the other boy. But he had his own methods of vengeance.

Tom made a dissatisfied sound.

"You can't expect me to leave him be. I won't."

"You don't trust me to deal with him satisfactorily?"

"You're too merciful and kind to your enemies for my liking, I will admit," Tom said. Harry laughed, slightly.

"Don't mistake forgiveness for the actions people take against me as something that will extend to anything resembling mercy or kindness when those actions start screwing with people I care about," he replied firmly. "The world could have gone up in flames today. It's not just me he's wronged, but it's me primarily, and so surely it is my right to decide his fate?"

"He's my Death Eater, and thus, my jurisdiction. Together."

"Together if I'm in charge. You'll follow my lead," Harry proposed.

Tom surveyed him for a moment, his eyes glittering.

"Better make it impressive then," was all he said, challenging.

Harry met intrigued eyes, and nodded.

They weren't alright…but maybe they would be.

With time.

A lot of time judging by the dangerous look in Tom's eyes.

Great.

Lucius Malfoy sprinted through his quarters, haphazardly packing, his beautiful Narcissa staring at him, alarmed but ultimately composed."

What do you mean we have to leave? Lucius - talk to me?" she demanded, seizing his arms tightly.

His eyes were wild, feverish, yet simultaneously cool with his plan.

"Pack your stuff," he ordered. "Now. I will explain everything later. Just…trust me. Okay?"

"Darling-"

"Please."

Ten minutes later, they apparated straight outside the Hogwarts Gates.

A/N: 3000 reviews! THANK YOU SO VERY MUCH! I love you all! :D You are amazing and I can't find enough words to describe your singular awesomeness. I read every review multiple times with a grin on my face that makes people think that I've gone mad for smiling for no apparent reason.

I'm still working on an idea for the anniversary.

I hope you enjoyed the chapter :)

PS: Happy Valentine's Day. I 3 you. What do you guys think of a Valentine's Day DD oneshot? (not replacing the anniversary one) Ideas? Thoughts? I'll either write it or not tomorrow/today cause it's 1am where I am...
If I have time, which I might, cause I tend to stay up late. Anyway.

Goodnight!