(TW & AN: sexual scene, vague death. If you're like me and need music with about the same urgency as oxygen and/or love immersion you can imagine Morty plays:)
A Fragment of My Soul, Invadable Harmony
(Instrumental)
When the Dark Lord returned to the sitting room, Harry was circling sleep—unable to catch it—ring clutched tight in his right hand. His and Tom's mother whispered and watched. Crux was quiet in his head unless his eyes wandered to Merope—then he was half-hardheartedly scolding. Swaddled by Bed Sheet.
He sprang upright when the door swung inward and jammed the ring on his middle finger, ready to fight for it. Merope and Lily vanished as he did, which irritated him instantly.
"…You can't take this back," Parseltongue, almost pleading, mostly angry.
Angry that what was given would likely be taken away, too powerful an object to just let him have. Angry that in the end, if it came to a fight, he would lose—if not physically, some other way. Angry that he loved the Dark Lord and that Voldemort would take the ring back despite knowing that.
Crux shot out of his head without another word.
The Dark Lord stood in the doorway, examining him for a moment before he closed them in. Harry thought about stunning him while his back was turned—Snakewood wand pulled from his pocket—instead, he repeated, "You can't take this back."
He'd returned to scanning Harry's face, frowning, "I need… Sleep."
"What?"
"I'm- I'm tired?" Voldemort sighed, pressed his palms into his eyes and dragged them down his face. "I need to think."
"Think about what? You're not taking this back."
"Harry…" He inhaled, cleared his throat, and he did look tired, "The ring is yours."
"…What?" He didn't unclench his fists; sure he'd heard wrong. "But- they're the Hallows?"
"I am tired." He opened the door and gestured Harry through it, but he didn't move.
The Dark Lord didn't usually lie. Far more his preference to hurt with the truth.
"Are you serious?"
"…Would you believe me if I said I was joking?" He scoffed, eyebrows raised, repeatedly gesturing at the door with his head. Clearly uncomfortable.
Harry didn't replace his wand in his robes as he approached, though he was less and less wary, more in awe. "You're gonna let me keep it?"
Voldemort ushered him into the hallway, sighing, "I do not like to repeat myself. You often insist I repeat myself. Do you not want the stone?"
"I want it, yeah, obviously, I want it, but… Why?"
Another long inhale that stuttered on the way out, "It should be with you."
Shocked quiet until they'd climbed into bed and Harry took the customary position of 'Wrapped around Voldemort so tightly he'd have to work to escape,' he asked, "…Did you know what they were going to say?"
"I do not need to hear what they said."
Harry took that as a yes, holding the ring fast on his finger as the bliss rolled through him. "…You're really not going to take it?"
He felt the Dark Lord shake his head, "If I need it, you will lend it. Otherwise, yes. The stone is yours."
By Sunday afternoon—three days after Remus' capture—Harry had marked an additional five hundred strangers. Along with those the Dark Lord had marked, there were no more waiting—bringing the total number of Death Eaters to seven thousand five hundred strong.
Nine Order members—held for questioning—were caught in the raids on the addresses provided by the werewolf, and Tom and the Dark Lord were… Undecided on how to approach Ironwood.
As Voldemort's spy suggested, there was an owl sent by Reed's father, and Narcissa reported that she had immolated it on sight as requested.
Executions were scheduled that night, along with the largest Death Eater gathering to date—a means to count those who didn't show up. And so the Dark Lord had combined the events to emphasise what would happen to traitors of his cause.
And there were three traitors among them. Three spies weaselled out of the lower ranks—not who they were looking for but fit to be made an example of—as a result of tighter security. It wasn't clear if Reed had brainwashed them or if they'd diverted on their own accord.
There would be more, of that they were certain.
After his stock of bliss-inducing potions had been restored, the Dark Lord returned to sneaking out in the dead of night, going red in the face if Harry mentioned it.
Despite watching like a hawk, he hadn't seen a wisp of Demetria since the marriage proposal. He figured it was by design. Irritating.
"It would be simpler to kill her," Voldemort said, sat in an armchair, shoes untied—caught between getting ready for the evening and arguing with Tom.
The Dark Lord was intent on killing Reed; Tom was doing his damnedest to convince him otherwise.
"…Do you recall Portam Keep?"
"I knew you would bring that up."
"Over seven hundred people worshipping an ungodly Dementor and Devil's Snare hybrid under the careful brainwashing of a cerebromancer?"
Voldemort narrowed his eyes, "I do not need a history lesson."
"Oh? Don't you? The cerebromancer died, the town remained brainwashed, and they all experienced the heady religious experience that is having your soul sucked out by a writhing mass of tentacles."
"And your point," the Dark Lord began, reefing his shoelaces tight, "Is that those with altered brains will not return to normal once Reed Harlow is dead."
"…Yes, that is my point."
"I am aware."
"I know you are aware, are you comprehending?"
"Give me an alternative? Other than eliminate the threat? How do you propose we bring her to heel once we have overcome the odds and taken her back?"
"I'm… Working on it." Though he'd fought it, Tom had been thinking about the dream. "Let me work on it… And take your pants off."
Harry's mouth filled with saliva, clear in his mind what Tom wanted, heart falling into his cock.
Voldemort watched Tom approach, but didn't move when he dropped Harry to his knees.
"How could it be you…? I can't… I cannot- How…?"
Harry didn't know what he was asking, sure it wasn't the time for it, his eyes flicking to the Dark Lord's pants—not undone.
"You, seventeen years old… An accidental vessel—"
Tom went for Voldemort's buttons and Harry still didn't know what he was talking about.
"…Nearly eighteen," he muttered when the Dark Lord stopped Tom's advances by abruptly grabbing Harry's face with both hands.
"…It can't be you, it can't," Voldemort was pleading, scanning his eyes, and the bliss hit Harry in the cheeks.
"He is your equal. He is me, as I am him… I am you. You are me… He is you." Tom returned his fingers to the Dark Lord's buttons—fighting the bliss with practised focus—and Harry grinned.
He bloomed the curse from his hands and said, "My age is your concern? You've made me… As old as you are. Older."
Voldemort pressed his thumb to Harry's scar, a war of emotions on his face, "…A fragment of my issue… With—this." Gasping his words out because they'd freed his cock—squeezing and rolling the tip, coiling darkness down his thighs, biting in—still he tried to speak, wouldn't let Harry put his mouth where he wanted it, "I am the Dark Lord Voldemort… And you-"
"So am I," Harry said, "Whatever you are… I am."
The Dark Lord said, "No-" but his cock was like a hot iron bar twitching in his hands, hips rolling for friction, his grip on Harry's cheeks relaxed.
"…Yeah," Harry pushed out of his hands and took him in his mouth—almost scalding—hot precum on his tongue—bliss burning a trail down his throat as he swallowed, humming, eyes fluttering closed.
He gripped Voldemort's thighs hard enough to bruise, ripping through fabric with the curse, drawing blood, the friction of his pants not quite enough but far too busy to correct it.
No more than a few seconds of sucking—swirling his tongue, salivating, rolling him in the back of his throat—and the Dark Lord thrust up, cried out, cock pulsing heat, his hands locked in Harry's hair, holding him in place—Harry was painfully close along with him, hips on autopilot, hot salt in his mouth, moaning on the Dark Lord's cock until a single touch with the curse—Tom's doing—muted and froze him, eyes sealed shut, nerves turned fireworks.
By nightfall—another shower and burn salve required, two bliss potions burning like the sun in his stomach—they were ready to publicly execute thirty-one Order members and three spies.
Or, Harry was ready to execute thirty-four people. The Dark Lord was ready to watch and give a masked speech about loyalty and death.
Voldemort knew a speech would do effectively nothing—if a Death Eater was turned by Reed no amount of loyalty would prevent it—simply an expected response to treachery and an opportunity to deal with a backlog of prisoners. No statement would be made on Reed, but Tom and the Dark Lord assumed that most had to know at least a whisper about Ironwood's unethical recruitment methods.
He'd looked out the window several times that evening, baffled by the sheer numbers. Waiting for them. Sent invitations with Portkeys by Narcissa, an ordeal that reportedly took a great deal of time.
Sprawled down the snow-covered slopes of Gwrych, glowing wands raised in the air. Thousands. Hooded and masked. Close to the appointed minute of the Dark Lord's arrival.
They didn't walk through the castle to the elevated, brightly lit stage; instead, Voldemort side-long Apparated Harry from within his quarters. Masked and quiet.
As Crux had been, a strange hush since the stone. Harry hadn't turned it since, but he felt it on his finger without pause—a constant reminder. Dozens more questions for Lily cropped up, the same true for Tom with Merope, but his heart would leap into his throat each time he considered asking.
He'd picked up the ring without thinking about the yawning ache in his chest that would come after.
That was what he thought about, on stage, mask on, obscured by Bed Sheet's hood.
He spotted vampires in the mass crowd, their faces exposed, grinning, yawning fangs. He found Har-im-hotep—white turban first—his students with him, also lacking anonymity. The Djinn whispering with Cassiopeia, both staring at Harry.
Thirty-four prisoners lined the stage behind him; the three Death Eaters wore their masks—Harry supposed they were worn to make it clear who they were and what they'd done to deserve execution.
"…My Chosen," the Dark Lord began, wand at his throat, standing at Harry's left while he pressed the ring stone side down into his palm and examined the faces of those on death row.
One prisoner there that shouldn't have been that made him do a double take, eyebrows raising as he realised he probably should have mentioned her sooner. Grateful for the mask hiding his expression.
"Tonight, we gather to witness the price of betrayal…" Voldemort gestured at the prisoners, and Harry took the lull to mutter in Parseltongue:
"I need one of them alive."
Cho Chang was shaking toward the centre of the group of prisoners, in between the other two men—strangers to Harry—that they'd captured at Muriel's.
"…You what…?" Wand briefly removed from his neck.
"Yeah, I should have said something sooner, probably… The one with the long black hair in the middle. Cho."
The Dark Lord's eyes said, 'You can't be serious.' He didn't answer straight away, and resumed his speech on loyalty with his shoulders bunched up.
Buying time to get an accurate measure of the crowd.
When Cho was removed from the line—Voldemort declared that she was to be made an example of in private; Harry thought the implications were weird but ultimately not his problem—she tried to get his attention, her hands vibrating, chained together, and raised as though she was reaching for him; too far away for contact.
"Harry, please-" Was all she managed to get out before she was manhandled, weeping, off stage by two Death Eaters.
He didn't look at her when she said his name; he stared into the crowd and watched her from the corner of his eye.
She might have thought she was going to die extra horrifically, but it was probably the best way to get her out without showing weakness. She wasn't actually going to die extra horrifically. And though everyone knew who he was, it wasn't in his best interest to acknowledge it.
By the end of the event, Harry had killed an additional thirty-three people, bringing his total to forty-eight if you counted Muriel (Tom didn't, Harry did.) The number supplied by Tom and adjusted by Harry.
The stone might have drawn blood from his palm as he cast the curse that he would use to slice so many throats, but his face had remained expressionless.
The final count showed that just under three hundred of the Dark Lord's marked were absent. Twenty-nine of Harry's were also missing, which aggravated Tom considerably.
He felt the weight on him before he was properly cognisant. Dreaming.
"Wake up, Princess," Crux's over-eager hand gripping his cock, sprawled over Harry, pinning him to the bed.
"I need you to see something," Crux whispered in his ear, breathy and theatric.
Waking up with four bliss potions in his system was a feat. Dragged from heavy unconsciousness by Tom and his Horcrux to find himself alone in the Dark Lord's quarters at nearly three in the morning.
He left Bed Sheet hovering near the ceiling, startled off by his struggle to get out of bed.
Led stumbling through Gwrych in semi-darkness, tracing the wall with a hand so he didn't slump back into sleep.
'What are we doing…?' He wondered, met with a thrill of excitement from Crux by way of answer.
Tom paused when Harry's Horcrux didn't answer, 'What are we doing?"
'Tsk, paranoid, never can just trust me. I need you to sneak up on him because that's the only way you'll ever know what he gets up to all night—too much of a scaredy perfectionist. Hurry up, then. That blindingly white sitting room.'
Tom moved them then, spurred by curiosity, both his and Harry's.
He heard the music before the thread snapped together and announced him, and when he did get close enough, there was a fumbling of the piano keys, a resounding thud, and then silence.
'Come on, don't be a bitch, come on,' Crux muttered to himself, and Harry waited on the other side with increasing awkwardness.
He hadn't expected the Dark Lord to sneak away at night to play the piano. He didn't know what he thought, but not this. It wouldn't have made his top ten guesses. He debated turning back—already caught—but Crux insisted against it.
'…He wrote it for you,' his Horcrux thought, somewhat begrudgingly.
'Wrote? Wrote it? For me? Like a song?'
'Harry, I'm going to call you an idiot now… You're an idiot. No, he wrote you a 'Get well soon' card, you mentally challenged- …Pardon me. Yes. He wrote you a song.'
As Harry stood baffled, the music started again, from the beginning. Melancholic, dark chords swelled and rendered him motionless.
'…Go in.' Crux told him, and his hand was already on the knob, so he turned it.
Harry leaned against the door once he'd shut himself inside. His heart crept up his throat watching the Dark Lord's hands on the keys, his shoulders tense, facing away from him in a mostly dark room, candles on the piano's lid. Voldemort didn't acknowledge him, though he hadn't entered silently.
Tom drew the Snakewood wand and charmed the room against unwanted guests while Harry stood transfixed.
The keys lighter toward the end. Softer—catching his breath in his throat, almost disbelieving.
'…How long has he been-'
'Too long, don't even get me started on the tantrums he threw. Wrong key wrong note wrong tone wah.'
'…It's beautiful.'
'Don't tell me, tell him.' Crux was gone then, his exasperated excitement left behind like an imprint as the Dark Lord's hands stilled on the keys.
"That was beautiful," Harry repeated in Parseltongue.
"…You should be sleeping," not much scolding in his tone.
"I knew you played… I didn't know you liked it," he approached slowly, and Voldemort stood to face him.
"I don't." Close enough to touch.
"Oh." Harry didn't move; Tom held him still.
Something in the Dark Lord's air was different, brushing Harry's sleep-mussed hair away from his scar, staring at it intently.
"You are mistaking me for the Horcrux in your head," he whispered, tracing the scar with his thumb.
"…So are you," Harry whispered too. He was certain he wasn't mistaking anything.
"He- it-" he grimaced, "—Your Horcrux is not in my head." His free hand came up to his shirt buttons and fell back to his side three times, "…I had you in ancient runes for months, and you did not recognise the rune on your forehead—" Thumb still following the line of the lightning bolt, "—Sowilō: the sun. Awakening, power, exuberance… The seat of the soul."
The fourth time the Dark Lord's hand came to his shirt buttons he undid them. Harry couldn't breathe, eyes fused to his chest, his shaking fingers.
"…Thurisaz." Voice a wisp in Parseltongue; he revealed the vial that held Voldemort and Cassiopeia's blood pact—chained around his neck—and the deep red-raw scar above his heart.
Like a rose stem without the flower, a horizontal line bearing a thorn. Angry, snaking redness spreading underneath the raised scar like so many tentacles, reaching into the depth of his skin and vanishing under his ribs.
"Chaos, destruction, breaker of resistance... The thorn of awakening." He pressed two fingers to his chest, but he didn't touch the scar, his expression as raw as the mark.
Harry was drawn to touch it, bliss rocking him on his feet—older in his stomach, fresh on his forehead, pulsing into his brain—but when he reached out, Voldemort stopped him, grip gentle on his wrist.
"Did you- write that song? For me?" Harry asked.
"The seat of my soul…" his face was so close so suddenly that Harry's first reaction was mild confusion. "…The thorn in my heart."
He searched Voldemort's eyes, certain he wasn't about to do what it felt like he would do.
But he did.
Over-hot lips pressed to his, glowing eyes fluttering shut, tentative until Harry inhaled the shock and pulled the Dark Lord in by the neck, seeking access with his tongue. One hand locked in Harry's hair, the other tied around his waist, untucking his shirt.
Visceral, the way it moved him. Furious pleasure bloomed in his middle, moaning into his mouth, first struggling to get the rest of Voldemort's clothes off, then, when the angry starving noisy pleasure in his stomach reached his throat, he pushed the Dark Lord—with his lips and his hands—toward the chaise lounge he knew was in the room somewhere, and shoved him onto it. Kiss broken for an instant, both magnetised.
Popping all his buttons off instead of wasting time, tongues interlocked, chest to chest, the sun whispering through Voldemort's skin like a siren song. Bliss thrummed through him along with the heat, drawing his mouth to the Dark Lord's neck—holding his arms above his head—then to his chest, the thrill of pressing his lips to the scar, that he wasn't stopped, giddy and breathless and so in love with him that it was physically painful, burning in his throat, seizing his lungs.
Light rippled under the Dark Lord's skin like a sunrise over water. Not quite hot enough to burn. He drew back to watch it; to see his face.
Fear in his eyes, heart visibly pounding in his chest, neck, and forehead. Stunning. Breathing hard. Soft to the point of breaking. Resistance worn to a nub. Gold brightness crested and folded across his face and chest; wrists slack in Harry's grip. Hypnotic. The Dark Lord's eyes swallowed by deep red, like pooling blood.
He pressed his forehead to the Dark Lord's chest, adoration fogging all thought but one, "I love you."
As though Harry had dropped a bomb. Ignited in an instant beneath him, heat so blinding it registered as freezing. Light—dense enough to solidify—seared his retinas, screaming burning vibration lit every nerve. Voldemort forced him off—like he'd touched a live wire, unable to let go without assistance—and though he couldn't see, he heard the Dark Lord. He could hear the light. Room on fire. Every inch charred nerves roaring agony—
"Nononono-NO no—yes yes YES-" Pleading then cackling—air buzzing like the inside of a beehive—followed by the loud crack of messy Disapparition.