I own nothing relating to any series, including Harry Potter and Marvel.

Rider in the Night

Chapter 2

'That went better than I expected,' Harry thought to himself, straightening his outfit after reverting back to his normal attire. He looked every bit the muggleborn he had been raised as.

He looked at himself in a mirror, taking a moment to make sure nothing had changed between realities. He was wearing a white shirt, as he had been earlier, as well as black jeans and a pair of tan work books over some rather comfortable socks. Add some grime here and there and he'd look like a construction worker. Which was good, as he much preferred looking like a person over some kind of cosmic entity, even though he was.

'I need to come up with something better than Negentropy, no one understands that,' he groused to himself. 'I mean, it's Negative Entropy, it's not that hard to understand.'

Despite his introduction being a bit of a flop, Harry didn't mind so much. He had a hard time holding back his laughter at Neville's reaction to gaining the knowledge that he had a shard of Voldemort's soul in his scar and the verbal thrashing he gave Albus. It was more than the old man deserved, but Neville was a nicer person than he was.

"I wonder how Neville will react when I tell him he's not related to the Dursleys," Harry said to himself, Stepping away from the mirror and out into Diagon Alley.

Finding out that he wasn't related to Petunia and that the Dursleys were, in fact, just victims of Dumbledore's manipulations had been horrible to discover, but nice to know. Dumbledore provided the initial prod and gave them an outlet for their anger. Harry had been the perfect outlet, with the number of curses he had been under. No one questioned his injuries or why he was in rags while Dudley got everything he wanted and more.

Harry could say what he wanted about Dumbledore, but the old wizard knew how to manipulate people into doing what he wanted them to. There were exceptions, usually those who figured out what kind of person Dumbledore really was, but they were few and far between.

Besides his ability to manipulate people, Dumbledore was also an expert on how people would react and could figure out what actions they would take before they decided on any action. He wasn't perfect at it, but he was damn good.

Harry noticed a few people looking at him with undisguised hatred as he walked through Diagon Alley. Death Eaters or sympathizers, it looked like. That was the other reason he decided on a simple, non-magical attire. The more he looked like a muggle, the more likely he was to be attacked.

Though he hated Dumbledore, enough to want to strangle the man with his own beard - again, as he had done that in one timeline - he was a man of his word, one of the few benefits of his being ritually abused. That meant Death Eaters, supporters - that potentially included the sympathizers and he wasn't going to ask questions about it - and allies were on the list of people he had to get rid of, just to weaken Voldemort's position.

As it wasn't quite late enough for them to be active, with the higher ranked Death Eaters having jobs that take up a bit of their time, Harry knew he wasn't going to be attacked by anyone. Unless they were drunk and or stupid, and Harry never ruled either of those out with blood purists. Or at least the lower-ranked ones.

Not that it mattered, as Harry climbed the steps to Gringotts. If the timeline was the same, they wouldn't fall to Voldemort's rule for a little over a year, so most people knew better than to attack anyone on Gringotts property. Though, that was mostly because people didn't want their gold seized for reparation or something equally as senseless.

Not that Gringotts had much power otherwise. They were bankers with a half decent army, but that army was designed to fight robbers, in a labyrinth they knew like the back of their hands.

He still didn't know where some muggleborns got the idea that Gringotts was a superpower within the wizarding world. They were a bank regulated by the ICW, and they weren't even the only one in the world. They were the only magical bank in the UK, but they were under so many restrictions that they were more or less subservient to magical humans.

That said, Harry couldn't remember the last time he walked into Gringotts, and this was an entirely new reality, so he could be totally wrong. Regardless, as soon he stepped into the lobby, all noise stopped. There was a clink of a few coins after he walked in, but nothing after that.

He smiled to himself at the dozens of fearful faces that looked at him. 'Ah, that's right. Goblins are more sensitive to death than a human.' They were more animalistic than humans and had a better connection to their instincts due to that. 'My presence must be making them shit themselves,' he cackled internally.

A few patrons turned to look at him, since the goblins that had been serving them suddenly weren't. Harry ignored them as he went up to a teller, "Hello. I'd like to inquire about the status of my vault."

The goblin looked at him a moment before he croaked, "Name-..." He cleared his throat, "Name, vault key, please."

Harry reached down into the shadow on the counter and fished out his key. Magic of this world felt similar enough to his, so he hoped it would pass, but he didn't yet know where to get the key to his family's vault in this reality. "The Potter vaults," He said as he handed over the key, intentionally not saying his name.

The goblin hesitantly took the key, fingers twitching nervously. He inspected the key for a moment before setting it down and grabbing a thick tome from under the counter. He opened it about half way, looked and flipped back a few pages before one clawed finger slid down to the bottom of the left page. "The Potter family vaults are open but inactive, Sir Potter. Would you like to visit one of your vaults today?"

'Sir?' Harry thought to himself. 'Ah, right, scared of me.' Harry hummed softly, "Not at this moment, no, but I would like it changed to active."

"Of course," the goblin said, sliding the key back along the counter. "Is there anything else Gringotts can help you with today?"

"Yes," Harry replied. "Tell the Regional Manager I'll be paying him a visit in the coming days, no later than a month from now."

"You can't just-..." the goblin started before freezing as Harry raised a brow and let inevitability radiate off of him. "Yes sir," the goblin then squeaked, looking greener in the face than usual.

"Good lad," Harry chuckled. He pulled his key off the counter and tossed it back into his shadows. "You have a good day," he said before turning on his heel and walking back out of the bank.

He had a smile on his face and a hefty pouch of coins in his hands as he left the bank, traveling twenty minutes from the present to make his 'swift exit' not so swift. He walked down Diagon Alley, exuding an aura of smug confidence as he traveled down the cobbled path.

Given it wasn't likely he was going to be attacked by Death Eaters in the middle of Diagon Alley, Harry made his way towards Nocturn. He had just barely gotten out of view of Diagon Alley when he found himself confronted by two wizards and a vampire. By the feel of the foreign magic on their right forearms, they were servants of Voldemort. Given that they were trying to mug him, they couldn't have been very high ranked. At all.

After killing the would-be muggers and taking their forearms, since they didn't have masks to prove their allegiance, he made his way, unimpeded, to Borgin and Burke's. He only waited a moment before the oily owner appeared, looking just as hideous as the man he remembered.

"Don't want no muggles here," the man said with a deepening scowl on his face. "Out you go, out!"

Harry hid a grin as he walked further into the shop, his outfit shifting to one that even Lucius wouldn't have been able to afford, especially given that silk dragons died out before the rise of muggle civilization. "Muggle, certainly not!" Harry exclaimed, sounding angry. "Perhaps you should look again, or I shall take my business elsewhere!"

Borgin visibly flinched as Harry got loud, his sallow skin paling further, "S-sorry, sir! A trick of the light, it must've been!"

"Perhaps I should tell the Dark Lord that your vision is starting to go," Harry drawled, his tone no less aggressive, "When you can't even differentiate between a muggle and one of my distinguished pedigree." He was laying it on a little thick, but Borgin was so afraid that he likely didn't notice.

"No, sir, please!" Borgin pleaded. "Half off anything in the store, I beg of you!"

Harry sneered at the man, "I will consider it." He turned away from the man and started to explore around the shop. He noted a few familiar artifacts, such as the Hand of Glory a young Draco had looked at, or the Vanishing Cabinet. He didn't have much of a reason to be in the shop, except to poke around and maybe kill a few Death Eaters.

It wasn't until Draco Malfoy walked into the store and Harry saw Neville and Hermione trying to listen in that he came up with an idea. He vaguely remembered a similar situation and smirked. If things went the same, Draco would purchase the Vanishing Cabinet and the cursed necklace in an attempt to kill Dumbledore.

Moving quickly, Harry grabbed the necklace and removed the curse from it, applying his own in its place. He wasn't the most skilled enchanter, but his power made up for the lack of skill. The level of detail it needed was a bit mind-numbing, but it basically ended up being that anyone who supported the blood purist agenda would believe the necklace was horribly cursed and would kill whoever wore it.

He set the necklace back down and Stepped behind Hermione and Neville, clapping a hand down on their shoulders, more gently on Neville if he was anything like Harry had been, "What are you two doing?" He couldn't resist a grin as both jumped under his grasp.

"S-sir!" Neville exclaimed in a hushed tone, like he was trying to get his point across and stay quiet at the same time. "What are you doing here?"

Harry raised an eyebrow, "Sir? Ah, I didn't tell you my name, did I? Call me… Agathos. Not my real name, you understand, but the game I'm playing must continue. As for what I'm doing, well, I'm working on completing my portion of the deal. Now what are you two doing, stalking the young Mister Malfoy?"

"We're not stalking him," Hermione protested. "We just happened to overhear him and wanted to make sure he wasn't up to anything shady, or more shady than usual."

Before Draco could emerge from the shop, Harry pulled the pair out of Nocturn - the lack of bodies didn't surprise him, they were likely already sold to some alchemist or potion master - and back to Diagon, "No worries there, I know exactly what Draco is up to. Nothing he has planned involves you or those you care about."

"Of course," Harry continued, laughing softly, "I know the two of you aren't going to listen to me, so I will provide you with some information." While Hermione was paying attention to him, Neville was looking around, looking like he was wondering why no one was paying them any attention. The similarities between them were startling. "Draco was given an impossible task and won't bother you for most of the year, besides the occasional bumping of shoulders in the halls."

"How do you know this?" Hermione asked.

Harry grinned, "I know because I must know. I won't say I'm a seer or some nonsense like that, but that's all I'm willing to tell you at the moment."

Hermione looked like she wanted to argue but he would have none of it, "Careful what you say, or I'll tell Neville about the things you do in public parks at night." He cackled as Hermione went bright red and shot a glare at him.

"Fine," she hissed, "but we're going to have a private conversation about that… Agathos? Kindness, really?"

Harry shrugged, "That's your first hint, yes. Now run along you two, get all of your school supplies. I've got plans to foil, Death Eaters to get rid of and a hot date waiting for me."

Without waiting for an answer, Harry vanished. He didn't Step, instead accessing an omnipresent reality so intricately intermingled with his new reality that it was strange that they weren't one. The Realm of Death was an odd one, but Harry wasn't likely going to stay long.

~Z~

Albus Percival Dumbleodre scowled as he paced around his office while considering what to do. 'That… creature certainly isn't Death. A person claiming to be a concept, how ridiculous! Still, the power he wields…'

Albus scowled further. He had done dozens of rituals and stolen the power of several muggleborns but he didn't even come close to scratching the level of power this creature had shown. 'Bad enough that the upstart Riddle gained more power than myself, and the young Longbottom heir was determined to be his equal, only gaining power as he grew older, but I don't know if the three of us pooling our power together if we would be able to make him notice us.'

He shuddered involuntarily. 'Nothing should be that powerful,' he thought to himself. 'Worse, it seems to despise me. But why? And why are his eyes so familiar?'

He looked up from the floor, glancing at the portraits on the walls, all frozen in place. It was times like this one where he had wished they weren't such sticklers for the laws and rules that would use their right as former headmasters, echoes though they were, to have him removed from the castle.

Not that he wouldn't do the same once it was his turn to be on the wall, but they should at least obey him! Not only was he the Headmaster, he was Albus Dumbledore, the greatest wizard to live and that would ever live!

He paused as his personal fireplace flamed to life, the orange embers turning brilliant green. He walked close, wand at the ready, before a nasally voice called out, "Wizard Dumbledore, your presence is requested."

Albus hesitated, a slight frown crossing his face. It was a goblin voice, that was for certain, but was it Snarltooth, Gripjaw, Goldtalon? Goblins had to look and sound so damned alike, it was hard to tell the difference between them.

"I fear you've caught me at a bad moment," he lied. "If this isn't a notice of the utmost importance, I insist that you wait."

There was silence for a few seconds before the goblin spoke again, "Your continued payment for information is of my utmost importance. The Potter vaults have been set to active, though the human decided not to visit the vaults. The human that had the vaults reactivated has also gotten an appointment with the Regional Manager."

Albus had paused for a moment, excited by the news at first. 'With a new Potter in Britain, I can finally have access to their family grimoire and vaults. Damned James for not trusting me like Frank had.' And then the goblin mentioned the appointment. "What?!" Albus exclaimed, shocked. "Truly? Do you know how?"

"That will cost extra," the goblin - Gripjaw, if Albus remembered right - said, the sneer on his face evident in his tone.

Albus exhaled through his nose. "How much?" He asked after a moment.

"Fifty galleons," Gripjaw stated.

"Ten," Albus returned.

"Fifty."

"Twelve."

"Fifty-five."

Albus scowled, "I cannot justify such an expense for unverified rumors. Twenty galleons."

"Eighty," Gripjaw said simply, the glee evident in his voice.

"Fine, eighty galleons," Albus said, pinching the bridge of his nose. He knew when to stop, and he had pushed anyway.

"The amount will be extracted from your account after we've finished our conversation. As for the information you paid for…" Gripjaw drew out the sentence. "I don't know how he did it," he said before shutting the connection off abruptly.

Albus massaged his temples, trying to shove the anger he felt down. 'If the goblin wards weren't so terrifying, I'd have made certain such nonsense was impossible.' He started to pace around the room again, knowing better than to let his anger control him.

'I haven't even been given the chance to ask who was the one that had reactivated the Potter vaults,' Albus mentally complained. 'Without that information, I will have a hard time getting proper access to the vaults.'

Dealing with the goblins had always been tricky, as they had certain ideals that clashed with his own, such as his desire to remain anonymous. He could use no artifacts or spells to disguise or hide himself, and James' brilliant cloak had been locked away with his death.

'Though,' he thought as he turned towards his private office deeper into the room, 'The fact the wizard simply set the vaults to active could be a boon. After all, I don't need proper access in order to get what I want from them.'

Albus opened the door to his private office, which he had installed shortly after becoming Headmaster, and walked in. Unlike the main office, his private one was nearly bare, having a plush chair and an expensive, elegant ebony wood desk with just a few trinkets scattered about the sole bookcase in the room.

This room didn't see much use, past the occasional satiating of his desires or when he had a particularly important planning session involving the future of his society. He also used it to store some otherwise illegal or unethical items, such as the grimoires of a few defunct families, dark artifacts and, what he was looking for, family vault keys that he shouldn't have.

After searching through the keys for a moment, Dumbledore's fingers wrapped around the ones that held the Potter family crest. "Now that the vaults are active, I should just take what I need. After all, they hadn't entered the vaults and wouldn't know the contents."

Albus smiled honestly for the first time in months. Finally, for the first time in years, he had access to a substantial amount of currency. Ever since he had drained the Longbottom accounts, leaving the heir just enough to get by for a few weeks once he had graduated Hogwarts, should he somehow survive his inevitable confrontation with Voldemort, he had been lacking in his finances.

The Philosopher's Stone was supposed to change that, but it had been destroyed and its magic lost to the aether. The only benefit of the situation was that Nicolas had passed before he could impart a verbal thrashing. How Perenelle continued to survive was beyond him, as was the fact she seemed to be able to counter all of his attempts to enthrall her to his service, as he had with her husband. He was still careful to avoid going to France due to her, even nearly five years after the incident.

But, with no Philosopher's Stone, Albus had to rely on more unsavory methods of getting the finances he required to continue the comfortable life he had grown accustomed to.

Since there was a time limit for his being able to pilfer the Potter vaults, Albus made haste, leaving to visit the bank before they closed for the day. His worries about the creature he had summoned were temporarily forgotten, as he was certain the creature could wait, being unable to cause too much chaos with the natural restrictions interdimensional beings had.

~Z~

Harry idly ran his fingers through the dark hair that belonged to the woman that was curled up against his side, sleeping as if she hadn't a care in the world. Not that they were on a planet, or technically in reality, but in a higher dimension of sorts that was connected to the reality he had been summoned to.

He looked down at the quiet, sleeping woman, memorizing her features. Like himself, she had untamable hair, but her hair swayed as if it were made of shadows despite the fact it felt like hair. She wasn't quite caucasian in skin color, not that it would have mattered to him, but looked somewhere between the start of a tan and caucasian. She looked a lot like Bellatrix, if the crazed woman hadn't been sent to Azkaban, with the sole exception of the three tattoos on her face.

Starting in the middle of her bottom eyelids were two silver lines, roughly as thick as her thumb, and ended just below the orbital socket, with two silver circles just below them, making them look like exclamation points. Starting just as her bottom lip ended, there was another silver line, twice as thick, that trailed down and ended where her jaw met her neck.

He didn't know why she had them, but he wasn't going to complain because it complimented her appearance perfectly. Of course, the silver lines were partially obscured, the ones around her eyes from the running of her mascara and the one below her bottom lip from smudging it across his body, decorating him with the black lipstick all over. He also wasn't going to complain about the fact her pubes were trimmed into the shape of the Deathly Hallows symbol. The fact she had been embarrassed about it was funny and a little endearing.

Still, the fact he had, within a few hours from their perspective, seduced and slept with this reality's version of Death was a little odd. She was a sweet thing though, just tormented from the darkness her role required of her. So much so that he would have to try to visit his home universe's version of her once he had returned.

Though, when he tried to pull away, she woke instantly, amethyst eyes staring up at him. "Where are you going?" she asked in her mesmerizing, melodic voice.

He smiled at her, pushing her hair back so he could kiss her forehead, "To work. You need to rest, I'll take over until you're rested." He then gave her a grin, "Or would you rather me tire you out again?"

The smile on her face, though tired, was a lot more sincere than the one she had when they had first met.

"Maybe later," she said quietly as she released him, allowing him to pull away while she laid her head back down.

He kissed her forehead again, getting another smile out of the woman before he left the room, pausing only to grab his pants off the floor. He could have created more, certainly, but he had gotten into the habit of grabbing his pants due to the fact that doing so was less likely to freak his partner out if they were unaware of magic.

As soon as Harry had placed himself on her throne, he used his right as Master of Death to take over her position as she rested, removing the burden from her so she could properly get some sleep. Had he been human, the sudden influx of souls, most of which needed to be sorted several times, would've shattered his mind. Even as an aspect of reality, he could feel the building headache, which made him wonder how Death hadn't gone insane long beforehand.

He couldn't say how long he had been working, taking the rare slow moment to work on properly automating the system so that Death wouldn't find herself burnt out again. It could've been centuries before he had a chance to sit back and take a break, he just wasn't sure. His headache was so intense it could kill a god, or such was his opinion, and it was no wonder Death had been slowly driven mad.

The only thing the system wouldn't do was take care of transgressors, but the free time would allow Death to build up her power so she could take care of such events with relative ease, depending on the severity of it. Now he just had to figure out how to send it to every other version of Death, so none of them got burned out.

Beyond the occasional glitch or minor error, which he had then taken care of, he spent his time reading or listening to the occasional story a spirit would want to share. The history of his summoned reality was interesting, if a bit odd. Countries he had never heard of, magic that transcended anything his native reality was capable of, actual deities influencing the world and monsters beyond mortal comprehension. It was a much more interesting reality than his own. Once he decided to travel around, he'd like to see the difference between the realities.

He had just gotten started on learning Kree history, needing a break from the politic-heavy history of Earth, when Death had exited her bedroom. Not that much of Earth history was that different from what he knew, he just didn't want to miss anything. He had already seen proof that there were sometimes substantial gaps between events that he knew did not take place in his home reality that had taken place in this one, such as the Corrupted Celestial crashing to Earth and being slain by Odin in roughly One-Million B.C., it was entertaining but absolutely wild.

Of course, there was no way he could focus on his book when Death walked out with just a sheet covering herself. Her hair was messier than before and her makeup had disappeared at some point but she looked rested and free of stress.

"How long have I been asleep?" She asked, sounding tired and dragging her feet on the floor as she made her way to him.

He stood from her throne, allowing her to take a seat on it, "Not sure, but a while." He found himself pushed into the seat, with her taking his lap instead.

"Any issues?" she asked as she wrapped his arms around her waist and got comfortable.

"A few, but nothing I couldn't handle." He relinquished control over the system as he felt her try to pull it back. "You've had a few visitors too. Life wanted to make sure you were okay, as did Infinity. They mentioned Eternity would've come, but his domain is more unstable than yours was. A few demise-related gods appeared to complain, and you had two semi-mortal visitors, Wade Wilson and Thanos."

"What'd you do?" she asked him.

"Hm? Well, I told your siblings you were asleep and they left, the gods I scolded and sent away, Wade left on his own after about an hour and Thanos tried to attack me, calling me some rather nasty names I rather not repeat and I ended up kicking him where it hurts and barring him from entering here again."

Death froze slightly but shook her head quickly, "Not them. The system. What did you do?"

"Oh, that?" he asked. "I automated it, mostly. You'll still need to take care of any transgressors, or just send me to do it, and I doubt I've made it perfectly, but you can at least rest instead of working constan-"

His sentence was cut off abruptly as she turned in his lap and kissed him. Again, Harry wasn't going to complain, especially as the sheet didn't turn with her and he hadn't yet put on a shirt.

The kiss lasted a few minutes, until he noticed she was crying, prompting him to break the kiss. He pushed her back slightly, reaching up to wipe her tears away. "Are you alright?" he asked.

She nodded as she pushed her head into his hand, "I'm okay… I just didn't know it was possible."

"It wasn't easy," Harry admitted. "Still, if there's something I learned from being a human, then it's the joys of being lazy." He slid a hand up to run it through her hair. "Besides, the work was destroying you and I would rather not have that happen."

"Thank you." She said, cooing slightly. "I owe you more than you can imagine."

Harry placed a kiss on Death's lips, sweet but swift. "You don't owe me anything. But, if you want to repay me anyway, could you send this to your alternate selves?"

"I can," she said hesitantly. "They'll want to meet you though."

Harry rolled his shoulders, "Tell them I'm busy and I'll visit on my own time. I want to explore for a while, see all the sights I've never known about." He lightly tugged on her hair, "I'd offer to let you come with me, but something tells me you're going to sleep some more."

Death had the decency to blush and nod, "Now that I have the chance to rest, yes."

"How about I tire you out and make sure you get plenty of rest, hm?" he teased, running a hand down her spine.

"Horndog," she scoffed, pushing away from him. She stood and grabbed the sheet again, wrapping it around herself. "Go adventure, Master, just make sure to visit occasionally."

Harry wrapped his hands around her waist, pressing a kiss against where her jaw met her neck. "Sleep well, Mistress," he teased. He watched as she pulled away and walked back to her bedroom before he conjured more clothes for him to wear before disappearing.