Spill the tea
The horcruxes, along with Voldemort, sat in a circle, each contemplating the mystery that was Harry Potter. He was an enigma, something that had begun to fascinate each of them in turn, which in some ways was a surprise. The horcruxes were all different, you see, each being a reflection of who he had been at the time.
There was the diary, who held the remains of a childhood filled with disappointment and desire for that which was always out of reach: family. He was cunning and young, reckless in some ways but secretive in every way that counted. He walked a fine line between acceptable and unacceptable, walking the path that had been forced upon him. If Dumbledore decided he was a villain and refused to see him as anything else, he would excel at it. He toes the rules and lines the man has drawn, walking the path that had been forced upon him.
There was the ring, who had discarded all hope for a family. He was the aftermath of meeting what remained of his family, the result of a murder caused by disappointment and cruelty. Betrayal is something he detests with all of his heart and he tends to respond in kind. He is the remains of a boy who shed the last of his childhood (if it could even be called that) for the painful steps of adulthood. Still, he relishes this pain, accepts it as the cost for the path he has chosen. Tom Marvolo Riddle is alone and he doesn't care, not anymore. This is the snapshot of a man who has had the last dregs of childhood hopes torn away. Even with all of his goals, he had still hoped for a family. But he has realized the futility of this desire and has torn his heart apart to stave the pain that will come from seeking love. He is so, so bitter and this horcux shows this. The ring is a cruel reminder of his hopes and dreams he had held onto even as he delved into magics that were forbidden. He is his anger and bitterness. The Tom Marvolo Riddle trapped in the ring has accepted this and refined it into a weapon.
The cup is by far the most mellow of them. He whispers calmly in a way the ring and diary never could. This is an imprint of the man he had grown into. He is a reflection of the goals and standards he follows; the Tom Marvolo Riddle that became the cup is calm and advocates for the return of all magics. No matter what Dumbledore’s sheep may say, dark magic is not evil. It is simply a color in the world, a different category that some have more of a natural aptitude for. He sees the truth, sees that dark is not synonymous with evil, and wants to share that with others. After all, how can the dark be evil when it provides a time for rest and protects the hurt and fearful from those who might hurt them? (The dark had protected him in the orphanage.) So he is calm, choosing to whisper seductively to gain what he wants. That is what he had done to acquire the cup. The skills he had learned at school and in the orphanage had served him well in his endeavor to get ahold of the cup. And it had worked. Tom Marvolo Riddle, while still young, had seduced an older woman in order to gain something he desired.
The diadem is the most cunning, having perfected his silver tongue and grown far more devious as he does the dirty work he trusts no one else with. This is the man who had become a Dark Lord, someone who had rose beyond schoolyard courts to amass enough power to bring all of his promises to life. He is a man who has done terrible things and doesn't care. When the world has hurt him so badly he has no qualms about returning the favor. The years have stripped him of anything resembling positive emotions. He is calm yes, logical, yes. Yet this Dark Lord cares not for the idea of creating a family or giving mercy to those who do not deserve it. He laughs at those who wish on stars, for he knows that it's futile; nothing ever comes of it. He knows this, has lived it.
There are many who would claim he never had been a child, that he had always been a devil, but no child was inherently evil. Tom Marvolo Riddle knows this but disregards the idea of mercy all the same; such an act only leaves one open to further treachery and betrayal. After all, when given an inch, they will take a mile. They will see a crack and tear it down. They'll take advantage of that scant mercy to get away with more and more until the kingdom has fallen. It is this man who has been trapped in the diadem.
The locket is the last of them, the last horcrux made before he succumbed to insanity. Already he had begun to deteriorate, the goals for the wizarding world slipping away from him, replaced with a desire to hurt and kill those who had hurt him. His family was already dead but there were others that would serve as a replacement. The muggles became synonymous with his father and blood traitors the same as his mother's family. He is the last bit of humanity, the remainder of the man he was before he continued to split his soul. He covets and reaches for everything he deems to be his. That's why the locket, the cup, and the diadem have found their way into his arms. They are the legacy of Hogwarts, the last piece of the place he once called home. This is a man that was born in chaos, determined to leave the world the same way he entered it: Someone born to destroy and live as a harbinger of death. He is unapologetic, and this shows in the sliver of soul given to the diadem.
The diadem sighed, bringing all of them out of their thoughts. It seemed that time had not worn any of them from the tendency to get lost in their head.
"It's dangerous to have so many of us." The locket crossed his legs. "Surely you've realized this?"
Marvolo inclined his head. "I shouldn't have made so many."
"Yeah." The youngest agreed. "You went bat-shit crazy." He had clearly spent too long with Harry.
"Technically we went batshit crazy." The cup corrected.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah." He rolled his eyes.
"You need to absorb us." The diadem folded his arms against his chest. "All of us."
He sighed. "I know."
"It's for the best," the cup offered. "You'll be able to do so much more with all of us together."
"You're doing alright now but eventually your sanity and grasp on magic will begin to slip again."
"What's the difference right now?" He growled. "How come I feel different from before when I've literally done nothing different."
"You'll figure it out eventually." The diadem grinned smugly.
"I swear-"
"I have an idea," the locket tilted his head to the side as he shared a look with the diadem. "But it will be much sweeter to see you realize on your own."
"A hint?" He sighed. Marvolo was not begging. Nope. He does not beg for anything.
"Something happened during the ritual that brought us back, something that stabilized us for the time being." He hesitated. "I wasn't sure at first, but in hindsight, it was definitely something there that caused it."
"Regardless. This won't last forever." The diadem warned. "If you don't want to regress, and want to keep this progress, you need to absorb us."
"One problem. How are we going to achieve our goals if we are limited by time?" That was one of the reasons he made horcruxes in the first place. Dumbledore's bullshit about him being afraid of death was exactly that, bullshit.
It had definitely been a factor, but wouldn't everyone be afraid of dying in the middle of the war. In hindsight he knew better, knew he shouldn't have made horcruxes, or at least not that many, but that sixteen year old boy had been so terrified of war and all the destruction that came with it. How could he not be?
The muggle world had been terrifying and there had been no way out for 'poor mudblood Tom Riddle.' No one should ever have to live that way, to live in constant terror for what a world that rejects you might be. So he'd continued his pursuit in immortality, determined to change the wizarding world for the better.
Clearly it didn't work out as planned given how much everything went to hell. The Tom Riddle from thirty years ago never would have went after a year old child because of 'some prophesy' that was most likely bullshit.
"When there's a will there's a way." The cup shrugged, rather uncouth, but in private he didn't care.
"You have to at least absorb me." The diary leaned forward, a curly hair falling in his face. "I have the largest portion of our soul."
"You seem rather eager..." The ring rose an eyebrow.
"If I'm absorbed then he'll remember my Harry." He looked rather smug.
The ring wanted to slap that look off of his face.
"Our harry." The locket corrected. "Most definitely our Harry."
"He's sixteen you dumbasses." Marvolo said, exasperated.
"Age is just a number." The ring waved him away.
"And jails just a place." He said dryly.
The ring scoffed. "You're a dark lord."
"A dark lord, not a pedophile." He rolled his eyes.
"The age of consent is sixteen." The diary wiggled his eyebrows.
"Still no."
He pouted. What the fuck had Harry Potter done to his horcrux?
"I'm sixteen though!" He perked up.
"Sure, you're sixteen. But I'm in my 60s."
"Nah, 50's." The diadem winked. "Trust me, I know."
"Besides, you don't look like you could be in your 50s old man." The ring said. "You look like you could be in your late 30s, early 40s at the most."
"Besides," the cup shrugged. "Once you absorb us, it'll age you down."
"What the fuck?" He asked incredulously.
"Ah. I see." The ring said with an air of seriousness. "We've reached the point of midlife crisis."
"Nah, considering the variation of our ages I'm pretty sure it's an ongoing crisis." The ring said dryly.
The diary snorted. He snorted?? Marvolo mourned the horcrux the diary had been before Harry Potter slid into his dms.
The diadem pressed his chin atop his hands. "He's sixteen right now, but he'll be of age in a couple of months."
"I had forgotten the majority age in the wizarding world was seventeen." The locket mused, brightening up ever so slightly. It looked wrong on him though, as something violent and blood thirsty had mixed with the desire all of them felt.
"Court him for a year," the cup purred. "Show him what we can do, then he can be ours once he turns seventeen."
The diary tilted his head to the side. "Harry needs to be cared for, to be loved and cherished. Do that and you'll have him forever." He hesitated. "But betray him and you'll wish you never lived."
"Show him we can provide for him, that we can protect him and our child. Show him that we will stay at his side and respect his choices." The ring's hands locked together as he continued in an unusual gentle voice. "Give him everything that we never had."
Marvolo sighed. "You've made your points."
"Who are you going to absorb first?" The locket bared his teeth at him, feral in a way the rest of them never had been. This imprint, after all, had been created at the very edge of sanity and insanity.
"Either the diary, as it has the largest soul piece or the locket because it's the most recent one."
The locket snorted. "Good luck finding me. I'm currently in the Black ancestral home and they have this place hella locked down."
"It shouldn't be too hard to get you out though," the diadem pointed out. "Severus is in this weird ass three-some with Black and the wolf."
He sputtered. "What the fuck."
Seriously. What the fuck.
How did that even happen?
"It shouldn't be too surprising considering the sexual tension that's been going on between them since they were teens."
How else could their convoluted relationship be described?
There is a fine line between love and hate. Both are emotions related to passion, and as such they mix and blend together until you can't tell where one ends and the other begins. It seemed that even them, in what they believed to be a clear and cut rivalry, had blended their worlds together. One was Slytherin, one Gryffindor, and another should have been Slytherin. Harry had that in common with Sirius. (Slytherin would have suited both of them well, the abused often did the best in there after all.)
The line between Gryffindor and Slytherin, of evil and good, of dark and light, had blurred and fell apart for them. The Gryffindors, upon realizing Slytherin wasn't synonymous with Death Eaters, had found themselves in some ways understanding Severus. In a like fashion, it seemed that Severus had grown some and was coming around.
His relationship with Harry, as far as Marvolo could see, was still convoluted but it seemed like they were both trying- or at least Severus was going to start trying.
"And Severus doesn't look too bad when he's not wearing that glamour." The diary pipped up. "If Dumbledore wasn't all anti-creature then he wouldn't have to worry about hiding his inheritance."
"Do you think Harry will have a creature inheritance?" The ring purred. "I imagine he'll be something spectacular."
"I can't think of anything strong enough on his father's side to pop up." Marvolo hesitated. "But his mother, if she was from a squib line, might have brought something into the gene pool that could result in him having an inheritance."
"Do you think Lilly is really his mother?" The locket tilted his head to the side. "If he gave birth to our child, then he's either a bearer or has a creature inheritance, if not both, and that's genetic."
"Are you suggesting that James Potter was a bearer?" He asked slowly.
"Well his mother was Dorea Black*, and those things tend to run in the Black family..." The diadem trailed off.
"He does remind me of Alphard Black at that age," he mused. "In hindsight, I think he too might of been..." He trailed off.
"No doubt that's the reason he never married." The cup snorted. "Revealing his status to the wrong person could have ruined everything for him."
"He was sure one hell of a wizard," the diary murmured. "It's a shame he's not alive any more."
"That's the price for immortality." The diadem clasped his fingers together. He didn't like to linger on that thought. Even if he were their lord and had discarded the idea of creating a family, he still cared deeply for his followers. Losing them was akin to losing part of himself. He hated that vulnerability but could not let go of that when his followers trusted and followed him without question.
"Do you ever wonder if things might have been different had we made a different choice?" The cup asked quietly, rather pensive in this moment. "If Dumbledore hadn't had it out for us would we have turned out differently? If we had been allowed to stay at Hogwarts during that summer would we have made the same choices?"
The ring sighed, calm and sorrowful for once instead of angry. "We'll never know." Sometimes he sat down with his anger and listened. His anger whispered in his ear, so quiet he almost couldn't hear, until he realized his anger was grief and sorrow in disguise.
"It doesn't matter, not at this point." Marvolo leaned forward, hands clasped. "We've made our bed and now we must lie in it."
"Onward ever onward," the diadem murmured.