Chapter 5
Harry slept an incredible amount. Voldemort could come and go as he pleased and spend a whole day encouraging and admonishing his secret police, making deals with giants and goblins, overseeing the building plans for a grander Minsitry hall and court, even supervise the torture of former enemies of his that had long since broken down and come back to find Harry exactly where he’d left him. He kept a pulse on Harry while he was away which was why he was completely sure that Harry was not moving or playing around or pretending.
He could sleep in stretches of ten, twelve or fourteen hours with no problem at all. At some point during his fever he’d started sleeping in front of the fireplace, and then a few times he found him half sitting up with his head propped against his arm as he slept with his mouth open. Sometimes he slept with his limbs flung out in every direction they could go, with an arm or leg stretched over the back of the sofa, with his face buried in the sofa or facing upward with his mouth slightly open. He didn’t snore, thankfully. Voldemort couldn’t have tolerated that, but sometimes he sighed, or huffed or wheezed for a moment before turning over and repositioning himself. Voldemort didn’t like having the healer in the room while he was working but the short man bustled in and out at regular intervals and got Harry up just long enough to feed him the medicine he needed and check his temperature.
He was feeling better about his horcrux’s health. Harry’s face had started to fill out again after more consistent meals and nutrient potions. He had a slightly olive undertone and his cheeks had a rosy tone again, especially when he was bundled up under blankets or sitting in front of the fire.
February slid into March and his power solidified every day that passed. He didn’t allow Harry to see all that he was working on, making sure that he spelled an anti-subterfuge measure on every important document he left around his library office, especially as Harry’s health improved and he began joining him for longer periods of time without needing to rest. When Harry sat at the table with him it was mostly for the purpose of getting him to eat as much as possible, but he made admirable attempts at sneaking looks into what Voldemort was doing.
He could feel him pushing and prodding at him mentally sometimes too, an amateurish attempt at using their mental bond to gain information that Voldemort was easily able to ignore. His physical presence was much harder to ignore, from the way he sighed in his sleep to the way his foot tapped in a fierce repetitive pattern on the floor when he was thinking very hard. It wasn’t altogether unpleasant to have him around, especially since he never tried to address the Dark Lord or look at him if he could help it.
Until one day, while Harry sat with him at the long dining table pushing boiled potatoes around with a sulky expression, he suddenly spoke. “Have any of the Hogwarts teachers or students been captured?”
“The traitors, you mean?” Voldemort said coolly, leaning back in his throne-like chair and not feeling at all dissatisfied with the way this conversation was going. He had expected Harry to break down and ask this for some time. He suppressed a smile. “Call them traitors and I’ll tell you.”
Harry’s jaw clenched. “Nevermind.”
As if he’d let it go that easily. “No,” he said. “I gave you an order, Harry. Call what’s left of the Order of the Phoenix traitors.” The threat was left unspoken.
Harry’s eyes gleamed with rebelliousness but Voldemort knew underneath the table his hands were trembling. “Fine. Have any of the traitors been captured?”
Voldemort did not respond at first. He picked up the correspondence he’d been reading and folded it over, thinking. The reality was that most of them were doing a good job avoiding capture, that some of the finest witches and wizards went on to teach at Hogwarts, and they had ample knowledge and time to prepare before Voldemort’s raid on Hogwarts. The students that had been caught– Ernie Macmillin and Lee Jordan– had more or less been sent back to Hogwarts in one piece and put under close watch in the new administration. The Order of the Phoenix members had suffered some losses, after an attempt to rescue mudbloods from the Ministry went awry, but was mostly undercover and quiet. What he told Harry could be anything he wanted it to be.
“We killed a few members of the Order of the Phoenix on March 17th when they tried to break into the Ministry.” Harry wouldn’t know who they were as they were new recruits, so he chose not to name them and leave it to the imagination. “Ernie Macmillin and Lee Jordan were found hiding out in an abandoned muggle home and discovered when one of their Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes fireworks exploded. Augusta Longbottom was executed for her refusal to give information about the location of her known associates.”
“Neville’s grandmother?” Harry blurted.
“Would you like me to keep going?”
But the boy never could hold back. “Hermione and Ron, are they– have they been found?”
They had not. If they had, he’d have already used them against Harry.
Voldemort withdrew his wand and pointed it at the boy. He immediately went quiet. The way he looked at the Elder wand with fear and anticipation was good. He’d kept his wand within sight as much as possible when torturing him. He wanted Harry to remember what he was capable of suffering every time he saw it. “Don’t interrupt me. I won’t give you any more information until I think you’ve earned it. Would you like to earn it, Harry?”
After a moment of silence, Harry cleared his throat and asked. “What… what would I have to do?”
Voldemort smiled thinly. He crooked a finger at him and said, “Come here.” Harry did as he was told and came to stand just a few feet away, looking at him with apprehension. Voldemort pointed at the floor next to his chair. “Sit.” The ground next to him was hard, cold stone. In the shadow of his tall, elaborate throne, it was a place fit only for dogs. Reluctance and humiliation played across Harry’s face. “Sit or discover how I can make you sit.”
Harry sat. In this easy range, all Voldemort would have to do to have access to his magic would be to reach out and touch his hair or his shoulder. He reached out and patted his head dismissively and left him to stew there while he went back to reading.
Harry felt defeated. Months had passed and escape seemed no closer than it had at the start. Every wizard around him with a wand kept careful watch of him. The wards keeping him close to the library where Voldemort spent most of his time were impassable and secure, as were all the windows. Sometimes the wards opened up and let him explore the manor, but only according to the Dark Lord’s whims. His thoughts and moods were monitored all the time. News from the outside came only from the Dark Lord and he didn’t know whether he could trust it or what value there was in learning of it at all.
Moreover, he was feeling less and less capable of standing up to the man he’d once solemnly defied.
He hadn’t ever been the chosen hero. His strength had been a combination of illusion and the backing of Albus Dumbledore, who was now gone. Without his wand, he was incapable of even the basic things wizards could do by themselves, and he was even more like a pet than Nagini was because she could at least come and go.
And he was sick of being tortured and afraid of it, though he could scarcely admit it to himself.
Depression weighed in on him. The only way to pass the time between being force fed large and unsatisfying meals was to sleep or observe the Dark Lord at work ruling the wizarding world. When he slept, his dreams were often unpleasant, and what he saw in them was sometimes true.
Nagini had become a faint source of comfort to him. She came and went, unannounced and unpretentious, monitoring her master and him. She still frightened him a bit, but he also knew she posed no real threat of hurting him now, and even liked him a little. When Harry was sleeping Nagini often came crawling over the top of the sofa to lay her thick heavy body on top of his. She enjoyed his body heat and the crackling warmth from the fire.
He was beginning to learn the manor. The wards keeping him extended through a fair amount of living area, but excluded what he suspected were the grand halls and meeting places of the death eaters. He could walk the long hallways filled with Malfoy portraits, poke his head into guest bedrooms opulently decorated with decor from the fifteenth century, open up jars of flours and herbs with house elves chirping at this feet in a massive kitchen, and step out into a greenhouse three times of the size of the one they kept at Hogwarts.
The greenhouse was sheltered under teal green stained glass held in place by intersecting metal beams that cast blueish green shadows on the floor. The air was thick with humidity and the earthy smell of growing plants and decay. Everywhere else in the manor was damp and chilly, but here it was warm. When he walked amongst the aisles of plants he saw plants he recognized; ivy of the mist, wild ginseng, hemlock and sneezewort, but many, many more he didn’t. Some reached out to him as he passed by with tentacle-like vines while others shied away, and he heard a few of them snickering after he passed. He’d seen Molly Weasley keep a few household plants in window sills at the burrow that were useful for potions and cooking and he’d known the Hogwarts greenhouse well, but they didn’t compare to this. The ancient Malfoy bloodline had had quite a few potion experts and horticulturists, and more importantly, lots of money with which to expand their interests. Further along past the potted plants and vibrant flowers, sprawled ancient trees with massive root systems that twisted and spiraled over each other. It was underneath those trees that Harry found the swimming pool.
He didn’t realize at first it was a swimming pool. It seemed like the natural water reservoir under the Banyan-like trees until he saw the white porcelain tiles gleaming underneath the bluish green water. The walls of the pool had been taken over by tree roots and mossy plants that dangled into the water and floated slightly along the surface. In the center of it all was a porcelain statue of a regal witch with her wand held aloft and her eyes facing upwards to the sky, with a dragon resting beneath her other hand. The dragon’s scaly body wrapped around the base of the statue and down into the water. Both of the white figures had been partially taken over by moss and weeds. The light came in from the glass ceiling and fractured and turned into shades of violet, indigo, blue, green, yellow and orange against swaying leaves. A small and plain bird darted branch to branch nearby.
Holding the roots as support, he dipped his toes and then disrobed down to his underwear and slid into the warm water. It was deep enough that Harry could easily sink past his shoulders into the water. When he put his head under the water he opened his eyes and saw how large the pool was and where the roots of the trees broke up porcelain tiles to find new soil. There were little silver guppies and some type of fat catfish. He stayed down there for a minute, then two, trying not to broadcast what he was doing, waiting for the moment when his chest would start to spasm and black dots would cloud his vision, but it never came.
After a minute of trying to commit suicide by drowning, Harry realized the pool was probably just spelled to be safe, and reemerged slightly annoyed. Somewhere in the greenhouse there might be the key to poison or trick his way out of Malfoy manor but he could look for it later. He let his lungs fill with humid air and swam on to his back to look up at the stained glass ceilings.
He liked it in this greenhouse. It was a surprisingly serene place in a bed of vipers. He hadn’t felt really warm at all since he’d gotten here. The cold had seemed to melt into his bones, he was tense and prone to shaking more than he’d ever been before, but in the humid heat of the greenhouse that tension began to unwind a little.
He swam from one end of the rootbound pool to the other in long backstrokes. He learned he could come close to touching the fat catfish by holding his breath and diving quickly to where they were. The water was clear enough he could see them all easily even without his glasses. When he came to the surface, his skin was immediately warmed up by the hot air and if he sat out on the rocks, he could sunbathe.
He stayed there, watching the fish and enjoying the heat for almost an hour before he began to feel vaguely uncomfortable, for a reason he struggled to put his finger on. Then he figured it out and got out of the pool, scowling.
It’d been so long since he hadn’t been stressed out, terrified, exhausted or in pain that he began to forget what it felt like to be happy. But he’d been feeling happy. All while the rest of the wizarding world was fighting and struggling to overthrow a dictator, and he’d just been enjoying swimming and lazing about. He threw on his clothes even though he was still wet and marched back out of the greenhouse the way he’d come.
He tried to shake off the good mood that had been building by making himself angry. He was sure that Voldemort allowing him to wander to the more pleasant parts of the mansion was all an attempt to manipulate him into complacency. If he got comfortable and happy in the little cage Voldemort had set up for him, it’d all be over.
He had to think of something. Any kind of plan to harm Voldemort would be better than sitting around doing nothing, even if it was stupid or dangerous. Why shouldn’t he try and make a grab for Voldemort’s wand, at the dining table or whenever Voldemort got close to him?
He could end it all in seconds with the killing curse, first aimed at Voldemort and then at himself, he’d master his mind and not let it slip until the last–
“Harry?” Draco Malfoy was sitting on his knees, in thick gardening gloves and protective glasses that made his eyes look twice as big, with a thick brown leather robe set over him. The plant he’d been trying to harvest fruit from was rearing back away from him with its spindly branches lashing about angrily. He took off his glasses hurriedly and stood up. He had changed a bit in the last year since they’d been to school together. His platinum blond hair was a few shades darker and his cheeks were more hollow, looking more like an adult than Harry remembered him.
“Oh, it’s you.” Harry’s first reaction was not hostile, but a bit thrown off. He’d been caught up in his thoughts and forgot that his old nemesis also lived in the manor. “What are you doing?”
Draco picked up the basket he’d been dropping fruit into, and said, “Harvesting ankh-fruit. It’s for a potion Ysvley is teaching me how to make.”
“Oh.” Was all Harry could think to say. They observed each other for a moment. “They have you helping out Yslvey then?”
“Yeah, mostly the boring stuff. Harvesting and grinding herbs and such.” Draco sneered a little, a familiar sight to Harry. “My dad was teaching me more advanced spells and potions, but apprenticeships can’t be within families. New rules.”
“But Ysvley is a healer,” that was the first thing Harry could think of. “You’re trying to be a healer?”
Draco shrugged, not seeming particularly proud. “There’s a shortage of them. It’s a good career, so why not.”
Harry realized all of the sudden that there was another way to get information than to go through Voldemort. Draco would surely know everything that had gone on since Harry had gotten captured, and the ins-and-outs of the new government, of which he was a part of. And he knew Draco better than any other wizard in the manor, besides maybe Voldemort.
“Does the Dark Lord even allow you to be in here?” Draco looked around like he expected him to emerge from the shadows and crucio them both. “I thought they were keeping you in the library.”
“If the wards didn’t allow me here, I wouldn’t be here.” Harry was a little annoyed that Draco knew exactly where he was being kept, while he had scarcely realized Draco still lived here. “I’m allowed to wander. Have you just been working for Ysvley then? Not serving as Death Eater still?”
“I’m still a Death Eater.” Draco said immediately. “Course I am. Everyone of any consequence is a Death Eater. I’m just lucky I got in early before everyone wanted to.” There was a trace of awkwardness in the way he said the end of this, like he’d said it many times before but realized it was kind of inappropriate to say all of that in front of Harry.
And what could Harry say? Of course he wasn’t surprised that Draco hadn’t turned to the other side, and cowardly kept on serving, especially with the Dark Lord so powerful and occupying his home. He didn’t want to be antagonistic. This was the first real conversation he’d had in weeks that wasn’t with someone who wanted to torture him.
“Oh.” Harry searched for a different topic and couldn’t help noticing his wand held lightly between his fingers. If he could somehow get it… “Do you still see anyone from school?”
“Look, I’ve got to get going,” Draco said brusquely. “I really shouldn’t be talking to you.” He started gathering up the things around him with his wand now held tightly between his fingers. Even if Harry lunged, the space between them was too large. Draco quickly gathered himself and left with his fruit and wand held close to his body.
Unsure what to say, Harry could only watch him go.
Alone again, Harry made himself familiar with the greenhouse for a while. The gardens closest to the manor were the most well maintained with walkable stone paths between raised beds and plants potted and labeled with their names and uses. Further towards the middle were flower beds and decorative marble fountains with bubbling water. Deeper still in were the mangrove trees and the swimming pool. Besides what was clearly labeled, Harry was able to identify some of the plants from his herbology knowledge and knew enough to be disappointed. There were some that could be used to make Polyjuice potion or that would make you extremely dizzy for a period of time, but none of them were useful as poison or to make an escape. Especially since he was without a wand or a cauldron.
The Malfoy manor had to keep plants with dark properties around– he’d bet his right arm that they had loads of them– but they had to have them kept away somewhere else.
That was something he’d have to look for. His only other plan was to search the library from high to low for something he could use against Voldemort. In the past, when he’d needed to breathe underwater or solve some type of puzzle, the library was where they’d put in the hours. The Malfoy manor’s collection of books far outstretched Hogwarts' restricted section. Out of all of those dark and obscure books, there had to be something he could use. It was what Hermoine would do, and she was the smartest of them.
He just hoped Voldemort wouldn’t be there.
The door was slightly cracked open and he could see immediately that the end of the great long table where the Dark Lord normally sat was empty. The library seemed particularly large without anyone else in it. He noticed that sound tended to echo and carry easily down the long aisles and reverbert against the high ceilings.
He made his way down the first aisle he saw with his heart pounding. He started scanning the titles quickly for anything that might be useful to him. Anything having to do with offensive spells, maybe wandless magic, or wandless aparating. Of the titles that weren’t in ancient ruins or foreign languages, he could barely understand what they were describing. Transient and Ephemeral Beings. Medical Guide to Deformation. Transfiguration as Conjuring. He picked a book out at random and flipped through. It was detailing the biology of hippogriffs, something of interest to him, until he got to the pictures depicting hippogriff dissections. He slammed the book closed, disgusted.
“What are you looking for?”
An icy chill ran down his back. He looked back and saw Voldemort standing directly behind him. A sense of dread and sheepishness from being caught settled into his stomach.
“Nothing.” Voldemort held out his hand and Harry returned the book to him.
He’d been told not to try and read any of the books in the library. He remembered it and couldn’t pretend like he didn’t. He had hoped he wouldn’t be found out but of course that’d been naive of him. Now there’d be a price to pay.
Voldemort turned around and began to walk away. With a wave of his wand the book resorted itself. As he walked, he kept wordlessly casting summoning spells that brought books flying smoothly through the air towards him. “Come, Harry.”
With no other choice, Harry followed.
“Sit.” The chair Voldemort gestured to moved itself out from under the table. The books the Dark Lord had summoned arranged themselves neatly in stacks on the table in front of the chair, far away from the maps, correspondences and books Voldemort himself was using. Harry sat down stiffly.
At a glance, all the books laying before him were familiar. Beginning Arithmancy, Intro to Ancient Runes, The Five Thousand Year Modern History of Wizarding Kind. These were Hogwarts books, and not just any, they were first-years Hogwarts books.
“Since you’re eager to improve your education, you can start here.” With a wave of his wand and a smile, Voldemort opened Intro to Arithmancy, where basic equations and sums were laid out in such a way any student with half a brain could understand them. “I know Hogwarts in your day allowed students to pick and choose classes based on individual taste, but I prefer the education of young people not to be neglected.”
Harry pointed at one of the books. “I’ve read that one before.”
“I know what your grades were like. Read it again.”
Voldemort sat down at his end of the long table. His hand only had to be on his wand for his magic to react with his surroundings. Maps unfurled and overlapped where his eyes moved, pens eagerly jumped to his hand, and book pages turned over and back again. Voldemort was the calm, cold center at the heart of the flurry of activity. Once Harry had looked his fill, he turned back to his books.
Seconds ticked by slowly as Harry started to read. Almost immediately he started to daydream. He’d learned that he could stare at one place on the page with a furled brow and think about the different maneuvers that could be performed on a broom without Professor Binns or Professor Flitzwick noticing. It was a skill he’d mastered in school. He could waste away an hour like that, easily.
After that hour passed, Harry had to start actually reading to relieve his boredom. Even then, he skimmed the content. He found it insulting how simple the content was, when he was supposed to be in his NEWT year. Sure, he didn’t know or had forgotten a lot of details, but the fundamentals behind it all were all drilled into him. He started bouncing his leg underneath the table, and by the time the third hour rolled around, he’d started daydreaming again.
“Are you done studying?” The voice startled him. “Bring your Arithmancy textbook here.”
Harry got up with a sinking feeling in his stomach and brought the textbook to the Dark Lord, who paged through it much more intently in a matter of seconds than Harry had in hours. He flipped to a random page.
“Does the magical significance of three still apply when a whole spiritual compound such as a unicorn horn is ground up and divided into the three?”
Harry took a stab at a guess. “Yes.”
“Why.”
“Because…” In his memory, Snape’s ugly face loomed over him, lecturing in that dark, nasally voice things about a million different principles of divisions in potion making. Hermione’s wand tapped on his paper corrections to his half hearted attempt at Transfiguration homework. He couldn’t recall anything in particular they’d said, and what came out was unconfident. “Because the magical significance of three transfers over to divisions...”
“A whole spiritual compound divides its power by compounds when it’s ground down. The first sliver that falls away contains half of all of its magical property.” He opened up Intro to Ancient Runes . “Tell me what the origin symbol of the rune thanespiel is and how it relates to its translation in modern texts.”
Harry gritted his teeth. “I don’t know.”
Voldemort threw that book to the side and opened the history book with a glint in his eyes. “And when the goblins made their final treaty with the wizard Hottsgolt in 1356 concerning the right to obtain and hold onto treasure, what loophole did they exploit at the wizards’ council’s expense to hold onto their financial power over wizards?”
“I don’t know.”
Voldemort threw the book an inch away from Harry’s head and hissed out the tirade he’d been holding back. “Of course you don’t! Not with Dumbledore’s lauded education that teaches equality and enmity amongst all creatures! All your cheerleading of these creatures and you have no idea what you’re dealing with.” Harry took the scolding with his eyes fixed on the ground, determined to not to listen to his anti-creature sermon. “They maintained their rights to make free trade between each other of treasure and gold that does not belong to them! That’s the loophole they exploit to hide wizards’ rightful relics that they so desperately crave! Do you have any idea how many relics of unthinkable power and historical meaning have gone missing in goblin hands? Where do you imagine those relics end up, after being entrusted to their withered hands?”
Harry gave the only defiant answer he could. “I don’t know.”
Voldemort threw another book at him. “Of course you don’t! You don’t read!” Voldemort pointed back to the end of the table he’d been sitting at and Harry silently returned. The books he’d halfheartedly parsed through stacked themselves in loud thumps in front of him. New books joined the fray. He spotted Fundamental and Theoretical Science of Potion Making, History of Wizarding Bloodlines , and Introduction to Conjuring fitting themselves into place in a stack that was growing alarmingly large.
“These are the new books being incorporated into the Hogwarts curriculum. Essential tools for understanding magic that have been sorely overlooked.”
“What’s the point of me reading all of this?” Harry picked up one with a dismayed expression. He’d really thought his long days of studying had come to an end when he’d discovered his fate was to be sacrificed or imprisoned. “Unless you’re planning on giving me a wand anytime soon?”
“Not at all.” Voldemort picked up a book among his stack much thicker and older than any Harry had on his table and found his spot to read. “I simply won’t be responsible for answering idiotic questions for a thousand years. In return, you’ve been blessed with an endless opportunity for learning which I’m sure you’ll be able to use to better plot your escape and my demise.”
With a sinking feeling, Harry remembered how a younger Tom Riddle had gotten to be top of his class and realized he was possibly being imprisoned by a much crueler version of Hermoine Granger. Still, what if the secret to his victory could be found somewhere in the halls of the library? Once he finished these books, he was sure he’d be given other topics to study which might prove more fruitful.
With this limited hope in mind, Harry redoubled his efforts to focus on his books.
There were complex laws and rituals regarding dragon taming. Even among the best wizards in history, only a few of them had been capable of breaking through a dragon’s spell-repelling outer hide, swaying its ferocious nature and changing what it saw and smelt to take it fully under control.
Deep within a castle in the moors of Scotland there was a beast that had been captured and chained for more than four hundred years. Even though its wings took up the space from one end of its prison to the next, its strength had not diminished in the time since it had been captive. Its scales were once the dark color of a gathering summer storm but had mellowed into a wintery gray in its middle age. The Ukrainian Ironbelly Dragon was one of the largest breeds of dragon in the world, capable of swallowing an elephant whole, and impervious to the effects of magic even beneath its first layer of dragon scale.
Voldemort stood within striking range of its teeth with little more to protect himself than his Elder Wand and a robe. Still, the dragon didn’t strike. Instead, as Voldemort began to move in slow, even paces to the right, the dragon took a step to the left, with its massive gray wings curled protectively around its body.
The first spell Voldemort cast was at the ceiling. Boulders began to rain down from the castle’s crumbling foundation onto the great creature, who shook them off as though they were pebbles and reared its great large head back like a snake, but Voldemort was casting again. This spell created a fog inside the dungeon that reflected each surface back onto itself until there were a hundred angles of broken torch light, heavy stone and old bones surrounding the dragon. The Ukrainian Ironbelly struck where it remembered the dark wizard to be and its fangs scraped gravel off the wall.
More spells came that sent shards of heated up gravel towards its hide and froze its claws to the dank and dirty ground underneath it. Despite the dragon’s age and infirmity after centuries of imprisonment, to the dragon these injuries were nothing more than slight stings of pain. It drove its teeth again and again at different parts of the stone walls where the wizard could be, chipping off great pieces of black obsidian as it did so. Its barbed tail lashed furiously around its enclosure and its wings beat and sent dust and debris into the air.
Deep inside every dragon was the desire to be free, it was as old and powerful a desire as that of every great wizards’ desire to tame it. Until its mouth found flesh or his tail crushed bone, it’d fight until it died from exhaustion, if it came to that.
The dark wizard began to chant an incantation in the misty darkness. A high pitched hum reverberated in the dragon’s ears, and the smell of toxic herb burning stunk in its nose. The dragon shook out its armored throat until it swelled to the largest size it could, and shrieked furiously.
Then, for a long time, there was nothing. Just the endless expanse of darkness pierced by tiny needles of firelight and the smell of old rot and feces. The dragon swung its head around cautiously and a sort of confusion set in. A few scales had been scrapped off its fortified and heavy armored snout, a thing that was bound to make him itch when it started to grow back in. It nuzzled the ground this way and that with its tongue flicking out to taste the air, but despite being sure it’d seen yet another wizard invade its den, there was no evidence of it anywhere, and its memory wasn’t what it used to be. Seconds turned into minutes then hours.
The dragon settled into its nest of smooth bones and the mostly decomposed bits of hay its keepers had left for it centuries ago. It drew its spiked tail around its talons and laid its head down to rest. It sighed heavily, as it had done so many times before as yet another day passed in solitude and hunger.
As time passed by, it began to dream. Once it had flown through the open skies with his wings stretched as far open as they could be, and powerful muscles propelling him upward. It’d tasted the fresh splash of blood and felt the crunch of bones from the upland herds of ewes and lambs, even the tougher meat of cattle and thestral. It’d lain beneath the warm sun on hot rocks with its body pressed to the ground with the sound of birds and gentle tickle of a breeze.
The dream was so pleasant there was nothing more the dragon wished for than to remain in it. Living trapped away from the sun and sky for so long was more than it could bear. When the suggestion came, it came as smoothly as the feeling of hot air rising up beneath its leathery gray wings. It rose to its feet with its eyes still closed, swaying slightly. The feeling of complete ecstasy and contentment increased and it was ordered to open its eyes. It saw its den as it had always been, except the torchlight was reflected from every angle like in a dream, moving in a slightly hypnotic sort of way.
In a trance, the dragon moved its right leg, then its left, and eventually matched up the movement so that it walked the three paces its small dungeon allowed it to move. Only once its nose was pressed up against the stonewall did Voldemort allow it to turn around and walk the other way. It flapped its wings, bowed its head, even pressed its tongue to its eyelid. Its movements were clumsy and slightly silly, like that of a human child, until Voldemort made it open its mouth and, with every bit of stone crushing force, bit its own scaly, barbed tail.
Blood spilled immediately, hot and gushing over its teeth and down to the dirty floor. Its teeth were sharp enough to sever the tail, but it had woken up in the midst of the act of self mutilation, not from the pain, but from a keen sense of humiliation.
A dragon’s greatest shame was to be tamed. In some corner of its mind, it had known it was under an enchantment and wanted to stay there, under the warmth of the sunlight and wind breaking beneath its wings, despite the cost to its pride. Freedom, the thought of freedom, was so delicious a prospect the taste of it had nearly driven the beast insane. But no wizard offered freedom for so little a price.
It sent its tail whipping blood and barbs around every inch of its dungeon, and roared, and roared. It crashed into one stone wall with thundering weight, then the other, and summoned up every last bit of fire and acid and strength in its body. In such a small space, dragonfire unleashed could cook the dragon in its own skin, but it could cook a wizard just as well, and so with a clicking of its inner throat muscles, the dragon ignited the fuel lingering in its stomach. The air heated up like an oven, with the rocks turning bright and semiliquid, spilling down the cavern and mixing with centuries of bones. Still, the dragon screamed, and screamed with all its heat, fury, and pain and loneliness.
It screamed dragonfire even as its eyeballs began to melt, even past the time a wizard could ever survive, until its bones shuddered and organs stalled, and it was finally free.
As the weeks passed, a routine fell into place. In the morning, his time was his. He watched the comings-and-goings of the manor, examined the plants in the greenhouse for useful properties and swam in the pool when he needed a rest. He rarely saw Voldemort during this time but sometimes caught glimpses through their mental connection of majestic, bureaucratic halls where he was surely tormenting someone. Lunch and breakfast were taken alone, showing up on the nearest table or desk to him, and if he ignored it, it would move into the next room with him. Although he’d spoken to an old house elf at the beginning of his stay, he saw her only in passing as she cleaned, and she rarely had more than a word or two to say to him. In the afternoon, he was summoned to the library to sit at the great table with the Dark Lord and continue his studies.
It was that part of the day he dreaded. Violence didn’t frequently occur but Voldemort did take advantage of his surplus of magic when Harry was around and it was always uncomfortable to be around him. Dinners were mostly cold. He couldn’t stop eating until Voldemort was satisfied and his stomach was painfully full.
One morning when he was examining a large and perpetually quivering flutterby bush for signs of a useful flower, he glimpsed a familiar back through the shaking leaves. He was grabbing something out of the air, moving in a slightly strange but recognizable way to Harry. A wicker basket, gardening gloves and shears were laid out around him haphazardly, with all his focus on what was in the air. Gold laced through the air, as thin and delicate as a string, before a pale hand darted out and grabbed it.
“Is that a snitch?” Harry blurted out.
“Merlin, Harry,” Draco put a hand to his chest. “Do you have to jump out like that?”
“Sorry,” Harry said, looking at what was in Draco’s hand. “I didn’t see you before either. What are you doing out here?”
“What do you think?” He gestured towards his garden shears. “Harvesting stuff. What are you doing out here?”
”Looking at stuff.” They looked at each other, and each became secure in the sudden realization that the other was intending to slack off. There was an urgent question on Harry’s mind. “Have you been following the Quidditch World Cup Series?”
“It’s been one of the best seasons so far,” Draco said. “Of course I have. You haven’t been able to?”
“Been locked up here. Think they let me out to check the Prophet for sports updates?”
“You’ve been missing a lot.” Draco was always at his best when he was talking down to someone. He missed the companionship of Crabbe and Goyle for exactly that. “Two games away from the Quidditch World Cup. Finnick McGovern on the Irish team got knocked off his broom illegally and they say he might never return. On the French team Antionne LeGarou is on trial in the court of France for poisoning his opponent Natalia De L’Etiolle during the seeker trials. Total upstart from a dark horse in the series: the Canadian team has demolished the Bulgarians, Morrocans and English, they might make it to the World Cup for the first time in history.”
All of this shocked Harry, who knew and had followed closely the careers of all the players Draco mentioned, but most of all was that it was a few games away from the World Cup was what shocked Harry. It had to be at least mid May, and he’d thought it was April. “Who’s in the top running?”
“Egypt, Argentina, Spain and Canada. Father’s got us tickets already to go to the World Cup.” Draco puffed up. “We’ll be one of the representatives of the new government. Some countries put up a bit of a fuss about anyone from Britain coming, given what all has been going on, but it’s said the Dark Lord dealt with them directly, and they haven’t made a peep since.”
Harry digested this new reality without too much internal strife. Something else much more important had consumed him. “How has Spain managed to be in the top three when their defense is so weak? Did they replace D’Amelgio?”
Draco shook his head. “Ramirez retired. Their new captain restructured the whole team so that the two beaters work side by side with a chaser, so D’Amelgio and Guerrero haven’t had the chance to feud with each other. Controversial change, very controversial, they say it can open up weak spots in the defense, but their keeper has been keeping things under control.”
“He’d have to be an extraordinary keeper to maintain defense with the beaters following around chasers, it can’t possibly hold against the other top teams if they get to the World Cup.”
“That’s what I thought, but they’ve already faced off against Ireland, who’s been having a fantastic season despite losing McGovern, and they beat them resoundingly.” Draco let the snitch slip through his fingers, he made a grab for it at the same time Harry did, and their fists ended up knocking together, and the little gold ball made a break for it towards the walls of the greenhouse. Draco exclaimed, “Now you’ve done it!”
“Well, why did you have it out when you don’t even have a broomstick with you?”
“I don’t need a broomstick to catch it.” They glowered at each other for a moment, before Draco relented. “Whatever. It’s spelled to return to whoever released it, it’s bound to return. You could help me harvest this thistle-dittany while we wait.”
Harry’s first instinct was to reply that it wasn’t his job to harvest the thistle-dittany, especially since the plant on closer inspection had thin, needle-like thorns on its stems, but a desire to hear more about Quidditch held him back. It was on him to be the bigger person, as always. “Fine, I’ll help, but I’m not going to do it all.”
On the stained glass walls of the greenhouse, the golden snitch tried its luck escaping by tapping delicately this way and that, investigating the intersecting lines for flaw. A curious young whomping willow reached its tendrils up towards it but was too slow to catch hold. Below, the two boys distracted themselves from their half-hearted attempts to harvest fruit with Quidditch talk. Their conversation was intermittently interrupted by swearing and shaking blood off of fingertips, but the mood was amicable.
“Never in my life would I have pegged you for a Bulgarian apologist. Bunch of cheating, dirty players if there ever were any!” Draco said with his fingers safely catching fruit and distributing them into the basket.
Harry replied with his fingers full of thorns. “If they were breaking the rules, the referees would call them out on it. As I see it, their strategy is just to get as close to breaking the rules as they can, and they’re better at it than everyone else who tries, there’s nothing wrong with that.”
“Well, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that, I just didn’t think you would. Or is it because Viktor Krum is a friend of yours?”
“It’s not because of that,” Harry lied. “Anyway, I’m not a fan of teams that follow every rule ever made like the Belgians, it’s like they justify their bad record by how much they suck up to the referees.”
“The Belgians.” Draco laughed. “Remember a few years ago when they all grew those stupid little mustaches together? Thought they’d intimidate the other team with them!”
“Ridiculous. Course Egypt is all about that type of thing, I can’t believe England got beat by a bunch of people whose trick is just covering their faces. The captain ought to have marked them early and kept an eye on who is who well enough not to get confused by that little trick.”
“It is working pretty well for them this year. I’ve heard that the beaters and chasers switch roles sometimes too to make it extra confusing, and that they only hire players that are the same height so that they can’t be recognized on the field.” Draco didn’t tell Harry that they’d already picked all the fruit his father had requested, he let Harry keep bloodying his fingers. “It’s the Argentians and Canadians who’ll be facing off at the World Cup, I suspect. Astoria is keen on Argentina winning as her Aunt married into a pureblood family there.”
“I’m keen on Argentina winning as well.” It took Harry a second to piece out that name. “Astoria? Who’s she?”
“My fiancé,” Draco said blithely. “Astoria Greengrass. We’ll be going to the Quidditch World Cup as part of our honeymoon.”
Harry startled and turned back to look at Draco intently. Pieces began to fall together, conversations he’d overheard between the Malfoy family and plans being put into place for the summer. “You’re getting married?”
Malfoy put his chin up with an imperious, composed look on his face. The classic look of the Malfoy heir. “At the end of July.”
“But you’re…” What Harry wanted to say was, so young, but that wasn’t right, because plenty of wizards and witches got married after graduating Hogwarts. Another thing he wanted to say was, not in love, but he didn’t know Draco or Astoria well enough to say that. Instead, he said, “Congratulations.”
“Thank you.” Draco brushed imaginary dirt off his coat. “She’s a lovely girl, from a good family. You know her older sister Daphne, I think? From our year?”
“Right,” Harry said, vaguely recalling that face. “How old is Astoria, then?”
“Sixteen. That was a concern, but she feels she’s ready to start a family and under the new regime they support that type of thing for girls, of course.” Draco seemed very composed about the whole, but Harry had the sense, after knowing him for so long, that there was something going on underneath it. “It’ll be a proper pureblood wedding, the likes of which hasn’t been done in centuries. All good families with connections will be invited. Anyone who isn’t invited will know they’re on the outs, so there’s been plenty of interest in getting a last minute invitation.”
“Is there?” Harry’s interest was waning. “How nice.”
Draco set the basket to the side with a sigh. “Let’s stop harvesting, we’ve got enough. Help me carry this stuff in.” It seemed the time for Draco to complain had come, and he needed all his focus for it. “The preparations have been non-stop, everything has to be absolutely perfect but between my apprenticeship, duties to the Dark Lord and going to fitting after fitting and dinners and decor shopping… I haven’t had a minute to myself.”
“That’s too bad,” Harry said.
“They’ll be coming in to do renovations within the week to get this whole place up to standard, and then this whole space will be off limits until the wedding.”
“Here?” Harry asked, kept his voice level but felt his heart start to pound. “You’re having the wedding on the grounds?”
“Yes, well, it is one of the oldest manors in England, and there’s plenty of room. The Death Eaters mean to set it up as the future center of power, it won’t be the last party to be hosted here. Although I imagine it’ll be the last wedding that the Dark Lord himself will be officiating.”
“He’ll be officiating?” Harry couldn’t keep the disgust out of his voice, or imagine getting married beneath the sinister, pale face of Lord Voldemort, but it made sense that he would want to take center stage for this show of power and pureblood supremacy. That wasn’t the only thing going through his mind.
The Death Eaters might all be present for the wedding, but with so many people coming, it’d be the perfect opportunity for someone to slip in. Such an ostentatious event would definitely catch the eye of everyone hoping to bring them down, exactly the type of event Ron and Hermoine would take advantage of. And it was the perfect chance to act while Lord Voldemort was consumed with performing before his subjects, if Harry could get a plan in place or some kind of distraction to use. He had to know more and keep Draco talking.
Harry kept his voice nonchalant and said what was sure to stroke Draco’s ego. “That must be one of the highest honors a Death Eater has ever received.”
Draco swelled up, assuming a haughty and superior expression. “Well, we’ve been receiving wedding gifts from wizards from all over the country since our announcement. It’s only right. Everyone ought to know we are one of the premiere pureblood families, not even taking into account our contributions to the Dark Lord’s cause. The magic we’ll be using to bind together is ancient, dark magic. It’ll set the trend of all pureblood ceremonies to come so the Dark Lord wants it done right.”
“How romantic,” This came out more sarcastic than Harry had meant it. He couldn’t help it. Draco was insufferable.
Their eyes met with hostility, as if they both suddenly remembered how they felt about each other. “It is amazing. How lucky I am to be on the right side.”
As they spoke, as if to torment them both, the escaped snitch flew down to inspect both Draco’s sleek platinum blond and Harry’s messy brown hair. Draco reached out first, his fingers brushed it but Harry was faster. His reflexes to catch it were instinctual and quick. The little wings tickled his palms, he opened his hand just enough to take a good look at his little prisoner.
“Keep it,” Draco said, his voice disgusted. “I’ve got more.”
Their comradery was gone. Draco gathered up his things and left Harry abruptly. Harry was left in the courtyard with only his thoughts and a golden snitch. That was fine by him.
He let it go, and caught it, and let it go, and caught it again. Next time he let it go he gave it a second, it wandered in amongst the bright green leaves and swooped amongst the orange flowered vines, he had to follow it for ten minutes before it hovered over a yellow flower long enough for him to sneak up and grab it. He let it escape another ten times all morning, not doing a bit of thinking about escaping or defeating the Dark Lord, as he chased it place to place. Then he had his plan.
The Dark Lord’s robe had been designed with everything he’d ever had in mind about what the ruler of the wizard world ought to look like. Layers of gray and dark green and black starting with shocking contrast at the pale skin of his neck, tailored around his waist and legs, with a wide cloak embroidered with the subtlest of sigils and emblems of the House of Grim. Now, over all the intricacies there was a layer of black soot and singed silk. He smelt of rotten eggs and he’d gotten rancid old blood between his toenails. That was what he’d gotten for all of his efforts. That was the result of being the most powerful wizard in the world. With a thought and a wave of the elder wand, his feet could be wiped clean and the smell dissipated, but for all that people talked about the elder wand and for everything he’d done to end up where he was, it should have been able to make his feet be created again with new skin, it should have been able to tame a goddamn dragon!
When he came back to the library he didn’t clean himself off before opening his manuscripts and ancient books. He wanted that disgusting feeling to stay with him and remind him of how much more there was to do. Of the books he’d acquired about dragon taming, he’d deciphered their ancient languages and sifted through them as carefully as one would sift for gold, but he knew some of their secrets still eluded him. That was how it was ancient knowledge, any wizard worth their salt had measures in place to guard their carefully honed skills and secrets. Even once one obtained these books, which was hard enough, it could take centuries to decipher and unlock their mysteries. That was why the thousand year reign promised in the prophecy wasn’t enough for him, could never be enough!
Oh, he’d make do with it, better than any alternative, and with his time he’d find some other secret path or road to go down for a better immortality, hopefully one not tied to a hostile little brat.
With the stink of sulfur in his nostrils and a thousand year timer ticking down, Voldemort resumed his hunt for answers. Everything about what he’d done from raising the dragon’s fury to sending it to sleep and temporarily possessing it were the first steps laid out to tame a beast like that, but it still hadn’t worked. The literature all suggested there was a touch that one could have for dragon taming, a sort of understanding that could be reached between wizard and beast… any wizard could obtain such a connection, but the more powerful the wizard the better the chances of success, so he had to succeed.
Impatient and growing angrier by the second, he redid the research he’d triple checked before. He dug his fingers abusively into the papyrus and ink that disappointed him and then tossed the books off the table, letting their fragile pages crumple and tear.
Irritated, he was irritated, and he’d get nothing else productive done until he could scratch the itch underneath it all. He left the library and started walking, knowing that whoever he encountered first was going to end up a victim. His feet took him across empty hallways and gilded banquet rooms. Something tugged at him from the hollow center in his chest.
The greenhouse was where he thought he might find Nagini. She liked the warmth and the challenge of catching small birds. It pleased him to see her hunting. She grew longer and stronger by the day bolstered by the perfect conditions he’d offered her. When she killed it was without animosity or anger. When she hunted, her seemingly clumsy body took on a dimension of agility and grace that was quite beautiful. She took pleasure in her own strength and cleverness and the feeling of bones snapping in her mouth, but not in the loss of another little bird for her to observe and stalk. There was something frustratingly simple about the way she thought about things that he could not change; when he tried to explain the reasons why men had to die, their inferiority, their obstructions to his goals, she only recognized that they had to die because he was stronger than them. She used the same logic against the birds and shied away from going with him to see any dragons.
He did not hold these differences against her. He welcomed her company as he might a friend.
But he knew with only a gentle propping that he would not find Nagini here today. She was digesting a large meal and sleeping in a quiet room of the manor. There was someone else here.
He snapped off an inquisitive branch of a plant that reached out to touch him. It curled back into itself. Deeper he traveled into the greenhouse, seeking out the thing that boldly sought to draw him in…
And found it.
Unconscious. Laying on broken porcelain tiles next to the pool, naked except for his boxers. His skin had long since dried, one knee was still bent upwards as though resting for just a moment after intense exercise, his clothes just within reach but still folded. His mouth was open slightly, his expression gentle. When Voldemort came in close he saw the way his eyes flickered beneath the delicate skin of his eyelids. He was dreaming something pleasant.
Voldemort breathed in the humid, warm air, reeking with the thick decaying smell of earth and the lustful aroma that flowers put out to lure in insects desperate to pollinate, and shared for a moment the feeling of warmth, satisfaction, lethargy. Only a young person could behave so worried and frantic and then drown their sorrows with something so simple as a swim in a pool. His neck was tipped back, exposing the clean line of his throat and Adam's apple protruding. His body had gone from skinny and short to skinny and tall, and now, only now, was it taking its adult shape. He’d never be tall and muscular but he was well portioned and had the suggestion of lean muscle underneath his skin.
Every distant bird call marked another moment gone by when Voldemort should have looked away but didn’t. A long time ago, before he was marked with hunger, dissatisfaction and coldness, he might have laid against warm concrete himself, with the clean cut of his jaw pointed towards the sky and his olive skin darkening. He’d been good looking then. He’d considered the sacrifice of his looks to be a shallow cost for the value of power.
He pressed his toe against the boy’s narrow waist and pushed until Harry’s eyes squinted. His pale foot was a contrast against Harry’s healthy skin and the patterned blue tiles and green weeds breaking apart tile.
”Get up.” His voice was cold and discordant with the birdsong. He pressed harder into Harry’s side. The boy’s eyes flickered open, uncomprehending, dazed. “Up.”
He startled, and sat up abruptly with his hands going to the side to grab his glasses. Then his hands went to his bare chest, and shame and self-consciousness flooded the link connecting them. Voldemort repositioned himself to stand between him and his clothes.
“I have an errand which requires your assistance. Up.”
Harry hadn’t found his balance when Voldemort cast a curse that sent his arms winding back and fastened tight behind his back. Voldemort grabbed him by the back of his neck, feeling the still damp pieces of hair brush his fingers, and began to shove him.
“My clothes are back there,” he protested, with his feet dragging. “And my glasses. I need them.”
”I’ll tell you if you need them.” Voldemort pushed him forward and let him walk by himself. With pokes of the Elder Wand in his side, he corralled Harry towards the neater, cleaner sections of the garden, that grew useful plants in stone bound square sections with soft, pliable and short grass underneath. The boy’s stride was stiff, when they came across stairs he halted, outstretched his foot cautiously, then when Voldemort impatiently jabbed him, he stepped forward and tripped. Voldemort scoffed impatiently and again reached out to touch the back of his neck.
He walked Harry to the edge of the garden and carelessly plucked a few fresh buds off of a salvo organica fusillade and handed them off to Harry to eat. A single pepper off of the small, innocent and red tinged plant would be enough to send anyone to the hospital, and the buds were only slightly less painful to consume. After eating the first blossom, Harry’s face flushed, his eyes watered and his lips swelled, after eating the second flower, Voldemort finally found the mercy within himself to summon up a goblet of water for Harry to drink out of.
”We’ll be going to see dragons. While we’re there, I expect you to be on your best behavior.” He reached out and squeezed Harry’s check with one hand. Harry could only stand there and helplessly allow it to happen, with his eyes continually watering and his glasses missing. He was both bound and blind. “Don’t move away from me. Don’t touch anything.” Voldemort considered his other conditions. “And don’t get any ideas.”
He didn’t wait to hear Harry’s assent. He grabbed hold of Harry’s arm and aparated them deep into the mountains of Romania. Immediately the cloying, sweet smell of so many plants and flowers trapped in a greenhouse was overtaken by the shockingly cold scent of pine. They were in an abandoned fourteenth century guard tower that had been taken over by dragon tamers for its strong walls and deep ravines. Ruin had crept in. Pine needles, weeds and bones littered the floor. Claw marks and scorched wood were the only suggestions of danger in the otherwise quiet, misty forest.
”This way.” The dragon tamers in Romania were not all loyal to his new regime. Even though he was confident that he could best any one of them one-on-one, the more clever among them would always call for backup first. He knew the Nigerian and French dragon tamers had been meeting with increasing frequency with foreign resistance movements and the Order. Only through a few purebloods sympathetic to his cause had he learned the secrets of their trade and found his way through the maze of rubble and fire pits.
At the top of a long crumbling stone stairway, there was the entrance to the dragon pit of an old, black Peruvian Vipertooth. Voldemort had climbed past scorch marks and flourishing ivy before he thought to look back and see Harry struggling to climb past the fifth step before him. Without his hands to balance him or his eyes to see where he was going, he clumsily lifted each foot and felt out in front of him for where to safely put his bare foot down. Without most of his clothes, he cut a very sorry figure in the cold air. Voldemort came back down and took off his cloak, and wrapped it around Harry’s shoulders. Then he took his arm and guided him up the stairs.
On top of the guard tower, you could see the defensive stone wall which threaded between mountains and over rivers for miles in either direction with tall and decaying stone towers breaking out over the low clouds. In the distance, a stream of blue and orange fire erupted in a blast from a guard tower and quickly disappeared. There was no dragon in the pit below them.
Voldemort cast three powerfully invisible spells around them and then sent an orb of blue light gently floating off into the pen. It floated this way and that, like a balloon being gently tossed about in the wind, and still no dragon appeared.
A prick of intuition tugged the back of Voldemort’s mind. In an instant, he had Harry behind his back and the wards flaring up with all their protection against white hot dragon flame enveloping them. The Dark Lord’s wand flashed hot white, and the stone tower crumbled, letting the black dragon drop that much closer to them from where it had been hanging upside down from the turret. It had not been able to claw or knaw its way through the impenetrable chain and lock attaching it to a heavy boulder, but over years it had ground down its teeth and claws biting and clawing at the rock underneath until it became just light enough to drag.
It slithered over the ground at them with its teeth bared and its intelligent dark eyes fixed on them. Any normal wizard's spells would ricochet off its armored scales, and it expected as much when it struck directly towards the two new wizards in its den. Instead of the death it hoped for, the wizard sent a spell back that shattered the scales on its left flank and slammed it back into the stone wall behind it. Quickly assessing the situation, the dragon retreated back into the labyrinth of broken stone and ivy. The weaker wizard was the key to killing them both. If it struck that one with flames then while the other wizard was distracted putting his companion out, he’d sink his teeth into the tall pale wizard’s soft bloody flesh. It slunk around broken stone quietly despite the boulder trailing behind it. It found the best position out of sight and locked its claws into the side of a mossy wall.
A blue ball of light floated around the corner of the broken wall and bounced gently off the ground. The Peruvian Vipertooth’s slotted eyes focused on its innocuous and gentle path towards itself, which was coming faster and faster, dragged to its prey like a magnet. The dragon tried to retreat but it was too late. It engulfed the dragon’s body, electrocuting and penetrating, until the creature was limp. And then its mind was attacked.
Somewhere between pleasure and agony, control could be exerted over any being. It was the same principle used in the imperius curse and, like the imperius curse, a strong mind could overcome it. The dragon’s first movement was a twitch of its claw, then an arching of its spine, and then tremors started to overtake it and it spat fire as it writhed in pain.
“Stop it,” Harry said. There was a terrible groaning noise coming from the dragon not unlike the noises he had made under the cruciatus curse. “It’s too much, you’ll break him.”
But the moment carried on. Voldemort had an intuitive sense for when a mind was about to break, and just at that point of no return, a wave of endorphins broke over the creature. The smell of cold pine, the snap of bones breaking and blood gushing down its throat, the warmth of a spring day laid out on warm stone. These were the things worth living, fighting, dying, submitting for. He opened his eyes as Voldemort’s creature.
“Come to me,” Voldemort commanded and it came. It settled down in front of the two wizards as eagerly as a dog. It would have done a tap dance or bitten off its own wings if it had been asked to do so.
Voldemort turned to his young companion with a smile. “You see, Harry? If you’re too soft they’ll never stop fighting. Let’s keep going.” The dragon trailed behind them with his leg still connected to his giant boulder. Harry kept glancing over his shoulder at it.
They went to another dragon pit. The Norwegian Ridgeback in this enclosure was neatly chained where it was supposed to be. It seemed young. Young enough to have been hatched and cared for by Hagrid during Harry’s second year at Hogwarts, although Harry couldn’t be sure. He turned his head away when torture began, but this Norwegian Ridgeback had been tamed before, and within minutes they had another follower.
Voldemort’s mood was becoming increasingly buoyant as they made their way to the third dragon.
The Hebridean Black dragon was known for its vicious disposition. Each adult required a territory of a hundred square miles. A mating pair always finished their reproductive cycle by the stronger partner killing the weaker. The black of its scales was of the sky’s deepest violet before true night falls. Its wingspan stretched larger than the mountain range on which the small guard tower where it was kept perched on. There was no guard tower here. The mountainside was bare of trees and human structures, with only a goat trail weaving its way between sparse grass and hard rocks.
They made their way up those faded trails with their two obedient servants in tow and their eyes and ears straining for a sign of the dragon. Harry’s feet were scraped bloody by sharp rocks. Voldemort cast spell after spell into the cold, pristine air that disappeared as they were whispered into existence. Three small, blue will-o’-the-wisps softly drifted on the cold breeze and investigate hollows in the rocks without the least bit of impatience. The Norwegian Ridgeback and Peruvian Vipertooth flicked their tongues out with increasing worry as they progressed. Mist rose from between the rocks. There was no more birdsong here.
”Stay close, Harry.” Voldemort reached back for the familiar feeling of his youngest horcrux, only for his palm to come up with empty air. Harry was nowhere to be seen, nor were their newly acquired dragons. The boulder they had passed three steps ago was now twenty steps behind. Harry huddled there, bound and mostly naked, on ground that was shaking itself up from slumber.
The steam Voldemort had seen rising up from rocks turned its flat, wide head towards its newest intruder with interest in its slitted eyes. If the Peruvian Vipertooth resembled a fast venomous serpent, and the Norwegian Ridgeback a rattlesnake, the Hebridean Black was the anaconda. Its body was thick and all muscle. It had burrowed beneath giant boulders like pebbles of sand. It lunged at Voldemort with its mouth open wide enough to swallow an elephant, and the Dark Lord threw an explosive curse at it, then a poisonous curse, then the killing curse.
Still the dragon came.
Its eyes were alive with the thrill of the hunt. Saliva dripped from its mouth onto the ground where Voldemort was backing up, retreating as he fought, and gaining no ground against the dragon’s impenetrable skin. His palms were starting to sweat around the elder wand. Adrenaline pumped viciously through his veins, throwing all his carefully obtained knowledge and tricks out of his head.
It’d be simple to apparat’s away, all he’d have to do was buy a second of time and turn on his heel and be away.
”Accio Harry!”
To buy himself time and inch closer to the boy who was still nowhere in sight, Voldemort began a mass levitation spell. The boulder he was standing on and all those that had been cast off when the dragon awoke began to move and shift. There was real power behind their momentum and they took turns slamming into the dragon’s fortified flank. The Hebridean Black batted at the stones with its paws, momentarily distracted but not injured. Voldemort couldn’t see any human figures hidden amongst the chaos. Through their connection he felt only pain and saw only stone. “Accio Horcrux, Accio Harry, Accio… ”
A boulder floated upwards to join the pebble storm raining down on the increasingly annoyed dragon. Underneath it, there was a scantily clothed boy with a crushed leg. In an instant, the Dark Lord appeared beside him and pulled him to stand, ignoring his pained cries, while one leg dangled uselessly. They fell together, dragged down by Harry’s weight and Voldemort’s imbalance on uneven stone. The dragon’s claws landed inches away from where Voldemort’s neck was and sheared stone like butter. It drew back. Its luminous eyes thoughtfully considered the best way to go about crushing the little thing laying before it. Then it opened its mouth.
”Protego!” It was Harry that shouted it, or it was Voldemort’s spell coming through Harry’s mouth. The elder wand was lifted.
Flames hot enough to melt iron and turn flesh into dripping fat melted away around them. The dragon’s fire burned out and they were still there. Then Voldemort cast another spell. This one was dark, cruel and meant to inflict damage. It twisted the dragon’s internal organs, wrenching them from side to side without going so far as to kill it, but enough to sicken and weaken it. The Hebridean Black reared back with his eyes rolling in his skull, staggering and confused as it sickened and saw the close specter of death.
Voldemort rose to his feet with a hand pulling Harry’s arm up with him. He sent out one spell, then another, and another, and watched them hit with perfect precision. A powerful dragon’s scales were supposed to be invulnerable, but now the dragon writhed in pain. It had no defense. Vengeful, Voldemort tortured the creature, invaded its mind and laid bare all of its fears. Faster than he ever had before, he broke its mind, body and spirit, and left the great beast writhing on the ground with hardly any sense or feeling left in it. There was a good chance it wouldn’t survive such brutality, but that didn’t matter to the Dark Lord anymore.
Submission came at last from the third and final dragon but there was no celebration.
Harry’s face was pale and his expression was disoriented with pain. With the cloak shifted to the side, Voldemort could see where the boulder had landed on right femur and left calf, where bones had distorted and flesh had split out over ruined skin. His blood was drenching the ground underneath him. It’d taken long weeks of forced feedings at every meal to get meat back on the boy and now this. Harry shivered intensely.
Come to me. Voldemort projected his thoughts across the ragged Romanian mountains and two large wingspans broke the thick mist and scattered it, coming to glide quickly to their master’s side. The Vipertooth and the Norwegian Ridgeback were diminutive next to their older, deadlier relative but together the three of them painted a formidable portrait of power. Now that they had been conquered they were his to do with as he wanted. Keep out of sight of all wizards and await my command.
Their heads bowed to the weight of his voice in their minds. They knelt before him with their wings low to the ground.
He gathered up his horcrux in his arms, with his blood smearing down his pants and Harry’s head rollling back as he passed out from the pain. He had to hold him tightly to make sure he didn’t slip away and then they disappeared from the mountains and mist. In their absence, the dragons kept their bodies and their eyes on the ground.
In the hospital wing of Malloy manor, Voldemort laid the unconscious and broken body out on a table and checked first that his pulse was steady and his breath still there. He could see everything laid out before him with almost no barrier. Harry’s face was loose and relaxed with his hair falling around him on the table. His arms and bare chest were muscular and olive toned. Blood smeared up his thighs and down to his feet. The worst of it was his knees, where white tendons and muscle hung limp and disconnected. Half horror and half handsomeness. The temptation arose to leave him as he was.
Voldemort rubbed a bit of blood on his cheek. It smeared after having been touched and turned into a dark red blush that marred his pretty face.