It will work.
"Get a little older, you'll get abandoned."
Harry was a liar.
A pathological sly liar.
It was written into his skin, the shiny piece of skin that had ' I must not tell lies ' carved into it wouldn't even stop him from telling his fibs.
His aunt scolded him for it, his uncle beat it out of him -- or so he though, that is until harry arrived at hogwarts and learned one important thing:
It was safer to lie,
Then to say the truth.
The lies have always given people more freedom,
More capacity to hope, uselessly.
And by God, wasn't he just that?
A product of useless hope-
-"It's not wrong."
Harry looked up from his bed in the cold dorm, the breeze hit his body like an ice-cube, and even when the another boy had shut the windows, the room still was as freezing as ever.
Is griffendor dorm warmer then this? Do hermione or-
No. He reminded himself, he couldn't think like that, it'd make it worse, so much worse, to him and to them.
"What?"
Rosier, Louis, Druella's brother hopped onto his bed, forcing Harry to move to give the white-haired boy some room, meaning Harry had to sit up, and no longer be out-streched on his bed.
"Your decision, whichever you decide to make, will not be wrong, no matter what."
Harry narrowed his eyes, had Tom told all of his deatheaters about the ultimatum he had to choose?
Rosier let out a laugh, "No, he hasn't, only one or two."
His eyes widened, had he said that out-loud?
"Oh, erm-- I didn't mean to say that-"
"-out-loud, you didn't."
Harry shifted awkwardly because he couldn't really respond to that in a way that would make the tension in the almost empty room disappear.
"Oh." He settled for, even though it didn't answer a single question he wanted to ask, How did Rosier know what he was thinking, Who had Tom told? What did they want him to pick-
Why do you care what they want? They're deatheaters. Do you care about them now? More then hermione and Ron? The low voice whispered at his neck, and he shivered, he knew it was his mind, but it didn't sound like it, not a bit.
"Not to be arrogant, it comes with my gift, I believe I am good at reading people, and you are as open as can be, It's hard not to."
"Your gift?"
Rosier smiled,
"I can see visions and illusions, of the future, past, or present, my mother could aswell, It's hard.
Really hard, like,
It's like tearing apart someones mind, body, soul.
Mother always said our soul was the essence of our magic, it didn't hold it together, but it held the strings of it all--
Druella's magical performance of the strings and the Manor sprang through harry's head as Rosier continued to speak.
--It's breaking the strings and reattaching them, squeezing a hole large enough to fit through, to strain them of energy; and also yourself,
but , "
Louis stopped for a moment, harry's head spinned.
" You, your energy drowns itself all on It's own."
Harry sat up more properly, to keep a stable balance so he didn't fall, but also to look into Louis' eyes more clearly, to make sure, that the Rosier boy wasn't just fucking with him.
"What does that mean?" He snapped, subconsciously, but Louis didn't seem to notice at all, or if he did, did not find it odd, as he spoke without a single ounce of annoyance of Harry's tone.
"Your magic is fated to be connected to someone else's, to be tangled in someone else's strings, to be held."
"And," harry's voice went quiet, he didn't fully understand what Louis meant, 'fated', 'tangled', but he knew, for a fact, he wasn't connected with someone else, his magic--his soul, was not held to someone elses.
He made sure it wasn't.
"And what if it's not? My soul, magic, is not connected, what happens then? To the magic, the strings, me?"
Louis exhaled sharply,
"It tears and does not repair."
"My magic will fade? "
"Yes. That's only if it you don't heal the strings."
"How do I do that, Louis?"
Louis smiled, and the room went cold, had it ever been warm?
"Find your fated."
Harry woke up in his clothes, a ray of sunshine peeked in through the windows that were now wide open, but still, not a single soul was in the dorm room, had they all left before the sun rose?
"Morning, sleeping beauty." A voice snorted from above him.
Nott.
Harry rolled his eyes.
"Piss off." He grumbled and squinted through the sunlight at the dark-haired boy, who was standing over him, grinning.
"What do you want?"
"Why were you speaking to rosie?"
"Rosie?"
Nott's cheeks seemed to redden, and he cleared his throat as he responded; "Louis, why were you speaking to him last night? Alone in the room?"
"Why do you care?" Harry slid from the bed to his feet, standing eye to eye with Nott.
"I, just want to know." He scratched the back of his neck, and clicked his jaw, he wasn't as intimidating as the others, he wasn't cruel or cold, but he kept his distance, and harry didnt blame him.
He had gotton to close to a particular slytherin, and that had gone to hell.
Harry sat on the edge of the bed, and looked up to Nott, the word rosie rang into his head, and then it clicked.
It all clicked.
"You're the boy."
"What?"
Harry rubbed his eyes again, "You're the boy in Louis' story."
"Story? Rosie--Louis, he told you?"
"Yesterday, he told me something that," That was the truth that you don't want to accept it, "It sort of, was bad news," The truth, "And he said he'd tell me the choice he made,"
Harry locked eyes with Nott.
" ' I would , if you asked . '
' I know. And I'll never ask you to . ' "
"The choice he made, and the choice you made."
Nott opened his mouth and snapped it back shut, as if he was scared of saying something he was afraid of, something wrong.
"The choice we made, is much different then the one you will make, you can't say no, harry, you can't." Nott's eyes went dead and harry shifted away subconsciously.
"Don't say no, it'll be better for you, for your friends."
"How can you possibly know that?" Harry lowered his head, his head still span.
Nott fell silent for a few seconds, before he headed to the dorm door and opened it, but he didn't go through it,
He turned back to harry and gave him the only smile he had ever seen Nott do,
"I don't, but don't make a choice you'll regret.
Do not make my mistake."
And the door slammed.
The great hall was loud, but all harry could hear was muffled sounds as he stabbed his food with the fork, so violently that it would've concerned everyone that witnessed it, but nobody was paying attention to him.
Except a certain boy, on the other side of the table.
"You look like shit." And Druella.
"Feel like it too."
The younger year made room for druella to sit besides him as she placed her food down.
She leaned into his ear, "You have time, to give him your choice." She whispered softly, giving him a genuine smile and squeezed his arm lightly, to reassure him, but all it did was make harry slouch down more.
"Do you have a fated?"
Druella breath hitched and she coughed, "What?"
"Do you have a fated?" He repeated.
"No, I know--" She shook her head, "Why do you want to know that?"
"Do you have one?"
"I-, I do, yes."
Harry glanced down the table and Louis looked up and met his eyes, raising his eyebrow, asking a silent question.
He turned back to druella, "How did you find yours?"
Druella looked down at her food before it vanished and she stood from her seat so quickly the girl beside her clinged onto her friend as to not to fall down when she stood.
"I'll show you, come on."
The libary was harry's favourite place in hogwarts other then the quidditch practices; Ron never knew, he would've never let it go, teased him until the end of time and Hermione would've squealed in joy.
That was in his time though, in this one, it was cold and empty, and lacking the comfort that made that libary, his.
Druella stopped infront of a shelf of books, and began to look through them before she stopped and picked a book out.
' Y O U R F A T E D '
She sat on the table next to it, and motioned for harry to sit besides her as she blew the dust off the book before placing it down inbetween them.
Druella flipped through the pages, symbols of strings and ropes, and whatnot, until she found the one she was looking for.
"It's in French?"
Harry turned to Druella; "I don't know french."
"Amour Destiné, It's a hoilday celebrated, within pure-blood families." She gave him a tight smile to remind him that she wasn't like most slytherins; prejudice.
He smiled back.
"It's on the eclipse, at exactly five to midnight, a string coloured to the one of your soul, will connect yours to your fated, the coloue of their's will blend into yours, the colour of your magic, when it will be connected . "
Harry nodded.
"How do you connect it? I--, the magic, your magic, how?"
Druella smiled in a sense that harry didn't quite understand, but she answered him so the unreadable smile went unmentioned.
"Love."
"Romantic."
Druella laughed,
"Maybe."
"I--I need to love my fated?" Harry hated how his voice sounded, weak, fragile, vulnerable, when he was taught to be everything but that.
"To connect it properly, or you'd have to make a contract."
"Contract?"
"A marriage contract, so even if you don't love one another, you'll be connected in law and," She shut the book tight and faced harry, "In magic."
Druella stood, and smiled down at harry, her eyes flickered to something he could pin, but as she slid the book into his hands, and leaned down to whisper,
"The eclipse is tommorow."
"The day he wants me to make my choice?" Harry whispered.
Druella put her hand onto his shoulder,
"It'll be okay."
Will it?
The door opened; Louis, and druella stood and bowed their heads: "My lord." They replied to the presence, none other then Tom Riddle.
Voldemort.
The Dark Lord.
Their Lord.
Tom nodded and they both returned to their seats they had been waiting in, patiently - or trying to, as they awaited their master's arrival.
"Rosier's, how'd it go with dear harry?"
Druella spoke first, as she stood, "I told him about the marriage contract, that if he didn't love his fated he could marry them, and it'd still connect the magic." Her voice trembled slightly and her brother layed a hand on her arm as to catch her if she fell.
Tom nodded, satisfied, "Louis?"
He stood aside of his sister, a hand still on her arm, just incase.
His sister, however, spoke before he could, "Is it really a good idea to lie to him? To--to, misinform him?"
"My dear," Tom began, his voice as soothing as ever and Louis could feel Druella's tension smooth out slightly from his hold on her, even before Tom was done speaking ,
"We are not lying to him, his magic is tearing, it is because of his lack of connection to his fated, but it's not just because of that, we're keeping information from him, but we are not lying."
"What--what," Louis had never seen his confident little sister stutter so much in the entire life line he has known her, but it made sense, she was stood infront of The Lord, doubting him.
"What else is destorying his magic?"
Tom hummed, "Not being in the right time-line."
"Louis."
"I told him about his magic, the tearing, the magic, the connection, he knows, as much as he needs to, for this to work." Louis felt a shiver go down his spine even as he spoke nonchalant.
Their lord smiled, charmingly and so very fake.
"It will work."
"What if your not his fated? In this time-line?" Druella asked.
"His fated is dead in this time-line, we're connected in his time-line, so we must be in this one."
Tom closed the space between him and Druella as he grazed her shoulder and ran his fingers softly through her hair;
"He'll die if he stays in this time-line without a fated, If the contract works, he'll be alive, he'll be safe." He'll be mine, went unsaid.
"Okay." Druella said, and with a nod from Tom, she left the room, her shoulders relaxed, and a smile, somewhat genuine on her face.
Louis turned to his lord as the door closed shut, as his sister left him alone, face to face with the man that would rule the world one day, he knew Tom would.
It was his fate.
"Do you think it'll work, My lord?"
Tom smiled,
"It will work."