Chapter 2
The scream seemed to reverberate in his eardrums far longer than the actual noise lasted. Harry tried to calm his erratic breathing as sweat poured down his face from both the heat of the flames that licked less than a metre away and the adrenaline coursing through his veins.
“Seize him now!”
Harry saw the man lunge towards him and, with a burst of strength he was sure he didn’t have, scrambled backwards, elbows scraping painfully on the rough stone floor, kicking up into Quirrell’s face causing his professor’s head to snap back. Not wanting to waste his precious seconds, Harry shoved himself up and dove for the doorway.
“Bombarda!”
An involuntary cry left his lips as the spell stuck him in the side and he was thrown away from the doorway and into one of the large pillars that lined the eaves of the room. Harry fought the urge to vomit as the pain throbbing in his right arm betrayed the broken bone. His head spun and he felt blood dripping slowly down his forehead from where he had struck the stone column. Gasping harshly, he was aware of every breath; sharp edges of broken ribs shifting with each of his movements. Pulling his right arm against his side as tightly as possible, he dragged himself upright again, using the pillar for support as his vision blurred and he swayed.
Blinking rapidly, Harry looked towards Quirrell. The other was holding a similar pose to himself, with one arm tucked in close to his body and Harry realized that Quirrell’s left hand that had been touching Harry’s skin was severely burned and charred.
Quirrell advanced slowly with his wand out ahead of himself, pointed directly at Harry.
“Avada ked-” Quirrell started, with a vicious snarl smeared across his face.
“Stop!” Voldemort’s voice echoed around the chamber. “Do not kill him yet.” The sibilant voice returned to its previous silky whisper. “I think,” the pause in his words gave Harry the jolt he needed to move again, only to have Quirrell whip his wand back into his face from where it had fallen to his side at Voldemort’s shout. “I think we shall take him with us instead. If I am not mistaken, and I very much doubt I am, he has something of mine. More than just the stone in his pocket.”
“Yes, master.”
The last thing Harry was aware of was lunging to the side as Quirrell’s wand tip glowed red. And then he knew nothing but darkness, the “stupefy” reverberating in the chamber.
***
“I hear your friends still pine for you, Harry. Imagine what they’d say if they could see you now.”
Harry kept his eyes on the floor in front of him. Voldemort taunting him with information, whether true or not, was not a new game of his. It was two years since Voldemort and Quirrell had abdicated Hogwarts with himself and the philosopher’s stone in tow. Two years of never ending stress and pain and hate. Harry had never considered himself a hateful person before. Even with the Dursleys, with whom he had never known love or kindness or even bare necessities, he had never hated them. But Voldemort. Voldemort, he hated. Quirrell too, for bringing him back and for giving Voldemort the means to resurrect. Although, at a certain point his hatred for Quirrell had tapered off. It was hard to continue hating a dead man after all.
“Your godfather has escaped Azkaban it seems.” Harry didn’t move but he felt his attention sharpen. “They still believe he was the one who betrayed your parents. My most loyal follower.” Voldemort’s scathing tone as he mocked the Ministry of Magic was almost as familiar as his taunts about Harry’s friends.
Harry’s knees ached to the bone from kneeling for so long and his throat felt as if it was full of glass. He couldn’t remember the last time he had had a sip of water. He was positive it had been at least two days. The crinkle of paper sounded as Voldemort turned the page of the Daily Prophet. Out of the peripheral of his left eye Harry could just make out the tips of Voldemort’s feet where he was sitting in a straight backed armchair of the office, one leg crossed over the other.
“Such a shame, your godfather. He was quite a skilled auror if I recall. He would have made a much better follower than Wormtail. Poor Regulus was heartbroken that he strayed so far from the family.”
Most of the time Voldemort would taunt Harry with things he cared about. Like his friends and Hogwarts and his freedom. Other times he taunted Harry with things that Harry was sure Voldemort thought he should care about but Harry had no true frame of reference to put them in. It seemed like this was one of those times. Harry was sure that if he had been raised by his parents, knowing and loving his godfather as he supposed they had intended, this line of commentary about his godfather would be somewhat distressing. Unfortunately, Harry had never met Sirius Black. He knew nothing about the man other than what Voldemort had previously implied or outright said during his mocking over the years.
Wormtail, on the other hand, he knew. The disgusting rat had showed up almost six weeks ago. He made Harry’s skin crawl with revulsion just looking at him. Voldemort had taken great pleasure in telling Harry every detail about how his parents had trusted the man who had then almost immediately taken the secret of their location to his Lord. Thankfully he had seen little of the rat, as Voldemort had him running errands frequently it seemed.
“Would you like a family reunion, Harry? I can bring your godfather here. Let him keep you company.”
Harry didn’t react. He knew better at this point than to think that Voldemort was truly asking for his input. No matter what he said or did, Voldemort always did exactly what he wanted. He just enjoyed getting a rise out of Harry.
Harry could no loner feel his lower legs but his knees were screaming in pain and his neck and back were beginning to burn from holding the position he was in. His shoulders felt like rock with his arms behind his back but thankfully he didn’t have to attempt to avoid eye contact with his head bowed while keeping his back mostly straight.
“Would you like some water, Harry?” Voldemort’s tone was so gentle and kind that along with the offer Harry was sure he would have cried if he’d had any moisture left in him at all.
He knew he shouldn’t respond. Voldemort was always gleeful when he did, but it was only because he would have a reason, not that he needed one, to punish Harry for days afterwards.
Despite knowing that the pain he would be in soon would make him regret it, Harry couldn’t stop himself from cracking his lips and whispering.
“Please.”
***
The scream reverberated in his eardrums. They always did now. All of the screams over the years, both his own and those of many others, haunting him in perpetuity. The only thing he could be thankful for at this point was that in this particular instance the screams weren’t his own.
“Please, Harry, sweet boy, you don’t want to do this,” Pettigrew’s snivelling somehow made him even more disgusting than usual. “What would your parents think?” The tears and snot dripping down the rat’s face did nothing to hide the tremors that wracked his body and the overly pain dilated pupils. The balding man’s wispy hair was plastered to his scalp with sweat and grease and blood dripped from his limbs; slowly dropping onto the flagstone floor of the dungeon cell from where he was chained to the chair in the middle of the room.
“Yes, Harry. What would your parents think if they could see you now?”
Harry fought down the urge to flinch at Voldemort’s casually curious tone. He didn’t need to look behind himself to know that the Dark Lord would be sitting one leg crossed over in a conjured chair, watching the proceedings like others would observe a play or an opera.
Harry could feel the cold, tacky sensation of blood congealing between his fingers and underneath his fingernails. His bare feet felt frozen against the rock beneath him and his stomach was cramping with hunger. Harry flexed his fingers against the leather wrapped handle of the curved blade held in his right hand, hoping this would be over soon.
Voldemort sighed heavily at Harry’s lack of response, “Oh very well then. Finish it, Harry. I tire of this.”
Inhaling shakily and readjusting his grip on the blade again, Harry nodded shortly, still not looking over at the man behind him. He stepped forward, not acknowledging the sensation of still warm blood seeping between his toes and coating the bottom of his feet.
“No! No! My Lord, please!” Pettigrew shrieked and began thrashing within his bonds. “My Lord! I am the most loyal! I can be useful! I can spy on your enemies for you and, and, and - ”
“Now, Harry.” Voldemort’s bored tone was almost drowned out under Pettigrew’s begging but Harry would always hear him now. Reaching out his left hand he seized a handful of Wormtail’s greasy hair tightly, wrenching the man’s head backwards. He lifted his right hand with the blade in it. Valiantly ignoring the sudden flush of warm liquid that brushed his feet as Pettigrew lost control of his bladder, he brought the knife across quickly.
Harry squeezed his eyes closed as blood sprayed his face from Wormtail’s slit throat. Swallowing tightly, he lowered his arm, released Pettigrew’s hair from his fist, and stepped back.
He stood, motionless, as blood dripped from the tips of his hair, and beaded on the end of his nose, and sluiced off the edge of the knife. The gurgling, gasping, wet noises coming from Pettigrew’s form filled Harry’s ears and he debated on whether this or the screams were worse.
It felt like years had gone by, but really it was likely barely a minute, by the time Pettigrew succumbed completely to death. The man’s eyes were open wide, bloodshot and bulbous, looking up towards the darkness bathed ceiling. His throat gaped open like a grotesque second mouth, and his actual mouth was wide, tongue swollen, lips blue.
The slowly spreading puddle of blood and other fluids surrounding Wormtail’s body was nearly touching Harry’s toes again when Voldemort seemingly decided he was done.
“Come, Harry,” he said, rising to his feet and vanishing his throne-like chair. Voldemort moved through the open doorway and Harry turned to follow, moving his feet just as the blood reached where he had been stood.
Harry emerged from the cell into the dank hallway beyond. Voldemort was standing across the hall, holding the barred door open of another cell. Harry stepped forward, never looking at the Dark Lord’s face directly, and into the cell. Turning around once he was about halfway back in the small enclosure, Harry watched as Voldemort closed the bars and tapped them with his wand.
Voldemort seemed to look him over clinically. “I suppose you’ve earned some food for tonight. I’ll have one of the elves bring you some dinner. Goodnight, Harry.” With that the man turned to his left and walked away down the hallway.
Harry finally raised his head to take in the sight of the empty doorway. Slowly, he lowered himself to the ground, folding his legs like a pretzel and cradling the bloody knife in his lap. He could move to the back of the cell and lay on the small cot there but he was still covered in cold and flaking blood and Harry knew he would not be allowed to clean the pseudo bed and he would rather not ruin the one item of comfort he was semi-regularly allowed to use.
Squeezing his eyes closed again, Harry felt his hands begin to tremble slightly. Feeling the gorge rise in his throat suddenly, he lunged across the small cell to vomit into the small bucket in the corner. Hanging his head over the bucket in case his stomach decided it wasn’t finished yet, Harry felt a single tear escape. Spitting once more into the bucket, he swiped the back of his somewhat clean left hand across his mouth.
He staggered to his feet and slowly moved back to the middle of the room. Kicking the knife across the floor, with little care as to where it ended up, absently noting it as it skittered under the cot with a metallic clatter. Lowering himself once more to sit cross legged on the floor Harry settled himself in for a long night with only Pettigrew’s corpse across the hall for company.
Happy birthday to him.