Chapter 6
Voldemort has been living a blessed life, by all accounts. It is justified, then, that his fall will be all the harder when it comes.
“Time for bed,” Voldemort murmurs to Harry, who has recently taken to cuddling with his arm.
“Okay,” Harry says, and tumbles from the sofa. Honestly, Voldemort is an objectively bad person - how on earth did he manage to end up with the sweetest, most personable child? “Goodnight papa.” Harry looks up expectantly at Voldemort, who belatedly realizes that he has yet to give his son a kissy. The goodnight kiss is delivered, and Harry beams. “Thanks papa. Can Tom have one too?”
Voldemort’s carefully laid house of cards falls with a crash that can only be heard by himself. “T- Tom?”
“Tom’s my friend,” Harry explains. “He lives with me, here,” Harry points to his own heart. “He is a bit lonely and sad, I think, so I try and make sure that he gets Nice things as well.”
No no no no no-
Unable to speak, Voldemort gives Harry another kiss before descending into a silent mental breakdown before slowly coming to the realisation that maybe, just maybe, he is in too deep.
***
“So.” Voldemort has to physically stop himself from groaning as he slumps into the armchair at the Black-Lupin house as Sirius looks disapprovingly at him over tea. “What you’re saying is, you were into some dark shit. Then a bit of your soul broke off and popped into Harry, and now that it’s nearby you a lot, it’s making itself known.”
“Succinct as ever, Black,” Voldemort murmurs over his teacup.
“So my baby boy is being possessed by… you.”
“A younger version of myself, yes,” Voldemort mutters sourly. “The soul, I believe, is growing with Harry. The more magic he is around, the more it ought to make itself known. And when he is with, well, me-“
“Yes, yes, you are the big cheese,” Sirius acknowledges glibly, before pointing at Voldemort sternly with the sugar spoon. “What on earth were you doing mucking around with soul magic? A porlock could have told you that it was a bad idea. Now look, you’ve done gone ripped up your soul like a toffee wrapper.”
Voldemort groaned aloud and slumped. Over the window frame, he could see Lupin showing Harry how to bribe the gnomes back into their corner of the yard. He was strangely proud that his son carried a part of his own soul, but Voldemort recognised that that was mainly the vain megalomaniac aspect of his personality. Soul bits were not healthy for children.
Nagini had more or less confirmed this when he had asked her the previous night, hiss-screaming at him about interfering soul bits and consent. She had then slithered off to coil around Harry protectively and had given Voldemort the stink eye for the rest of the night.
“Clearly, you’re enough of a changed man to fess up and look out for Harry now,” Sirius goes on, “so we’ll obviously help. What’s your idea, then? Find some way to get your soul bit out of Harry?”
“There are prescribed methods to destroy the piece if soul,” Vodemort grits out, “but those come with hazards.”
“You’re probably overthinking things. How do you destroy the soul bit?”
“Basilisk venom and fiendfyre are the most accesible.” Upon seeing Sirius’ alarm, Voldemort sighs. “You see why these methods do not appeal to me.”
“Yeah, no,” Sirius agrees. “Is there any other way?”
“One,” Voldemort hazards. “Regret. But the horcrux is sentient, and I would need to talk it down. I would need to legilimize Harry, and then attack the horcrux from within.”
“Sounds reasonable,” Sirius hummed. “What will you need?”
“Anchors,” Voldemort says. “A runic circle - blood drawn, preferably - to strengthen me, and anchors to pull me back to this world. I will also need to strengthen my own soul first.”
Voldemort did not go into detail about how he would accomplish the latter, and to his credit, Sirius does not ask. Instead, he asks, “Do the anchors need to be sentient?”
“Magic is greatest when channeled willfully,” Voldemort nods. “Magical peoples, beings, and beasts all channel and use magic wilfully, lending to their power. Wizards and witches are strong, and their magic is varied, making them powerful anchors. The strongest would be beasts the likes of dragons, in terms of pure, raw, power. Alas, the last true Dragonborn died out with Circe’s line, leaving us unable to communicate with them.”
Sirius blinks at the deluge of knowledge. “Huh. I’d forgotten about that lore. You sound like my old man, he used to tell us about all of the old folklore.”
“Orion always did enjoy history,” Voldemort recalls. “He would always preside over Yule at the old manor, and we children always appreciated the stories. He even did the voices.”
“You were at school with my dad?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, I was at school with Cygnus. Orion was far older than us. People thought it strange that he was invested in me.”
“He was?”
“He rather approved of the Heir of Slytherin,” Voldemort smiles evilly. “He wanted to revive the bloodline, I think. He pushed for Cygnus to court me, but he was madly in love with Druella Rosier. Shows what romantic love is good for - they ended up spawning Bellatrix.”
Sirius spends several minutes in shock at a potential life in some universe wherein Voldemort never rose, and was instead probably Sirius’ favourite uncle. He has to take several fortifying sips of tea, and is still a bit shaken when he says, “Right. Back to the anchors - who were you thinking of?”
“Well. You,” Voldemort says, and raises an eyebrow when Sirius looks askance. “Come now, you are a prodigious wizard, surely your own magical strength is not unknown to you. The Black Bloodline is a strong one. Atticus, definitely, he will need to preside, at any rate. Granger can be the third - it is good to have a woman’s protection for these rotuals. As for a fourth…”
“I have one, but you won’t like it,” Sirius murmured.
“Don’t say Dumbledore-“
“Dumbledore.”
“-egads, certainly not, have you lost your puny mind!” Voldemort hisses, as Sirius smiles at his vehemence. “No. Think of someone else.”
“Avery?”
Here, Voldemort hesitates. “I… I cannot be sure. Not of his loyalty, but of his ability.”
“You’re marrying him,” Sirius points out.
“Avery is my oldest friend,” Voldemort shrugs, “ever since we first sat together on the train. He got stuck in the luggage room, and I had to pick the lock.” Voldemort pauses, caught up in his reminiscences. “When he found out my actual last name, he spent ages trying to trace it to Wizarding ancestry for me. We eventually figured out that I am descended through the maternal line.”
“What is your actual last name, then?” Sirius asks, and smiles impishly when Voldemort recoils. “Oh, go on, you’ve already shown your hand as a mushy papa, and I know you’re not pureblood. No one cares, I hope you realize. Most people follow you because you’re an overpowered traditionalist. What was your name, then?”
“Riddle,” Voldemort bites out, and watches Sirius goggle at him.
“You- you gave up a surname like Riddle, for Voldemort? Mate, you really sold yourself short,” Sirius shakes his head in wonderment.
“Excuse me?”
“You could have been the Dark Lord Riddle. The Enigmatic Lord of the Shadows… Riddle. And you went for some awful French tidbit. Shame, that,” Sirius tsks, and Voldemort seethes. “And now you’re Gaunt! That’s a fantastic name for a dark lord! You had such a bevy of good, solid, English names, and you went with some bad French. Alas!”
“I can’t believe you,” Voldemort hisses, as Harry and Remus walk back in.
“Papa!” Harry beams, and immediately soothes the fire of annoyance in Voldemort’s heart. “Papa, Uncle Remus and I gathered some veggies for lasagna tonight! I saw the pasta - they’re like squares! I couldn’t believe it!”
Voldemort smiles at his son’s innocent wonder and joy in the small things in life. “Square pasta,” he repeats, “what will they think of next?”
Sirius fills Remus in on the plan to find a third anchor for Harry’s ritual over dinner, while Kreacher pointedly glares at everyone and takes Harry upstairs to run him a bath before bedtime.
“Come, little Herakles,” Kreacher says, using the “better and more noble name” that he came up with for Harry, “we is be using the nice rose bubble bath if you is bathing nicely.”
“Okay!” Harry cheers and allows Kreacher to lead him upstairs by the hand.
Sirius watches with a frown, and wonders aloud, “I wonder why Kreacher is being nice to Harry.”
“Maybe it’s because Harry is small and nice to him, and brings him colourful balls of yarn to make himself socks?” Remus hazards.
“Naw, old stick insect is probably up to something.”
“Oh honestly,” Remus sighs, and turns to Voldemort. “Can we tlk about the unspeakably evil acts you committed, and your idea to summon a bit of your soul out of Harry? That actually makes sense.”
Voldemort groans at the reminder of his past, now coming to haunt him. “I just need a third anchor for the ritual - someone strong magically, and not-“
“Dumbledore?”
Voldemort stops to glare at a gently smiling Remus. “No.”
“Well, can you think of anyone else?”
Here, Voldemort falls silent, his fingers running along the slim handle of his fork. Eventually, the dark lord’s prodigious intellect shines through, and his face splits into a dark, satisfied smile.
“Severus.”
“Veto,” Sirius replies promptly.
For his part, Voldemort simply raises an eyebrow. “I will only entertain your thoughts if you can back them up with logic.”
“Easy. He’s a slimeball and a greasy slug, and I refuse to have him around Harry.”
“Harry is already around him,” Voldemort replies. “he squeezes out flobberworm jelly for his potions. Severus says that he rather likes this new iteration of Harry.”
Sirius makes a little moue with his lips and pouts seductively, but only succeeds in Voldemort scooting away from him. “What is he doing, make it stop,” the dark lord orders.
“Sirius, that never works,” Remus sighs. “Honestly.”
Sirius un-moued his lips and frowned. “Still. It’s the principle of the thing,” he says.
“I know better, and am smarter than you,” Voldemort says stoutly.
“Not smart enough to know that one shouldn’t shred their soul like fish flakes!” Sirius cries. “Really, there’s a reason children’s stories don't end with, ‘and he lived happily ever after once he had torn up his inner divinity and conscience, the end’.”
“There are no such stories,” Voldemort refutes. “I should know - Harry insists on reading bedtime stories to Nagini, and I vet the books myself.”
“Oh come on,” Sirius scoffs. “Dolores Dirigible and her Separated Soul? She turns to dust and is scattered across the seven seas because she went on a horcrux spree?” Sirius looks around at an aghast dark lord and Remus. “What, really? Just me? My old man loved reading me and Reg that story.”
“This explains so much about you,” Voldemort murmurs, and lapses into thought, before coming to a firm decision. “Still, my initial thought is solid - Severus will be the third anchor in the ritual.”
With that, Voldemort takes a definitive sip of his tea, and dares someone to refute his logic. As is typical, no one does.
***
“I should be honoured to assist in the ritual, my lord,” Snape says deferentially, when he is informed about his role by Voldemort.
“Stop judging me, Severus,” the dark lord sighs. “I have been told by numerous sources that I mucked up.”
“I would never dare to condescend to my lord,” Snape says simply, and continues to judge him quietly. “How does my lord intend to remove the soul from within the child?”
“Regret, mostly,” Voldemort says. “One pf the only sure fire ways to end a horcrux. And believe me, I am feeling it by the cart load right now. I just got back from talking to Black, and the man was actually making sense about it all.”
“I regret that my lord had to subject himself to such an odious presence,” Snape oozes. “Shall I prepare a cup of tea for my lord, to soothe his sensibilities?”
“Oh, go on then,” Voldemort says, never one to turn down tea. Besides, he needs it tonight.
***
“I had foreseen this-“
“Oh, shut up, Atticus.”
***
Avery was rather upset when Voldemort told him what was going to happen. “Didn’t anybody tell you the story of Dolores Dirigible and her Separated Soul?”
“For god’s sake,” Voldemort sighs.
***
Narcissa won’t stop crying, sniffling and holding onto Harry on the day of the ritual. “Be safe, my sweetling.”
“Don’t cry, Auntie Cissa, it’s only a little procedure,” Harry whispers. “Papa says that I’ll be right as rain soon, and be a healthy boy forever.”
“Let’s go, son,” Voldemort says, reaching one hand out for Harry, the other being occupied with shielding others from Atticus’ lack of clothing in a very particular area. “Atticus, why did you take your clothes off here? We’re doing the ritual at Black’s house!”
Severus tries ineffectually to use his cloak to shield Atticus’ pendulous manhood from the public eye, but is scared off when the thing swishes aggressively in his direction.
“I don’t like being cloaked in elements of the mundane world,” Atticus hums, swaying back and forth, his appendages swaying with him. Giving up on shielding his modesty, Vildemort took his hand away, revealing all, and subsequently had to catch a fainting Narcissa.
Upon arriving at Sirius’ house, Voldemort greeting Sirius with a glib, “You may wish to send your cousin a fruit basket, she just fainted upon seeing Atticus in the nude.”
“I would too,” Sirius said, admiring Atticus’ blessings. “Hello, Atticus. Do you want to set up the ritual in the basement? I cleared a space for it.”
“Very well then,” Atticus hums vaguely.
“Hurry up so that Hermione can uncover her eyes, yeah?” Ron asks, his hands clamped firmly over Hermione’s eyes.
“Honestly Ron, it’s just a penis,” Hermione huffs. “It’s not as though the twins aren’t nudists-“
“What!”
“You live with them, how do you not know this?”
“Papa, how come Ron and Hermione are here?” Harry asks cheerfully. “Don’t they have school?”
“Ah, we took leave for the weekend to look after you, mate,” Ron smiles at Harry. “I made loads of corned beef sandwiches, ‘cause I know that you like them. I also smuggled some treacle tart out of the kitchens-“
“Ron, Harry should be on plain foods till Monday, I am going to make him porridge and as a treat, granola,” Hermione lectures.
“Very reasonable,” Voldemort agrees. “When I was ill as a child, all I got was gruel. Didn’t even get seconds.”
“Papa! That’s awful!” Harry cries, because he is an empathetic and good hearted child. “When we get home, I will make you all the jam sandwiches!”
Ah! What a loving child he had! The dark lord smiles, and squeezes Harry’s hand with gentle pressure. “Not if I feed you first.”
“It’ll never stop being weird, seeing him being nice,” Sirius murmurs.
“Hell, it’s weird seeing him with a nose,” Ron comments, then whisks Harry up into his own arms, stealing him away from his doting papa. “C’mon Haz, the quicker we get this done with, the sooner you’ll get better, then we can trounce Malfoy at quidditch.”
“Auntie Cissa says that I’m too small to go on a broom by myself-“
“Too right,” Voldemort mutters.
“-but Uncle Avery takes me with him, he ties me to his stomach and lets me sit in front!”
Voldemort’s mood sours immediately, because Harry had been having illicit flying sessions. He looks at Snape, who bows his head apologetically. “It is my eternal regret, my lord, that I could not sway the child from broom-jockeying to a more noble art, such as potions. Avery used his wiles and smiles to win the child’s affections, for he is a sly cad with powers of charisma unknown to me.”
“You mean that he smiles at people?” Sirius asks. “Go on, Snippy, give it a go- oh egads, I regret everything, stop doing that - Remus, protect me!”
Voldemort enjoys Harry’s tinkling little laugh, because Uncle Sev is doing his I’m-going-to-use-your-blood-in-a-potion smile, and he is scaring people that he doesn’t like.
There is no time to bask in sentimentality, however, as Sirius is soon giving Harry some lovely chocolate milk dosed with sleeping potion to help him fall asleep for the ritual. Sirius does not let go the entire time Harry is drinking and chatting to everyone, and holds Harry in his lap, occasionally pressing a kiss to his tiny head.
It hurts Voldemort’s twisty little heart to see Harry snuggle into Sirius’ arms and fall asleep, breaths coming in little huffs. “He is asleep, it is time,” Voldemort says quietly, running his hand through his son’s untameable hair.
Sirius is crying quietly, and this sets Granger off, but the girl is made of stern stuff, Voldemort discovers, as she follows Atticus to set up the ritual circle. Lupin is quiet, pensive, as is Snape, who is looking at Voldemort. “My lord, are you sure…?”
Voldemort sighs. “Don’t doubt me now, Severus. He is my child. I cannot be weak.”
“No,” Severus agrees quietly, “you cannot.”
They troupe into the back yard, where Hermione has put Harry down in a nest of blankets and pillows, along with the little satin spread that Narcissa gave him that Harry is adorably attached to. Voldemort enters the ritual circle, and nods to the people outside. “Activate the wards,” he says quietly to Granger.
As one, Hermione, Sirius, Severus, and Atticus all slit their palms and drop their blood to the floor to activate the runes. By the light of their magic, Voldemort leans over Harry, and brushes aside his hair. He sees the scar marring his child’s face, and for the first time, speaks. “I regret it.”
The scar thrums with magic, and engulf the Dark Lord, who fights back with his legilimency. He will not be overcome this day - not when his child’s life is on the line.
Then, in a flash of light, Voldemort is victorious, as his consciousness invades the horcrux, and the man drops to the floor beside his son, waging the next stage of the battle in a new, mental plane.
***
Harry’s mindscape, rather adorably, is Voldemort’s study in Malfoy Manor. The dark lord does not have to look far before he sees Harry, and what can only be the horcrux.
“Hi papa!” Harry beams, looking up. The horcrux, which Voldemort was not prepared to see, is an equally small Tom Riddle. “Papa, this is my friend, Tom, and I’m reading Martin Miggs to him.”
The horcrux looks knowingly at Voldemort, but does nothing to antagonize him or Harry. Instead, it says, “Harry was starting the story about when Martin flew in a plane.”
Voldemort nods, and looks over at his sweet son. “Harry, do you think that I can speak to Tom for a second? You may continue to read quietly.”
Harry, ever the happy plum, nods and smiles. “Tom, maybe papa is going to take you in too! We can be together forever!”
The horcrux smiles back, but doubtfully, even as he exits the room with Voldemort. As soon as the door shuts, the horcrux kicks Voldemort. “That was uncalled for,” Voldemort grunts, as he dodges the next kick.
“I’m- not- leaving- Harry-!” Tom hisses, still trying to kick the dark lord, and good grief, had he been this feisty as a child?
Eventually, Voldemort managed to hold the horcrux-child, and looked him in the eye. “You are an aberration,” he said flatly.
“I know you are, but what am I?”
Good lord. “Your presence is hurting him.”
“No! You’re hurting him, you hurt him before!” Tom shrieks, waves of power radiating from him, sending a draft of air up and around Voldemort’s robes. “I’m protecting him, I always have! He’s mine, he’s mine!”
Voldemort watches the child from his past scream, and in an unprecedented move, bends to be at eye level with him. “I know,” he says quietly. “You’re right.” The little horcrux stopped crying and instead quietened to little sobs. “I understand. But little one, you know that I am also right. If you come with me, we will still protect Harry. He is our boy, after all.”
“B- but I won’t see him again, as me,” Tom whimpers. “I’ll be… gone.”
“No, little one, we will be together,” Voldemort says. “The three of us.”
The horcrux continues to gulp wetly, but eventually starts to nod. “I- I want…”
“Go on,” Voldemort whispers. “Ask me.”
“I want to say goodbye.”
They enter the study once more, and watch Harry, fast asleep by the fire. He had bookmarked the page for Tom to pick up where he had left off. “He loves us so much,” Tom murmurs.
“Yes,” Voldemort agrees. “He does.” After a beat, he turns to his childhood self. “I am sorry, child. For everything.”
Tom nods, mature beyond his years, even as tears continue to fall from his eyes. “I know,” he replied. Then, “I forgive you.”
A flash, untold pain, and then… darkness.
***
“Papa?”
Voldemort opens his tired eyes to the welcome sight of his son smiling down at him. “Papa, you’re awake! Uncle Siri said that you hit your head when you were doing the ritual. He said the ritual worked, and I’m okay now, and we can be together and happy forever now!”
Harry lays down beside Voldemort and hugs him around the middle. This was the moment the others chose to interrupt by walking into the room, Avery leading the pack.
“Hello, my domestic goddess,” Voldemort grumps at his fiancé, who puts down a tray of tea and soup and looked hesitantly at him. Voldemort raises a questioning eyebrow at the dithering man, who slowly leans forward, creating an unspeakable soupy tension in the air, before placing the world’s most awkward kiss up in the dark lord’s face.
“I’m glad that you’re alright, m’lord,” Avery mumbles, as Harry giggles merrily at his intensely awkward parental figures.
“Ye gods, Avery,” Voldemort mumbles through a spoonful of soup. Ooh, tomato. “You act as though we haven’t showered together for seven years and shared soap.”
Avery smiles slightly tremulously, and is swatted out of the way by Sirius, making his way over to Harry. “Pup! Are you alright?”
Voldemort cedes Harry to Sirius and only then realizes that Atticus was sleeping next to him and being tended to by Hermione. “Good lord, Atticus, why are you in bed with me?”
“He lost too much blood,” Hermione explains. “He kind of just flopped over as the ritual was finishing, he held on until you were both out of the woods.”
“Thank you Atticus,” Voldemort nods to his friend, “I am touched.” Then, “Atticus, are you clothed?”
“No,” Atticus admits, and then rolls over so that he is mooning the dark lord.
Really, he completely deserves the scream-fest that follows.