Perfect Places

Like others by tenderness,

On your life and your youth,

I want to reign through fright

The Revenant – Beaudelaire

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Potter freezes when he sees him in the kitchen.

Voldemort says nothing, his eyes riveted on his book. He wants to say nothing, for it is up to Potter to break the silence, leave this torpor he had found himself engulfed into.

“What-” Potter begins in a brittle voice, then firmer, his heartbeat accelerating. “What the hell?”

Voldemort still stays silent, and turns a page from Magike Moste Evile. It is not its author’s best work, for it is full of contradictions that recent research had shed light on, but it is still a passable reading. One that fulfils its role, providing an adequate distraction while Potter goes through the five stages of grief.

“Voldemort?” Potter slowly says.

Voldemort rests the book on the table. He raises an unimpressed eyebrow at Potter, who stares at him unashamedly. “No,” he says. “You must have mistaken me for someone else.”

“Not funny!” Potter shrieks. He still is gasping but slowly manages to regain a semblance of composure, circling the table to take place a few seats away from Voldemort. “Care to explain yourself?” he asks, staring as if Voldemort would morph back into his known appearance should he concentrate deep enough.

It is extremely amusing, and perhaps frightening for the sake of humanity, Voldemort thinks, how easily disturbed their supposed saviour is. He does not fault the boy, however, for he knows that many older men could have fallen to such deceit.

Many might claim the contrary, but he knows the truth. If not the sole factor of the perception of one, there is a phenomenon that calms the spirits at the sight of something desirable. Whether it is the appearance of a person, or the physical representation of a need, their natural distrust tends to dissipate.

“Is it relevant?” Voldemort asks. He still is the picture of phlegm; one that he is certain to infuriate and confuse the boy. In a matter of seconds, Potter’s perception of him has taken a sharp turn; be it for the calmness that he displays, or the physical changes he now wears.

Potter stays silent for a second, still sparing him a few glances. “I guess not” he finally says, full of a cautiousness that is bound to fade.

Voldemort smiles then; sharp but still less than the display of fangs he had given before. The boy blinks, and it fills him with such self-satisfaction that it could almost overcome his lingering anger. “There is a spell I wish to try, today,” he says.

Potter, who had chosen to stare at his coffee to avoid his gaze, raises his eyes.“… Alright?”

“I desire for your intervention,” Voldemort continues, as if the boy had not spoken. It is not a demand, rather clothed in the mantle of information. “Far too long have been our entrapment in this place.”

“This, I agree” Potter mumbles. Then, raising a dubious eyebrow. “What makes you think that it will work this time?”

It won’t. The boy does not need to know this, though.

“Waiting for a miracle cannot be a suitable alternative,” he says, his tone still adorned by this softness his circle had learned to fear. “I intend to try everything within my power; and I assure you, it is a very wide definition.”

He tilts his head to the side then, and the familiar gesture makes Potter’s frantic heartbeats slow. He can still hear it. “But of course,” he quietly continues. “We can stop fighting, Harry, and resign ourselves to our fate. We can wait for the seconds to fly, the days to come and disappear, the longing for freedom to turn into bitter acceptance. Is it what you desire?”

“Of course not!” Harry Potter hotly says. “No need for your theatrics. I want to get out of there as much as you do,” Potter adds; because it is painfully obvious that the boy desires to keep control of the situation, even if its possession was only a chimaera.

Voldemort does not answer; for he will indulge the boy for now. He understands this Gryffindorian desire to feel in control of the discussion, even if Dumbledore would have falsely announced that a conversation was being held between two equals.

Propaganda; for the subtlety of the power set up did not take away from its presence.

Instead, he picks up the book and pretends that he does not see the scorching stare on his self. Let the boy look his content, for the more this vision will replace the one Potter had been acquainted with, the more he will be inclined to tie other definitions, more positive, to Voldemort.

~*~

“I really don’t understand the point of this” Potter protests; sitting inside a circle of candles. “You think I didn’t try this? That’s literally one of the first rituals the Aurors taught me! Do you really think that doing it yourself will change things?”

Voldemort wishes himself patience, and says nothing to the boy. Instead, he carefully paces around the circle in which Potter is entrapped, and murmurs incantations that are barely audible. It does not matter; for it is them being thought that is part of the ritual, not their enunciation.

It is merely a favour he is gifting Potter, to let him understand his role in the ordeal. The boy is not grateful, although, and it is not something that surprises him. Severus had talked in great length about Harry Potter, and Voldemort had been intrigued by the picture painted.

He had seen for himself the bravado the boy carried; his arrogance; but had foolishly thought that it came with the weakness taught by Dumbledore. Empathy, concern, love.

Severus had informed him that such lessons had not been assimilated by the boy. But Severus had also revealed himself a traitor, and Voldemort now considered his words with far more doubt. He had seen the boy sacrifice himself, after all; where another would have flown away. For all his flaws, he cannot be said to not weaken himself with careless love. Even the old fool had not been as enamoured with giving affection as the boy is.

“Can you at least tell me how long should I stay here?” Potter says, and Voldemort marks a pause.

He is far too delighted for his answer to be prompt; in the casual familiarity that had just come from Potter’s lips. It is a first step, he thinks, for Potter to disregard his primary instincts, his cautiousness towards what screams danger. Then, of course, the boy had never displayed fear for him; but this lack of fear had been replaced by anger, by a fury so deep it animated his every feature.

Now it isn’t anger that acts in place of fear, it is nonchalance. It is the same kind of easiness that made muggles adopt predators; seeing in their tranquillity the false assurance of friendship.

Voldemort wants to laugh, but he does not. “Not long”, he rather says. “Do not whine, it is unbecoming.”

Potter is forgetting, he delightfully thinks, he is forgetting to stay cautious. He so vividly wants to see humanity in others that he buries himself in a sand made of self-delusion, and it will prove itself rather nefarious.

“I did it, once” Potter continues, his arms crossed on his chest.  “There was this guy; he had trapped me and my auror partner in a sort of shack, and even blasting the door did not work. He was very powerful, had he not been a muggle-born I think you’d have enjoyed his abilities. So, uh, we tried this.”

Voldemort raises an eyebrow. He is not certain to know what prompted the boy to open his heart, and is even less sure to understand why should he choose to. “I do hope you were successful. This should hardly be a challenge for Aurors.”

Potter shrugs. “Well,” he says. “We could have; but then my partner got impatient and blasted the roof off.”

Voldemort’s eyes immediately raise. Salazar, he bitterly thinks, did it really require the intervention of the boy for him to think of such a solution?

He wastes no time sending a dozen of Confringo’s to the roof; to no visible avail.

“Well, at least you tried,” Harry Potter says.

It is only the constraint put on their wands that refrains the killing curse from hitting Harry Potter.

Voldemort grits his teeth, and remembers the time when the boy had been strangely detached. How foolish had he been, to not see the benefits of such a situation. It was truly when something was lost that its value appeared, he thinks, and wonders if silent charms would bypass the protection that shelters the boy.

He says the last words of his incantation, only for nothing to change. Where the candles were supposed to waver, they are flat; where the wind should blow; it is still peaceful and quiet; where the circle should load itself with power, nothing happens.

Voldemort marks a pause.

“Well, what then?” Potter asks. “Did you do it?”

Voldemort frowns. It is peculiar. It should not be this still; even with the magical constraint burdening them. The particularity of the ritual stands in the participation of different parties. The caster needs to be different than the entrapped one; for two souls needs to be channelled.

The only reason it would not work- Voldemort freezes mid-thought. He becomes so still that one would have mistaken him for a statue, no breath escaping his lips, unblinking.

Potter’s hesitant voice echoes in the corridor. “Uh- you’re alright?”

Voldemort stares at him. He cannot move, cannot think.

It feels as if his very soul had been devoured by a serpent made of ice; tightening his coils around him, so tight that he can not breathe- and of course, he thinks, frantically so; Potter’s incomprehension growing into distress; of course, he had been so blinded by what could be that he had not seen what was-

He feels as if he had been drenched in cold water. The signs had been there, he thinks, furiously thinks about what he knows, about how he had seen Potter’s mind, how the boy had seen his-

Voldemort stares, and the muscles of his jaw twitch.

“You are frightening me” Harry Potter begins- and Voldemort sharply cuts him off.

“You are my Horcrux” Voldemort breathes. The admission is painful; raw. “You bear my soul.”

The boy raises an eyebrow. “Yes” he slowly says; and the confession is like a stab in his core, in his soul. “You know that. I thought you knew that.”

Voldemort is still unblinking, and regrets his gaze not to be coated in crimson. “What.”

“I died,” Harry Potter says, and slowly raises to his feet. He is tall now. Not as tall as Voldemort had made himself. “I died, and I came back because it was the Horcrux who died. You saw me die. How did you think I came back? I am no son of god.”

Voldemort wants to scream, and destroy the boy in front of him. He wants to go back to the past and tear the wand from his own hands. He wants to Crucio someone for such a mistake, except that he is the only one at fault. The realization leaves him breathless, and he doesn’t know what to do with it.

His gaze finds Potter’s, and the look that is returned to him is full of incomprehension.

“You didn’t know” Potter realizes. “How could you not know? How- Did you not feel- I mean- you fell-” he is blabbering now, eyes wide open. “I saw you- did you not sense it? I thought you knew- it looked like you knew-”

He killed himself. He killed himself.

He.

He killed himself.

Harry Potter’s eyes are wide and green. There is no trace of bearing the soul of another; of surviving and seeking his own self demise. It wanted to oppose him. It sought his destruction. It wanted to kill him.

He can not escape it. He feels it at first, and finally, finally, there is this fright in Potter’s eyes. He feels the fury, the anguish seize his heart and laugh at him, strong of its victory- he feels the distress, the terror at the idea of his own death, and he had done it, he thinks, terribly, he had done it; he had betrayed himself, he amongst all of them, he who had sworn fidelity to, he who had sought and sought to cheat Death, he had done it-

Voldemort had killed himself.

He screams.

The corridor explodes.

It is brutal, none of the elegance he had perfected in his magic. It is raw; emotions at their purest;  anguish and dread that drowns him from the inside. The floor cracks and shatters; large cracks running through the walls. Immediately repaired by the wards; only to crack again the walls half a second later. A vicious circle that does not aim to stop.

Harry Potter stands tall in the turmoil. He is silent; fright and awe balanced in his eyes as he looks at the chaos around him.

Voldemort does not see him. He was blind, he furiously thinks, he is blind, and his magic obeys; always one to answer to him. It glazes over his vision; for he believes himself sightless to the realities of life.

“It does not matter now” Harry Potter’s voice is soft amongst the chaos. He has nothing to offer to Voldemort, no words that could appease the anguish. Voldemort does not want to hear him, and it is only his incapacity to mute him that allows the boy to continue. “It was never a real part of me, you know. Only dormant. It gave me some abilities, perhaps; but did not contribute to my self. I am my own person, and I make my own choices.”

It is of no interest, it is nothing, Voldemort thinks-

“I am not another you,” Harry Potter continues. His voice is still as quiet and yet begins to overcome the noise around them. “Your Horcrux did not inhabit my body. It slept in my mind; and it was not it who decided to stand against you, to make friends and protect them. It was me.”

His dread recedes- only a hinge, almost imperceptible, but there, nonetheless. If Harry Potter is no Tom Riddle, then Voldemort did not kill himself-

“It did not support you, nor joined you, because I have my own mind- because it is not a part of my soul but merely attached itself to it- it was doomed from the beginning. It died like it lived; without taking any part of my real self with it.”

Harry Potter makes a step forward.

“I am me,” he says, firmly repeats. “I am me, and it is me that you killed. It took my place perhaps, where I could have chosen to stay. But I was always the one in control. I am not you, Riddle, and it was never yourself that you faced, that you cursed.”

Harry Potter’s gaze is fiery; determined. He grits his teeth almost, his jaw twitching; and Voldemort realizes that he can see once more.

“You caused me a lot of pain,” Harry Potter says. “But you always saw me as who I was; as my own person and not a manifestation of another. Don’t mistake me for what I am not, and if not anything else, give me the honour of consideration.”

The wind slowly calms.

They could have been grand, Voldemort thinks, as Harry Potter’s eyes reflects his fiery determination. They could have been more.

~*~

Harry Potter is sitting with a book on an armchair near the fire.

There is no need for a fire, for they do not know which time of the year this is. There is no way to count time, now that they had been passed by it, and it could be as well January than mid-July. It has less to do with actual warmth than its simulacre; the comfort brought by the illusion of winter spirit.

Voldemort reads too, but his attention is diverted by the boy. He is ordinary; with laugh lines that animates each time the passage he sees pleases him. He scratches at his beard sometimes, as if suddenly remembering that he has one. His eyes are riveted on the lines, but crease when a smile stretch on his lips.

He shares nothing with the quiet impassibility that had once adorned Tom Riddle’s features. The cold calculation that had flashed in his gaze.

It infuriates him; the plainness the boy displays. The crudeness with which he reveals himself; shamelessly so, and offers his emotions to the world. It destabilizes Voldemort; for never had he been confronted to such a casual exhibit of one’s self.

Modesty intended not to unveil oneself to the public, rules of societal demands that he boy disdains. People presented to the eyes of others what they decided to offer; an embellished image of what they wanted to be. Speaking of qualities that they often failed to possess.

Potter cares not of such demands. It is unsettling; such a contrast to what he should have been; to what Voldemort had always respected. It is hard to see himself in the boy; faint traces of his soul.

“You are staring,” Potter suddenly says; raising his eyes from his book.

He is, and remarks so. Lord Voldemort will never be ashamed of speaking his mind; not when others should instead feel the sentiment.

“I meant, why,” Potter corrects; half-closing his eyes as he relishes in the warmth the fire provides.

Voldemort had been half tempted to turn it into a Fiendfyre; only to difficultly refrain himself. It would most certainly than not do no damage to the boy, and he is not in a mind to clean the room. He can still wonder about it, though, visualize the flames morph into something greater; something worthy.

“You have no visible similarities with me,” Voldemort slowly says. Potter’s eyes raise to his; and strangely enough, the boy immediately averts his gaze. “I find it… difficult to imagine you my soul.”

Potter rolls his eyes. “For the last time,” he says, speaking of an argument that is lasting days. “I am not your soul. I might have been, but it was not my whole self, and anyways I’m not anymore.”

Voldemort tilts his head to the side and gave him a piercing look. “You have shared my very self,” he corrects. “It does not matter if the semantics had changed. It does not invalidate the years you have spent as a sentient part of me.”

Potter groans.

“I am not,” he hotly says. Then, after a thought, a flash of suspicion passing in his eyes. “Does it- does it flatter you to think that only you is worthy to oppose you? Is it why you are so settled on the whole thing?”

Voldemort smiles, and says nothing.

“It does,” Potter gasps, then, incredulously. “It does! Merlin! It does!”

Potter laughs then, but it is not a joyful laugh. It is bitter and angry; in a way that finally makes Voldemort see the remains of Tom Riddle. He was right, he thinks, and is not surprised for he usually is. Potter might not admit it; nor see it; but it is there.

He can see it on Potter’s face. The cold anger that creeps on his features; the narrowed eyes; and the bitterness. He is there, he thinks, and the thought pleases him more than he would have thought.

“You know what you told me-” Potter says; in a low voice. “You know what you told me, in the chamber of secrets? I met Tom Riddle, see, but I am certain that dear Lucius told it all to you. I met Tom Riddle, and he was so full of curiosity and anger!”

Voldemort knows it; but not because of Lucius. He remembers his fury; white-hot and burning, upon realizing that a childish resentment had caused the loss of his diary. A raging resentment that had no place on the heart of a pureblood; even less so towards a traitor to his blood.

Bellatrix had impaired his judgment, and he falsely thought that Lucius could be deserving of the same honour he had gifted her. He had forgotten the resentful nature of men, quick to forsake higher considerations to satisfy their pettiness of the moment.

He would have killed him then; if the Lestrange had not begged for their survival.

“I was a child; naïve, and I did not understand his misplaced curiosity. He wanted to know, you see, how could an infant defeat what he called the greatest wizard of all time. He wanted to know, fiercely so, how I could have destroyed you. Him, I guess.”

Voldemort bristles in fury.  “You did not destroy me,” he says, his voice dangerously soft.

Potter fans his hand; he still laughs, and it is bitter incredulity that now colours his laugh.

“How proud he would be,” Potter whispers. “To know himself the main source of his torments. His main opponent. How delighted; for it seems that a man’s greatest foe is only himself.”

“It is me,” Voldemort sneers. “There is no him, and you know nothing of pride.”

Potter smiles; brightly. It is falsely beaming for it still is tainted by acidity. “You admit it, then? You are a contradiction; claiming to have killed Tom Riddle, yet wearing his handsome face, yet vindicating his actions, his words. You cannot eternally do both.”

Voldemort hisses at him, parseltongue’s venom. It infuriates him; the piercing gaze of the boy; the ease in which he places his words; claiming to know his every thought. He wants to claw the boy’s sharp tongue out of his mouth; slice it to see him choke on blood-

He manages, barely so, for his fingers to sink into his armchair and not Potter’s flesh.

“What else did you speak of” he slowly says. He wants to redirect the conversation until his anger fades; until he can wear his old mask of charm and brilliance.

“Mostly you,” Potter says after a second, accepting the olive branch. “Not very surprisingly. I don’t remember it very well; I was quite busy trying to survive.”

“You always had a facility for such a competence,” Voldemort is quick to acknowledge. He forces his feature to return to a quiet neutrality, and Potter’s eyes trail a second too many on his face.

“One learned through too many experiences, I fear,” Potter says. He frowns then, and bends forward. “It’s easier to remember when you, well, when you look like this.”

Voldemort could dismiss the words. Instead, he smiles.

“Like this?”

“Don’t play coy” Potter almost begs. “It is very unsettling. I am no Hepzibah Smith.”

“You hardly resemble the old woman.”

“Thank you, I certainly hope so.” Potter pinches his lips, and shakes his head. “I regret mentioning her. She seemed…”

“She was,” Voldemort says. Here is his opportunity, and he carefully crosses his legs. “Burke certainly knew what he was doing in sending a young man to her house. She had desires that money usually fulfil. Unfortunately for her, I had mastered Memory Charms in my first year at Hogwarts.”

Harry Potter gasps. “First year?” Then, realizing the innuendo, widens his eyes in barely hidden horror. “She- what?”

“Respectable witches and wizards do not come to Borgin and Burke, Harry.”

“Yes but- I mean- and what about Aurors?”

He laughs. “Certainly, I believe Burke would have been only too pleased to have his most faithful customer leave. His shop to be investigated; for of course everything respected the biased rules settled by the Ministry about Dark Arts.”

“They are not biased,” Potter immediately defends.

“Are they not? Never?”

Potter must think of something for his cheeks blush, and he averts his gaze. It is candid for the boy to believe so. Knowledge is power, and controlling one is controlling the other. It is not the content the Ministry fears but what some might do with it.

It is also the freedom of speech that comes from this knowledge, as the information feeds the opinion. Examples were notable throughout history; one, in particular, involving the Captain Dreyfus and Zola in France. For it was the debates of the press that had influenced the democratic life of the country, and it was these opinions that had played in favour of the falsely convicted captain.

“Not in the meaning you think of” Potter continues; having overcome his moment of reflection. He narrows in his eyes; in the same way Tom Riddle used to display suspicion, and Voldemort relishes in those comparisons.

How frustrated must the old fool had been, he thinks with a delight born of years of hatred, to glance at his saviour and finds a mirrored image of his foe. How frightened must have he been; when Harry Potter had first stepped upon Hogwarts, black-haired and driven by an inner fire strong enough to survive.

Voldemort stares at Harry Potter; and realizes his hatred for the boy to now be tainted by petty satisfaction. Curiosity too; for if it pleases him to gift lies to others; only honesty is permitted to himself. He is not a man to lose himself in disillusion created by self-indulgence, and would not accept anything other than the truth to be said to him.

“Explain yourself,” he says.

Potter raises an eyebrow. “Should I? Both of us perfectly knows what I am talking about.”

“No. Indulge me.”

Potter sighs; as if dozen of torments suddenly assault him, and it is amusing that conversation would tire him more than screaming matches.

The boy agitates his wand for the fire to grow stronger, and rubs the back of his hand over his forehead.

“You appointed the Carrow in Hogwarts,” the boy tiredly says. “They performed Unforgivable on students.”

He sounds angry now, and it fascinates Voldemort to see the boy so lost in his weaknesses; so concerned. He should not have, not with Tom Riddle in the back of his mind. He had disregarded it very soon in life, perhaps never having predispositions for such a flaw.

“I did not appoint them,” Voldemort softly says. “I was rather occupied with other considerations.”

“Snape, then?” the boy asks. “You know very well he must have done so only because you would have refused other candidates. The Carrow or another Death Eater, the result would have been the same.”

Voldemort laughs. “Your perception of Severus seems to have been revised.” He can not say the name with anger bubbling in his chest. In all the things that he despised, that he loathed, betrayal wore the first place. “I am aware that death erases many defects of the living, but even you should not be affected by such blindness to his values.”

The boy narrows his eyes.

“What do you mean?”

“Severus might have betrayed me,” the word is bitter on his tongue, but he spits it out all the same. “-for your mudblood of a mother, but I assure you that would her blood have been anything other than soiled, he would have joyfully partaken in our mindset. I do not force anyone to join me, Harry, I ask, and they decide. Severus choose to join us because he had known the truth about our world, and wished to be an actor of change.”

“You ask! You ask!” Harry Potter’s laugh is incredulous and bitter. “Yes,” he sneers. “I have seen how you ask. This is not a proposition; this is an order with a question mark! Join me, or die, yes? You above all others should understand how one of those outcomes is not very appealing!”

Voldemort raises to his feet, and his eyes pierce through Harry Potter. In two steps he is near the boy, grabbing his hair between his fingers. The boy yelps; but his grip is harder.

“You want to know, Harry, you want to know the truth about your new heroic figure?” he hisses; and it is only the glamour that let not venom pours from invisible fangs. His fist pulls Potter’s hair, and the boy tries to escape from the grip; to no avail. “You want to know how he came to me? How he begged for your father to die, for his friends to be slaughtered, how he cried his thanks when I promised him his desires to see the light of day; how he kneeled and kissed my robes?”

“It does not matter!” the boy shouts. He wiggles enough to push his feet on Voldemort’s chest, and he pulls harder on the hair in retaliation. “He made terrible mistakes! He is not a saint but at least tried to redeem himself!”

Voldemort’s face is so close to the boy that he can feel his breath on his skin. “Redeem” he laughs, laughs, and laughs. “Redeem! Tell me, who killed your precious headmaster, who kept me updated on your situation? Who participated in my raids?”

“People change!” Potter shrieks. “You never understood that! They don’t stay the same at eighteen and thirty!”

No, they don’t.

Harry Potter finally manages to push him, and Voldemort stumbles back. The boy is breathless, his cheeks red and his hair tousled; but the fiery gaze settled on Voldemort is filled by nothing but resolve.

“It is not only what you do in your life that counts!” Potter hotly says; a little breathlessly so; his eyes riveted on Voldemort. “It is how you actively try to change, and recognize your mistakes! Snape was a bastard, and he did terrible things, but he also tried to do good things in the end! He risked his life for our victory, he submitted himself to the Cruciatus and you tearing through his mind! He helped me, and we won because of what he did!”

“Is it so?” Voldemort asks; his voice dropping to arctic temperatures. “Is it your vision of redemption, Harry? Nothing you do matters-” and he still is laughing; an unamused laugh. “- for you only need to feel a hinge of remorse and everything is forgiven?”

Harry Potter falls silent. He shakes his head, then.

“That is not what I said,” he murmurs. “But, then what. Would you rather want me living in hatred of the man for the rest of my life? I made peace with who he was, his shortcoming and qualities. I don’t want to feel loathing for others, as cruel as they might have been towards me.”

“Hypocrisy” Voldemort spits. “When the very one you hate stands in front of you.”

Potter laughs. It is by no mean a happy laugh. “I don’t hate you,” he says. “If anything, I pity you.”

“You dare-”

“Yes, I do. I always have, and I will always,” Harry Potter says. “Be peaceful still, I don’t pity you in a way that could hurt your precious vanity. I pity you, I said it and will repeat it, because you don’t see past the hatred and contempt. I pity you because it is terrible in my opinion to judge weaknesses what is the core of living, and that without them, no matter how much you cheat Death, you will never do something else than surviving.”

“I don’t?” Voldemort sneers. The words do not infuriate, nor surprise him, for many times had he heard them from Dumbledore’s mouth. “How vain and arrogant of you, to claim knowing me better than I do.”

Potter pinches his lips. “I judge what I see.”

“Such a restricted point of view, thus.”

They stay silent then; a fraction of seconds that goes by, Voldemort standing up, Harry Potter half out of his armchair.

“We cannot, can we,” Potter then says. It is quiet, so very so that another would not have heard him.

Voldemort’s nostril flares. “I do not yet speak in riddles.”

“Being cordial to one another, I mean,” Potter continues, as if Voldemort had stayed quiet. “We will always find so many points of disagreement that it will end up in screaming at each other. I tried, very hard, to not think about what you did. We are trapped here, I thought, we need to stay cordial, or it will be even worse than it already is.”

Voldemort’s lips thin. He does not answer.

“And then, you came with this appearance. I thought- you know, it’s stupid. I thought that you were silently agreeing to some sort of truce. Saying- like- I don’t know! Saying you were amenable to show some humanity; that you were not just- it’s so- it thought it was progress!”

Potter passes a hand through his hair. He resembles Bellatrix, Voldemort surprises himself to think, not in the physical sense but in the mad exhaustion that he displays. It benefits the boy, for it adds a fascinating magnetism to his plain features.

“But we can’t-” Potter continues. “We’ll always be trapped in this circle, and we’ll always end up trying to kill each other. But here we can’t!”

Voldemort makes a step forward.

He senses it; a golden opportunity that he cannot let slip between his fingers. The boy is at the edge of resignation and hope, and would only need a push to oscillate in the right direction. He can make a choice, now.

And his choices had always guided him towards his objectives.

“We are the only masters of our fortune,” he says. “We can hold for each other the respect that bounds adversaries.”

He marks a pause, long enough for him to hold a hand. It is an honour that he gives Potter, for he usually loathes the plebeian contact of skin against skin. Voldemort would have preferred a magical vow, but he knows Potter to favour his muggle traditions, and the pale long fingers have the worth of a silent proposition.

Harry Potter raises out of the armchair, and stops in front of him.

He glances at the hand Voldemort offers, then pinches his lips, as if debating with himself.

“Cordiality?” Potter asks, childishly so.

Voldemort’s smile shares no similitude with the shark-like ones he used to wear. “To the extent, we are capable of,” he says, and Potter chuckles.

The boy inhales then, and very quickly, shakes the hand offered.

Potter’s skin is warm, a contrast to the coldness of his; and he finds himself surprised to not despise it as much as he would have thought. It is no pleasure, most obviously, but he doesn’t recoil at the contact.

“It’s too late now,” Potter says; as they separate. “You can’t back up from our deal.”

It is not bounding. No magic is involved, no terrible outcome if Voldemort breaks it. No outcome at all, except for the boy’s disappointment. Even less bounding than words, for the demand had been silent. Voldemort could break it in a heartbeat.

And yet, as he recedes, he finds himself reluctant to do so.

~*~

The atmosphere shifts. Imperceptibly so, perhaps, but subtlety had never been synonym of nothingness.

The boy is no fool. He does not trust him, not pretends to have forgotten. Instead, he tries for what he thinks to represent politeness and kindness. He informs Voldemort of the advancement of his research, a vain thing in everything but the principle of being disclosed, and does not wait before telling him of his new discoveries.

Voldemort does not care for the house itself, the secrets it might have. He believes it to shift, and that Potter does not necessarily discover hidden places as much as he creates them. It is his will to discover new things that made them appear, not that they were there in the first place.

He compares it with the Room of Requirement, and find his hypothesis proven one day, when he wishes for a potion room, and discovers the next day such a room on the third floor. Upon his arrival, every nook and cranny had been examined to ensure their solitude, and he is certain of his memory.

There was no potion room, and now there is one.

Then, of course, potions are useless when used to destroy wards. No, the more seconds pass, and days follows, the more he is convinced that the answer lies in Potter and him. A collaboration, more precisely, one born out of trust and honesty from the boy.

Those are not disillusions, nor theories thrown in the air for the sole pleasure of enunciating ones. No, Voldemort prides himself on his knowledge, and curiosity, and the origin of his belief comes from a Ghanaian pureblood witch.

He had spent a few weeks in their village, for all the countries he had ever travelled to never had he before seen such raw warding power. Akin to the Patronus; their magic came from the heart rather than the mind. The community had coated their wards in a delightful combination of both dark and light emotions, a part of the village insufflating trust and desire to protect, whereas the other offered aggressiveness, and promises of wrath.

There lays his desire for Harry’s trust. If, as he believes, it is this magic that had served to create the wards, then the same magic would destroy them. Then, he would depart for Ghana, and slaughter the village responsible for such a betrayal.

Voldemort remembers the serene features of the witch. She had warned him, for his heart’s desires to not surpass his mind’s. Be careful, she had said, for the senseless desire to eternalize one’s name imposed an iron yoke on the mortal whom he intoxicated.

He had given her a cold laugh, and she had smiled. Such a risk would prove difficult, he had answered, for eternality, he had already conquered. He was not one to lose himself in mirages as their appeal lay in their realization, not the fantasy of them. 

Many told themselves content with the idea of wishing, not the concretisations of such wishes. Voldemort is not one of them; not one who could counter a frustration by declaring himself satisfied with the illusion of the realized desire. Dreams are not enough; dreams are not worthy.

Only actions are.

It is the way of the world, Voldemort thinks, to possess both of those types. Those acting on their desire and others losing themselves in their daydreams.

~*~

Harry Potter comes running into the third living room, six days after the event. He holds a broom in one hand and a pair of gloves in the other.

“This is glorious,” the boy breathes; utter delight illuminating his face. How strange, Voldemort thinks, and finds himself staring. If the Black’s madness had brought magnetism to the surface, joy transfigures the boy’s features.

It brightens it, and Voldemort realizes that the emotion is foreign on the boy’s face. Of course, he thinks, after all he had given very little reason for Potter to smile in his presence.

Potter continues, unaware of the thoughts that agitate him. “There was this door, I just wanted to look, I was curious and just the last time I was thinking that I would have died for a Quidditch match, and so I woke up this morning and I wanted to go brush my teeth to the bathroom, the one just next to my room when I saw it, so I open it of course because we can’t really die here can’t we, and there’s this massive Quidditch pitch! Inside the house! That’s insane!”

Voldemort thinks it is very telling that the boy would choose to say die for rather than kill. Then, he blinks, and tries to understand Potter’s logorrhea.

“There’s a Quidditch pitch inside a room!” Potter repeats, and nervously laughs. He can not refrain from smiling, his legs twitching as he would want for nothing else but run to said pitch.

Voldemort tries to remember a time when Tom Riddle had been so enthusiastic about something, and can not find it. It is very peculiar, that for living so long with the Horcrux, its influence is so minimal on Potter’s mind.

“You don’t play, obviously,” Potter says, fanning the hand holding the gloves, “but I thought that you at least appreciate the fresh air. Or as fresh as it could be; I don’t really understand how it all works.”

The boy is… not wrong, per se.

He usually does not concern himself with such considerations; even tends to dislike nature after having passed so many years as a wraith. Drifting in the wind, incorporeal, each second bringing its fair share of anguish and pain, tends to cause such aversion.

However, it might have been months since their arrival. Months spent entrapped by those walls, and freedom is as much a part of the primary instinct as defence. It is inherent to every human, this heinous rejection of imprisonment, for the species is a creature born nomadic.

“Very well,” he says, and raises from the desk where he was writing. A flick of the wrist seals the parchment, no one other than him able to open it. “Show me the room.”

Potter refrains a gasp, his proposition having been more theoretical than concrete. “Uh- yes, sure. Right now?”

“No, Potter” he slowly says, two irritated black eyes finding the boy’s gaze. “I am rising because I favour being closer to the roof.”

Potter awkwardly laughs and scratches his beard. “Of course, yeah,” he says. “Uh, then, come on I suppose.”

And without further ado, the boys trots towards the corridors.

~*~

It really is impressive magic, Voldemort thinks. He would be half a mind to let their jailer leave unharmed for such a display of power. He will not, of course, for no one imprisons Lord Voldemort and sees himself alive to speak of it.

The illusion is perfect. Even his senses betray him, believing the soft wind to be natural, the grass of the pitch to have grown under sunlight. He knows it can not be, nonetheless.

His feet are bare on the grass, he prefers so, for he craves the shameful contact with the earth. Too long had he been floating, unable to establish a contact between him and the physical universe; that the thought of a barrier is unbearable for him.

The boy had wasted no time jumping on his broom. He had contemplated joining him; not in this outrageous tool, as he is perfectly able of flying without such things, but had refrained from doing so.

Voldemort does not want to be perceived as if frolicking, and rather relishes in basking in the sun.

The idea reaches him then, a passing thought about Nagini, and he is quick to retrieve his wand. One murmured incantation later and he is not alone on the grass, a saw-scaled viper appearing near his left foot.

He bends to retrieve the beast; and no words are needed for it to slither from the grass to his hand, then wrapping itself around his forearm.

“You woke me,” it says. “Why.”

Voldemort appreciates this in snakes. For all the connotations that they are associated with, they do not embarrass themselves with hollow coatings. No honey-coated sentences to disguise truth; no deceit but raw honesty.

It is instead of human nature to deceive and embellish.

“I desired your company.” He does not lie. He has no need to. “You will appreciate the weather.”

It flickers its tongue, then, seeming satisfied by the state of things, and rest his head on the back of Voldemort’s. Above them, Harry Potter is so high in the sky that he is no larger than a bird.

“I was in a forest,” the snake says. “It was dark.”

“It usually is the case when resting under the trees,” Voldemort says, patiently so, because the animal had been woken from his sleep and still bears the traces of a deep slumber.

“You asked for me. Why.”

“The boy,” Voldemort says. “When he comes, you will sense him and tell me if he resembles me.”

The snake flickers his tongue, and nods. Voldemort would not have expected any other answer, for even if snakes are bound to answer parseltongue, it is something in him that makes them so prompt to carry out his desires.

If Harry Potter and he would find themselves trying to subjugate a snake, it is not the former that would brandish the medal of victory.

They stay silent, then; Voldemort slowly reaching for the other end of the field as the snake curls on his wrist, falling back into torpor. Its scales are cold on his skin, but it does not refrain him from periodically stroking its head.

He tries not to think of Nagini, for it is sure to fill him with a fury strong enough to shatter the entire Quidditch pitch. Not only had the snake been a constant companion since Albania, but it had proven itself loyal beyond expectations, much more than humans could ever be. It was his venom that had helped him regain a physical form, its fangs that had slaughtered his enemies, its transfiguration abilities that had lured Potter and his friend in Godric’s Hollow.

It had been loyal enough for Voldemort to trust it with a piece of his soul, and for this, it had died.

Voldemort swears to himself that he will hunt the one responsible for its death, for his death, and make him beg for the release of death. He raises his eyes to the sky, where the boy is chasing a golden ball and thinks that Potter must know of the culprit.

It is not long before the boy tires of his loneliness, and descends towards them. He lands a few steps away from them, his face still animated by a childish joy.

The boy shakes his head, and jumps from the broom, striding towards them with a smile so stretched it might tear his skin.

“I missed this!” Potter exclaims, full of a glee that leaks from every pore of his skin. “I missed this so much, if we get out of here, I won’t ever complain about waking up at five for practice; this is the best feeling ever.”

Voldemort very much doubts it, but keeps his wisdom to himself.

Then Potter sees the snake, and fails to hide his small recoil. It is fast, but not enough for Voldemort not to see it. He says nothing, but finds himself intrigued. Of all, parseltongue speakers should not fear snakes, not when they prove themselves so full of devotion.

He wonders if the fright is born out of years of conditioning by the old fool or if it is a fear that comes from collective hatred. It is not innate, this he is certain, for no parseltongue, created or born, can hold such distaste without any external influence.

Voldemort is most certain that the boy had not carried such a distaste younger. No, he thinks, it is all the consequence of Dumbledore’s stigmatization towards what he judges outside of the limits of his leniency.

“This is the boy,” he says after a few seconds of latency. “Smell him for me.”

The snake obeys, and whisper a few words of greetings to Potter, darting towards him. Potter’s eyes widen, and he takes a step backwards.

“What is he saying?” Potter blurts out. “What did you ask?”

Voldemort stops; and raises two unblinking black eyes. “What did you say?”

Potter is nervous, and his fidgeting only highlights it. “I don’t understand what you are saying. What did you ask of him?”

“This is not possible,” Voldemort slowly says. The snake still tries to reach for the boy, and he lets it slither from his body to the grass. “Parseltongue does not fade. It cannot disappear. The ability is inherent to your self.”

“To your self,” Potter quietly corrects. He raises a subconscious hand to his scar, brushes a finger against it. “You are a parseltongue. I am not. It died with the Horcrux.”

“He smells strange,” the snake says. “Nothing like you.”

“It… died,” Voldemort numbly repeats.

Potter scratches at his chin, and winces. He then reaches a hand for the snake, reluctantly so, and awkwardly pats its head. It does not come from a desire to touch the serpent, but more to occupy his hands and cut through the tensed atmosphere.

“I tried,” Potter offers. “A few months perhaps after the battle. I was, uh- I was looking for an owl, and there was this snake with three heads-”

Voldemort thins his lips. “A Runespoor.”

“Yes, that. So it was clearly angry, and it was hissing- so yes, at first, I thought that he was not saying anything, just like hissing sounds to globally say back off; but then I tried to speak to it and well- it was all very embarrassing. For me, the owner of the shop, and that snake.”

How strange, Voldemort thinks, and he is not quite certain if he is disappointed, angry, or destabilized. It is the first time he has heard of such a thing; the ability disappearing. Then again, no other than him had had the strength of will to create seven Horcruxes; and Harry Potter is, with absolute certainty, the first human being to wear the soul of another.

Soon to be eight Horcruxes, Voldemort adds in an after-thought, for if he is right; and he quite often is; his safeguards were all destroyed.

The thought fills him with anguish; one that he takes care of hiding. It benefits him too, that they cannot harm each other. It will be the first thing to be done, Voldemort assures himself. As soon as their entrapment is lifted, he will find a muggle and once again assure his immortality.

The thought does not make his soul cry and distort. It is very peculiar, and he frowns.

After the fourth one, his soul had been so mutilated that the thought of another had rendered it painful, a lingering cry of despair that he had become well accustomed to ignoring.

It is not there, Voldemort realizes.

Potter is speaking; agitating his hands, but he does not listen. Instead, he closes his eyes, and breathes.

There is a peacefulness in his soul that only the absence of mutilation can bring. His breathing freezes, for a second. It seems - it is not complete, not exactly, but it resembles pieces stitched together that could separate at the slightest gust of wind.

“-strange that just snakes can apparate, is it not?” Potter’s voice echoes.

Voldemort pushes his recent thoughts at the back of his mind, and blinks.

“Excuse me,” he says; with a forced politeness born of stupefaction.

It seems destabilizing him makes him return to what he knows best; the mask of courtesy that he had worn for so many years.

“Yes!” Potter insists. He is stroking his thumb against the snake’s head, even without the ability of understanding it. “Why this favouritism? Why couldn’t we make, I don’t know, other creatures appear? Why only snakes?”

Voldemort tilts his head to the side and wonders about the connections the boy makes in his mind. “Is your distress about serpentortia?”

“Yes!” Potter says again, and waves his left hand, receiving an angry hiss at ceasing his strokes. “It is favouritism, and I will stay by my words.”

“By all means,” Voldemort says, with a hinge of confusion that he takes care of masking. “You are welcome to summon what pleases you.”

Harry Potter freezes. Then, slowly, raises two incredulous eyes towards him.

Voldemort takes advantage of his momentary stupor to send the snake back to the forest from which it came. It vanishes with a cloud of smoke, but Potter does not even notice it. Instead, the boy is quick to retrieve his wand; so much so that Voldemort mirrors the move in half a second.

“You are saying,” Harry Potter slowly says, a smile threatening to stretch his lips. “-that I can conjure every animal I want to?”

“I am saying,” Voldemort corrects. “-that the limits of magic are usually tied to imagination. It is the creativity that develops the magic.”

“Have you ever tried? I mean to conjure something else?”

Voldemort does not sneer at the boy’s ignorance, but it comes very close to. “Certainly. Nagini required frequent mice.”

“Wicked,” Harry Potter breathes.

Then, the boy eyes his wand as if wishing to put his recent knowledge at work. His fingers fidget on it, for impatience is a characteristic found in many humans. Voldemort too finds himself subject to such a feature; but whereas younger he had been forced to bend under his yolk, he finds it quite unnecessary to continue to do so.

He is enough powerful to demand quickness of action and thought.

Voldemort eyes the boy’s restriction and judges it futile. “Try, then,” he says, cold enough to not be mistaken for a suggestion.

Potter pinches his lips and his forehead creases. Then, the boy points his wand in front of him, and so softly that it is barely audible, whispers an incantation.

Voldemort has half a second to raises an eyebrow, intrigued, and confused that the boy would choose such an animal, before it appears in front of them.

An elephant.

An adult-sized, three meters high and seven tons of body mass, frantic elephant.

“Why-” Voldemort slowly says, then stops, finding himself speechless. Instead, he wastes no time erecting a shield between them and the beast, should it suddenly decide to charge at them.

Harry Potter laughs, and Voldemort doesn’t need to read his mind to know it is only his presence that refrains the boy from clasping his hands.

“It worked!” the boy says, delightedly, staring at the animal. “It worked! I can’t believe it worked!”

Voldemort too stares, but for other reasons.

“This is a Sumatran Elephant,” he says after a second.

Potter is not listening. He advances as much as the shield allows him, and keeps his eyes riveted on the beast he has summoned.

“Potter,” he extremely slowly says. “You summoned a Sumatran Elephant.”

The boy, in his candid ignorance, takes a few seconds to turn and shift his attention. “Maybe,” he says, frowning. “I don’t really know the different species. What about it?”

What about it.

Not for the first time, Voldemort wonders about the education given in the magical world. Not only are the words crude, plebeian and devoid of any form of politeness but also reveal a crass ignorance that should not be present.

“The species is almost to the point of extinction.”

The boy, who had returned to making cooing noises at the beast munching on grass, freezes. Very slowly he turns. “Really?” he asks.

“Yes,” Voldemort says. He will not reduce himself to noises of acknowledgement. “Tell me, Harry, how did you manage to summon, amongst all the possibilities, one of the rarest elephants in the world?”

The boy shrugs, and it makes him grit his teeth. “Words, boy.”

“Boy?” Potter incredulously asks. Behind him, the beast is slowly drifting towards the middle of the pitch. “I am six years older than adulthood!” Then, darting his eyes towards his summon. “I really don’t know. We’re magical, can’t we do- I don’t know- something to save them?”

Perhaps. Alas, it would be to no avail if the muggles does not stop hunting them.

“Have you played enough?” Voldemort sharply asks instead. “Sent him back.”

The boy sighs, something akin to disappointment, and murmurs something to the beast. Then, he takes a step backwards and waves his wand, enough so for it to disappear; leaving the pitch short of a grass rectangle.

Harry Potter lets a few seconds pass before turning to face Voldemort. “This,” he slowly says, a bright grin creeping on his features. He eyes Voldemort with pure delight, and shakes his head. “was the most awesome thing ever.”

Godric Gryffindor, Voldemort thinks, would be most pleased by the imbecility of his students.

~*~

Harry Potter loses his mind precisely six days after testing the limit of magic.

Six days since the discovery of the Quidditch Pitch; the summoning of one of the rarest species in the muggle world.

The boy is sitting in front of him in the Lestrange’s library. He has his eyes riveted on a history book, one about the specialization on the pure-blood families of the magical world and their associated characteristics. He is contemplatively staring at the Metamorphmagus page, and every seven or eight seconds, when he thinks Voldemort not to be looking, he glances at him.

“Speak your mind,” Voldemort finally says, vaguely annoyed.

The boy blushes, ashamed of having been caught, and pinches his lips.

“What makes abilities sometimes dormant but sometimes coming back to the light of day? Like- If I get this right, there hasn’t been a Metamorphmagus in the Black Family since Arcturus III. What would it skip so many generations?”

Voldemort raises an eyebrow. “There are many theories,” he says, and closes the book he was scanning through. An uninteresting one, for the Lestrange’s library had not included only brilliant works. “ One of the first, which I am sure will speak to you, is attributed to the mudblood Evelyn Rabbot, and is closely linked to the notion of interchromosomal shuffling. This one puts forward the hypothesis of plus and plus equals minus, with the purely theoretical idea that the confrontation of these two genes carrying four active alleles conflicts and invalidates them.”

Potter blinks, slowly, and Voldemort continues with a sneer. “This is a great extrapolation on her part, for there is no justification for this hypothesis of invalidation due to the similarity of the genes. However, she explains her reasoning by thinking that this occurs because the two alleles do not recognize each other as different, and think themselves cloned. Therefore, they conclude that there is an anomaly and this disables the gene. This is not how genetics usually function, but it is approved by many half-blood and mudbloods.”

The mudblood had been courageous to advance such a hypothesis, even if obviously biased for this was pure speculation. Voldemort remembers the turmoil in the Ministry, the cries and shouts of pureblood who judged it slander.

Potter nods then, and raises his eyes to meet Voldemort’s. He does not protest against Voldemort's choice of words, and this, above all, is surprising. There is something unidentifiable in the boy’s gaze, something that is bound to make him intrigued.

“So, in general terms, her meaning is that inbreeding causes the gene to disappear?” Harry Potter asks. He seems fascinated by the explanation, leaning forward in the way excitation tended to cause.

Voldemort dislikes the term. It reminds him of unpleasant memories, and he difficulty refrains from snapping at the boy. “Yes,” he says, nonetheless. “It is not cantoned to incest, but widens to others Metamorphmagi. This can be invalidated by Alcyone Black, which, while possessing such gift, had two Metamorphmagi as parents.”

Harry Potter nods again. “And the others?”

“They are as numerous as the grains of sand in the desert,” Voldemort coldly says. “However, there is one in particular that have gathered my attention.”

The boy chuckles. “No? What does it say; muggles are slowly stealing it from wizards?”

Voldemort shuts him off with an unamused glare. “Silence,” he says. “You speak of topics you know nothing about.”

“Well, I should know, I was an auror,” Potter says, strangely not angered by Voldemort’s words. He marks a pause. “Am, I guess. If they still want me after disappearing for so long. I can imagine the press from here.”

Voldemort says nothing, instead he darts his black gaze on the boy, who seems wistful. Then, for a reason he cannot explain, Voldemort says. “They would hardly focus on you, for I intend to mark my immortality in their mind.”

Harry Potter laughs, and fans his hand. “Well, isn’t that thought just pleasing. But continue, please; what is that theory you like so much then?”

How strange, Voldemort thinks, for the boy to not dread the words he has spoken. To laugh and disregard it. For the first time since the stone, Voldemort sincerely considers the thought of recruiting the boy.

Men's desires are not difficult to satisfy, as the vast majority of them carry them on their lips. An attentive ear enables one to identify them, and Voldemort had found that they so rarely differentiate from one another.

Who lives on hope has burning desires, Voldemort thinks, and hope has never deserted the boy.

Potter is still expecting his answer, and Voldemort thins his lips. “Antares Nott, blamed the loss of magical abilities of our wizards and the overall decline in the level of education and magical strength of wizards on pre-natal conditions.” He lets the boy gasp and begin to protest before continuing. “I disagree.”

The boy opens his mouth. Closes it. “What?”

“I disagree,” Voldemort flatly repeats. “I am of the mind that the genetic cannot be tampered with; and believes mutations to be out of the human control. Prenatal mutations, of course, for the body is a reflection of the soul, and I have proven that such can be transfigured to one’s will.”

Harry Potter shakes his head, his incomprehension increasing. “Wait- what? But you said it caught your attention-”

“I did,” Voldemort concedes. “I never said that it caught it because of its righteousness. Antares and I had quite a vivid debate on the subject. Nature is a fickle creator,  and it is useless to wonder about the abilities gifted to you upon birth. It is knowledge and power who gift you others.”

There is a silence; which makes the seconds seems longer, but Voldemort is quite satisfied by the turmoil of emotions fighting on the boy’s features.

Then, Potter shakes his head, speechless, and the laugh that comes from Voldemort surprises both of them.

 Voldemort laughs, and it is filled with mirth and genuineness. Amusement at seeing the boy’s incomprehension, then soft resignation at what a conversation with a Slytherin entails; and this laugh is nothing like the cruel condescendence it is usually tainted with.

It is sincere.

And then, then, the boy loses his mind.

As quickly as the snake pounces on his prey, rapid enough to not let him any time to react, to surprise him when his reflexes are above those of humanity, Harry Potter bend forward and kisses him.

~*~

Unbeknownst to them, a few meters away, the walls tremble as a long fissure suddenly appears on the front door.

Ps : why an elephant you ask? Well this is a question for limeta