How the Dark Lord Played the Wizarding World

Hermione Granger was gone. The students who had supported Harry throughout the school had launched a campaign against the muggleborn, making snide comments and carefully bullying her until she couldn’t take it anymore. She’d gone to Dumbledore several times, whinging about the treatment she was receiving, but all she got was a pat on the head and a metaphorical ‘there, there’ before she was sent on her way. The professors, most of whom were on Harry’s side, and ergo on the Dark Lord’s side, turned a blind eye to the school’s efforts to drive Granger away from the beleaguered brunet. Her complaints went unanswered, and it was with a sinking heart and shattered self-esteem that she finally withdrew from Hogwarts, returning to her parents and working to receive her A levels.

Dumbledore wasn’t sorry to see her go; the level of smug superiority she exhibited really ground his gears, but he needed her to keep his puppet in line. When he finally figured out that Harry no longer kept her in his confidences, he washed his hands of her, glad to see the back of her as it meant that she wouldn’t be able to contradict everything he’d proposed in order to reaffirm his hold on Potter. With her interference gone, and the drain on his own vaults eased, since he no longer had access to Harry's galleons, he dove into his schemes for Potter with new vigor.

“You wanted to see me, sir?” the Savior asked sullenly as he flopped down into one of the gaudily patterned chairs in front of the headmaster’s desk without so much as a by your leave.

Huffing in annoyance at the blatant lack of respect, Albus put on an insincere smile and said, “Harry, my boy. It is very good to see you. I haven’t had a chance to catch up with you since that whole Ministry fiasco and your subsequent abduction. How are you feeling?”

“Fine, sir,” the teen replied in a monotone voice. The vibes he was giving off made the headmaster very, very happy. He was despondent and depressed, which worked to the old man’s advantage as he could manipulate the child into anything at this point.

“What happened with you and Miss Granger?” Dumbledore queried. He really didn’t care overmuch, but he had to keep up the appearance of grandfatherly concern so that he could wind his puppet back onto its strings.

“What do you mean, sir?” Harry responded tersely.

“I was just wondering why you didn’t defend her against her attackers, and allowed her to be driven from the school,” the headmaster clarified, frowning when his dig received no discernible response whatsoever.

“I am not responsible for Granger’s welfare in any way, shape or form,” the brunet snapped savagely. The actual response had the headmaster jerking back in obvious surprise, his mask of benevolent grandfather slipping a little to give way to fear. “The fact that you would act more concerned about her instead of me speaks volumes as to where your loyalties truly lie. As well, your question implies that I am required to put myself out there for everyone but myself. She did nothing to help or encourage me, so I washed my hands of her.”

“I see,” the old man murmured, hand restlessly stroking his beard in thought. “I am sorry that you’d lost one of your best friends, but I have more important things I wish to discuss with you. I hope you now understand, my boy, how urgent it is for you to begin training to defeat Voldemort. I understand that the torture to which you were subjected was rather brutal, and I hope it has made you more cognizant of the scope of the coming conflict. I am relying on your cooperation in our future endeavors against the great evil that threatens the wizarding world.”

“I understand,” the raven murmured in a monotone. The look on Harry’s face told Dumbledore that he’d have the boy’s cooperation, albeit unwillingly. Heaving a silent sigh, the old man continued the meeting for several moments longer, feeling more and more like he was getting canned responses from the teen. Finally he dismissed Harry, watching as the boy left his office without a backward glance. Sitting back in his chair, he pondered the meeting, going over it and over it in his mind and looking for any signs that Harry would balk at his destined responsibility. Finding nothing but the usual teenage angst, the old man finally put their chat out of his mind, turning his thoughts to the upcoming legislation to be put before the Wizengamot. It was one of his own, and he wasn’t looking forward to going head to head with Lucius Malfoy on the merits of his proposed policies.

“Well, I’ve had another chat with the bumblebee,” Harry spat as he exited the floo to Riddle Manor. Instantly he found himself engulfed in the strong, safe arms of the Dark Lord, and he sagged in relief. He burrowed his face into the older man’s neck, sighing happily and shivering as large hands stroked gently up and down his back. “Do I have to go back?” he whined into Tom’s neck, eliciting a shiver from the man. Grinning, Harry leaned up and licked the Dark Lord’s earlobe, setting off another cascade of shudders as the arms around him tightened to a punishing degree.

“I wouldn’t recommend continuing that,” the older wizard warned with a husky growl. “We are not alone, and I fear that I would not stop, should you push me past my limits, love.”

“I’m sorry,” the raven whispered, pulling away from the delicious bit of flesh to look contritely at his partner. “I’m just feeling a little out of sorts right now. The headmaster keeps trying to push his agenda on me, and I’m getting heartily sick and tired of seeing his office, with as many times as I’ve been called up there for one of his ‘chats’. The good news is that we finally have the vanishing cabinet fixed, and you can start sending your minions in at any time. We have it located in an abandoned workout room deep within the dungeons; I don’t think even Dumbledore knows it exists, so we’re ready when you are.”

“That’s excellent news, Harry,” Tom enthused with a wide grin. “And to answer your question, yes, you have to go back. You’re my eyes and ears within the castle, and I’ll need you there to lead my minions when they finally breach the walls of the school.”

“Are...are you sure you want to do that?” Harry asked uncertainly. “I mean, they probably won’t even listen to me. Wouldn’t it be better to have Draco lead them, since his father is your right-hand man?”

“They will listen to you, Harry,” came a voice from the doorway. The teen turned to see Narcissa and Lucius standing there, and it was Lucius who had spoken. “Tom and I have ensured that they understand completely your status within the organization. They know on whose side you stand, and they’re more than willing to follow you, since they now see you as an extension of the Dark Lord.” At the raven’s incredulous look, Malfoy chuckled and continued. “Oh, there were protests, of course; mainly by Bellatrix Lestrange. She fancies herself in love with Tom, and covets the position you now hold. She was schooled on her attitude, and now understands better her role in our organization, and what should happen if she should take her displeasure out on you.”

“She’d better watch how she behaves around you,” the teen snarled, arms tightening around the Dark Lord possessively. “If I see even one hint of inappropriate behavior, I will strike her down where she stands.”

“If she is stupid enough to do that, even after the warnings given to her, then she deserves whatever you will do to her,” Narcissa chimed in with an indulgent smile. “I’ll not stand in your way whatsoever, darling. She’s been more a hindrance than a help, especially with her attacks on the Longbottoms after your parents were murdered.” Tom flinched minutely at the reminder of his own culpability in the way Harry had to grow up, and the raven responded by squeezing him gently and smiling lovingly up at him.

“What did I ever do to deserve you?” Voldemort husked out, ruby eyes suspiciously bright.

“I was charmed by you from the moment I met your shade in that diary in my second year,” Harry told the man softly. “I wasn’t terribly keen on your goals and your values at the time, but part of me understood that something about your life shaped who you were at that moment. As I grew, and learned more about who you were and what you wanted for our world, I started to understand that, as wrongheaded as your efforts were, your ultimate aim for our world was protection and safety from the muggles outside our borders. I understood that desire; I’d felt it myself, having grown up abused and neglected as you did.

“You rescued me when no one else would. You saw how I was treated by my relatives, and you wanted to do something about it. Even knowing that you were bringing your ‘enemy’ to your home, you still did it, without asking for anything in return. You gained the respect and regard of witches and wizards who had no reason to trust or believe you. You gained allies of people I look up to, and rely on to keep me safe. I was more than halfway in love with you by my fourth year, but hearing about the efforts you went to in reaching out to people in my life, all for the desire to protect me, told me that my love and trust was not mislaid. You deserve this; you deserve me."

“Today we will be watching some memories provided to me by a variety of sources,” was not what Harry had expected to hear. He’d gone to the headmaster’s office at a summons to ‘train’ that night, and he was expecting to be taught some Auror level spells and curses, but instead, he was informed that they would be doing a sort of ‘show and tell’ about Tom Riddle, aka Lord Voldemort.

“Yes, sir,” the raven replied, his head down as he rolled his eyes so hard that they nearly fell out of his head. Fortunately occlumency couldn’t be performed through someone's skull, so the teen felt relatively secure in his private ridicule of the old man. Dumbledore was completely oblivious to the young man’s sarcastic, vicious thoughts of him and bulled ahead, not caring that the boy wasn’t meeting his eyes at the moment.

“The first memory we will be observing is from a civil servant, sent to Tom’s grandfather’s house because of some violence against the muggles in the little village. His visit is regrettably short, as Morphin Gaunt had threatened him in their front yard. Shall we?” he finished as he made a flourish of his hand toward the bowl.

Several hours later, they emerged, having watched the last memory for the night that covered Merope’s underhanded seduction of the son of a muggle landowner nearby, which ultimately led to a series of rapes of the man. She had used a love potion to make the man hers, and had engaged in sexual congress for many months before deciding one day to stop dosing him with the wizarding version of rohypnol. She was a few months pregnant by that time and thought, with her carrying his heir, that Tom Riddle Sr. would look more kindly on her. Instead, he kicked her out and abandoned her to her fate, thereby dooming his son before he was even born.

“So you see, my boy, why Tom Riddle is unable to love or form attachments to anyone,” Albus said grandly with a smirk on his face. “Because his conception was poisoned by the repeated use of love potions, the elixirs damaged him in fundamental ways. When his mother died giving birth to him in Wool’s Orphanage, she took with her any love he might have had; not that he would have been able to reciprocate.”

“Why didn’t anyone look for him?” Harry asked curiously, seething inside at the callous, cavalier way that Dumbledore had so easily dismissed an orphaned child. The same way he dismissed me, Harry thought angrily. “After all, his birth was registered in the Book of Names for Hogwarts; surely someone noticed a magical child in the muggle world.”

“We assumed, wrongly it seems, that he was a muggleborn, orphaned because of the muggle world war. We had no reason to look for him, since he was being cared for by the staff at the orphanage. The only thing we kept an eye on were feats of accidental magic that may have occurred. Fortunately for us, he never manifested obvious accidental magic, but we soon came to find out that he’d been exercising his powers on the other children without anyone being able to pinpoint exactly what it was that he was doing to them. You’ll find out more about that at our next meeting. Off to bed you go, my boy.”

“Thank you, professor, for showing me those memories. I now understand a little better my purpose in the world,” the raven replied softly, hiding the deep, abiding hatred he felt for the man behind the shields that Tom had taught him during the summer.

“I am very glad to hear that, Harry,” Albus rejoined with a beaming smile. That is exactly what I needed to hear, he thought as he watched his puppet leave his office. Now that I know that all is right with the world, I can begin to plan the deaths of Tom and Harry. After all, it wouldn’t do to allow the boy to survive, especially with that bit of poison that has most likely attached to his own soul. Harry must die, for the protection of the wizarding world. Can’t have yet another Dark Lord ascendant, after all.