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Harry was struggling to breath as pain slammed into him like several bludgers had hit him mercilessly, centering around his lightening scar but spread through his entire body.
He crumpled to the marble floor, nervous system on fire, licking up every inch of his insides.
He had been so stupid.
He should have known better than to try to neutralize the manor wards with the meagre little information he had managed to scrape from the library. But he was desperate, merlin damn it. And he had been so close – oh so close to breaking them after two long years.
But then of course Voldemort had sensed it somehow and apparated right from God knew which country he was in today. Harry had tried to plan it as meticulously as was possible in his situation.
It was all for naught though. He had felt him first, before he saw him and then Voldemort had viciously grabbed him by his arm and pulled him inside the hall.
Harry was desperate to get away because it was the full moon in three days and the Dark Lord was preparing a ritual for Harry to make a horcrux for himself. And he – he can’t possibly partake in that.
It was unfathomable.
And here he was now, writhing on the floor as Voldemort poured his complete wrath through their bond. Harry didn’t even know if he had stopped screaming or not, did not even realise when all the three Malfoys and Bellatrix had entered the room.
All he knew was pain, pain, pain –
“Harry, have I not treated you good enough? Is this how you repay my hospitality, darling?” The tone was deceptively sweet, but Voldemort’s face and particularly his eyes spoke a different story altogether.
Not to mention the venomous cocktail of insecurity, anger, fear, frustration, disappointment and possessiveness that Harry felt in the moment - emotions which were not quite his own.
“No words now? What happened to your insolent tongue, my dear?”
Bellatrix cackled in the background. Though, it turned to a sharp scream as Voldemort shot a quick cruciatus curse on her.
It was terribly unfair. No crucios were flung at him and yet the pain in his scar was beyond anything an unforgivable could inflict on him.
Harry felt he might pass out at any moment, his scar was bleeding already (Good, he thought. That might save him from being assaulted in the Dark Lord’s bed at least until the cruel bastard had some time to cool off) and he would have been pulled under unconsciousness but suddenly the entire room dimmed and it was suddenly icy cold.
The shift in temperature was so sudden, even Voldemort went off-balance, if the lift of the hurt from his scar was any indication.
“Lucius-” Voldemort starts but is sharply interrupted by noise of the window panes shattering. All of them turn to look in the direction of the ceiling high window, a thick cloud of shadow forms smack dab in the middle of the hall.
As everyone watches in bewilderment, triangular points of navy blue light appear in the shadows as brightness shimmers from them into the centre and then coalesces into a gateway – a portal? – of sorts.
“My Lo-ord,” Narcissa begins but no one is paying attention to her as everyone stands stunned, even the great Lord Voldemort.
Or not, because Harry is by his side in a moment, a luminescent bubble wrapped around his form, probably to ‘protect’ him.
Harry does not even protest, because he has no fucking idea what the hell in going on but he uselessly hopes its something to do with the remaining members of the Order.
There is pin drop silence for a few precious seconds before Harry can make out a dark silhouette of a person coming out of the backlit portal.
He can’t make out who it is but he doesn’t even get the time to guess because three things happen all at once.
One – Lucius, Bellatrix, Narcissa and Draco shout different dark curses (the binding spell in case of Draco) at the dark form of the man.
Two – Voldemort also murmurs some obscure spell at the silhouette. The fact that the Dark Lord had to murmur the spell instead of casting it non-verbally shows it must be something really strong or evil.
And Three – None of them actually land on the figure. None. All the magic fizzles out just before it reaches their target.
Voldemort’s eyes widen a little – very minutely that only Harry notices – before he shoots forward a barrage of spells and curses, some even in parseltongue.
Not that it makes any difference. The dark figure steps into the room – he is wearing a hooded cloak, Harry notices that the moonlight is reflecting against the man’s glasses – and he chuckles lowly, slightly shaking his head this way and that.
When Voldemort raises the Elder Wand again, no doubt to try some other spells, the man raises his hand and the wand zooms into his hand.
Just like that.
Harry is not the only one to gasp in unhidden shock.
Just at the same time, the man (no taller than Harry himself, but what an imposing figure nonetheless) swishes the wand and immediately everyone present in the room fall to their knees, stiff and unmovable.
Well, everyone except Harry, that is.
The bubble containing him bursts and Harry stands there numbly staring at his…saviour? And because Harry Potter is Harry Potter – no amount of time being exposed to the Dark Lord could change that – he straightforwardly asks the man one of the many questions in his head.
“Who are you?”
All heads swerve in his direction and Harry shudders at the onslaught of attention. The mysterious man has a smile on his face, that much Harry can decipher before he replies, “Hi Harry, it’s me.”
Okay, the voice sounds awfully familiar but the answer does not bloody help, because Harry is quite sure he has never met this person before. It was impossible to miss the power the man oozed, and Harry has spent time with both Albus Dumbledore and Voldemort, thank you very much.
“O…kay?”
The man chuckles again and Harry would have been perturbed at being patronized but his mind blanks as the man lowers his hood.
He stands there flabbergasted as he stares at…himself.
He stares at the man for merlin knows how long – it could be seconds, minutes, sodding hours – when Voldemort finally finds his tongue back.
“Why do you wear his face? Who are you?” Harry would like to give credit to the Dark Lord for sounding so composed – relatively speaking – when someone as powerful as him is on his knees in front of this man.
“Oh Tom,” the man wearing his face answers, “I am Harry Potter. I do not need to wear another face to sound more intimidating, you know?” There is a huge smirk on his face which really should not belong to Harry’s face but it is there.
“H-how?” Harry asks the other man - Harry? – because none of this makes sense. Lord Voldemort should not be on his knees, no one was coming to save him, there should never have been a breach in this manor’s wards, Harry should not be talking to someone who claimed they were Harry Potter.
He is more than convinced that he is dreaming.
Or Voldemort has drugged him.
Or this man is lying, which Harry somehow doubts he is.
Harry Potter might be a terrible liar, but he knows when someone else is lying or not very accurately.
“You see, my little self, I am you from another universe. More precisely, I come from no one universe. Because, I am the original Harry James Potter, Fate’s chosen one, the Master of Death…and now the creator of a branch of new universes, apparently.” The man giggles like there was a joke hidden somewhere there.
Harry feels a sudden pain in his scar and he notices that Voldemort is experiencing a huge range of emotions which even he can’t make out properly but when Harry winces a little, the other Harry immediately comes to him, touching his scar lightly muttering something sounding very foreign to his ears and the pain…vanishes.
It just vanishes like it never existed. It is like a weight of the whole Hogwarts castle lifted from his body. Harry has never felt this light in his entire life.
Not even when Voldemort taps into his soul to open their connection for his rather hedonistic activities.
Harry can’t help it, he closes his eyes and sighs. He opens them quickly enough though, as he hears a very sharp ear shattering scream from Voldemort’s lipless mouth.
“NO..IT IS IMPOSSIBLE! IT IS NOT –“
“Please do shut up, Tom.” The other Harry cuts him sharply, his mouth twisted uglily but his eyes never leave Harry. His other self cups Harry’s right cheek in his hand and very tenderly runs his index finger on the area. His face relaxes and the man is smiling again.
Now that he is so close, Harry notices the subtle differences in their appearances. Though the man looks as old as he himself is, his green eyes are brighter and his raven locks are slightly curled. There is nothing significant to distinguish the two look wise, no.
No, the biggest difference lies in how the man carries himself, and the sheer raw power emanating off of him. It feels otherworldly, divine and utterly celestial. Harry doesn’t know how he knows it, just that he knows…
“There Harry, your pathetic scar is gone.”
Harry opens his mouth, then closes it, then finally settles on, “I don’t understand.”
“Of course you don’t. All of this…it’s my fault really. You see, Harry, there was this one universe where I lived as you, became the Master of Death, died, met Fate, met Death…and met my true purpose."
"True purpose?”
“It is a long story, I will fill you in, in due time don’t worry. But to be very brief, I am an eternal soul – the eternal soul – but I was cursed by a foe into the mortal plane living many different lives. But when I finally reunited the deathly hallows in my life as Harry Potter, I finally met my family.”
His other self was smiling very indulgently, and Harry had never seen such a soft expression directed at him in years.
“But…then who am I? And why are you here?” Harry had to ask questions. Making sense of it would come later. This was something he learnt in his captivity.
“You are a part of me. I was executing a task, where I…messed up Harry. By my miscalculations, I created off shoot alternate realities to the last universe I was born as a mortal and I splintered off into these realities. One such is yours, Harry.”
“Wow. I mean…I am you? Merlin. But does that mean…you…you are going to absorb me or something?”, honestly Harry didn’t mind it. He was already open to welcome death. There was nothing for him here.
The other Harry – the divine being – laughed quietly as he shook his head. “No, my little one, not really. I will be honest to tell you that I have in fact fixed and closed the other realities and this one is my last. But I do not intend to vanish yours. I intend to keep you.”
“Wh..what? Why?”
The other Harry was cupped both of his hands on his face and softly kissed his forehead. Merlin, there was so much affection and love in it, Harry shivered so pleasantly, he thought he might cry.
“My little one, I am in need of a companion. I have always been. I fixed the other universes, and this was my last. I felt very forlorn at the fact that I would finally finish this little side project of mine and really gain nothing. I thought, why not seek a part of myself out, someone who had the potential to fully understand me, who could ease my aching loneliness?”
His voice was full of melancholy as he gently carded one of his hands through Harry’s hair.
“I guess that makes sense,” Harry muttered to himself as the divine being smiled again. “But then what of this reality? If I join you, what happens of this world?”
Here, the other Harry got a very vicious grin on his face as he shifted behind him so that they were chest to back, both looking in the direction of Voldemort.
“Tell me Harry, what all has our dear old Tom done to you?”
His voice was very malicious, and Harry felt goosebumps raise on his skin. Though at the same time, he felt so safe in the eternal one’s arms, it felt like home.
Harry shifted his gaze, first to Bellatrix who had gone chalk white. Then to Narcissa, who looked in awe but also frightened in equal measures. Lucius was still as a statue and Draco looked like he might faint at any moment.
The eternal one wrapped his arms across Harry’s torso and rested his chin in the crook of Harry’s neck.
“Tell me Harry, how have our other…guests enabled this pathetic excuse of a man?”
Everyone in the room was trying to look as small as possible. Not Voldemort however. The Dark Lord looked at the other Harry with poisonous loathe, despair and…fear.
Yes, fear. Because if Lord Voldemort was afraid of one thing, it was Death.
And here standing in front of him was the Master of Death himself, a family member of the creator of the universes.
But Harry noticed something else too. There hidden between these apparent reactions was a feeling of possessiveness and pride. Possessiveness, probably because the man must be thinking Harry somehow still belonged to him, never mind that the horcrux was gone. Pride though?
“My pretty little one, he feels proud of himself because he thinks he conquered you, and by extension, conquered a piece of me, in his wretched little existence.”
“Oh”
“Yes. Tom, am I not correct? Do you…still long for my soul? Do you feel accomplished that you held a part of mine with you? Probably you do, because that is the only thing worth talking about you. How your wrecked soul begs for me every single day. How you compensate for your miserable self by lording over others…over Harry, over me.”
Voldemort remained silent. Just looking straight ahead with no discernable expression on his face.
Harry felt vindictive all of a sudden. “No words now Voldemort? What happened to your insolent tongue, my dear?” Harry repeated the Dark Lord’s own question mockingly with some added spite.
The eternal one laughed throatily, and it reverberated through Harry’s own soul, and it felt to light, happy and welcome. Harry thought he could swim in such feelings forever. Million leagues above the horcrux bond with Voldemort.
Harry knew he was somehow constantly drawing parallels between Voldemort and the other Harry; perhaps that make as a given when talking about powerful beings.
“Nothing would change the fact that I still conquered you. You can have a thousand words of whataboutery but I did best you, Harry. You are mine, always were. Fate’s favourite, are you? The same Fate, who weaved an entire prophecy between you and me?”
Harry realized that Voldemort’s words were for the eternal one. He ignored Harry’s jab, of course he did.
“Don’t flatter yourself Tom. You are nothing more than a nuisance created by her due to reasons I do not deem you worthy of to know.”
Voldemort laughed then. He laughed louder – hysterically – high pitched – and then looked at Harry again.
“I have ravaged this little piece of yours, wrecked and ruined it and it will forever tarnish you – oh great original Harry Potter.”
The eternal one did not reply, kept himself wrapped around Harry but Harry did go a little rigid at hearing Voldemort.
His other self kissed his cheek to relieve his tense posture and said, “Actually Harry, I do have some spare time. I might as well enjoy myself in this universe a bit. I am aching to play some games with these mortals, Tom most of all, it will be good practice for you as well. What say you?”
He sounded mischievous and Harry looked into the otherworldly eyes. Harry realized he would never be able to say no to anything he asked. He also realized that he would enjoy this. He did want to teach Voldemort and his merry band of death eaters some lessons.
“I am ready.”
The other Harry grinned, then smothered his entire face with kisses. “Oh my love, I knew I was right to keep you.”