Chapter Text
Summer with the Dursleys was as awful as ever, and most nights were filled with nightmares of the Basilisk and trying to save Ginny. Harry often dreamt up new ways that Voldemort would infiltrate Privet Drive because he was too impatient to wait until fall. If Hogwarts was one of the most safe places in the Wizarding World, Harry had now lost all feelings of security.
But it seemed the dangers of the wizarding world were quickly leaking into the muggle world. Listening to the news from the garden window, Harry knew what was behind the strange flocks of owls, dozens of claims of people losing their memory, and the mysterious reports of a murderous escapee without saying from what prison. He was, for once, glad to be away from it all, even if he had missed Ron’s letters for most of the summer while his family was off in Egypt. Hermione’s owls always brought snacks as well as the comfort of her voice for pages and pages.
Harry had successfully bargained with Uncle Vernon after being ignored most of the summer, that if he ‘did well’ while Marge was staying, that he’d sign Harry’s permission form for Hogsmeade. Harry made it through only one night before Marge pulled the last straw and began swelling up and floating towards the ceiling and out the sliding door. Harry was furious. He deserved to be. The Dursleys had spent all his life lying to him about magic, about his parents death, about how they lived, and treated him like absolute shit. Since he began at Hogwarts, Harry was able to shove most of that down, cover it with thoughts of Quidditch and moving portraits and his friends. But Marge brought it all up.
Anytime she spoke of Duddikins and only called Harry him Boy, asked about the boarding school for criminal children- or whatever Vernon had told her, Harry’s memories of being shoved into his cupboard and starved as punishment were brought up. When she began speaking badly of his parents, Harry spoke the truth over in his mind, that they’d saved him, that they were heroes and well loved and respected, even if he never knew them, never saw their faces. She insulted James’ looks and his life, and spoke awfully of Lily- when those were the two people that had loved Harry the most, and nobody could ever live up to.
Harry was raging mad, even as the Dursleys watched her inflate and yelled for her as she floated higher, he was wishing that he could do something to the rest of them too. All his life they treated him in the same way, and they got to be here, safe on the ground. Harry rushed upstairs to grab the few things he’d unpacked and shoved them into his luggage. Wand in hand, he brought it all down, Hedwig set loose into the night air with a gentle chirp. When Vernon came upon him, Harry jabbed his wand forward, and declared his goodbye. Harry ventured down the street, trying to figure how he’d get to London, it was already dark out, and he hadn’t sent a letter with Hedwig.
He groaned and pulled at the hair on top of his head in frustration. Using his broom would promise he’d be caught, inflating his Aunt was bound to get him expelled after being blamed for Dobby’s magic last year, he couldn’t afford to go to Azkaban too. It was luck, not thought, that brought Harry the Knight Bus. Wand arm raised in aggravation, and then whoosh, he was on the ground. He looked up at the double decker bus, magic clearly at play from instant arrival. They cheerfully brought him to Diagon Alley, where he got a room at the Leaky Cauldron under his cousin's name, with his hair dragged down over his forehead and hood in place.
Harry fell asleep quite easily, thankful to be on his own in the Wizarding World. He was awoken by a tapping on the window, but when it was only Hedwig, he let her inside stroking her feathers, and fell back to sleep at ease and with sweet dreams of flying his Nimbus over the town, Hedwig trailing alongside him.
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The next day, Harry donned a cloak over his sweatshirt and jeans and made his way down a side street which was much quieter than Diagon Alley. He pushed in a door to a small shop with books and potions alike. He knew he was looking for information on the trace, on accidental magic, and hopefully, something that would help ensure continuing at Hogwarts.
He was on his way up to the register with the book that looked like it would help when he heard a yell, and the bell to the shop ring. The place grew cold, and Harry froze, seeing three very tall dark figures hovering into the shop, despair radiating from them. He heard a pleading scream and it was all too much to remain standing, his heart rate dropped and Harry fainted, surrounded by the darkness.
The store clerk watched fearfully from behind the glass counter case as the dementor sunk down to the boy. She was unable to cast a patronus, but she did know her potions, and nothing would sour the soul feast like the elixir to induce euphoria and a body recovery potion to revive the child. So she took the vials from the case beside her and threw them at the boy, breaking and becoming absorbed by the dementor who was performing the kiss with relish.
The store clerk gulped as the dementor jerked back in a wave, but it seemed she had been unsuccessful, the dementor had gained a soul and the boy was still unconscious. She stood shaking as the other dementors neared her, and could hardly comprehend what she was seeing, the dementor that’d preformed the kiss was changing, its translucent black form touched the ground, its bony hands turned to sleek translucent skin, and though the hood remained, she no longer feared what was under it. What had she done? The dementors lurked closer, and she knew she had no defence, it took only moments more for her to become overtaken by the memories of her son in St Mungoes, due to her uselessness to protect him.
It was intriguing. To take form again, without planning how. Tom watched as two dementors feasted and left the shop, leaving him standing tall above another victim. No, it couldn’t be, Harry Potter? Tom laughed as he began to understand what had occurred. He looked down at himself affected by the dementor; seven feet tall with pale ghostly skin, draped in a dingy cloak, with the Boy Who Lived unconscious on the floor with broken glass and books on youthful magic surrounding him. Tom bent down and grazed his fingers over the boy's forehead tracing the scar he’d given him. Tom remembered years through the boy's eyes, glances of Hogwarts, pieces of his life at his muggle family’s, and even more so just the knowledge that they were meant to be. Tom had returned through wonderful coincidence, and miraculous accident- the boy had been made a horcrux. And now it was through that piece of his soul that lived within the child, that Tom had come to regain life through the misery of a dementor.
Tom pulled off the hood and found himself curious about a few things. First, of course, was magic, he had no wand thus took the boys, and was glad to find it worked as well as his own yew wand. Next, he brought his hand down to Harry’s forehead again and glimpsed at what the boy was stuck in dreaming.
They’d spent thirteen years together in what should’ve been opposing, but here he was wanting to relieve Harry of the pain and fear that’d been forced upon him. Harry hadn’t known, but he’d spent his whole life reassuring Tom’s horcrux that he’d be okay, that he wasn’t a freak, that he was safe, that he’d find an escape from the Dursleys, that they’d make it back to Hogwarts. So Tom aspired to give Harry the same reassurance.
Kneeling next to Harry, one hand on his scar, the other sensing Harry’s pulse by his neck, Tom dove into Harry’s mind to see what memory the dementor had left Harry in. It was all too familiar. It wasn’t even from baby Harry’s view, but his own, telling the redhead to step aside, her yelling the child’s name, pleading to spare him, and a bright green flash. Tom felt Harry’s fear as well as he felt the cold clammy skin beneath his hands. He urged himself to pull Harry out of the memory, the euphoria surging through him and into Harry as he searched for the boy’s happiest memories.
First came flight, Harry on a broomstick speeding over the quidditch pitch, and the glint of a snitch far ahead. Then the warmth of Ron and Hermione on either side of him at the Gryffindor table after they’d taken down the troll in first year, a friendship forged by fire. The peculiar but endearing sight of the Burrow, filled with Weasleys who’d worried for him and helped him escape the Dursleys, ready to surround him with laughter and fill his plate before his stomach rumbled.
Tom breathed easier after ensuring Harry felt only the comfort of these memories, and that of the death of his parents had retreated once again. Tom found the memories and the swarm of love from them to be exhilarating, and knew he wanted more. With his teen body returned to him, and these new powers of a dementor, Tom was grateful to have Harry and wanted to be selfish in getting to keep him. After all they had spent forever together and he did not want that to change.
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Tom had one place in mind that he could go without argument, so he lifted Harry into his arms, glasses sweetly and uncomfortably jamming into his neck, held the boy's wand, and apparated. When they arrived, the wards were ringing, portraits loud except for those that recognized Voldemort’s form. Tom held Harry, still passed out in his arms, but now dreamily thinking of a hearty Hogwarts meal and the chatter of the Great Hall.
“Who dares!” Lucius Malfoy’s voice rang from down the hall, robes rushing behind him as he cast a spell towards the tall intruder. Tom simply stepped out of the way, turned to display the boy in his arms.
“Who do you think you are, and with the Potter boy in my home?”
Tom narrowed his eyes and Lucius stumbled backwards, hit by a wave of fear, his worst memories as a Death Eater and the trials afterwards coming to the surface of his mind. “Settle Lucius,” Tom commanded, “It is your Lord, to whom you owe a great debt.”
Lucius looked upon him in great horror and pulled his mouth back tightly, bowing low with his hands clasped over his wand. “My Lord, this is unexpected, pleasantly though, I, I serve you.” He tucked his wand back into its pocket in his robes.
“You will spare the east wing of the manor for us, there is to be no one that discovers our presence.”
Lucius nodded curtly, “As you wish my Lord,” he hesitated, “And your plans for the boy?”
Tom felt Harry squirm in his arms, a hand grasping at Tom’s abominable dementor cloak. The chandelier above them rattled and the candles flickered, and Harry began rapidly panting and mumbling in his sleep. Tom looked down, placing his forehead against Harry’s to catch a glimpse at what was harming him. Harry had retreated into the memories of last year, where Lucius had kicked around a house elf, and then been ready to cast a curse at Harry in the hall. Tom gently pulled the fear from the memory, and pushed forward the Gryffindor courage instead reminding Harry that he’d dared to return the diary, dared to free the house elf, and had yet another that’d fight to protect him. Tom soothed Harry and looked back at Lucius with the same taste of spite.
“Know your place,” he said cooly to Lucius.
Lucius bowed again, and walked his master silently toward the east wing. It was still a fortnight from September, Draco and Narcissa were about the Manor, though it was not often they ventured down this way. He approached what was worthy to be the Dark Lord’s quarters, and ventured again to toe the line. “My Lord, your knowledge is superior, and you say you want none to know of your presence here. But I ask if the same is of your return? The achievement of the century, may I say, only second to the capture of the boy, but my Lord, with September first close, the fool Dumbledore will know from Potter’s absence, and a search will begin for the both of you, should we not initiate?”
Tom set Harry on the large bed and let Lucius stew in the silence. He traced his fingers over Harry’s scar and sensed the comfort he was feeling, again bringing up the feeling of flying this time in the Weasley’s car with Ron, heart pumping as they heard the whistle of the Hogwarts Express behind them, cheering in relief as they turn out of the way and would make it to Hogwarts despite all that’d stopped them.
“Last year, not only did he return to Hogwarts late, but caused your failures and cost you a house elf,” Tom said dryly. Lucius blanched, and looked down without response. “I’ve time to spare before needing to worry about Dumbledore.”
Lucius nodded, and again thought of how to be useful, “It is helpful that you may not be the only suspect in his absence, Sirius Black has escaped from Azkaban, and he’s been heard muttering ‘he’s at Hogwarts’, must be searching for the child.”
Tom hummed thoughtfully, then turned back to watch Harry’s chest rise and fall. “You are dismissed. I shall call your house elves for meals.” Lucius turned and left the Dark Lord at Potter’s bedside.
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Tom sat beside Harry on the bed, with a book in his lap. He’d cast a diagnoses charm on him, and it seemed Harry would be fine, just energy depleted from having the horcrux ripped out of him. His magical core and his brain were fine, though he did occasionally drift back into dreadful memories the dementor had pulled forward. Harry crying in his cupboard under the stairs, smacked for burning the bacon, chased up a tree by a barking dog, again experiencing the bright green flash of light and a scream.
Tom placed his hand to Harry’s cool cheek and soothed him. Tom had never been one to comfort, but for Harry he would be. He wanted to stay close to Harry, and surprisingly he didn’t find it to be a weakness but a gift. Harry had been his horcrux, kept a piece of his soul safe, made Tom feel love despite all that Harry hadn’t experienced growing up. Now, Tom would do the same in providing Harry solace from the worst of his memories, reminding him of the warmth he’d experienced until he recovered.
Tom sat and enjoyed the peace of the Mirror of Erised alongside Harry, draped in the invisibility cloak watching his family beyond the veil. It was bittersweet, it was impossible, but it was a comfort all the same. Tom remembered through Harry’s eyes the encounter with Quirrell at the same mirror, and admired Harry’s courage as the weight of the Philosopher's Stone dropped into his pocket and lied to Voldemort. Tom took the fear from the memory, because Harry was kind hearted and felt afraid and guilty of killing Quirrell by the burning touch. Tom petted his skeletal fingers through Harry’s hair, sending the euphoria of the touch to Harry. Tom was grateful to Harry despite the former conflicts. He had brought Tom back, he was the reason Tom could feel any of this…happiness.
Tom pulled forward the memories of second year, discovering that the diary wrote back, and he relished in the fact that Harry couldn’t wait to hear back, to know more of Tom. Tom removed the fear of being a parselmouth, but pushed forward his own feelings of pride in being able to speak the ancient language of snakes. Harry crooned as Tom spoke to him gently in parseltongue.
<<You’re mine. My joy, my warmth, my soul, I will take your fear and guilt and you will know only my affection when you return to me.>>
From the memories in the chamber, Tom took away the mistrust and the fear for Ginny’s life, but emphasised the amazement at the reveal that Tom Riddle was Voldemort, and shared with Harry the warmth he’d felt when Harry began writing another piece of his soul. Tom had been devastated to know that Harry destroyed the diary, but he couldn’t stay angry, especially not now that Harry was the reason he’d returned. Tom relaxed and read besides Harry, asleep on the bed, and called the Malfoy’s elf for tea.
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Tom was on his third cup of tea the next day when Harry awoke. His hands went straight for his face, rubbing at his eyes under the glasses. Tom was careful not to draw attention by moving, but did send a wave of assurance towards Harry in case of uncertainty in a new setting. When Harry turned his head, he immediately sat up and turned his body to face Tom, he had a look of recognition, and hesitance that was out of character for the Harry he knew. Tom happily waited, knowing that his manipulation of Harry’s emotions through memory had been successful. Harry wasn’t afraid, though had he ever been, and didn’t search for his wand to fight, didn’t put up his hands or an argument, but sat with wide eyes at Tom which flickered down to the book, at the bed, and then around the room.
The reassurance Tom had sent must not have been enough because a vase shattered on the bedside table and Harry clamped his hand to his scar.
<<It’s okay my sweet, you may be experiencing a shock, but I guarantee your safety>> Tom said, his fingers splayed gently over the pages of his book.
Harry’s brows furrowed, “What?” Tom felt Harry’s wave of confusion, then understood, even with thirteen years with the piece of Tom’s soul, it was not enough to hold onto the beauty of parseltongue.
“You may be experiencing a shock, but I guarantee you’re safe. What do you remember?” Tom asked.
Harry tightened his lips and looked over Tom’s face again, “Didn’t I destroy you? Where are we? How are you here? Why do you look like that?” His eyes roamed over the other boys pale skin, black tipped fingers and bones displaying through the pale skin. But at the same time it wasn’t discomforting Harry, he was confusingly calm.
Tom was buried in the uncertainty and Harry’s flicker of memories from the Chamber of Secrets, and pushed them aside to bring forward the joy of the writing back and forth with the diary horcrux. He grinned that Harry had remembered this piece of him so favourably. He turned to the bedside table and freshened the cup of tea and handed it to Harry. He didn’t address Harry’s questions but asked, “How are you feeling?”
“I’m fine,” he paused, “I’m glad you’re here.” Harry clearly looked unsure about it, as he didn’t know how or why it was so, but it was true. Harry knew something was wrong, here this Tom was saying he was in a shock, but he was safe, and Harry had to wonder what from? His curiosity won out, because the cup of tea stayed in the palms of his hands.
“How, how’re you here? Shouldn’t I- I was in Diagon Alley!” he remembered.
“It appears, my sweet Harry,” Tom said, “This summer we’ve saved each other. We’re both alive at the hands of the other.”
Harry was confusingly delighted, and mouth hung open debating if he should ask how again. “What happened to me? What’s wrong?”
Tom spoke slowly, watching the younger boy for signs of stress. “There was a dementor attack and you’re emotionally and magically exhausted. I overtook the dementor and have been gifting you your positive memories to overtake the ones the dementor pulled up.”
Harry looked inquisitive, and nodded as he remembered the strange flow of dreams when he was unconscious, they were hardly ever so warm. He never slept well. All his fear and anger had subsided, and Harry found himself grateful.
He looked at Tom’s dark eyes, “And how did I save you?”
Tom marked his place in the book and closed it, gathering the nearest truth. “A complete accident, I was overcome by your memories and emotions which brought me back to this form.”
Tom smiled at the feeling of triumph from Harry, as they sipped their tea.
“So you don’t, uh, want to sic a basilisk on muggleborns?” Harry asked.
Tom smiled, “Not unless it would make you happy. But let’s keep that amongst ourselves, we are in the humble abode of the Malfoys.”
And he found it to be true, Tom no longer did want to hunt muggleborns, or cared for blood purity. He couldn’t find it in himself to blame Harry for this change of views, thirteen years of his soul inside the kindheart and it was bound to happen if it was that piece that reformed.
Perhaps he could blame the elixir to induce euphoria, and how it had connected him to Harry’s joy, and perhaps erased all feelings of hatred, but now that Tom knew this, he wouldn’t return to what he was before. He had a life worth living, and now a life, Harry, worth protecting.
Harry felt Tom’s satisfaction and honesty, and was confused by their location. “Does he? Does he know what happened?”
Tom shook his head, “You have nothing to fear, Lucius knows not of my change of heart per se, nor does anyone else know of my return or your absence. You are safe with me.”
Harry yawned, and fought with the memory of Hagrid telling him Hogwarts was safest, of catching Lockhart in the middle of packing to escape finding Ginny in the Chamber of Secrets, of being told by Dumbledore he had to return to the Dursleys’ over the summers. Tom cupped his large shadow black hands over Harry’s around his cup of tea, and sent the feeling of surety.
“I only wish to provide you peace, I will not allow others to break it, you should sleep, you’re still recovering,” Tom said. Harry nodded, let Tom take the cup, and placed his head back on the pillow, green eyes still open looking at the moulding along the ceiling. Tom hummed, and pulled the book back open, “Close your eyes, go to sleep.” Then Tom began reading aloud, his gentle voice luring Harry to sleep.
Harry spent the next few days going in and out of a haze, Tom's hand gently laying on his forehead whenever he startled in bed, though the remaining despair from the dementor became less over time. Tom called the Malfoy’s house elf for soup and crackers whenever he awoke and didn’t say much to instigate the Gryffindor.
Harry didn't hesitate to ask questions but seemed immediately as comfortable with Tom as he had with the diary. “What do you know about the Chamber of Secrets?” became
“What will you tell your Death Eaters?”
Tom looked Harry in the eyes from the lounge chair across from him and asked, “What do you think I should tell them?”
“Well, I don’t think you should tell them. Show them.” He said pointedly. Tom moved his bishop across the board, and raised his eyebrow. “Well, make them agree with what changes you want to make. Supporting Muggleborns transition into the wizarding world, endorsing the history of Dark Arts and its uses to older students, and how murder and torture is bad since you want to be in power without being opposed,” Harry listed, “Show them what you’ll achieve now that things are different.”
Tom hummed, it was a lot of changes. And he wasn’t against any of them, but he didn’t appreciate the thirteen year old had clearer ideas than he’d had from fifteen to fifty five, though he had to admit the horcruxes must’ve skewed his thinking.
Now with two less horcruxes, only the diadem, ring, locket, and the cup, and Harry’s insane capability of making this piece of soul feel loved and sane and capable in ways he hadn’t before, Tom was sure he could make the changes Harry was asking for, but getting his followers to agree would take much more effort.
“It’ll take more than influencing their feelings and erasing memories. My followers have spent decades on this path, their lives intertwined with blood supremacy. It would indeed take a show.” Tom frowned.
The Death Eaters would take well to Voldemort regaining his form as this creature inclined Tom, a display of power greater than that of Flamel’s Sorcerer's Stone- the man stuck ageing indefinitely. But they’d question his extreme change of morality, even framed as a way to gain power acceptably. Tom considered the possibilities. His feelings of deep thinking projected towards Harry, as he was making his next move on the chess board.
Harry thought of Hogwarts coming up, of Malfoy and the other Slytherins, and knowing more about Tom than they did. To convince the death eaters to follow Tom, and convince the public of his changes for good, what was the balance between lies and the truth? And what would Harry say to his friends? Harry had escaped the Dursleys after blowing up Aunt Marge, and then… was happy to wake up besides Voldemort because he managed to calm Harry down and block all pain and fear that’d lurked over him like a shadow?
Harry was uneasy at the thought of sharing this week with anyone. He was glad to have Tom to himself. He didn’t want to share him with the Death Eaters, Lucius was more than enough. The man had been chided by Tom for laying eyes on Harry, suspicious of his presence and comfortability alongside his Lord. Tom had been treating Harry like he was precious, gentle touches when he was upset or when Tom was happy, reading aloud to him, playing chess, making him tea, keeping Harry comfortable and happy. It was almost overwhelming, Tom treated him so lovingly, made him feel so cherished.
Harry wondered if other people would see it as clearly as he felt it. “So show them. Show the public how you treat me, how I don’t fight you anymore. That’s the clearest way to show you’ve changed, to convince your followers of your power over me.” But Tom felt Harry’s conflict over what he’d said and reached out to him, taking his hand.
Tom looked admiringly into his eyes and sworled his thumb over the back of Harry’s hand. “To bring you into the public eye, would be exceedingly successful. My equal, my treasure, my soul, we would rise and achieve more than any other. But I feel as you do, I want you to myself.”
Harry blushed and stuttered, embarrassed. “I-I don’t, I haven’t- They would need to see us as a pair, to understand, and I want things to change but I-“ Harry looked down at their hands.
Tom squeezed his hand, “What is it?”
He paused and said, “I like how things are, with you now. And I’ll have to go to Hogwarts soon.”
Tom felt Harry’s apprehension and debated only for a moment before admitting, “You don’t have to return yet. It would be good for you to stay until we’re ready to take action, to make our reveal. Lucius says there’s an opportunity to cover your absence from school, should we need to.”
Harry thought on it, he did miss Hermione and Ron, and Hagrid, but after Dumbledore had clearly failed to keep people safe from the basilisk, when he’d set Harry up in the first year to find the Sorcerer’s stone, and kept him from the magical world at the Dursleys…Harry didn’t have to question anymore.
“I’d like to stay longer, if I can,” he admitted. Tom nodded happily, and squeezed Harry’s hand once more before taking his turn on the board.