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Harry Potter reclined on the sofa of the Slytherin common room and let his eyes be led astray by his lover.
Tom Riddle has always been picture perfect, aristocratic features with sick pale skin and thinness that was unnatural. Just like he looked in the Chamber of Secrets, oh so long ago.
He was talking with Abraxas, his second in command, with the scheming glint on his face that Harry knew so much of; could this be the day Tom killed Myrtle? She was still alive and roaming Hogwarts grounds, whining to anyone who would listen that Tom was a fag for rejecting her advances.
This would not be the first life he’d take, he had already killed his parents and grandparents by this point, Harry had arrived too late for the creation of the Horrocruxes.
Still, he could prevent his lover’s soul from being tainted any further.
He chatted away with Orion, trying to kill time but always keeping an eye on the Head Boy. He hadn’t quite hashed out the plan of how he'd stop him if things came down to it, but he also knew that plans tended to go to hell either way, the stint at the Ministry only showed it.
Maybe if he had been an auror, things would have turned out different, and his plans would have actually worked. But then again, if he had been an auror he wouldn’t be here, and he wouldn’t trade his lover for the world.
Maybe only to see Ron and Hermione again, just for a brief while, before letting them go back to their regular lives without him, without the war and without all the suffering that he’d prevent by being here and plowing their villain to the point of incoherence.
“Harry? Are you even listening?” Orion asked in front of him, the truth was he wasn’t, he had been daydreaming about his old friends again.
“No, Orion, I am sorry.” Harry sighed and caressed his shoulder. He was not above using his good looks to conquer people.
The war had changed him to the point of no return.
“Oh well, it’s uhm, alright Harry-” Orion spluttered. Harry leaned in closer to his ear, feeling how tense Orion was under his hands, how quickly men and women turned into putty with a bit of a flirt and making them feel like they are the only one in the world.
Tom had taught him that.
“Let me make it up to you, by giving you a drink.” He whispered, and Orion nodded quickly.
As he stood up and headed to the drinks table, he look around for his lover, only to find him missing. The little bitch was waiting for a moment of distraction to make his escape.
Harry scoffed and served Orion’s drink quickly, handing it to him and running up to his dorm for the invisibility cloak. Hopefully, he wouldn’t be too late.
He took the shortcuts to the women’s bathroom and put on the cloak, making sure it covered him whole, before stepping in, only to see the faucet leading down already open.
Bloody fucking hell.
He walked down the stairs in two and took off his cloak. It’d be better for Tom to see his face. He ran through the rocky pathways leading closer to the basilisk, to his beloved.
“Tom!” He yelled as he bursted through the main room, his lover was standing in the middle, looking over Myrtle’s unmoving body.
Suddenly, and for a microsecond, Harry was transported to his second year, where the hottest wizard he had ever laid his eyes upon, and one he thought he could trust, was standing over his best friend's sister, draining her life source.
“Harry…why am I not surprised?” Tom asked as he turned around, eyes bright red without his usual glamour. Signs that he had made a Horrocrux.
But Harry did not yet see Myrtle’s ghost, so that means he was not too late.
“Don’t kill her, Tom.” The ex-gryffindor all but pleaded, walking closer and closer, but still gripping his wand underneath his robes.
“How’d you know I was here, beloved?” He said this last word mocking, as if the last month had meant nothing at all. “So many secrets that you have…”
“Let Myrtle go.” He asked again, Incarcerous at the tip of his tongue.
“Or what, Harry? Breaking up with me?” Tom said with a grin that looked a bit too close to Voldemort’s in that graveyard. “Choose Harry, Myrtle, or me.”
Harry did not want to choose. He wanted Tom’s caresses and his jokes, he wanted to feel cared for and cherished, for his magic to be valued and not suppressed. He wanted to be the one to give Tom the love he never had, he wanted Tom to change.
But he’d never change if he killed Myrtle tonight.
But he’d never change if Harry chose Myrtle and split them up.
So he took a deep breath and let go of his wand, letting it clatter on the slightly humid floor.
“I can offer you the truth.” Harry said, going down on his knees for the first time in his life. Bowing before his boyfriend. “I can tell you how I know about the chamber of secrets, how I know about the Horrocruxes and your father.”
Harry had his eyes looking towards the floor, so he did not see Tom’s expression, only hear a sigh, and a finite encantum, followed by an obliviate and directions to go back to her dorm.
“How’d you know, Harry, that I’d never be able to resist the temptation of you on your knees?” Tom asked, caressing his scalp and pulling him up by the hair. “How’d you know my curiosity would outweigh my necessity to kill? How do you know me so well?”
Harry stood back up and grabbed Tom’s waist, but did not pull him in for a kiss. Not yet, anyways.
“Because I love you, Tom.”
And Harry did not lie.
-I must not tell lies-
“And you are the person who my life has always revolved around.”
“You’ve only known me for a few months”
“No, Tom. I’ve known you for much longer than that.”
And Harry told Tom the whole truth, and comforted him through his sobbing once the story was done. He had been defeated after all, but not before taking the lives of everyone his lover held dear.
He apologized, promised that he’d not commit the same mistakes, and that he’d treasure Harry forever. Who needed horrocruxes when he had such a powerful wizard by his side? Someone who had died and came back.
And Harry took him that night, he whispered sweet nothings in Tom's ear, comforting and cherishing him, giving him all the love that Voldemort needed and never got.
Maybe love was the power that the Dark Lord knows not after all.