New Divide 15/16 - LV/HP

[k155_me]

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Well, FFnet is being a pain. I’m not getting update alerts, so I assume most of you aren’t either, even though stories are being updated. So I doubt many of them are being reviewed. This seems a waste, honestly. Ah, correction, it seems to be fixed now, yes? I’ve added a Phantom/Harry oneshot and I am about to post a LV/TMR oneshot either later tonight or tomorrow sometime, if anyone is interested.

ONE MORE CHAPTER TO GO!! Thanks to Star_Faerie for beta’ing.

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Words: 4,013
Chapter 15

July 2nd 1998.

It was the anniversary of Anathema’s death. How many years had it been, Voldemort wondered; too many years. Fifty-one if his maths was correct. Fifty-one years since he had plunged a knife into the man who loved him, since he had tried to cut their child from Ana’s stomach. Fifty-one years since he had made the biggest mistake of his existence.

It hurt him to think back on it; to remember the slick feel of blood on his fingers, streaked across his face as he calmly brushed his hair out of his eyes. The sudden terror as he realized that Anathema wouldn’t survive the make-shift abortion, that he would lose his lover. He could still see Ana lying before him, skin pale and grey, eyes glassy, smiling at him sadly. His mouth had moved, whispering “I love you, I love you” to a boy who could no longer hear him, who would never respond to him. Voldemort opened his eyes, pushing his memories back into the recesses of his mind, where they could no longer hurt him.

Out of sight, out of mind. Wasn’t that the saying?

But Anathema wasn’t out of sight, Voldemort reminded himself. It had been almost three weeks since he had been alone with Harry Potter, since he had spoken to the boy who lately had begun talking to his Death Eaters; addressing them instead of him, as if Voldemort were not even in the room. Harry was angry, he knew that, hurt and upset, but he was alive. Anathema was alive. And with all that Voldemort owed his murdered lover, he could not fault Harry this one temper tantrum.

Today was different though. For the past nineteen days, he had been willing to allow the boy his space; to reluctantly allow Harry to avoid him and hide within his room with the child, to ignore him and slight him. But not today. Today was the anniversary of Anathema’s death, and it was the first one to pass where Voldemort knew that his Ana hadn’t stayed dead. The irrational fear that Harry could die again this day was enough to force Voldemort to seek out his lover, to force his presence on the boy who probably despised him once more.

Lord Voldemort was supposed to be at a meeting, but he had cancelled it. Sent his Death Eaters home to their families, or to whatever scum they chose to associate with in their free time. And he stood now, hovering uncomfortably outside Harry’s bedroom.

The door was open, and Voldemort watched as Teddy wriggled on the floor. The child was almost three months old, but he was making efforts to commando crawl towards his new father. Harry was laughing; sitting crossed legged with his back to Voldemort, his arms stretched out towards his child. “Come on, Teddy bear. You can do it.”

Voldemort allowed his eyes to slip closed, but he continued to listen as Harry teased and tickled the baby; he lost himself in the sound of Harry’s voice and the occasional gurgles of the happy child. He could see them; so clear and defined, as if they were really seated before him instead of mere memories and imaginations of his troubled mind. Anathema, crossed legged on the floor of Tom’s little London flat; his torso and legs longer than Harry’s, his skin paler, hair darker, the glasses gone, his mouth shaped like a bow as he offered their child a soft smile. And the child… Tom thought about the child, their child. Would he be as loud and noisy as other children were, or would he have been more like a young Tom, studious and silent? “Say I love you Daddy, say I love you,” Anathema breathed, scooping the dark haired, blue eyes baby into his arms. They turned to face Tom, who waited at the threshold of his flat with bright eyes and a thumping heart. “Tell your father you love him.” Anathema’s voice dropped lower, almost to a whisper, as he waved the baby’s pudgy fist at Tom. “I love you Daddy,” he said, pretending to be their son, “I love you also,” he added as Tom remained silent.

“Teddy bear, I knew you could do it. I love you! Who’s my clever little boy?”

Voldemort’s eyes snapped open. Anathema was gone. Their son was gone. He was back in Harry’s bedroom at Malfoy Manor, where Teddy had somehow managed to drag himself less than an inch towards Harry, where Harry was exclaiming excitedly about his genius son, tickling the baby’s stomach proudly.

Voldemort shifted, and Harry caught his reflection in the window. The teenager turned slowly, eyes narrowing as they landed on Voldemort’s face. But when their eyes met, there were tears in Voldemort’s, and the sight of them was the only thing that stopped Harry turning his back on the other Wizard. Instead, he pulled Teddy into his arms, and stood slowly, almost stumbling over a discarded toy. Voldemort grabbed his arm, steadying him. They stood like that for a moment, silent, uncomfortable, before Voldemort reached up to gently touch his eyes. His fingers came back wet and he looked at them, uncomprehending; he had never cried before, never, not in his entire life. Perhaps he had mourned and wailed as he rocked Anathema’s corpse in his arms, but even then he hadn’t shed a tear. Wet fingers touched Harry’s cheek softly.

“I could have had this,” Voldemort whispered, his forehead pressed to Harry’s. He looked down on Teddy, just as the boy yawned and threw out a fist to catch Voldemort’s robes. “This could have been mine.” He, and Ana, and their child. A family, his family: that could have been his life.

“You still could, you know.” Harry offered him a shrug and a soft smile when their eyes met again. “You could help with Teddy. I can’t take care of him on my own, you know. Someone needs to be the responsible and strict one, because I’ll probably be crap at that.”

Voldemort chuckled softly. He untangled Teddy’s fist from his robe and took a step away from Harry. “I won’t be much good at it,” he warned, even as he moved to take a seat on the floor, his legs folded beneath him.

Harry watch as Voldemort hesitantly reached for a rattle, the same toy that had nearly tripped Harry. He sat opposite Voldemort, crossing his legs again, and lay Teddy on the ground. Voldemort shook the rattle, and Teddy giggled.

“You’re not doing too badly,” Harry told him with a grin.

Voldemort looked over at him, a frown on his face. He had been fantasising about ‘Tom and Anathema’ for so many years now, it didn’t seem right to think of his life in any other sense. But ‘Voldemort and Harry’ sounded just as pleasing when he whispered it softly to himself. Harry and Ana were the same, essentially. Different people, but made up of the same things, ideals, desires. One boy for who he had been, for Tom, and one for who he was now. Fate had been kinder than he deserved, sending Anathema back to him, and he had already messed it up once. No more, he vowed mentally to himself.

Voldemort allowed a smile to cross his mouth, and he offered it to Harry first and then Teddy as he hesitantly reached forward to touch the child’s stomach. Teddy reached out for his hand, squeezing one finger for dear life, and Voldemort let him, because it was making Harry happy.

XXX

July 10th 1998.

Courtroom 10 was as it ever was. Cold and filled with the noises of people shifting in their seats. Neither Hermione nor Ron had ever been there before, but she thought back on the courtroom they had ambushed Umbridge in; thought back to the chill that permeated its walls, and the way noises seemed to be magnified and silence swallowed by shadows. This courtroom was much, much worse. There was something oppressive in the air, damaging and terrifying, and yet the Dementors were not present.

Hermione stared defiantly at the assembled crowd of Witches and Wizards, seating before her, with Voldemort sitting dead in the centre. The spectators whispered furiously at her back, and by her side Ron trembled in anger and fear with his hands chained behind his back. She was similarly bound, because even though she was inferior due to the fact that she was a Mudblood, or so she had been told, Lord Voldemort recognized that if either of the two of them were to escape, it would be her. She was the clever one.

She tried to appear brave. Tried to be strong. She even reached to the side, straining the muscles in her left shoulder as she tried to catch Ron’s fingers in her bound hands. But when their sentence was passed down, she cried.

“…Three years in a medium security cell in Azkaban Prison for the combined offences of breaking and entering into the Ministry of Magic, London, and for the attempted break-in of Malfoy Manor, Wiltshire. Case adjourned. Bailiff!” A short, stocky Wizard approached them from the corner of the room. With his wand pointed in front of him, he herded the two teenagers out of Courtroom 10.

Hermione tried to ignore the words reverberating in her brain, tried to forget the sound of Minister Thickenesse damning them both, but the words were there. Loud, and terrible; continuing in a horrific loop within her mind, over and over: three years in Azkaban. She cried harder as she passed the stand where the spectators waited and watched, throwing her angry, judgemental glances. Because there he was. Her friend, her brother in all but name and blood, and he simply watched them take her away. Harry didn’t try to save them.

XXX

July 30th 1998.

It was supposed to be just an ordinary day spent as an ordinary family. Voldemort was still adjusting to the idea of even being a fake-father to any child, let alone one Harry had claimed for himself and who kept changing his appearance to look like their child. Harry had decided to take a leaf out of the Dursleys book: if they pretended they had no problems, then no problems would exist. Voldemort would spend time pretending that he was happy with a child, and Harry would pretend that life was sane, for a day at least. They were going for a picnic. They had food with a cooling charm on it, they had flasks of conjured tea, and Harry had a blanket slung over one arm, as he cuddled Teddy against his chest with the other.

Unfortunately, Harry was anything but ordinary.

Harry wasn’t sure where he was, as Voldemort had apparated them to a seemingly randomly picked park. When he found a spot that looked pleasant, but where the sun’s rays could still reach, he handed the blanket to the Dark Lord. “Lay it here, would you?” He asked, shifting Teddy in his arms. Pain shot through his stomach, nothing too painful, but it was discomforting nonetheless, and Harry shifted Teddy again. It had been happening on and off for the past week, this cramping pain, and the occasional morning where Harry had fled from the bed to vomit in the basin or the toilet or a bucket, whichever he reached first.

He and Voldemort had continued to keep separate bedrooms, and the Dark Lord had made no attempt to seduce Harry again, and so he remained unaware of Harry’s illness.

But the pain was starting to make him feel sick now, and his vision started to blur a little around the edges. Without a word, Harry thrust the child at the stunned Wizard. Acting on instinct, Voldemort reached for the boy, holding him awkwardly under the arms, as Harry pitched forward and vomited across their picnic blanket.

“Harry?” Voldemort questioned, sounding panicked. He couldn’t do anything with a child in his arms, but he was more worried about his lover than he was the baby, so he laid Teddy gently in the grass and knelt by Harry’s side.

“I feel sick,” the boy said unnecessarily. Then he slipped into unconsciousness.

Voldemort tried to keep calm, he tried to think reasonably, tried to be sensible and logical and cold. But he could do nothing but wonder if Harry was going to die. It was fate, he decided cynically, as two of his Death Eaters appeared and took the child back to Malfoy Manor. Voldemort Apparated Harry to St Mungos, uncaring that they were in a Muggle park, and Muggles might have seen them vanish. This was his fate, he thought again, as the medical staff ran tests on his lover. He was fated to never be happy. He was fated to loose Anathema. Again.

He glanced at the boy lying unconscious in the bed and he whispered so that only he could hear. “I should have told you I loved you, Ana.”

“My Lord,” one Wizard said hesitantly, unsure of how to approach the silent Dark Lord.

“What is it?” Voldemort asked, though he didn’t really want to know. Anathema was going to die again, before his eyes once more, but this time at least it would not be at his hands. Still, Voldemort had no desire to know what was about to kill his Harry. 1

XXX

July 31st 1998.

Harry slept through the rest of that evening. When he woke, he was in Voldemort’s bedroom at Malfoy Manor and it was his eighteenth birthday. Voldemort was perched on the end of the large bed, at Harry’s feet, with one hand lightly running across the duvet. Harry smiled as Voldemort looked up at him, though he was frowning.

“Sorry about that,” Harry said, shrugging as if him being injured wasn’t a big deal. “It’s never been that bad before, so I didn’t think it would ruin our plans. We can go today if you like. I’ll have a house-elf bring some food, or you can and I’ll grab Teddy and-” Voldemort raised his hand, and Harry obediently fell silent.

“You’re pregnant.” Voldemort stated flatly. He didn’t look away from Harry’s face, even though the boy lowered his gaze to his stomach, hands patting softly against the flat expanse of belly. Harry’s face was swamped with emotions, ranging from momentary fear, to worry, to excitement and joy and happiness, to love, and back to fear again as he looked up at the Dark Lord. They both remembered Anathema, pregnant and excited, moments from sharing his news with Tom before he was stabbed to death, as Tom tried to kill the baby. Harry’s fingers spread across his stomach, trying to cover as much of it as he could beneath the blankets and his clothes, wanting to protect his unborn child. He swallowed heavily, wondering and waiting for Voldemort to do something.

Would he kill this child too?

“There are a variety of choices to consider, Harry.” Voldemort’s tone hadn’t changed at all, still flat and emotionless; clinical, as if he were a doctor speaking to an unknown patient. Some stranger, who didn’t care at all what Harry chose; just some guy who had drawn the short straw and was being made to give this speech, repeating everything the medi-Wizard had told him, but not really caring.

But, Harry thought, at least he wasn’t angry.

“You could put the child up for adoption, though it would be best to lie about the child’s paternity. It would be cruel if they child was shunned or abused because I fathered it.” Harry’s mouth dropped open. He had half expected Voldemort to refuse to be listed as the baby’s father, but to tell Harry to simply give it away? However, Voldemort was talking again and Harry was too shocked to interrupt. “There is a potion you could take of course. It would freeze the foetus in place, it would never move or grow or live. Many people choose this instead of an abortion but there are side effects. The medi-Wizard said that many women feel continuous nausea, but there are potions for that too. Or you could simply abort the child! Going through with the pregnancy and the labour only to give the child away seems frivolous, and there are simpler solutions, two of which I’ve mentioned.”

Harry swallowed back a gasp. He should have expected this really. After the way Tom had reacted to Anathema’s pregnancy, why would Harry have considered that Voldemort would be happy with his pregnancy, the way Harry was? Voldemort didn’t want this child. Voldemort could barely tolerate Teddy: he paid attention to Teddy for Harry’s sake.

“You killed his child,” Harry whispered, sliding across the bed away from Voldemort. “And now you want me to kill mine?”

“Then give it away!” Voldemort shouted. He jumped up off of the bed, pacing angrily, as Harry watched him warily. He didn’t like that Harry would look at him in such a manner; wariness, fear, uncertainty, all painted across the boy’s lovely face. And those hands, that had held him and touched him, were pressed firmly to Harry’s stomach, hiding it from Voldemort’s eyes. “I have no need for this child, Harry, I don’t need an heir. I still have one Horcrux left and I don’t intend to let Nagini be harmed, nor do I anticipate the loss of my own life.” He fell silent for a moment, thinking of his fears and his desires, and wondering which was stronger. “I have never wanted a child.”

“That’s a lie!” Harry hissed. He was crouching on the bed now, back against the headboard, with his legs tensed under him. He was ready to jump out of the way, to run and hide, if Voldemort attempted to hurt him. “You said, you said you wanted this; a family. We can be a family! We’ll just have one more child and I’ll be fat for a while but you can be all protective and domineering and I can keep pretending to hate it cause if I didn’t you’d stop and-”

“Pregnancies kill people.”

Harry nearly missed it. It was said so quietly that the boy had thought Voldemort was merely letting out another of his patented aggravated sighs; he had nearly kept rambling, trying to justify the continued existence of his baby. But they were words, Voldemort had spoken, real words, with real meaning, and Harry nearly started crying as he finally identified the crux of Voldemort’s aversion to his pregnancy. His and Anathema’s both. Voldemort was afraid of them leaving him, whether for the child, or because death would take them, as He took Tom Riddle’s own mother.

Harry relaxed into the bed again, shifting forward so that he was within Voldemort’s reach. It took everything he had to force himself to hold still as Voldemort reached out a hand towards him, settling it lightly over Harry’s own hands which still covered his stomach. This man, who had moments ago talked of killing their child, was now rubbing lightly at the skin that protected it, him or her, with a sadness about him that made Harry pity him more than fear him.

“That was years ago, Voldemort. Years, and years; things have changed since then. Medicine is better, and we have magic too,” Harry added, solemnly, because of course Merope didn’t. “The medical staff at St Mungos won’t let anything happen to me, I’ve never even heard of someone dying there anyway! And I want this baby; I want to love this baby.” Harry paused, as Voldemort pushed lightly against his stomach as if trying to feel the parasite that dwelled within. Harry took his hands away from his own body, grabbing onto Voldemort’s free hand instead. “I want to love this baby… and you… but you need to give me the chance. Please don’t take my chance away?”

The Dark Lord’s breath caught in his throat. “Say it,” he breathed, unable to believe this was happening.

“I love you.” Harry whispered back. They both knew he was lying, but Voldemort tilted his head back revelling in the sound of the words and the ache they created in his chest.

“Say it again,” Voldemort ordered. He continued to pet Harry’s stomach and hold his hand even as he climbed onto the bed beside his lover.

“I love you,” Harry lied, his face blank and guilt the furthest thing from his mind. Voldemort knew he was lying; he wasn’t doing anything wrong by lying to the man. Voldemort knew. Voldemort understood.

“Say it again,” the Dark Lord’s voice broke as he spoke this time, a horrible whimper left his throat, and Harry had to close his eyes this time so he wouldn’t see what kind of expression crossed Voldemort’s face as he whispered ‘I love you’ again. “You will say it, once every day until I tell you otherwise. Do you understand?” The hand pressed harder against Harry’s flat stomach, and the boy took the warning as it was meant.

“You want me to lie to you?” He should have been angry or resentful, but Harry understood that fear made people act in incomprehensible, abhorrent ways sometimes. If there was anything Voldemort feared, it was death, and Harry understood that even with the Hallows there might still be ways for him to die. This pregnancy might be one of them, though Harry doubted it, but Voldemort’s fear was strong; a potent force of poison within the man’s mind, and Harry was afraid of the things Voldemort would do to fight his fear. “I love you.”

They sat like that in silence, as Voldemort did not request Harry to repeat the sentence again, and Harry didn’t see the point of lying unnecessarily. After a moment, Voldemort left the bed. He walked towards one of the dresser-drawers within his room, and pulled something out of the drawers. Harry recognized it immediately; it was his photo album. For one horrible second, Harry thought Voldemort would destroy it, as some sort of twisted vengeance for Harry becoming pregnant in the first place, but instead Voldemort silently handed it over.

“Happy birthday, Harry.”

Harry nodded his thanks, not looking away from the pages he was flicking through, and missed the fond smile Voldemort bestowed upon him. If Hermione had seen it she would have known what it meant, and if Harry had seen it he would have compared it to the way Tom used to look at Anathema, even though he had struggled to say the words out loud. But Harry didn’t see it, and Voldemort still wasn’t able to say it, and so the moment passed unmentioned.

Harry gasped, his hand coming up to cover his mouth. He stopped flicking through the pages, pausing on one page in particular. The caption read “July 1980: Lily, James and Harry Potter”, but where the picture should have been, the picture Voldemort had burnt, was one of Tom and Anathema in their school uniforms. It was black and white, one of those grainy old fashioned ones, but they both looked so happy, so in love. Harry reached out to stroke Tom’s cheek, but the picture didn’t move like the rest of the ones in the album and so he stopped. Instead he looked over at Lord Voldemort, who was watching his calmly.

“Thank you.” Harry said at last.

Because while many would have taken it as a dig or an insult, Harry understood what Voldemort was trying to achieve. He was attempting to replace the family he’d stolen with another. Him and Tom… and now their baby.

Voldemort nodded his head, accepting the gratitude graciously, and then he left the room. When he returned, he had Teddy pressed to his chest, and he lay the boy carefully in the centre of the bed, so that Harry could reach him but he wouldn’t fall off the edge. Correction, Harry thought with a soft smile, glancing lovingly at the baby boy. Tom, and him, and two babies.

XXX

1 - Bear in mind how badly Tom overreacted the last time this happened!

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Thanks for reading, and if you are reading please leave a review. Go on: it’s almost finished! And now, I have to go finish The Abyss, but after that I have my next multi-chaptered fiction semi-planned out. It’s also LV/HP and it’s called Through the Looking Glass so keep an eye out! Though, it would be nice if someone would make me a banner for it, grins!

Words: 3,801
Chapter 16
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