"Snakeskin." (Harry Potter) G
Title: Snakeskin. (On Archive Of Our Own)
Author:
lannamichaels
Fandom: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Series: Snakeskin
Rating: G
A/N: Note: in this fic, Voldemort kills Harry along with James and Lily. When he tries to kill Harry, the spell bounces, causes a magical bodyswap, and then the ricochet hits Voldemort's body, which has Harry inside it. Voldemort is stuck in Harry's body and grows up in Harry Potter's life. This is not possession and Harry isn't in the body along with him.
Summary: "I don't care, Aunt Petunia," said Voldemort. Or: Lord Voldemort starts over.
1.
Lord Voldemort raised his wand. He cast the spell the same way he had done countless times. Green light spilled from his wand and--
--something bounced.
Lord Voldemort looked down at himself, at his child's pajamas, at his small fists, at his short legs. He looked across the room at his body, lying prone and dead on the ground. Voldemort had heard of spells that could do this, but he hadn't cast any of them, and young Harry Potter certainly hadn't. What could possibly have caused this?
He had brought Death Eaters with him, but they had all been killed by the Potters. With the Fidelius broken, Dumbledore should be by shortly. There was no time to figure out what had happened. Voldemort had to Apparate, he had to call his Death Eaters, he had to get to his wand. There was no time--
But, he realized slowly, wouldn't he have all the time he needed?
He had defeated the Potters, not the other way around. No one, not even Dumbledore, would look inside a child to find Lord Voldemort. It was the perfect hiding place. And it could be, he decided, breathing hard to pull air into a child's lungs, the greatest gift he could have been given. His body had been damaged by some of the spells he had tried, but now he had a new one. Why try to reverse this?
And even if he could, he was out of time. He could hear people approaching. Even if he could switch back eventually, he couldn't do it now. That path was closing rapidly.
But strategies changed. Plans changed. The mark of greatness was knowing how to adapt. He was in no danger now. No one would suspect anything. There was no need to rush when his enemies would do all of the work for him. The Potters had given him another chance and he would take it.
He wondered what his Death Eaters would make of his supposed death. He wondered if they would squander this opportunity. Voldemort would certainly not squander his.
Footsteps thundered in the hallway, reinforcements shouting for the Potters. Voldemort opened up his new mouth and began to scream for his mother.
2.
Voldemort had never given a moment's thought to the contingency plans that the Potters would have put into place for the custody of their son. If he had, Voldemort would not have expected the Dursleys. But the Potters were all dead, and the boy's godfather had been known to be their Secret Keeper. Black would no doubt be sentenced to Azkaban for betraying them. And so Harry Potter went to his mother's sister's family, the most ordinary muggles Voldemort had experienced since his own childhood.
They were not the true sadists of his orphanage. Petunia and Vernon attempted to force Voldemort to sleep in a cupboard, but some wandless magic quickly convinced them of the foolishness of that idea. Within a month, his purported aunt and uncle were scared enough of him to treat him properly. His muggle brat of a cousin was too young to be immediately useful, but as he grew older, he matured properly into a loyal follower.
At the muggle school they sent him to, Voldemort contemplated magic. If any of the children thought him odd, Dudley's fists soon convinced them otherwise. The teachers found him a perfect student, as teachers usually did.
The question Voldemort considered in those long days behind a desk, ignoring his surroundings, was what had happened that night. He had known it could be a trap, but it was too tempting a target to leave to a mere Death Eater. The Potters had become an annoyance and Pettigrew had given him the key to their location. The parents had put up a reasonable fight. But the boy-- what had the boy done? What could the boy have done? Voldemort had never heard of any accidental magic that could have done what the boy did, and the boy had been much too young to learn any spells. It couldn't have been young Harry Potter who defeated Lord Voldemort.
What kind of magical protection could the Potters have swaddled their son in? What treasures had the Potters kept hidden from the magical world? Voldemort had done an overview of his new body when he had been rescued from the destroyed house, but he had noticed nothing more than the usual assortment of tricks that any worried parent might place on a toddler. Voldemort would have noticed any mysterious magical artifacts before he had killed the boy. What could have happened?
He couldn't figure it out sitting in a muggle school. He needed to do real research and he couldn't do that here. He could only go in circles, wondering.
But, in all, it wasn't so bad. His muggle relatives gave him a safe place to lie low and, if they didn't also give him news of the magical world, they also didn't interfere with him. Every so often, a wizard would stop Voldemort in the street and congratulate him on defeating the Dark Lord. Every so often, Voldemort would spot one of Dumbledore's chosen fanatics watching him. No one suspected.
Voldemort knew he would re-enter the magical world when he went to Hogwarts. He would see then what had happened. He would plan accordingly.
This was, after all, not the defeat of Lord Voldemort. It was, in a way, his greatest triumph. He had clung onto life so strongly that he had been granted a new body, one free from any evil associations. He could do whatever he pleased.
And for now, what he pleased was watching Dudley and his gang entertain him, while he idly twirled a stick between his fingers and wondered what kind of wand Ollivander would provide him this time.
3.
Harry Potter's Hogwarts letter arrived right on schedule. Petunia handed it to Voldemort, her lips pursed and thin.
"Is that the school letter you were expecting?" Vernon asked with forced cheer.
"Yes, it's the same school as my mother," Voldemort said. He had never known if his mother had gone to Hogwarts or had been taught privately at home. Either way, it had not saved her life. It had not saved her from his father. It had not saved her from death.
Something had saved Voldemort from death, but he didn't know if Hogwarts had anything to do with it at all. He doubted it.
"Can I go to Hogwarts, too?" Dudley asked, and Vernon looked terrified.
"No, you're a muggle," Voldemort told him. "I imagine you'll be going to the same school as your father."
"Yes, he will," Vernon said, relieved. "Wonderful place, Smeltings. Some of the best years of my life were there."
"Did Aunt Lily like Hogwarts?" Dudley asked Petunia.
Voldemort imagined that most of Lily Potter's best years of her life were in Hogwarts, too. She hadn't been out of Hogwarts for all that long when he had killed her.
"She did," Petunia said. "Harry, when do you want to go get your school things? We'll make a day of it."
"I don't care, Aunt Petunia," said Voldemort.
4.
Diagon Alley hadn't changed very much since Voldemort last stood there. This time, he was trailing three muggles. They went to Gringotts, where the Dursleys exchanged money and Petunia produced a key that had come by a separate owl. "We'll pay for your school things ourselves, of course," Petunia said nervously. "But you should see what you have here. But if you need money in school," she trailed off.
"I'll let you know," Voldemort said. The Dursleys had been very generous with his allowance. Voldemort had no intention of bankrupting them while he still needed them, but after his first childhood, it had been pleasant to want for nothing that money could buy an eager child. His clothes had always been new. He had never gone to bed hungry. He had never walked out of a bookstore empty handed.
Voldemort surveyed the Potter vault. Now that was something he'd be happy to drain dry. It was nothing less than what they deserved for standing against him.
The trip to Ollivander's went badly, but Voldemort left with a new wand and had only had to use the lightest of wandless persuasion charms on old Ollivander. The new wand was yew, like his old one, but the core was a dragon's heart string. It seemed odd that, having died and lived as he had, that his new wand held no phoenix feather, but Voldemort now had the power of a dragon at his fingertips and he had no complaints about that. Yes, this would do nicely.
5.
"If you do not put me in Slytherin," Voldemort pleasantly told the Sorting Hat, "I will unravel you and use you as flooring for the Owlery."
The Sorting Hat stopped in mid-word. "SLYTHERIN," it screamed.
6.
Lucius had a brat, how delightful.
It took even less time to tame Draco than it had Dudley. Oh, dear. Coming out poorly in comparison to a muggle, Malfoy? How... ordinary.
The other first year Slytherins fell in line. He bided his time with the rest of his House. No one but an eleven year old would follow another eleven year old. He needed time to plan and that time was given to him on a silver platter.
Whispers soon followed him. Harry Potter was a bully, how like his father. Harry Potter was a genius, how like his mother. Harry Potter was powerful, but he had defeated the Dark Lord, so of course he was. Harry Potter was effortlessly brilliant and effortlessly terrifying. There was probably something very wrong with him.
After two months in school, Severus asked Harry Potter to stay behind after class and peered into his eyes.
Severus blinked first.
"Do you need anything more, Professor?" Voldemort asked.
'I need to know how you did this,' Severus thought, not so loudly as to be intentionally heard, but that was Severus. He always kicked and screamed and pretended to have principles. Voldemort had found him amusing, for a time.
When Severus hit him with a bevy of anti-possession spells, Voldemort stood there and took them. Then he looked Severus in the eye and slowly smiled.
Severus paled. He bowed.
"This is our little secret, Professor," Voldemort said. "Isn't it?"
"The Headmaster will--"
Voldemort brushed away the concern. "He won't care enough to even ask."
7.
What would the Headmaster want with someone like Harry Potter anyway? Dumbledore had more demands on his time than one child, no matter what rumors were being spread about him. Dumbledore's only contact with Voldemort was to give him James Potter's invisibility cloak for Christmas. And even then, Dumbledore didn't even do him the courtesy of returning it in person.
A wizard like Voldemort didn't need an invisibility cloak, but he allowed the other Slytherins to borrow it when they asked. He was generous with his favors. If they pleased him, then why shouldn't they have their little mischiefs? He hadn't kept too tight a rein on his Death Eaters and it had paid off handsomely. It was true that he'd always had to watch his back, that every Death Eater was only as loyal as their confidence in their ability to betray him and live, but he wouldn't expect otherwise. If he wanted a mindlessly loyal follower, that was what the Imperius curse was for. Lord Voldemort was known as a cruel man, but he rewarded creativity. Within limits, of course.
His Slytherins learned his limits. His class flourished under his leadership. Anyone who tried to hex him was made an example of, and he didn't need to make too many examples. Even the seventh years eventually learned to stay out of his way.
Voldemort went home for all school holidays. It wouldn't do to let the Dursleys forget him. Dudley was growing up very nicely and Voldemort began to wonder about the half-blood part of his heritage. He had always hated his muggle father, and so had made his choices in his first life accordingly, but Dudley... Dudley had potential. The possibilities inherent in Dudley were eye-opening. Maybe this time, there would be a muggle component to his plans. He'd always known that muggles outnumbered them and, in those numbers, could overpower them.
Maybe it was time to work both sides of the problem.
8.
Despite all his efforts with Severus, the Dark Mark remained inert. "It's almost as if the Dark Lord is dead," Severus sneered.
"Defeated by Harry Potter, or so I'm told," Voldemort said, stabbing harder at the bend of Severus's elbow. The Mark didn't respond to him. Voldemort wondered if his old wand still would.
He wondered where his old wand was. No doubt Dumbledore had it, or it had been snapped to pieces and fed to flames.
"It's a pity that no one would believe any upstart claiming your name was really you," Severus said.
That presumed Voldemort intended to keep his name. The problems of the name Tom Riddle had turned out to be unfixable. Over time, Voldemort had even come to resent his rearranged name based off of it. It had taken barely a decade of using his new name before he had started insisting that his followers refer to him simply as their lord. If he had to change his name for his second rise to power, Voldemort wouldn't mourn the loss. It would take him even further away from that muggle filth that had hurt his mother. Harry Potter was the name of a wizard. If Voldemort chose to take it up, it was fine as it was. It didn't need to be changed.
"I've already made a new start with my Slytherins," Voldemort said. "Why should I bother with you dregs who all surrendered and betrayed me? I should make you grovel and beg, Professor."
"Some of us went to Azkaban," Severus said lightly.
"And none have had the wit to break out," Voldemort said. "When one of them can, then I'll take them back. I have no need for old cowards, old fools, or old prisoners."
"You want schoolchildren when you already have seasoned wizards who would die for you?" Severus asked.
Voldemort looked at him. "The ones who would die for me already have."
Severus looked away first.
"I've seen the measure of all my followers," Voldemort said. "Consider yourself lucky that I still have use for a double agent, Professor."
"Why do you fear Dumbledore?" Severus did not dare ask him.
Voldemort considered the question anyway. Dumbledore could have saved him from suffering as a child and chose not to. Some of his fear likely stemmed from that childhood conditioning. Still, that wasn't any of Severus's concern. "He has powers that none of you will ever reach. He'll have to be taken down by trickery, not a direct attack. If you want to prove yourself to me, Severus, you could consider that an assignment."
Severus opened his mouth. Voldemort silenced him.
"Your actions will answer me," Voldemort said. "Nothing else will."
9.
The Chamber was opened only once. Voldemort called his pet to him and asked it who freed it. He tracked down his missing diary and placed it beneath his invisibility cloak for safe keeping.
He'd have to speak with Lucius one of these days about his misplaced sense of initiative. A man who had pleaded the Imperius should not be wasting the relics that Voldemort had entrusted him with.
One day, Voldemort would demand them back. He hoped, for Draco's sake, that Lucius would not fail the inventory.
10.
It was a shame that the man who escaped from Azkaban was not actually one of Voldemort's followers. Voldemort considered allowing Sirius Black to join him. Instead, he nudged Draco forward.
"Kill your cousin for me," he whispered. Draco raised his wand arm and, shakily, obeyed. It took him several tries, but he obeyed.
Voldemort smiled at his Slytherins arrayed behind him. "Which of you would like to take care of Pettigrew for me?"
There was some nervous shuffling and more than one student looked at the naked man's arm.
"Too scared to kill a Death Eater?" Voldemort asked. "You shouldn't be. Lord Voldemort is dead, but I," he smirked, "am alive. You should be much more scared of me than of him."
"I'll do it, Harry," said Millicent Bulstrode. It took her two fewer attempts than it had Draco. Voldemort would have to reward her for it.
"Well done," Voldemort told her.
11.
"There's going to be some changes now," Voldemort told them afterwards. "If any of you want to turn coward, do it now."
"If anyone turns coward, he has a giant snake in the basement," said Theo Nott.
Voldemort flicked his fingers at him. "One time only, an amnesty," Voldemort said. "Any takers?"
12.
When the Goblet of Fire spat out Harry Potter's name, the Slytherin table went abruptly silent.
"Is he--" "Are you--"
Voldemort stood up. Severus caught up to him quickly and whispered in his ear, "what are you doing?"
"Did you put my name in, Professor?" Voldemort asked him.
"Of course not," Severus said. "I would never be so stupid."
"Someone was," Voldemort said. "You know how I like to play with my food."
Severus glared at him.
"Karkaroff will die before the end of the year," Voldemort told him. "If you want to join him, you are welcome to. Otherwise, get out of my way."
13.
"What did you hope to gain, Crouch?" Severus asked the Defense professor. Voldemort sat behind Severus's desk. Crouch looked between them, his lips pulled back.
"I can't believe you would leave our lord to follow an infant," Crouch said. "I'm going to resurrect the Dark Lord--"
Voldemort couldn't hold back the laughter. "Already been done," he said.
Crouch blinked.
"What was your plan?" Voldemort asked him. "Some cauldron over the grave I never got?" He leaned forward. "Did you manage to find my wand?"
"I don't believe you," Crouch said.
Voldemort looked to Severus. "You were right. But," he added, "so was I."
"He escaped from Azkaban," Severus noted.
"Yes, but he also entered me into an inconvenient tournament that I had every intention of simply ignoring," Voldemort said. "Add that to the insult of daring to take the Defense professorship when it was denied to me... no, Professor, I don't think I'll take this one back either."
Crouch's fingers twitched in a poor attempt at wandless magic, but it fizzled out, useless against the spells that Severus had placed on him before alerting Voldemort.
"Where is the real Moody?" Voldemort asked Severus.
"Kept captive in a trunk," Severus said.
"How nice. Dumbledore won't even need to hire a mid-year replacement professor. I know he'll be relieved." Voldemort lifted his chin. "Barty, do you have any last words?"
"You are not my lord," Crouch said.
"Indeed," Voldemort replied. "I'm not."
14.
Voldemort ignored the Yule Ball and went home for Christmas. Dudley was eager to show him everything he'd learned.
"Aunt Petunia, Uncle Vernon," Voldemort said. "I'm taking part in a tournament at school. I'd love it if you would come to the final task. Most of my friends haven't met any muggles before. I want them to have a good first impression."
"Y-you want us to come to your magic school?" Vernon asked.
"I'll send you the date by letter once I know it," Voldemort said. "My Head of House will arrange transportation."
Voldemort placed last in the tournament. He was only a fourth year. Who would expect a fourth year to win, especially one who hadn't wanted to enter? He had no need for that prize. He was after a much bigger one.
His Slytherins did very well when they met the Dursleys. Voldemort expected nothing less.
15.
As the older Slytherins graduated, they asked him for his plans. He told them all to continue on as if he had never existed. "What we have is time," he would tell them. "What you need to have is patience."
They wanted orders. He gave them none. They wanted his mark. He gave them none.
"I'm not your lord," he would tell them. "I haven't even done my OWLs yet. I'm not accepting any followers until I can grow facial hair. Go away. Live your lives. But," he would add, "when I call, I will expect you to answer."
They always seemed so relieved when he said that. He didn't know why. Plenty of them hated him. Plenty of them had dreamed of ruling Slytherin, of gaining power to their own name. They were eager to follow him so that they could stab him in the back and steal what he had won.
Ask the Death Eaters how well that had worked. Ask the Death Eaters if they had scavenged anything from what had remained behind.
His first attempt, Voldemort knew, had been an utter failure. Defeated by a child, what an ignoble end. But he had been given a second chance and he was going to be better. There would be no going back to his old name. He would take the name that came with the body. A new start, a clean slate, a new purpose. He would shed his past like a snake shed its skin. It was time to become someone else. It was time to become someone who would succeed.
Harry Potter drew his wand and pointed it at the cowering Death Eater. "Avada Kedavra."
This entry was originally posted at https://lannamichaels.dreamwidth.org/1214018.html.