[From Samhain to the Solstice]; Pride and Power, R, Harry/Tom, sequel to Earning His Notice, 1/3
Title: Pride and Power
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Pairings: Tom Riddle/Harry, a few mentions of Albus Dumbledore/Gellert Grindelwald
Content Notes: Angst, violence, time travel, mildly dubious consent
Rating: R
Wordcount: This part 4300
Summary: Harry, stuck in the past and asked by Dumbledore to infiltrate the ranks of Riddle’s proto-Death Eaters, is also being courted by Riddle himself, and by the Aurors, and by a couple of people who might not have anything to do with them. Harry struggles to hold onto his sense of himself and reality in the midst of all this. Sequel to “Earning His Notice.”
Author’s Notes: Make sure that you read “Earning His Notice” first, or you won’t have much idea what’s going on. This is the first part of one of my “From Samhain to the Solstice” fics-stories I’m posting between Halloween and December 21st. This will have three parts, to be posted today, tomorrow, and Friday.
Pride and Power
“I want you to at least consider the Aurors.”
Harry felt the sharp ripple of distaste travel up his back as he realized that Riddle was staring at him again. He shook his head and aimed a curse that cleaved the dummy they were facing in half. This manor house that Riddle kept inviting him to had so many dueling rooms that it was never the same one twice. “Why? I’m happy working in Ophelia’s shop. And I know that you must have a few people inside the Auror trainee classes already.”
“Yes. But none with as much interest from the Ministry itself as you’ve generated.”
“It’s mistaken interest. It’ll wear off in a little while.”
“Do you say that about anyone who has an interest in you?”
“When it’s based solely on my magical power.” Harry gave Riddle a nasty smile and purposely focused on the next dummy marching into place, ignoring the distracting flash of both their reflections in the mirror off to the side. Harry had no idea why that was there. Some duelists liked to pose before they began fighting, he supposed.
“I wonder.”
That was all the warning Harry had before the floor abruptly opened in several places and more dummies came whipping out. They were made of iron instead of the cloth and straw Harry had battled so far. They were also twice the size. The holes closed behind them, and with a clanking and robotic motion, they turned to focus on Harry.
Harry’s eyes narrowed. Then he waved his wand at the floor, casting a nonverbal Transfiguration that he’d used a few times in Hogwarts to stop Slytherins from bullying younger Gryffindors or Hufflepuffs.
The floor promptly turned to ice. The dummies took one step forwards, and began to fall and slip and slide.
Harry turned, making sure from the corner of one eye that Riddle was standing back and watching instead of joining the battle, and yelled, “Confringo!”
The mirror shattered into a series of flying pieces. Harry used another spell to grab control of them from the air, and then he turned and sent them flying towards the iron dummies, which were still struggling to get back to their feet.
The pieces of glass shattered smaller and smaller as Harry concentrated on them, and then he Transfigured them into heavy stones, which he dumped on the ice around the dummies. After a bit of sliding, the stones stayed in place-but the dummies were also almost all the way back to their feet, using their blunt “hands” to keep themselves from slipping again.
That was okay. Harry only intended to use the stones as anchors, not weapons.
“Cavea lucis!” he cried.
His wand flew, tracing the patterns he wanted among the stones, and lines of light sprang up between them, draping in a cage over the top of the stones that looked a lot like a tent. It also looked fragile. But when the first dummy pressed against it, the cage only bent so far before it sprang back, glowing furiously. Harry chuckled a little as he watched the six dummies doing their best to get out of the cages. They wouldn’t manage it.
“Beyond impressive.”
Riddle’s voice was right next to him. Harry flinched, unable to help it, and stumbled back a step. Riddle’s hand steadied him before he could step onto the part of the floor he’d Transfigured into ice.
“Er,” Harry said. He shook his head to get a ringing out of his ears. Then again, it was hard for his head not to ring when Riddle was staring at him like that.
“You battled them exactly right,” Riddle said, over the crunching sound of the iron dummies trying to walk around on the ice and the sizzling sound as their hands struck the cage of light. He didn’t appear interested in releasing Harry’s shoulder, even when Harry shrugged at him. “But how did you know the right tactics?”
“It seemed obvious.”
“Yet none of my followers managed the right tactics in such a small amount of time.”
“Well, I mean-iron would be hard to cut. And I know that dummies like these don’t stop if you only cut off part of them, and smashing them down all the way would be even harder. And I can’t conjure fire hot enough to melt iron.”
“All of that,” Riddle said softly, “reasoned out within a few seconds. And you slowed them down, as well, using their weight, which is usually a deadly weapon, against them.” His hand tightened, and he stepped towards Harry, tracing his fingers down behind Harry’s ear, as he was fond of doing. It hadn’t stopped being effective. Harry shivered and then tore himself away.
“Do you not see how remarkable you are? How people are interested in you for more than your sheer power?”
Harry took a deep breath and shook his head. “Listen, Riddle, you didn’t know anything about the kind of dueling or thinking I can do until after my fight with Malfoy. No, it’s power that attracts them.” He turned away, disquieted. The burn in Riddle’s eyes became more ravenous all the time.
Harry had accepted that he thought Riddle, in this state that was so much like the diary shade, was handsome. It was stupid for him to feel that way, but it was his own private stupidity. And he knew, from rumors that had swirled around Hogwarts in the seventh year he’d attended in this time, that Riddle was certainly not above using his beauty to seduce and fill his bed, or his pockets, or his ranks, or all three.
Riddle had no right to be looking at him like that, as if Harry was attractive to him. Harry knew he was still skinnier and shorter than normal, even in 1946, and his hair was a mess. Riddle couldn’t be interested in sleeping with him. No.
“There may be one more call from the Aurors.”
Harry felt his shoulders relax. “Just one? Then it’ll be easier for me to go back to my actual job.” That job, working at Ophelia’s apothecary shop, got harder when Aurors wanted to drop in for a “cup of tea and a chat.”
“It may be that they’ll have more information about you.”
Harry felt a prickling speed up and down his spine that had nothing to do with the pleasure Riddle often stirred in him. He glanced over his shoulder, frowning. “What do you mean?” The first, stupid suspicion that had occurred to him was that the Aurors now knew he was a time traveler, which would mess everything up.
“It may be,” Riddle said, leaning his shoulder on the wall and appreciating Harry with his eyes, “that some of them will learn about the results of the duels we’ve been staging here.”
“You wanker. What-you can’t force me into being an Auror!”
Riddle only smiled, although those same rumors at Hogwarts said that he’d never forgive even one of his followers who talked to him like that. “Not force. I would never be that crass. But to have someone else make you an offer you can’t refuse? Why not, Harry?” His voice lingered on Harry’s name, caressing it.
“I don’t want to be an Auror!” And it was true. Harry might have wanted to if he was still in his own time, but he’d never got the chance to enter training there. And this time, when it was still reeling from the war with Grindelwald and people acted like raw power and pure blood were all that mattered, was even less attractive.
“It would help me.”
“I don’t care enough about your cause to sacrifice my time and freedom for it.”
Riddle only smiled at him again. “You’re more impressive than you know, Harry,” he said, moving away from the wall and past Harry. Harry watched his hands, and he would have sworn that Riddle never reached towards him, and especially he would have sworn that Riddle didn’t touch him. Yet a fleeting warm sensation brushed his skin anyway.
“Consider carefully.”
The only thing I’m considering right now is all the reasons I can’t bury a knife in your back, you sadistic prick.
*
“I would like you to join the Aurors, Harry.”
Harry set down the cup hard enough to earn a “tsk” from Albus. But he didn’t care about that right now. “What? Why?”
“Because it would serve us well to have you seem to go along with Riddle’s plans for the moment. And it would serve us well to have a spy in the Aurors.” Albus settled on the small chair in the back of Ophelia’s shop with a sigh. “You know that the Aurors were ineffective against Grindelwald’s forces?”
“Well, yes. But I also thought they didn’t really fight them?”
“Some of the British Aurors went to join with Continental forces who did. And they came back not energetic or respectful or thoughtful, but terrified. The Ministry is already regressing, Harry. I can see it. They’ve convinced themselves that if they do nothing to attract the attention of another Dark Lord, another one will never arise.”
Harry groaned and buried his head in his hands. He knew exactly what kind of stupid bloody thinking that was, and he could see how it pointed the way for a bunch of things. The way Fudge had acted, denying Voldemort’s return. The way that Aurors had been authorized to use the Unforgivables, because Merlin forbid that they learn some other spells or effective ways to fight Dark wizards.
“I’ve changed the timeline so much already,” he muttered to himself.
“I’m afraid that you must change it more.” Albus reached out and squeezed his hand. “I would not ask this of you if I did not think it the very best position you could be in to serve our cause as well as seeming to serve Riddle’s, Harry. He will trust you more when you seem to be agreeing with him against your own will. He will assume you are more prideful and ambitious than you actually are, and that is also an advantage.”
“And I’ll learn the kinds of tactics that might help me take the Death Eaters down.”
“There is that. I am sorry to ask it of you.”
“That never stopped you from asking it anyway.”
Albus winced a little, but he nodded. “That also is true. But at the same time, I can’t force you. I only ask that you consider it might be the best way forwards, not just the path of least resistance.”
Harry considered it. He’d hidden for so long, but he’d already thrown that away. And Albus had managed to point out things about the possible changes to the timeline that Harry hadn’t considered, like that history probably wasn’t that fragile.
And Harry had always intended to act to change the timeline anyway. He just hadn’t thought it would be this soon or this big.
“All right, sir,” he said. “I’ll do it.”
“Please call me Albus, Harry. I’ve told you that before. I’m no longer your Headmaster.”
“But you are my general. My leader.”
Albus looked honestly flustered for a second. Then he toasted Harry with his teacup. “That has a much more pleasant ring to it.”
*
“My Aurors have been telling me tales about you, Mr. Keller. Frankly, I’m not convinced.”
Harry just nodded, a little relieved for the sight of someone who treated him normally, not like he was bloody special just because he was more powerful than some people. Head Auror Jessica Greengrass studied him with deep-set grey eyes and then moved over to the other side of the dueling room. It reminded Harry of nothing so much as a walled and roofed version of the grounds at his Muggle primary school. The “floor” was dirt and stone. The walls had few objects on them: a few rings, a few chains, a few weapons. Harry understood the purpose even without Greengrass explaining it to him. There were few places to hide here and few weapons to wield. He would be judged on spells alone.
And if he just happened to come up weak or lacking in Greengrass’s eyes, that wouldn’t be his fault, would it? It would be proof that he wasn’t as special as Riddle and Albus thought.
“You understand dueling stances, Mr. Keller?”
“Not well, Auror Greengrass. I’m Muggleborn.”
She squinted at him. “Funny. For a moment I thought there was something familiar about your face and hair.”
Harry shrugged, unbothered. A few of the pure-bloods at Hogwarts had said the same thing to him. “I don’t know a lot about my father’s family, Auror Greengrass. But as far as I know, I’m purely Muggleborn.”
She accepted that, and walked over to the other side of the dueling room, turning around to face him. “Show me what you can do, Keller. The duel is to first incapacitation. Bow.”
Harry bowed, all right, but he also kept his eyes on Greengrass. He wasn’t surprised when she hurled a jinx at him from the middle of her bow. Harry ducked it, rolled, and came up on the other side of the room, casting the Whirlwind Charm.
Dust and small stones immediately blew up between them. Greengrass let out a sound that might have been a cough of surprise. Harry tensed and jumped to the side, and the Stunner missed him.
He added another Whirlwind Charm, plus a Shield Charm to keep the dust from blowing into his eyes, and muttered, “Saggita ignis.”
The air in front of him ignited, formed into an arrow, and flew through the winds at Auror Greengrass. Harry had chosen that particular spell because his charms couldn’t affect it. He put his back to the wall and waited for her response.
“Aguamenti! Motus!”
Harry didn’t worry about the first one; it was just her way of putting the Fire Arrow out. But a second later, the floor under him started to shake. Harry jumped up, grabbed one of the chains dangling from the wall, and climbed partway up so that he could throw more curses at her.
Auror Greengrass dodged the first two, but that put her in the path of Harry’s third, a brilliant purple hex that he’d found in one of the library books at Hogwarts. It threw her off her feet and made her heart beat too fast at the same time. It didn’t last as long as a Stunner, but the initial shock was worse.
Harry held onto the chain, ignored the pain in his arms, and waited as she writhed on the floor for a second. Then she threw a nonverbal Body-Bind at him.
Harry let go, dropped, and leaped again, out of the way of the pit that had opened beneath him. He filled the air with smoke and wind, then hurled a Stunner.
Auror Greengrass lay still. Harry eyed her cautiously. Maybe she’d actually been Stunned, but maybe she wasn’t.
Sure enough, Auror Greengrass stood up a second later. Harry poised his wand and started a silent incantation for a mobile Shield Charm that he could float in front of her and get in the way of her spells.
“Enough, Keller!”
Harry ended his incantation, but still kept eyeing her. She’d said they’d duel to first incapacitation, and that hadn’t happened yet.
“I can see why so many of my colleagues want to admit you as a trainee. You have power, yes, Keller, but you have something rarer than that.” Auror Greengrass pointed her wand at him, which made Harry’s back tighten. “Instinct. The ability to think on your feet. The ability to move back and forth without thinking about it, even. I would say this was a draw, which is bloody impressive for someone of mine. You belong in the Aurors.”
That was what you wanted, Harry reminded himself, around his sinking heart. What Albus asked of you. And Riddle will be pleased, so you can keep acting as though you’re doing what he says.
He made the right noises, and ignored, as best he could, the way Greengrass squinted sideways at him and muttered a few times, “Damn familiar face, damn familiar.”
*
“Do you doubt your prowess now, Keller?”
“You really wanted to say ‘Dare you doubt it now?’, right? I could hear that in your voice.”
Riddle laughed instead of getting angry with him. Harry swallowed his Firewhisky and leaned back in his chair. They were alone in yet another lavish dining room in yet another manor. Riddle either had more followers than Harry had thought, or his followers had more houses.
“I might say that. I might think it. You would ignore me and mock me for it, and that is as it should be.”
Harry just shook his head. “They must be really desperate for recruits if they took someone with a mediocre Hogwarts record and no known blood status.”
“Oh, yes, about that.”
Harry straightened up slowly. Riddle had that grin on his face that Harry distrusted more than any other, the grin that said he was about to throw a curse in some form Harry couldn’t dodge. “What is it? My lord.”
Even the sarcastic title didn’t make Riddle shy away from his terrible revelation. “You know that they need more Aurors because of the war with Grindelwald killing so many, but I would hardly say that makes them desperate. And, Harry.” He paused, then added, “Keller is inappropriate now.”
Harry narrowed his eyes and did his best not to show how much he was shaking by keeping still. “Yeah?”
“You should have claimed your blood status at once. A Potter half-blood? Much more to the point than a Muggleborn with a random surname. Much more useful. Much more to my taste.”
He hissed that last word, with enough sibilants to make Harry want to hex him, and stood. Harry just sat in place as he moved around the table. It wasn’t like this was unusual. Riddle loved to come up to him like this.
But the focused look on his face, the burning in his eyes-yeah, that was new.
Harry doubted he could lie to Riddle well enough to fool him even with the brooch that protected him from Riddle’s Legilimency, so he just tilted his head at him and sighed. “How did you find out?”
“Well, your looks are similar enough, of course. And there was Tristan Potter abruptly packed off for a jaunt around the world when he was barely out of Hogwarts. Whether he fathered you in Britain and that was the cause of the scandal, or he fathered you on the Continent-did you think I would discriminate against you for being illegitimate?”
Harry shook his head. “I wasn’t sure. And claiming to be Muggleborn would be less shaming for a family like the Potters than claiming their name.” There. All truths, without being the ultimate truth.
“Mmm.” Riddle’s hand slid up his arm. “It’s going to change matters with my Knights, of course. They won’t be as quick to insult you as they were when they thought you Muggleborn.”
“Then do you want to tell them? Since you said one of the things you were looking forward to was seeing a mere Muggleborn put them in their places.”
“I want to tell them because I want to see the look in their eyes when they realized they underestimated you.”
“Okay.” Harry nodded without reacting to the way Riddle’s hand had traveled to his shoulder. “Then we can do that whenever you want.”
“I also heard about your duel with Auror Greengrass. I’m not sure more dueling practice would benefit you.”
“Then what do you want me to do?”
“At the moment? Be quiet.”
Harry opened his mouth indignantly and found it nearly full of Riddle’s tongue. He gasped and tried to lean further back in his chair, bringing up the legs to press against Riddle’s and get him to back off, but Riddle only tightened his hand in Harry’s hair and kissed him harder, pulling the chair back to the floor.
Harry was trembling with shock and adrenaline and the need to break free. Riddle was a bloody good kisser, not wet like Cho, not almost mashing Harry’s lips flat like the one kiss he’d had at Hogwarts in this time. Warmth spread through his body and he went limp, leaning back, letting Riddle do-
No.
Harry coiled up his legs in the limited space between them and kicked Riddle in the chest. It wasn’t a great kick, considering the angle and how bloody stupidly hard he was, but he did it, and broke the kiss. Riddle staggered back, his eyes as wide as full moons.
Harry stood and got behind the chair to hide as much of his erection as he could. But Riddle’s knowing smile said he couldn’t hide his flushed cheeks, or the way his hands trembled when he gripped the chair back.
You have no reason to allow this. It doesn’t matter how handsome you find him. Dumbledore didn’t ask this of you.
Harry breathed out harshly and found it was a little better when the breath took care of the taste of Riddle on his lips. “No.”
“Why not? You were enjoying it.”
“You keep telling me that I’m the closest to an equal you’ll allow yourself. How in the world would that survive becoming your plaything?”
Riddle studied him for a second with a blank face. Harry didn’t believe it would put him off if he was determined to fuck Harry, but at least maybe it would make him think how this would appear to his followers.
Once again, Riddle surprised Harry. “I never intended for you to be my plaything.”
Harry blinked, then snapped, “Maybe you wouldn’t intend for it to happen. But it would. You would start treating me as lesser than you because of the way you made me look or something stupid like that.”
“Why do you believe that?”
“Because you can’t love people, Riddle! And I only want to have sex with someone I’m in love with. So there,” Harry added triumphantly. He knew there was no way around that barrier for Riddle. He couldn’t fake love, and he wouldn’t try. He would think it was beneath him.
Riddle narrowed his eyes as if Harry had shown him a complex Arithmancy equation. “You seem very sure you would never sleep with me.”
“I just told you why!”
“And I think,” Riddle went on in a musing tone, “that you can’t have had sex with very many people, if you have that strong a rule. There aren’t that many men here who would sleep with a Muggleborn-not ones worth having.”
“I don’t share your standards of worth! And I like women! And stop assuming things about me, Riddle!”
A strange smile had taken the place of that narrow-eyed stare. “You are a virgin, then. There were times I nearly fooled myself into not thinking it, but of course I should have known.” Riddle was looking at him with something Harry could only describe as starvation. “Well, I’ll entice you into surrendering. Then you can change your mind about your standard without pouting that I forced you to change it.”
Harry stood up. His legs were still shaky, and he hated that, but he also knew that simply sitting here to try and prove that he was stronger than Riddle would be a bloody stupid thing to do. “We’ve wandered a long way away from the original subject. I suppose you’ll reveal me to your Knights as a half-blood. And then what?”
“Then you’ll duel one of them.”
Riddle seemed to have let the subject of kissing him go, even if he did still stare at Harry with those disturbing eyes. Harry wanted to roll his own eyes at himself. He should have known, of course. Since when did Riddle genuinely want to sleep with him? Or seduce him? Harry was still beneath him, a Hufflepuff and illegitimate and all that.
“All right. When is this meeting going to take place?”
“At six tomorrow evening.”
Harry grimaced. That meant he would be going right from his first, no doubt intense day of Auror training to the tender non-existent mercies of a Death Eater gathering. But Riddle would get suspicious if he protested too much, so he just exhaled. “Fine.”
Riddle watched him as he walked towards the door. Harry scolded himself inside his head all the way. Of course Riddle was playing games. It was Harry’s fault for taking him seriously for even a moment. He knew who Riddle was going to become as well as who he was now. Riddle didn’t have the patience to seduce someone who truly rejected him. He didn’t mean to let Harry stand at his side. He-
A hand on his back, a mouth on his mouth. Harry arched, not sure if he was trying to throw Riddle off or not, as a tongue swept over his teeth and Riddle’s other hand dropped to squeeze between his legs.
Riddle was the one who stepped back this time, his smile small and pleased. “Remember that when you think that I don’t care, Harry Potter,” he whispered, and vanished down a dark corridor with almost-mirrored walls that Harry had seen him walk out of when he made his way into the dining room.
Harry stared after him, mouth pressed, cock hard, wondering.
Part Two.
This entry was originally posted at https://lomonaaeren.dreamwidth.org/1007830.html. Comment wherever you like.
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Pairings: Tom Riddle/Harry, a few mentions of Albus Dumbledore/Gellert Grindelwald
Content Notes: Angst, violence, time travel, mildly dubious consent
Rating: R
Wordcount: This part 4300
Summary: Harry, stuck in the past and asked by Dumbledore to infiltrate the ranks of Riddle’s proto-Death Eaters, is also being courted by Riddle himself, and by the Aurors, and by a couple of people who might not have anything to do with them. Harry struggles to hold onto his sense of himself and reality in the midst of all this. Sequel to “Earning His Notice.”
Author’s Notes: Make sure that you read “Earning His Notice” first, or you won’t have much idea what’s going on. This is the first part of one of my “From Samhain to the Solstice” fics-stories I’m posting between Halloween and December 21st. This will have three parts, to be posted today, tomorrow, and Friday.
Pride and Power
“I want you to at least consider the Aurors.”
Harry felt the sharp ripple of distaste travel up his back as he realized that Riddle was staring at him again. He shook his head and aimed a curse that cleaved the dummy they were facing in half. This manor house that Riddle kept inviting him to had so many dueling rooms that it was never the same one twice. “Why? I’m happy working in Ophelia’s shop. And I know that you must have a few people inside the Auror trainee classes already.”
“Yes. But none with as much interest from the Ministry itself as you’ve generated.”
“It’s mistaken interest. It’ll wear off in a little while.”
“Do you say that about anyone who has an interest in you?”
“When it’s based solely on my magical power.” Harry gave Riddle a nasty smile and purposely focused on the next dummy marching into place, ignoring the distracting flash of both their reflections in the mirror off to the side. Harry had no idea why that was there. Some duelists liked to pose before they began fighting, he supposed.
“I wonder.”
That was all the warning Harry had before the floor abruptly opened in several places and more dummies came whipping out. They were made of iron instead of the cloth and straw Harry had battled so far. They were also twice the size. The holes closed behind them, and with a clanking and robotic motion, they turned to focus on Harry.
Harry’s eyes narrowed. Then he waved his wand at the floor, casting a nonverbal Transfiguration that he’d used a few times in Hogwarts to stop Slytherins from bullying younger Gryffindors or Hufflepuffs.
The floor promptly turned to ice. The dummies took one step forwards, and began to fall and slip and slide.
Harry turned, making sure from the corner of one eye that Riddle was standing back and watching instead of joining the battle, and yelled, “Confringo!”
The mirror shattered into a series of flying pieces. Harry used another spell to grab control of them from the air, and then he turned and sent them flying towards the iron dummies, which were still struggling to get back to their feet.
The pieces of glass shattered smaller and smaller as Harry concentrated on them, and then he Transfigured them into heavy stones, which he dumped on the ice around the dummies. After a bit of sliding, the stones stayed in place-but the dummies were also almost all the way back to their feet, using their blunt “hands” to keep themselves from slipping again.
That was okay. Harry only intended to use the stones as anchors, not weapons.
“Cavea lucis!” he cried.
His wand flew, tracing the patterns he wanted among the stones, and lines of light sprang up between them, draping in a cage over the top of the stones that looked a lot like a tent. It also looked fragile. But when the first dummy pressed against it, the cage only bent so far before it sprang back, glowing furiously. Harry chuckled a little as he watched the six dummies doing their best to get out of the cages. They wouldn’t manage it.
“Beyond impressive.”
Riddle’s voice was right next to him. Harry flinched, unable to help it, and stumbled back a step. Riddle’s hand steadied him before he could step onto the part of the floor he’d Transfigured into ice.
“Er,” Harry said. He shook his head to get a ringing out of his ears. Then again, it was hard for his head not to ring when Riddle was staring at him like that.
“You battled them exactly right,” Riddle said, over the crunching sound of the iron dummies trying to walk around on the ice and the sizzling sound as their hands struck the cage of light. He didn’t appear interested in releasing Harry’s shoulder, even when Harry shrugged at him. “But how did you know the right tactics?”
“It seemed obvious.”
“Yet none of my followers managed the right tactics in such a small amount of time.”
“Well, I mean-iron would be hard to cut. And I know that dummies like these don’t stop if you only cut off part of them, and smashing them down all the way would be even harder. And I can’t conjure fire hot enough to melt iron.”
“All of that,” Riddle said softly, “reasoned out within a few seconds. And you slowed them down, as well, using their weight, which is usually a deadly weapon, against them.” His hand tightened, and he stepped towards Harry, tracing his fingers down behind Harry’s ear, as he was fond of doing. It hadn’t stopped being effective. Harry shivered and then tore himself away.
“Do you not see how remarkable you are? How people are interested in you for more than your sheer power?”
Harry took a deep breath and shook his head. “Listen, Riddle, you didn’t know anything about the kind of dueling or thinking I can do until after my fight with Malfoy. No, it’s power that attracts them.” He turned away, disquieted. The burn in Riddle’s eyes became more ravenous all the time.
Harry had accepted that he thought Riddle, in this state that was so much like the diary shade, was handsome. It was stupid for him to feel that way, but it was his own private stupidity. And he knew, from rumors that had swirled around Hogwarts in the seventh year he’d attended in this time, that Riddle was certainly not above using his beauty to seduce and fill his bed, or his pockets, or his ranks, or all three.
Riddle had no right to be looking at him like that, as if Harry was attractive to him. Harry knew he was still skinnier and shorter than normal, even in 1946, and his hair was a mess. Riddle couldn’t be interested in sleeping with him. No.
“There may be one more call from the Aurors.”
Harry felt his shoulders relax. “Just one? Then it’ll be easier for me to go back to my actual job.” That job, working at Ophelia’s apothecary shop, got harder when Aurors wanted to drop in for a “cup of tea and a chat.”
“It may be that they’ll have more information about you.”
Harry felt a prickling speed up and down his spine that had nothing to do with the pleasure Riddle often stirred in him. He glanced over his shoulder, frowning. “What do you mean?” The first, stupid suspicion that had occurred to him was that the Aurors now knew he was a time traveler, which would mess everything up.
“It may be,” Riddle said, leaning his shoulder on the wall and appreciating Harry with his eyes, “that some of them will learn about the results of the duels we’ve been staging here.”
“You wanker. What-you can’t force me into being an Auror!”
Riddle only smiled, although those same rumors at Hogwarts said that he’d never forgive even one of his followers who talked to him like that. “Not force. I would never be that crass. But to have someone else make you an offer you can’t refuse? Why not, Harry?” His voice lingered on Harry’s name, caressing it.
“I don’t want to be an Auror!” And it was true. Harry might have wanted to if he was still in his own time, but he’d never got the chance to enter training there. And this time, when it was still reeling from the war with Grindelwald and people acted like raw power and pure blood were all that mattered, was even less attractive.
“It would help me.”
“I don’t care enough about your cause to sacrifice my time and freedom for it.”
Riddle only smiled at him again. “You’re more impressive than you know, Harry,” he said, moving away from the wall and past Harry. Harry watched his hands, and he would have sworn that Riddle never reached towards him, and especially he would have sworn that Riddle didn’t touch him. Yet a fleeting warm sensation brushed his skin anyway.
“Consider carefully.”
The only thing I’m considering right now is all the reasons I can’t bury a knife in your back, you sadistic prick.
*
“I would like you to join the Aurors, Harry.”
Harry set down the cup hard enough to earn a “tsk” from Albus. But he didn’t care about that right now. “What? Why?”
“Because it would serve us well to have you seem to go along with Riddle’s plans for the moment. And it would serve us well to have a spy in the Aurors.” Albus settled on the small chair in the back of Ophelia’s shop with a sigh. “You know that the Aurors were ineffective against Grindelwald’s forces?”
“Well, yes. But I also thought they didn’t really fight them?”
“Some of the British Aurors went to join with Continental forces who did. And they came back not energetic or respectful or thoughtful, but terrified. The Ministry is already regressing, Harry. I can see it. They’ve convinced themselves that if they do nothing to attract the attention of another Dark Lord, another one will never arise.”
Harry groaned and buried his head in his hands. He knew exactly what kind of stupid bloody thinking that was, and he could see how it pointed the way for a bunch of things. The way Fudge had acted, denying Voldemort’s return. The way that Aurors had been authorized to use the Unforgivables, because Merlin forbid that they learn some other spells or effective ways to fight Dark wizards.
“I’ve changed the timeline so much already,” he muttered to himself.
“I’m afraid that you must change it more.” Albus reached out and squeezed his hand. “I would not ask this of you if I did not think it the very best position you could be in to serve our cause as well as seeming to serve Riddle’s, Harry. He will trust you more when you seem to be agreeing with him against your own will. He will assume you are more prideful and ambitious than you actually are, and that is also an advantage.”
“And I’ll learn the kinds of tactics that might help me take the Death Eaters down.”
“There is that. I am sorry to ask it of you.”
“That never stopped you from asking it anyway.”
Albus winced a little, but he nodded. “That also is true. But at the same time, I can’t force you. I only ask that you consider it might be the best way forwards, not just the path of least resistance.”
Harry considered it. He’d hidden for so long, but he’d already thrown that away. And Albus had managed to point out things about the possible changes to the timeline that Harry hadn’t considered, like that history probably wasn’t that fragile.
And Harry had always intended to act to change the timeline anyway. He just hadn’t thought it would be this soon or this big.
“All right, sir,” he said. “I’ll do it.”
“Please call me Albus, Harry. I’ve told you that before. I’m no longer your Headmaster.”
“But you are my general. My leader.”
Albus looked honestly flustered for a second. Then he toasted Harry with his teacup. “That has a much more pleasant ring to it.”
*
“My Aurors have been telling me tales about you, Mr. Keller. Frankly, I’m not convinced.”
Harry just nodded, a little relieved for the sight of someone who treated him normally, not like he was bloody special just because he was more powerful than some people. Head Auror Jessica Greengrass studied him with deep-set grey eyes and then moved over to the other side of the dueling room. It reminded Harry of nothing so much as a walled and roofed version of the grounds at his Muggle primary school. The “floor” was dirt and stone. The walls had few objects on them: a few rings, a few chains, a few weapons. Harry understood the purpose even without Greengrass explaining it to him. There were few places to hide here and few weapons to wield. He would be judged on spells alone.
And if he just happened to come up weak or lacking in Greengrass’s eyes, that wouldn’t be his fault, would it? It would be proof that he wasn’t as special as Riddle and Albus thought.
“You understand dueling stances, Mr. Keller?”
“Not well, Auror Greengrass. I’m Muggleborn.”
She squinted at him. “Funny. For a moment I thought there was something familiar about your face and hair.”
Harry shrugged, unbothered. A few of the pure-bloods at Hogwarts had said the same thing to him. “I don’t know a lot about my father’s family, Auror Greengrass. But as far as I know, I’m purely Muggleborn.”
She accepted that, and walked over to the other side of the dueling room, turning around to face him. “Show me what you can do, Keller. The duel is to first incapacitation. Bow.”
Harry bowed, all right, but he also kept his eyes on Greengrass. He wasn’t surprised when she hurled a jinx at him from the middle of her bow. Harry ducked it, rolled, and came up on the other side of the room, casting the Whirlwind Charm.
Dust and small stones immediately blew up between them. Greengrass let out a sound that might have been a cough of surprise. Harry tensed and jumped to the side, and the Stunner missed him.
He added another Whirlwind Charm, plus a Shield Charm to keep the dust from blowing into his eyes, and muttered, “Saggita ignis.”
The air in front of him ignited, formed into an arrow, and flew through the winds at Auror Greengrass. Harry had chosen that particular spell because his charms couldn’t affect it. He put his back to the wall and waited for her response.
“Aguamenti! Motus!”
Harry didn’t worry about the first one; it was just her way of putting the Fire Arrow out. But a second later, the floor under him started to shake. Harry jumped up, grabbed one of the chains dangling from the wall, and climbed partway up so that he could throw more curses at her.
Auror Greengrass dodged the first two, but that put her in the path of Harry’s third, a brilliant purple hex that he’d found in one of the library books at Hogwarts. It threw her off her feet and made her heart beat too fast at the same time. It didn’t last as long as a Stunner, but the initial shock was worse.
Harry held onto the chain, ignored the pain in his arms, and waited as she writhed on the floor for a second. Then she threw a nonverbal Body-Bind at him.
Harry let go, dropped, and leaped again, out of the way of the pit that had opened beneath him. He filled the air with smoke and wind, then hurled a Stunner.
Auror Greengrass lay still. Harry eyed her cautiously. Maybe she’d actually been Stunned, but maybe she wasn’t.
Sure enough, Auror Greengrass stood up a second later. Harry poised his wand and started a silent incantation for a mobile Shield Charm that he could float in front of her and get in the way of her spells.
“Enough, Keller!”
Harry ended his incantation, but still kept eyeing her. She’d said they’d duel to first incapacitation, and that hadn’t happened yet.
“I can see why so many of my colleagues want to admit you as a trainee. You have power, yes, Keller, but you have something rarer than that.” Auror Greengrass pointed her wand at him, which made Harry’s back tighten. “Instinct. The ability to think on your feet. The ability to move back and forth without thinking about it, even. I would say this was a draw, which is bloody impressive for someone of mine. You belong in the Aurors.”
That was what you wanted, Harry reminded himself, around his sinking heart. What Albus asked of you. And Riddle will be pleased, so you can keep acting as though you’re doing what he says.
He made the right noises, and ignored, as best he could, the way Greengrass squinted sideways at him and muttered a few times, “Damn familiar face, damn familiar.”
*
“Do you doubt your prowess now, Keller?”
“You really wanted to say ‘Dare you doubt it now?’, right? I could hear that in your voice.”
Riddle laughed instead of getting angry with him. Harry swallowed his Firewhisky and leaned back in his chair. They were alone in yet another lavish dining room in yet another manor. Riddle either had more followers than Harry had thought, or his followers had more houses.
“I might say that. I might think it. You would ignore me and mock me for it, and that is as it should be.”
Harry just shook his head. “They must be really desperate for recruits if they took someone with a mediocre Hogwarts record and no known blood status.”
“Oh, yes, about that.”
Harry straightened up slowly. Riddle had that grin on his face that Harry distrusted more than any other, the grin that said he was about to throw a curse in some form Harry couldn’t dodge. “What is it? My lord.”
Even the sarcastic title didn’t make Riddle shy away from his terrible revelation. “You know that they need more Aurors because of the war with Grindelwald killing so many, but I would hardly say that makes them desperate. And, Harry.” He paused, then added, “Keller is inappropriate now.”
Harry narrowed his eyes and did his best not to show how much he was shaking by keeping still. “Yeah?”
“You should have claimed your blood status at once. A Potter half-blood? Much more to the point than a Muggleborn with a random surname. Much more useful. Much more to my taste.”
He hissed that last word, with enough sibilants to make Harry want to hex him, and stood. Harry just sat in place as he moved around the table. It wasn’t like this was unusual. Riddle loved to come up to him like this.
But the focused look on his face, the burning in his eyes-yeah, that was new.
Harry doubted he could lie to Riddle well enough to fool him even with the brooch that protected him from Riddle’s Legilimency, so he just tilted his head at him and sighed. “How did you find out?”
“Well, your looks are similar enough, of course. And there was Tristan Potter abruptly packed off for a jaunt around the world when he was barely out of Hogwarts. Whether he fathered you in Britain and that was the cause of the scandal, or he fathered you on the Continent-did you think I would discriminate against you for being illegitimate?”
Harry shook his head. “I wasn’t sure. And claiming to be Muggleborn would be less shaming for a family like the Potters than claiming their name.” There. All truths, without being the ultimate truth.
“Mmm.” Riddle’s hand slid up his arm. “It’s going to change matters with my Knights, of course. They won’t be as quick to insult you as they were when they thought you Muggleborn.”
“Then do you want to tell them? Since you said one of the things you were looking forward to was seeing a mere Muggleborn put them in their places.”
“I want to tell them because I want to see the look in their eyes when they realized they underestimated you.”
“Okay.” Harry nodded without reacting to the way Riddle’s hand had traveled to his shoulder. “Then we can do that whenever you want.”
“I also heard about your duel with Auror Greengrass. I’m not sure more dueling practice would benefit you.”
“Then what do you want me to do?”
“At the moment? Be quiet.”
Harry opened his mouth indignantly and found it nearly full of Riddle’s tongue. He gasped and tried to lean further back in his chair, bringing up the legs to press against Riddle’s and get him to back off, but Riddle only tightened his hand in Harry’s hair and kissed him harder, pulling the chair back to the floor.
Harry was trembling with shock and adrenaline and the need to break free. Riddle was a bloody good kisser, not wet like Cho, not almost mashing Harry’s lips flat like the one kiss he’d had at Hogwarts in this time. Warmth spread through his body and he went limp, leaning back, letting Riddle do-
No.
Harry coiled up his legs in the limited space between them and kicked Riddle in the chest. It wasn’t a great kick, considering the angle and how bloody stupidly hard he was, but he did it, and broke the kiss. Riddle staggered back, his eyes as wide as full moons.
Harry stood and got behind the chair to hide as much of his erection as he could. But Riddle’s knowing smile said he couldn’t hide his flushed cheeks, or the way his hands trembled when he gripped the chair back.
You have no reason to allow this. It doesn’t matter how handsome you find him. Dumbledore didn’t ask this of you.
Harry breathed out harshly and found it was a little better when the breath took care of the taste of Riddle on his lips. “No.”
“Why not? You were enjoying it.”
“You keep telling me that I’m the closest to an equal you’ll allow yourself. How in the world would that survive becoming your plaything?”
Riddle studied him for a second with a blank face. Harry didn’t believe it would put him off if he was determined to fuck Harry, but at least maybe it would make him think how this would appear to his followers.
Once again, Riddle surprised Harry. “I never intended for you to be my plaything.”
Harry blinked, then snapped, “Maybe you wouldn’t intend for it to happen. But it would. You would start treating me as lesser than you because of the way you made me look or something stupid like that.”
“Why do you believe that?”
“Because you can’t love people, Riddle! And I only want to have sex with someone I’m in love with. So there,” Harry added triumphantly. He knew there was no way around that barrier for Riddle. He couldn’t fake love, and he wouldn’t try. He would think it was beneath him.
Riddle narrowed his eyes as if Harry had shown him a complex Arithmancy equation. “You seem very sure you would never sleep with me.”
“I just told you why!”
“And I think,” Riddle went on in a musing tone, “that you can’t have had sex with very many people, if you have that strong a rule. There aren’t that many men here who would sleep with a Muggleborn-not ones worth having.”
“I don’t share your standards of worth! And I like women! And stop assuming things about me, Riddle!”
A strange smile had taken the place of that narrow-eyed stare. “You are a virgin, then. There were times I nearly fooled myself into not thinking it, but of course I should have known.” Riddle was looking at him with something Harry could only describe as starvation. “Well, I’ll entice you into surrendering. Then you can change your mind about your standard without pouting that I forced you to change it.”
Harry stood up. His legs were still shaky, and he hated that, but he also knew that simply sitting here to try and prove that he was stronger than Riddle would be a bloody stupid thing to do. “We’ve wandered a long way away from the original subject. I suppose you’ll reveal me to your Knights as a half-blood. And then what?”
“Then you’ll duel one of them.”
Riddle seemed to have let the subject of kissing him go, even if he did still stare at Harry with those disturbing eyes. Harry wanted to roll his own eyes at himself. He should have known, of course. Since when did Riddle genuinely want to sleep with him? Or seduce him? Harry was still beneath him, a Hufflepuff and illegitimate and all that.
“All right. When is this meeting going to take place?”
“At six tomorrow evening.”
Harry grimaced. That meant he would be going right from his first, no doubt intense day of Auror training to the tender non-existent mercies of a Death Eater gathering. But Riddle would get suspicious if he protested too much, so he just exhaled. “Fine.”
Riddle watched him as he walked towards the door. Harry scolded himself inside his head all the way. Of course Riddle was playing games. It was Harry’s fault for taking him seriously for even a moment. He knew who Riddle was going to become as well as who he was now. Riddle didn’t have the patience to seduce someone who truly rejected him. He didn’t mean to let Harry stand at his side. He-
A hand on his back, a mouth on his mouth. Harry arched, not sure if he was trying to throw Riddle off or not, as a tongue swept over his teeth and Riddle’s other hand dropped to squeeze between his legs.
Riddle was the one who stepped back this time, his smile small and pleased. “Remember that when you think that I don’t care, Harry Potter,” he whispered, and vanished down a dark corridor with almost-mirrored walls that Harry had seen him walk out of when he made his way into the dining room.
Harry stared after him, mouth pressed, cock hard, wondering.
Part Two.
This entry was originally posted at https://lomonaaeren.dreamwidth.org/1007830.html. Comment wherever you like.