Chapter Seventy-One of 'His Twenty-Eighth Life'- Moves Towards Immortality
Chapter Seventy.
Title: His Twenty-Eighth Life (71/?)
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Pairing: Eventual Harry Potter/Voldemort; mentions of others, including canon pairings, in the background, and past Harry/others
Rating: R (more for violence than sex)
Content Notes: violence, torture, gore, manipulation, angst, Master of Death Harry Potter, reincarnation, suicidal thoughts, suicide attempts
Summary: Harry Potter has been reborn again and again into new bodies as the Master of Death, some of them not human, none of them exactly like his old one-but he has always helped to defeat Voldemort in each new world. Now he’s Harry Potter again, but his slightly older brother is the target of the prophecy, and Harry assumes his role is going to be to support Jonathan in his defeat of Voldemort. At least, that’s what he thinks until Voldemort comes that Halloween night, discovers what Harry is, and kidnaps him. The story of a long fight between Voldemort’s sadism and Harry’s generosity.
Author’s Notes: This is going to be a very long fic, exploring some fairly dark character interactions. While the heart of the story is Harry’s relationship with Voldemort, that’s going to change only slowly and over time, and there will be plenty of concentration on other characters, too. Also, please take the tags/content notes seriously.
Thank you again for all the reviews!
Chapter Seventy-One-Moves Towards Immortality
“Please sit, Mr-Voldemort.”
Voldemort nodded as he took a seat on the couch across from the ICW representative who had wanted to speak to him, a tall woman called Anita Pedersen. She was grey-haired, with the hair pinned in two loops along the sides of her head in a way that totally covered her ears. She had pale green eyes that didn’t remind him much of Harry’s, considering how much more watery a color they were.
But her words were as sharp as if she had broken the delicate porcelain tray serving tea between them to pieces. “We are not satisfied with your actions.”
Voldemort shrugged a little. “I’ve done what you asked of me, Madam Pedersen.” He drank from the teacup nearest him without worrying that it had any sort of controlling potion or poison in it, even though they’d taken his wand from him before allowing him into this room in the Ministry. His magic was powerful enough to warn him. “Kept to myself, released fines to those families who wanted some kind of compensation for the loss of their loved ones, removed the Dark Mark from those who asked. What obligation have I left unfulfilled?”
Pedersen leaned forwards a little. “You have not agreed to be questioned under Veritaserum.”
“Your interrogators have refused to list the questions I would be asked.”
Pedersen paused at that. Then she said, “You might make an attempt to hide your crimes. We have to be sure that our interrogators are being thorough and investigating every avenue.”
“I understand that. But you could also ask me about my childhood and other personal things.” Voldemort let acid slip into his voice. “I overheard some of your people saying that you should, in order to ‘understand where I went wrong.’”
Pedersen frowned and lifted one hand as if she would call a house-elf and summon the transgressors immediately. When she sighed and lowered it again, Voldemort wondered if she believed him. He had heard some of the Confederation’s people saying that, although with his wandless eavesdropping spell rather than simply being close enough to hear.
“What questions would you want left entirely off the list?” she asked.
“Anything that pertained to my childhood and to my method of seeking immortality,” Voldemort said. He was not about to betray Harry. As far as Harry was a public figure, the ICW asking about him was inevitable, but Voldemort would not betray that Harry had known about the Horcruxes and had helped to integrate him again.
“We make every effort to understand how a Dark Lord became a Dark Lord-”
“Then you can ask me about my tactics and my followers,” Voldemort interrupted, ignoring the way that Pedersen drew back from him as if in reprimand. The ICW had ignored Britain for years, despite the violations of the Ministry and his own actions. They could deal with limitations now. “After what I’ve overheard your people discussing, I don’t trust you not to make fun of me for the circumstances of my birth and raising.”
For long moments, Pedersen was quiet. Then she nodded. “And you will take further oaths to prove that you have changed?”
“Yes. If you show me the list of questions that you’re planning to ask.”
Pedersen shifted and tapped what resembled a Muggle wristwatch of sapphire on her left hand. It flashed once. Voldemort was sure that it was transmitting a vision of their conversation to someone else, so they would notice if Pedersen suddenly began acting as though she was under the Imperius. “Another reason we are reluctant to share such a list is that you might be able to come up with ways to evade giving us the truth if you knew what they were.”
“Do you distrust your brewers’ ability to create Veritaserum that much?”
She stared at him in silence.
“I will take twice the required dose,” Voldemort bargained. Honestly, the negotiations with the Confederation were beginning to bore him. Far more important was the fact that Harry would be leaving Hogwarts for the summer in two days, and Voldemort preferred to think about his welcoming party instead of politics. “That ought to curtail any attempt I make to lie.”
Pedersen sighed. “I’ll present that as a compromise to my superiors. I can’t promise they’ll accept it.”
“Then perhaps you should be prepared to accept that I will not answer the questions.” Voldemort tapped the teacup with the edge of his fingers and stood. “If you will excuse me. I have another commitment.”
“What might that be?”
Pedersen had a slice of suspicion in her voice, but Voldemort pretended not to hear it. He turned and smiled at her instead, and enjoyed the way she flinched a bit. “A welcoming celebration for a friend.”
*
“I think I understand what you’ve been on about, Potter.”
Harry turned around with a patient smile. Today was his morning for him to eat breakfast with Hermione at the Ravenclaw table, and they’d been having an interesting debate about whether Arithmancy and Ancient Runes ought to be required classes or not. Harry had lived in worlds where they were, but that gave him material for either side of the argument, and really, Hermione was enjoying herself so much explaining why they should be that he was only opposing her to give her more enjoyment. “Yes, Malfoy? What is it?”
“You could call me Draco, you know. I’ve given you permission.”
“I know,” Harry said, and was grateful that Hermione had muffled her snort in her porridge. “But what are you talking about?”
“When you were saying Muggleborns deserve some respect, and power isn’t the same as blood. I came up with a reason why you’re wrong. But at the same time, you don’t want to be wrong because of course you have a Muggleborn mother, and you wouldn’t like someone to classify you with the less powerful people.”
Harry checked a sigh. He reminded himself that he was over a thousand years old in real terms, and had also spent one lifetime with years of boredom in a pet shop, which meant he could give Draco some patience. “Yes?”
“So if I say that Muggleborns who have the sense to marry pure-bloods and have half-blood children are smart and powerful, that ought to be enough, right? While the ones who marry Muggles or other Muggleborns or half-bloods aren’t.”
Harry stared at him in perfect silence for a long moment, and Draco’s smile faltered more and more the longer he stood there. Then Harry shook his head, sighed a little, and turned away.
“What did I do wrong?” Draco demanded, marching around the Ravenclaw table until he was in Harry’s line of sight again. “Tell me what I did wrong!”
“You’ve still decided that I’m wrong, just that my own mother and a few people like her are different.” Hermione’s face was turning bright red, and Harry thought he ought to get rid of Draco before she could. “And you’ve also thought that the most important thing is soothing my pride, instead of thinking about my arguments.”
Not that he’s very good even at that, Harry had to add to himself. Telling someone outright that they were wrong about being proud of their family members but the speaker would indulge them was…clumsy.
There were some worlds where Draco was more spoiled by his parents than others. This was probably one of them.
“But Muggleborns are magically weaker than pure-bloods!” Draco’s face was nearly as red as Hermione’s now.
Harry glanced at Hermione. “Do you want to give him the demonstration?”
Hermione nodded eagerly and drew her wand. Harry considered the state of her fury and added, “And no spells that can be cast directly on him.”
“Oh, fine,” Hermione muttered. “You’re no fun, Harry Potter.” But she was smiling, and a second later she reached out and pointed at the top button of his robes, which was hanging loose from its hole the way it usually did. “Can I have that?”
Harry nodded and twisted the button loose. Draco folded his arms and gave a huge sniff. “Just because she can perform a few easy charms on a button doesn’t mean she’s powerful.”
“Don’t worry,” Harry said. “If the spells are easy, then you should be able to do them all right after she does, right? And with the same level of power?”
Draco blinked. Harry knew from other worlds that he had never been bad at Charms, but he was also far from a prodigy. “Um,” Draco said, after long moments when he seemed to mind Harry’s intense stare more than he did the ones from the other tables. “Of course.”
Harry nodded and looked at Hermione. She held up the button in front of her and said, “Wingardium Leviosa.” The button tore out of her hand and hovered near the ceiling. Some of the other Ravenclaws applauded.
Hermione then changed the color of the button to a shining yellow so bright that some of the Hufflepuffs complained, and changed it to red and green and blue in quick succession. Then she ended the Levitation Charm and called it back down to her and lit it on fire with some bluebell flames, although she put them out before they could damage the button or the table too badly. Almost everyone was watching by now.
Finally, she cast a complicated charm that made frost crackle across the button’s surface, and a Warming Charm that melted the frost off. Hermione smiled widely as she handed the button back to Harry. Harry nodded to her and then turned around, offering the button on his palm to Draco.
“I-I don’t know that spell that caused the frost,” Draco said, his voice a little croak. “Or all the Color-Changing Charms.”
“Oh, well, but you heard her cast them,” Harry said cheerfully. Hermione, talented as she was, was nowhere near ready for wordless magic yet. “So you know the incantations and the wand movements. So you can cast them too.”
Draco balled his hands into fists. “It’s not fair!”
“What’s not?”
“You, comparing us! You said-” And then Draco shut his mouth very hard.
Harry smiled as gently as he could, since he didn’t want Draco to think Harry was mocking him. Not stupid at all, only spoiled and made to think he was always right just because of his last name and his blood status. “I think the comparison made was ongoing throughout the school year,” he said, not pointing out what Draco had just realized, that he was the one who had claimed that he could reproduce any spell Hermione could. “And all I ask is that you consider Muggleborns aren’t inferior because of their blood. Not that you say all Muggleborns are great and powerful and good people. Just that they aren’t automatically inferior.”
Draco glanced doubtfully at him and frowned at Hermione. Hermione crossed her arms and stuck her nose up in the air. “We’re all waiting, Malfoy.”
Draco wavered. Harry waited. There were two ways this could go now, and he had to admit he was eager to see which one Draco would choose.
“Maybe,” Draco said, and then turned and stormed out of the Great Hall.
Harry blinked. Okay, three ways. He had thought Draco would turn his back on the decision, at least for the summer, or admit he was wrong, but this was an understandable attempt to save face.
Harry did like how this world kept surprising him.
*
Jonathan chuckled as he watched his brother’s stupefied face. “What, you didn’t think that an owl could match speeds with the train?”
“Of course I thought they could,” Harry muttered softly enough for only Jonathan to hear. “I’ve released enough owls on the train to know that they can usually make it to Hogwarts before I could.” He waved the letter around. “I just-we saw him not that long ago. Why does he want to send a special owl now?”
“Who?” Hermione asked, looking up from her Charms book.
Jonathan had never heard her mention that she knew Harry was allies with Voldemort, and honestly wasn’t sure that he wanted to tell her now. Harry looked as though someone had hit him with a book larger than Hermione’s, so Jonathan took over. “A friend of the family. He actually wants to hold a special celebration of Harry successfully completing his first year.” Jonathan sighed and shook his head. “I didn’t get that kind of celebration at the end of my first year.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, Jonathan,” Hermione said immediately. “Why don’t you tell your family’s friend that you’d like one?”
Jonathan almost choked at the idea of asking Voldemort to throw a celebration for him. From the noise next to him, Harry hadn’t managed not to choke.
“Oh, it’s okay, Hermione,” Jonathan said at once. “It’s just the principle of the thing, you know? And of course, I’m a third-year, and much more mature than my little brother here.” He reached out and ruffled Harry’s locks until Harry jerked his head away. “Little brother still needs surprise parties to feel good about himself.”
“I will twist off your head with my bare hands.”
“Not if I cast a Tickling Charm at you first.”
Hermione laughed, and then sighed. “Sometimes I wish I had siblings. Being an only child was great when I wanted my parents’ attention, but…I feel like I missed out on a lot of things.”
“The only thing you’re missing out on is planning the body disposal,” Harry growled, and then cast a Tickling Charm with his hand, wandless, which was not fair. Hermione shrieked and then giggled while Jonathan fought to subdue his own unwilling laughter and get his little brother back for this.
He did, although he had to wait almost until they got to London to paint the white letters that said Please kiss my arse on the back of Harry’s robe.
*
“What is that on the back of your robe?”
Voldemort was staring at the words that someone seemed to have inscribed in letters of paint on the back of Harry’s robe. Harry rolled his eyes and Vanished them with a wave of his hand. “My brother thinks he has a sense of humor.”
“Your brother did that?”
“Yes.” Harry raised an eyebrow at him, and something like an invisible fence butted at Voldemort as he turned automatically in search of Jonathan Potter. “If you really believe that you’re going to hurt him for a silly prank, then we’ll have to have a much more serious conversation than I thought we would.”
“You let him-treat you as a child. Even though he is perfectly aware of what you are.”
“I need that sometimes. To keep me mortal, to remind me of what I look like now.” Harry cocked his head at Voldemort and glanced over at the Potters, who were waiting with his brother and Remus Lupin. “Now, I want to know what this special celebration you have planned is.”
“Do you know where the Chamber of Ambitions is?”
Harry jerked abruptly back from Voldemort, and his eyes were swarming with darkened green clouds. “Yes, I do.”
“What is it?” Voldemort whispered. He had only wanted to share the most private of Salazar Slytherin’s strongholds with Harry. There had been rumors about the Chamber of Secrets, but nothing about the Chamber of Ambitions had ever come to be known by anyone outside of the main Slytherin family.
“It’s the place where I died twice.”
Voldemort swallowed. He had never thought something like this lurked in Harry’s past-he never would have offered-
Then Harry looked into Voldemort’s eyes and seemed to return to human all at once, shaking his head. “How could you know? I don’t blame you for it. I mean, not you. The version of Voldemort who killed me once, of course.”
“I didn’t kill you the second time?” Voldemort asked, feeling the oddest version of wounded pride that he ever had.
“No. My lover in that lifetime did that.” Harry smiled wistfully, his eyes seeking some imagined horizon, and Voldemort’s chest pulsed this time with a very familiar emotion. Someday I will know everything there is to know about him. “But it doesn’t matter. I can meet you there this evening after my parents and Jonathan go to bed.”
“Very well. Then I will await you in Wales.”
Voldemort started to turn away, but Harry’s hand caught his. “The Chamber of Ambitions is in Cornwall,” said the heavy whisper from behind him, once again sounding like a wind that might have blown thunderclouds in circles.
Voldemort turned, shaking his head slightly. “No, it’s in Wales.”
Harry let his hand fall, leaving Voldemort to mourn the lost sensation and enjoy the way Harry’s brow wrinkled at the same time.
“In every world, it was in Cornwall, on Bodmin Moor,” Harry murmured, his head tilting further, until it appeared his neck was as flexible as a snake’s. “Why is this world so different?”
Voldemort didn’t have the answer to that question, but there was something he could say, to ensure that he would see Harry later that night. “Here, it is in Wales, on Mount Snowdon.”
Harry’s eyes focused on him abruptly, and he locked the inhuman part of himself away with an ease that Voldemort both admired and envied. “Very well. How will I find it?”
“You will see the green light shining,” said Voldemort, and half-bowed to Harry, and strode away, leaving him in the embrace of his family for now.
He had plans to make, especially since it seemed that Harry wouldn’t know what the Chamber of Ambitions looked like in this world, and that meant he could prepare a true surprise. He hoped it would be a wonderful one.
And if helping Harry figure out what made this world so different would convince him to remain immortal and stay in this world with Voldemort…
No trouble was too great.
Chapter Seventy-Two.