Chapter Twenty-Five of 'His Twenty-Eighth Life'- Phoenix Drooping
Chapter Twenty-Four.
Title: His Twenty-Eighth Life (25/?)
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.
Chapter One.
Thank you again for all the reviews!
Chapter Twenty-Five-Phoenix Drooping
Harry was shivering as the visions began to fade about him. He knew they weren’t done, though, or Fawkes would have flown away, or demanded something from him. He leaned back and stared at the phoenix perched on his arm.
“Why are you doing this? Why not take the visions to Dumbledore or my parents? Some adult who would be accepted as an adult and could do something?”
Fawkes bowed his head. A single tear slipped from his eye, but only splashed hot and useless against Harry’s head. Fawkes had no strength to spare for healing tears, Harry realized abruptly. His crest drooped. His wings shivered. He might not even have been able to fly.
Stunned, Harry caressed his neck. “Do you need help?” He had studied magical healing of animals alongside other disciplines in many lifetimes, and although he’d never specialized in it, his memory made sure he never forgot anything.
Fawkes raised his head and uttered a soft, musical cry of negation. He stared into Harry’s eyes with utter misery, and Harry finally understood. The phoenix had a decision to make. He didn’t even know if he could help with making it.
“Is it Dumbledore? You’re going to stop being his companion?”
Fawkes wept again. His wings were folded tightly against his body now, which swayed. Harry brought his arm closer to his chest so Fawkes could have something to lean against. He combed his fingers slowly through the scarlet feathers, and Fawkes huddled close to him like a fledgling in a nest.
Harry sighed.
“I can’t promise it’ll be perfect if you leave him,” he whispered, knowing Fawkes was listening to every word. “But you don’t need to show me these visions to make me defend you or my brother. If you just want to explain why you’re leaving him, though, that’s okay.”
Fawkes leaned against him harder and moved his head up and down. Harry stroked the sides of his beak. Fawkes parted his bill in a silent sigh and finally lifted his head to look at Harry.
“You’re ready to show me whatever came after that point?” Harry asked quietly.
Fawkes snagged a claw into his shirt and leaned forwards, looking deeply into his eyes. As fire and song blossomed around them, Harry could only hope that this was something his brother had survived.
*
“Of course this won’t stand, Jonathan. The students should already have known better than to bother you. I will make a general announcement at dinner.”
Jonathan started out of his chair before he could help himself. “No, Headmaster,” he said forcefully. “That won’t help. It will only make them think I’m getting special treatment. Can’t you just stop the ambush and make sure they don’t do anything like this to anyone else, either?”
Mr. Dumbledore frowned a little. “Why would it be your concern what they did to anyone else, m’boy?”
Jonathan stared at him. He could hardly believe the man who had taught him all about compassion and the greater good was saying this. But Dumbledore continued to frown at him, as if he assumed that Jonathan would agree with him and was just temporarily out of his mind to not do so.
“I want other people to feel safe, too,” Jonathan said, when he could speak. “I just-I don’t want this to turn into more bullying or like you’re protecting me and keeping everyone else at a lower level.”
“I have to keep them at a lower level, when they are not the people who can save the world,” Dumbledore said gently.
“You don’t know if I can save the world either, Headmaster. With all due respect,” Jonathan added as he watched Dumbledore’s eyebrows start to rise. He had been speaking almost as he would to Harry, free and uninhibited, and he had watch to out. “The prophecy hasn’t happened. I’m happy you want me to stay safe, but everybody has to stay safe, not just me.”
“How will my making an announcement that bullying will not be tolerated make them less safe, my dear boy?”
“Well, will you say that, or will say that bullying of Jonathan Potter will not be tolerated? Because it sounded as if you were going to say that, sir. I’d rather that you not.”
“There are so many things you need to learn before you’re ready to face Voldemort, Jonathan. And one of them is that certain people take up danger so that others need not. In return, they do get certain rewards. Fame or wealth or gratitude. And you will have to face Voldemort. I gave you advanced training. That’s one of the costs or the benefits, depending on how you look at it. Here is another.”
“I-can’t you just say that you’re not going to tolerate bullying and the other professors aren’t either?” Jonathan asked weakly. He felt like that so much when he was dealing with Dumbledore. Just incapable of saying what he wanted because Dumbledore was saying it so much better.
Dumbledore gave him a kind look from under his glasses. “You’ll understand when you’re older, Jonathan.”
“When I face Voldemort?”
“Hopefully before then.” Dumbledore stood up and came around the desk to press his shoulder. Then he leaned in and said, “I believe I can entrust a secret to you, in return for you accepting that certain burdens will always be yours to bear.”
Jonathan stared up at him. He thought, A second ago he was talking about good things I’m entitled to, and now it’s burdens?
But he knew he would only get mixed up again if he had to contradict Dumbledore, so he just asked, “Yes, sir?”
“I believed, at first, that your brother was the answer to our prayers, a way to fight the war without risking members of the Order of the Phoenix.” Dumbledore was almost whispering to him, leaning so close that Jonathan felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. “And then I realized he could not be. He doesn’t have your innate moral compass. You were raised by your parents all your life and you know the reasons for what we do. He was raised by Voldemort for part of this life and who knows by what kinds of Dark wizards for the others. You are the only unstained one left, Jonathan. Please embrace your status.”
Jonathan breathed through rage. He knew what it was because he’d felt the same kind of thing when he really realized what it meant for Harry to go missing. “What are you planning to do with Harry then, sir?”
“It may be there is some other use to be made of him.” Dumbledore’s face was serious. “But I don’t think that he can play the role I had in mind for him. He’s simply too committed to seeing the Dark win.”
“How can you say that? When Voldemort kidnapped him-”
“But if he truly despised the Dark, he would go ahead and destroy Voldemort of his own free will. Has that happened? It has not. He’s too sympathetic to them. I don’t know if he’s uncertain about what he should do or actively plotting to overthrow the Order of the Phoenix, but either way, it’s not something I can trust.”
“Then you shouldn’t trust me, either,” Jonathan spat at him. He could feel himself vibrating. He knew that Harry would say that he had to calm down, that it was no good letting Dumbledore and the other adults suspect what he really thought, but this time, he had to say it. It had to come out. “Because I love Harry, and I trust what he tells me.”
Dumbledore sighed a little. “Then you want the Dark to win, too?”
“I don’t want anyone to die!”
“But that would mean that you don’t want Death Eaters or Voldemort to die, either. And don’t you see that he must die for our world to be at peace forever, Mr. Potter?”
“It won’t be at peace forever. There was Grindelwald, and now there’s him, and I read that history book you gave me about the nineteenth century and there were Dark Lords then, too. I just don’t want this war to happen. It’s the only one I care about!”
Dumbledore shook his head. “I see that I have not explained the history and the stance of the Order of the Phoenix clearly enough. And I see that I must not have demonstrated what makes this war different from all the others.” He moved his wand a little.
Jonathan blinked and touched his forehead. It seemed as though his sight had blurred, or maybe his mind. What had he and Mr. Dumbledore been arguing about?
“Are you all right, Mr. Potter?”
“Um, I think so, sir,” Jonathan said. “But I don’t really remember most of the last few minutes. What happened?”
“I was telling you that I received a threat from Voldemort against your brother,” Dumbledore said. “And you were telling me about the threat that you received from the Slytherins. Or the threat that is purported to come from them, perhaps it would be more accurate to say.”
“Voldemort threatened Harry?” That seemed strange to Jonathan, because Voldemort was close to Harry-or something. But then, could you ever completely trust a Dark Lord? Voldemort might have been plotting something like this all along and only tricked Harry.
“Yes. I can show you the letter if you wish?”
Jonathan nodded, and then read the letter that Dumbledore handed him with growing horror. Voldemort was threatening to take Harry back and keep him forever, and he said that he would torture all the members of the Order of the Phoenix to do it, even people like Sirius that Jonathan knew Harry considered family.
“This is horrible.”
“I know, my boy. And that’s why I’d like to start your training again as soon as possible. Keeping you away from the other students and building up your magical strength have to be our priorities right now.”
“Of course,” Jonathan said numbly. He put down the letter and looked up at Dumbledore. “What do you think we ought to practice first?”
*
Harry’s hands had become too hot for Fawkes, that was obvious. The phoenix had hopped up onto the mantel above the fireplace and was watching him a bit reproachfully.
Harry closed his eyes and willed his magic to leave his hands, not manifest as sparks that might burn the carpet. Dumbledore hadn’t used a complete Memory Charm on Jonathan, but a combination of a modified Memory Charm and a Confundus Charm. Jonathan would still remember most of what they’d discussed, but the details would blur.
More insidiously, his attitude would change. He would think of certain events from a different perspective than his first one, and while Harry was confident that nothing could make his brother’s loyalty to him waver, he might do evil under the perception that he was doing good.
Just like Albus.
Harry looked up wearily at Fawkes. “No wonder you want to leave him. He’s not capable of drawing lines that he won’t cross anymore.”
Fawkes gave a low, worried croon. Harry sat down on the couch and stared into the flames.
He could undo the damage to his brother’s mind, but only by taking him from Hogwarts and keeping Jonathan with him for a month or so-away from the ordinary life that Harry wanted him to have. And that would reveal to Dumbledore that he knew about the spell, which could put Jonathan and Fawkes and other people in danger.
And that would mean dealing with his parents, too. Or running away from them altogether, and Jonathan, although he was a resilient young man, wasn’t ready to abandon people who could care for him. Harry had lived all sorts of lives, including his first one, where parental care was something he had to dispense with.
The more he sat there and thought, the more tangled his thoughts became.
“I wish that I’d never told anyone about my power,” he whispered. “Rescued Remus and kept it secret somehow-maybe left after I’d brought him to Hogwarts. Gone off and drawn Voldemort after me, so that he could hunt me and leave my family alone. I can’t Obliviate them. I can’t violate their free will like that. But what can I do…”
He hesitated. There was always the chance that he could kill himself. He knew he would survive, that he would wake up in another world, and the problems of this one would be lessened, if not solved, by his vanishing.
But Jonathan would miss him. The war would continue, and his brother would still be Confounded and not acting in his own best interests. Maybe Harry should have been smarter in the past, but he couldn’t abandon the people who leaned on him now.
Fawkes flew down to his shoulder with a low, concerned sound, and rubbed his beak against Harry’s hair. Harry reached up and leaned his hand on him, letting the ordinary warmth of a phoenix cheer him up.
“Can you stand to stay there longer?” he asked. “Because if you leave him now, then he’ll probably know something’s changed.”
Fawkes turned his head. Harry met the horrified look in those shining eyes and shook his head.
“No, you’re right. That would corrupt you.” Phoenixes were pure creatures. Fawkes had probably stayed this long only because he believed that there were some actions Albus would never take. And then he’d taken them.
Fawkes crooned in relief. Then he pointed his beak at the far side of the room and waited, immobile, until Harry had conjured a perch. When he flew over to it, Fawkes wasted no time in tucking his head under his wing.
Harry shook his head in slight exasperation. “So you brought me this problem and now it’s my problem? Thanks ever so.”
But Fawkes didn’t wake up. Harry turned back to the fire and stared into it.
He would have to start a resistance movement against Albus bloody Dumbledore, the man who had led most of the resistance movements in the worlds he had been born into.
Harry shut his eyes. He would have to go up against Sirius and his parents and Remus, without letting them know he was going against them.
It hurt like a hand had reached into his chest and curled around his heart. But his first loyalty was to Jonathan. Perhaps that was his own fault, perhaps there would never have been strangeness with the adults in his life if he hadn’t told them the truth, but not even he could change the past.
Harry shuddered a little. Well, he could, but the price for such magic was more than he was willing to pay.
His first step would have to be freeing Jonathan. Since he couldn’t simply snatch him away from Hogwarts and bring him to live with Harry by themselves for a month, he would have to pursue a longer and more complicated route that would involve potions. Harry would begin brewing them in the morning.
His second step…
Harry rolled his eyes. It was time for another letter to Voldemort, explaining the circumstances and changing their plan. They would still have to fool Dumbledore, but it would take even more time and lies.
I’ve done harder things. I know that. Taking down an insane Voldemort. Convincing Snape to be my lover. Burning my own magic while holding open that portal to-honestly, whatever that place was-while phantom cheetahs ran past me. Merlin, that was weird.
Why does this bow me down so much?
Harry sighed. Because I know that I’m making enemies of some people who wouldn’t have to be my enemies. Because it turns out I was right, all the times that I thought revealing my power would cause more problems than it solves.
Harry stood up. There was something else he had to do before the war, or the not-war, began in earnest. He stepped out of the house again, leaving Fawkes sleeping on his perch, and sent out a pulsing tendril of magic to make sure Lily and James were still asleep. They were.
He Apparated, following the formless tug in the back of his mind. He opened his eyes to a black-walled tomb, and stared. This wasn’t the place that Voldemort had ever hidden the ring Horcrux in any of his lives.
Then he shook his head. Of course, there was no guarantee that it would be with the ring Horcrux in this world, either.
Harry held out his hand and called. The sides of the tomb seemed to bounce and waver in his vision for a second. Then the door flew open, and the Resurrection Stone shot out of it and into his hand.
Harry felt the bolt of power that soared through him. He swallowed. Now the three Deathly Hallows were joined again, and he would have to take up the power that he had never wielded except in his first life, and that unwittingly.
Now he had to be the Master of Death.
Chapter Twenty-Six.
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