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His Twenty-Eighth Life	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Voldemort Views: 18821 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 3
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I am making no money from this story.

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Thank you again for all the reviews!
Chapter Twenty-One—Understanding
“Watch this, Harry.”
Voldemort’s low voice was compelling when he wanted it to be, Harry admitted. He tilted his head back and watched as Voldemort’s wand flickered in and out of the branches of the small tree they stood next to. There was a twist on the end that Harry never remembered seeing before. He leaned forwards, attention sharpened.
Voldemort visibly preened. Harry didn’t have the time to say anything about that, though, because he was too busy watching the stream of mixed elements that trailed into being through the branches of the tree.
Some of it was dirt, some of it steam, and some of it packed and gleaming rock. Harry tried to touch the place in the braid where the stone and the steam blended, and couldn’t feel a join or a seam. He shook his head in wonder.
“It’s rare to be able to join air and earth and water like that. Especially since most people think of earth as more yielding, either wood or dirt or mud.” He turned around to smile at Voldemort. “Congratulations.”
Voldemort’s eyes were so bright that Harry thought he might have been able to read by their light. “Good. It would not do for Lord Voldemort to only imitate lesser beings.”
Harry turned and began to walk away. Voldemort hissed behind him, but it wasn’t even in Parseltongue, so Harry didn’t have to respond.
Abruptly, Voldemort Apparated in front of him. Harry held up a hand instinctively, light gathering around his fingers. Then he forced himself to calm down. He didn’t need a repeat of his fifteenth life when he’d hurled fire at Rodolphus and it turned out to be fire from the heart of a star.
“I—apologize,” Voldemort said, forcing the word out as if it was in a foreign language completely different from English. “For speaking of myself in the third person and denigrating your—associates by contrast.”
Harry folded his arms and eyed Voldemort cautiously. He didn’t move, and the glow in his eyes had dimmed. That was one thing Harry regretted. A Voldemort who could learn joy and triumph in something other than death and torture was one who was less likely to go back to his murdering and torturing ways.
“It’s all right,” Harry said, when enough moments had passed that he knew he should have Apparated away if he was going to. “I just find it intensely creepy and disorienting. It’s like you’re talking about someone else. Like you’ve left this place and time and gone somewhere else. Instead of being here with me.”
Voldemort continued to stare at him. Harry refused to back down or look away. And finally Voldemort nodded, although his stare was still pensive. “No one has ever made that particular complaint. If anything, they have been glad not to share a time and space with Lord—”
Harry felt his eye twitch.
“Not to share it with—me.” Voldemort was audibly gritting his teeth, but that was hardly Harry’s problem. For a moment, his hand twitched as if he was going to reach out and touch Harry. Then he pulled it back. “Do not leave.”
And that’s as close as he can come to asking politely, right now. Harry nodded and turned back to the hovering stream of mingled elements, which hadn’t dissipated even when Voldemort’s attention was elsewhere. That was impressive, too. Most people had too little experience in controlling elements like this to maintain them except if they were glaring directly at them. “All right. What do you intend to use these for?”
“To reinforce the wards on the manor.” Voldemort was still watching him rather than the elements, but that was something that no longer bothered Harry after lifetimes of staring—although most of the time it was people staring at him for unexpected magic or being an unexpectedly smart animal or seemingly foreseeing the future rather than being the Boy-Who-Lived. “This will be a protection that few people can force their way through. They would have to know how to do it.”
“That’s true—”
“Do you intend to show Albus how to do this, Harry?”
Harry remained silent for some time. Then he said, “I intend to show my brother. I have no secrets from him.”
“Does your brother intend to fight against me?”
“He would fight against you with everything he has if you threatened me.”
“Then he need never fear. Do you understand how far I am from threatening you, Harry? I would protect you with everything I have.”
Harry met Voldemort’s eyes, and nodded. “I know. I don’t question that. Jonathan doesn’t, either, I think. He managed to figure out that I was still writing to you when no one else in our house did. But he would still fight against you if you did turn into a threat.”
“Tell me how I could do that.” Voldemort seemed to have come closer without moving.
“You want me to give you ideas?”
“Not precisely. I want to know what would make you feel trapped or threatened, so I will know not to do it.”
“You know, at some point you should try being good for the sake of—I don’t know. Principles. Ideals. Not because you think it’s what I want you to do.”
Voldemort only watched him, eyes as vivid as before. Harry managed not to roll his own. “All right. Trying to force me to stay with you. Putting Tracking Charms on me. Reading my mind without permission. Using the magic I taught you to hurt someone I care about—”
“My oaths prevent that,” Voldemort said, as soft as the sound of a serpent sliding through grass. “I will never do any of the others unless you give me permission.”
“Permission to try and force me to stay with you? What the hell.”
“I meant that there may come a day when you welcome me monitoring your welfare and seeing into your mind.”
Harry only sighed, because that was his best defense when Voldemort started being ridiculous. “I think I’ve had enough for tonight. Unless there was some other magic made with blended elements that you wanted to show me?”
“No. I wanted only to bask in your presence. Harry.”
And I could do without that, too. Voldemort mouthed his name as if he was eating a toffee sometimes. “Good night, then.” Harry Disapparated before Voldemort finished the creepy inclination of his head that he was doing.
Was it a bow? Meant to be a bow?
Harry honestly thought it was better if he never found that out for certain.
*
Lord Voldemort stood watching the place where Harry had Disapparated, with a faint frown. Then he cast several charms and curses that would tell him the presence of any magic in the clearing. Faint traces gleamed where he had Disapparated to get in front of Harry, where Harry had used the same talent, and where his stream of blended elements had coiled.
Nothing else.
He is not using a spell to make me feel like this, then.
In truth, Lord Voldemort had not suspected otherwise. Harry had his reasons for behaving as he did, and Lord Voldemort understood him even though no one else in Albus’s grasping clutches could. Harry did as he did to Lord Voldemort’s mind by being himself, and coming and teaching him magic, and speaking his approval, and asserting his will. There was no one else in the world—in all the worlds—that Lord Voldemort could have thought of as an equal, or wanted to spend time around, or tolerated this level of insolence from.
Which meant that this longing to be around him more often was a natural consequence of being around Harry.
Lord Voldemort Apparated back to the manor and to his room, spending some time thinking deeply. He could not implant desires for his presence in Harry’s mind. He could not charm him with a Dark spell. He could not use a love potion. Harry would notice all of those at once, and he would disappear forever.
That left—
Lord Voldemort grimaced. That left making his company pleasant in return, and offering a refuge, as he already was, from the stupid things Albus had done. Asking questions. Charming Harry with the charisma that he had once relied on above all other weapons.
You relied on that when you were a powerless child, without blood and the knowledge of the magic that you would someday wield, said a sharp voice into the back of his mind.
Lord Voldemort tilted his head. Outside the window, a white snake coiled in the garden. Lord Voldemort watched it idly. He had bought several exotics and was letting them roam free around the manor and breed as they chose. He was interested to see what kind of talents would emerge from them that he had not planned for.
Well, was he not in a position of limited power again? Harry was greater than he was. And there was no shame in admitting that. It was a matter of survival. Lord Voldemort would have died as a child if he had not only thought himself the equal of wizards like Albus, but tried to demonstrate it.
He would bide his time. Offer his presence. Offer an escape. Offer what might be most valuable, the knowledge of who Harry really was and his acceptance of that, instead of rejection as he thought Harry was most likely encountering from the Light.
But there was one more thing he could do, and he stood and walked out of the manor to see whether he had the means to do it as yet.
*
Severus leaned his head against the useless bookshelf and closed his eyes. He had only his words left now, and he picked through them carefully, projecting a façade of insouciance, much as it went against his instincts not to look at the powerful, dangerous witch in the room.
“You must have seen that the Dark Lord has changed, Bellatrix. He no longer cares about the goals that drew the Death Eaters together. He permits Mudbloods to flourish unchecked in our world, and does not harm even Muggles who stumble dangerously close to us. He does not care for pure blood. He gathers obscure research that might gratify his curiosity, but will not be useful in battle. What do you think has happened to him?”
“I know that the Dark Lord has goals that neither of us could understand, Severus, and your attempt to turn me against him is pitiful.”
“Then why not explain those goals? He certainly never had trouble doing that before. Why does he keep silent and laugh and sometimes torture us—us, his most faithful, instead of the Mudbloods? Why, Bella?”
“It’s not for you or me to question.”
But at least she sounded more pensive than she had, which Severus was prepared to claim as a victory at the moment. He forced his eyes open and straightened up from the bookshelf. Bellatrix was turning her wand in her hand and glaring at the books as if she couldn’t read them, either.
Severus carefully turned his thoughts away from the curse he labored under. He would become breathless with fear and rage if he persisted, and neither was a good mindset for undermining the Dark Lord. “But he no longer makes inspiring speeches, does he? He no longer sends us on raids? He no longer acts as he did before this cursed influence came into his life.”
“What cursed influence?”
“He didn’t tell you? He spared young Harry Potter. He never tried to kill the boy, and he hasn’t gone after the Potters for defying him, either, even though they’re some of Dumbledore’s closest associates and they’re the only family that survived one of his visits. Haven’t you wondered why?”
“It wasn’t my place to wonder.” But Bellatrix only waited a moment before she added, “Why?”
“Because he believes that their youngest son has some sort of important, special magic that no wizard has ever possessed before.” Severus sneered. He had no intention of telling Bella the truth of Harry Potter. She would make some attempt to capture the boy and bring him to the Dark Lord as a “cure.”
Severus didn’t want Harry Potter here. He wanted him dead, and the Dark Lord’s world on fire.
“That’s stupid. How can a child have that kind of magic?”
Severus only watched her. A second later, Bellatrix paled as she realized that she had indirectly called her lord stupid. She licked her lips and looked around as if she expected the Dark Lord to materialize out of the walls and kill her for her insolence.
But nothing happened, as Severus had known it would not. The Dark Lord had changed.
But not enough. Not to someone I can be loyal to, not when he laid this curse on me.
“How can a child have that kind of magic?” Bella repeated.
“He can’t. I don’t know why the Dark Lord is so deluded. Either it is the child’s fault, or it is the result of a plan of Dumbledore’s, or…”
Severus let his voice trail off, and Bellatrix’s imagination suggest the other possibilities. Her imagination was good at that. A second later, she closed her eyes and nodded.
“And the simplest solution would be to kill the child.”
Severus pretended to think about it, although that had been the conclusion he had always intended to lead her towards. “I suppose. We might try to speak to the Dark Lord and ask him the true source of his fascination. It is possible that this is a clever plan on his part and not the child’s fault at all.”
“If he is cursed or under the influence of a potion, then he would not respond to us. Yes, yes, I see it now. Something happened when he became obsessed with the child. Perhaps Dumbledore implanted a curse in the boy’s flesh. And that is the source of the Dark Lord’s difference, and that is what we must remove!”
Severus bowed his head, and watched from beneath lowered eyelids as Bellatrix swept out of the room. This was only one of the plans he had in motion. He did not truly think that Bellatrix would manage to harm someone as powerful as the Potter being. But there was the chance.
He would not rest until he had taken from the Dark Lord what he valued as much as Severus had valued the knowledge that came from books.
Bellatrix bowling down the rails, Severus turned his attention to the next of those plans.
*
Harry closed his eyes. He couldn’t believe that James had just told him he would have to keep his powers a secret from Neville and the other children his own age.
“Yes, of course,” he said, for the fourth time in this conversation. “I know that.”
“Do you? Because you confessed them so openly to Albus that I have to admit I assumed…”
“I only told him as much as I did because I’d rescued Remus, and that meant a few of my secrets were out. I never would have if I’d been able to keep my Dementor powers secret.”
James shifted uneasily. Harry opened his eyes and looked hard at his father. They were in the back garden where Harry had spent so much of his time weeding and tending flowers, and James looked as though he was much older than Harry knew he was, with the sunlight catching on subtle lines around his eyes.
“But don’t you think that’s lying? Keeping magic that could do a lot of good in the war from the leader of the war?”
“What do you want me to do, Dad? You get upset when I keep them a secret and when I tell someone. What do you want?”
James flinched, and Harry tried to rein in his irritation. He told himself again that James Potter was only twenty-nine and couldn’t be expected to accept that his child was an immortal being with seventeen hundred years and more of life behind him and magic that he could hardly understand if it was explained to him.
A treacherous voice in the back of his head asked, But why not? He’s had three years to accept it.
Harry intended to ignore that voice. It sounded way too much like Voldemort for comfort.
“I just want to know what you want me to do. I want to be a good son, Dad. Please.”
“Well—tell them to the appropriate people, of course. And Albus is an appropriate person. I don’t want to make you think he isn’t.” James was visibly floundering. “But keep them from other children. And honestly, Harry, that should include your brother. He’s still a child.”
“Unless you’re going to Obliviate Jonathan, then you can’t take the knowledge away from him now.”
“I won’t do that!”
Harry nodded and managed to smile. He could see the generous, great-hearted person James was in his responses when he said things like that. It was just—it just made it hard, sometimes, when he felt like the only people who understood him were Jonathan and Voldemort.
“I know, Dad. And I’ll keep the knowledge from all the rest of the children.”
James relaxed, and ruffled his hair. “I knew you would, Harry. You’re a good kid.”
Then why did you bother asking me if I would or not? And am I a child, who has to be coaxed and asked and given promises and lectured to, or an adult, who can be trusted to fight in the war and know what’s right and have knowledge that’s forbidden to the rest of the children?
Harry dismissed that thought, again. James wasn’t him. He was a wonderful father, a father who had literally died for him in Harry’s first life, and someone who had been patient and a prankster and shallow and manipulative and a valiant fighter and so much more in other lives. Sometimes Harry thought the people who knew felt uneasy around him because they felt lesser next to him, but they shouldn’t. They had existed in as many worlds as he had. They had lives as rich as his. They just didn’t remember them. That was the only difference.
He thought that. He told himself that. But there was still a deep ache in his chest, and a determination never to tell anyone in his next life who he was. It caused too many problems.
Voldemort would understand.
That thought was far more horrifying than James’s lack of understanding. Harry condemned himself for thinking it, and bowed his head, and let his father’s hand travel through his hair.
They don’t remember. But I do. I have no right to complain.
*
Anaelyssa: I hope this chapter answers your question about Snape! And the answer is: not well.
Let's hope Remus turns around before he does something even more foolish.
Fenrirsboy: Remus is terrified to death at the thought that someone could accept his Darkness and be a good person. It would mean he's been wrong all his life. So he hides from the idea.
Glad you like Jonathan.
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His Twenty-Eighth Life