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In the seemingly endless summer after Harry’s fourth year, he visits Diagon Alley to flee the muggle world. Foolish notions of perhaps contacting his friends in his head, questioning them on their apparent lack of care for his well-being, maybe obtaining a Daily Prophet to figure out the state of the wizarding world. He has been expressly asked not to leave his relatives, but Harry simply has to flee the loneliness and their abuse. As he feels every time he comes to Diagon Alley, his vibrant surroundings enliven him and lift his spirits. This time though, he feels a strange disconnect between the careless happiness of his surroundings and the oppressive knowledge he had obtained through blood and death at the end of the school year.
‘Harry Potter.’ A soft sibilant murmur in his mind, tugging on his thoughts, halting them. It is more a press of another mind against his, more a feeling, rather than something he hears physically. He knows this voice. Fear courses through him and dread is like lead in his stomach, as he turns. There is no screaming, no running, yet. This surprises him until he finds the man. Voldemort stands in the busy crowd, though they part for him unseeingly, uncaringly. Common wizards and witches perhaps subconsciously guided by his magic that subtly diverts them. Harry’s pulse rushes in his ears and his heartbeat obstructs his throat. A hot flush of fight or flight on his face, he knows.
Voldemort has donned his Tom Riddle glamour, which explains the obvious lack of mass-hysteria. Harry's mind is unwillingly transported back to two years ago. The memory of a younger Tom Marvolo Riddle conjured up and compared to what he sees, now. This Riddle has more lines in his face, he is taller, is filling out his frame better than he had been previously. Harry is suddenly struck by the ridiculous notion that he looks like prince Eric from one of these ridiculous muggle Disney movies his cousin watched when they had been little. White shirt, casually unbuttoned, tall, dark hair curling into his forehead artfully, aristocratic features. Sleeves rolled up to expose corded forearms. Pressed slacks. Unassuming, almost mundane, if it weren’t for his almost otherworldly beauty teetering the line of danger. His eyes, deep grey, flashing red when angry, and his slightly too pallid skin reveal him for what he is. He looks like one of these toxic flowers that lures victims in by their beauty to only reveal their true danger after it is too late. There are a few moments for Harry to form these stumbling, quasi-philosophical thoughts in light of Tom Riddle’s stunning looks and they just stare at one another.
Voldemort cocks his head, eyes flashing, sharp amusement playing with his features, instantly vanishing the impression of a fair prince, instead hurrying towards imminent danger. ‘Charming.’ The Dark Lord’s amusement widens into a sneer. Mortification floods through Harry at the realization that the other is able to hear his thoughts. Wand flying into his hands. The Dark Lord tutts condescendingly in his mind. ‘We wouldn’t want to expose my presence in Diagon Alley to all of wizarding Britain, do we, Harry? It wouldn’t end well for the poor, innocent people surrounding us…’ The Dark Lord’s disparaging voice makes his callous disregard for the poor, innocent people surrounding them abundantly clear. His unnerving eyes never leave Harry’s. Harry racks his brain for the reason the Dark Lord wouldn’t want to expose himself. Thinks of ways he can turn this situation into his favour. Curses himself for his foolish mistake of coming here. Bile rising at visions of Diagon Alley in chaos, wizards and witches, children shouting in fear and panic at Voldemort in their midst. He swallows thickly. ‘Very good.’ A satisfied sheen in the stunning eyes of Voldemort’s façade. ‘Now, follow me, if you wish any of these people to survive this day.’
The man who looks like Riddle turns and saunters into a less-populated side-branch of Diagon Alley, confidence in his certainty that Harry will follow. The boy bites down a curse. He knows, of course, that this is a mistake. That he’ll be running in Voldemort’s arms, knowingly. And yet, he catches sight of two second-years he fleetingly remembers having seen before in Hogwarts. They are discussing the newest broom designs just two meters to his left and he knows what he’ll have to do before his legs start moving. A soft chuckle reverberates inside his head to accompany him. Mocking him. He wants to live. But more than that, he doesn’t want others to die because of him. Harry grits his teeth in anger at his own predictability and starts pushing through the crowd that fails to part as easily for him as it did for his arch-nemesis.
He reaches the mouth of the side street and scans the heads of hair, faces. There, he spots the man, casually leaning against the corner of a seedy looking pub. It seems as if this street, which is much less populated than Diagon Alley, miraculously clears out further as the seconds tick by. Then, the man’s eyes rise up to meet his, and Harry knows his time to stall has run out. He comes to a stop in front of the man, who, by now, is scanning the faces of the few people left in the street, before his eyes find his again. “Voldemort.” Harry croaks out, not loud enough to attract any one’s attention. The man in question smiles almost benevolently, though his eyes focus on Harry with a sharp edge. “Harry Potter.”, he answers softly, slightly sibilantly. Harry starts at the sound, the Dark Lord’s voice eerily similar to parseltongue. Then, he feels the hard wood of a wand prod his ribs. ‘Don’t scream, don’t run.’ The voice in his mind supplies. ‘Unless you want a bloodbath, that is…’, Harry suppresses a shudder of rage and fear at the invasion of the voice in his head. This time, it is as if Voldemort was speaking directly into his ear. The two of them are angled such that an unassuming voyeur wouldn’t be able to tell that Harry is being held at wand-point. “What do you want?”, he grits out, heart beating fast in the face of his enemy. His enemy, whose eyes widen faux-innocently: “Why so cagey, Harry? To talk, of course.”
Harry nods while his thoughts race a mile a second. “To talk… Of course.”, he parrots, disbelief obvious in his sarcastic intonation. The dark lord inclines his head almost accommodatingly. “Tell me Harry, isn’t it strange that I can hear your thoughts and you, mine?”, he asks as if the answer was obvious. As if the question were truly a self-evident statement. But there is something in its’ undertone, something pressing, something prodding, which makes Harry truly consider it as a question. If he hadn't been asked, he would have certainly dismissed it. It was strange, Harry had never heard of such a phenomenon, though that might as well mean nothing. He was decidedly not a Hermione. Harry had long since accepted anything between the Dark Lord and him to be a by-product of the strange connection they’d formed, when his opposite had first tried to kill him. Or when he had resurrected his body using Harry’s blood. One of those. Some magical love-mumbo-jumbo, Harry presumed. Dumbledore would probably know the specifics.
His opposite chuckles softly. “Almost.”, the other acknowledges. His wand-less hand moving upwards to push away the strands of the unruly hair covering his scar. Harry braces himself against the pain. It doesn’t come. Voldemort’s touch is light, almost gentle and Harry’s heart rises in cadence. “The night I gave you this… The night I marked you as mine -.”, there is an eery flash of red in his opposite’s eyes at that and something like heat that is not his own flashes through his head. Voldemort continues, intonation falling, pensive, almost wondrously: “The night I tried to kill you, I left something of my own behind. Something – I will admit – not even I had anticipated.” Harry is confused, he knows his ability to speak with snakes is derived from the Dark Lord’s own abilities, and sometimes he feels mercurial moods that he is sure are not entirely his own, but other than those, he doesn’t know whatever his opposite might be talking about.
Even though Harry tries to control his expression, trains it into smooth apathy, Voldemort appears to discern his confusion. His long, elegant fingers trail down the side of Harry’s face and stop to cup his chin, to force it upwards. Fear and anger battle for dominance inside him, but he doesn’t dare to oppose the other. The slight widening in his opposite’s eyes warning him to be smart. Another satisfied smile. “Do you know what a Horcrux is, Harry?”, the older wizard asks, the question enticing. Suggestive. No. He does not know what that is. “You house a part of my soul, Harry.”, the Dark Lord continues, almost lovingly, a thumb brushing over Harry’s bottom lip as if they were doing something else entirely. Harry, though, has little time to flush at that because something about that statement seems foreboding and twisted and wrong. Even if he is unable to parse what the other means in its entirety. That, and because there is someone calling his name from behind him.
“Potter!” Harry knows that voice. Associates it with greasy hair, a crooked nose and billowing robes. He doesn’t need to turn to identify Professor Snape. The wand prods him a little bit more insistently, now. Voldemort’s gaze strays from his and focusses on the professor who is, presumably, behind him. Voldemort, in Tom Riddle’s skin, drops his hand from its previous damning position and the man straightens, stops leaning against the pub’s exterior. Faces the man behind Harry more directly, which brings him even closer to Harry. There is something cold and calculating in his face, which renders Harry truly afraid for the first time since meeting him in Diagon Alley. Harry takes that as his cue to turn and acknowledge the potion’s professor as well, still subtly at wand-point. Severus Snape is behind him indeed, face pinched in obvious frustration. The professor’s eyes glide over the man softly pressed against Harry’s back, without comment, not showing recognition, from which Harry deduces that Voldemort either has a particularly strong notice-me-not charm applied to himself, or Snape simply doesn’t know Tom Riddle’s visage. Either option is not helping him in the slightest right now.
Then, his professor’s eyes focus on his own: “To what imbecilic notion do we owe it, Potter, that you are out here? Why are you not with your relatives?” The older man’s eyes flash dangerously. Harry feels Voldemort move behind him. Transforming into the perfect image of casual, self-confident sleaze, his wand-less hand finding Harry’s shoulder as if… as if they had been flirting. “Oh, don’t worry Professor.”, Voldemort says from behind Harry with easy charm. He can feel the other man’s voice rumble through his chest. “I was just inviting Harry here, to share a drink.”, Voldemort gestures towards the pub’s front door. Harry can feel the flush rising in his cheeks quickly.
Snape’s expression flits back towards Voldemort, brow furrowed, as if trying to remember something. Harry hopes for a few seconds the Hogwarts professor will realize what danger Harry is in, but then the man’s eyebrows climb upwards, face turning back towards Harry. His expression utterly unimpressed, if maybe a little surprised. “Mr. Potter should know that… neither is he of age, nor is the situation such that he should follow… acquaintances into pubs…”, Snape’s states clipped, as his mouth twitches in irritation again. Harry wants the ground to swallow him up and simultaneously feels annoyed anger crawling through his veins. What has he ever done to warrant Snape not suspecting this to be a plot. When has he ever given his professor the impression, he could be into men thrice his age. Then again, his position now could be considered quite indicative.
Voldemort hmms behind Harry, as if contemplative, but inside his head, Harry can feel a vesuvian rage swelling at the thwarted opportunity, which quells Harry’s mortification. Then, Voldemort seems to have reached a decision when he abruptly squeezes Harry’s deltoid. He bends towards Harry, breath fanning his ear to murmur lowly: “Dumbledore will kill you for it, Harry. When the time comes, find me… Maybe we can come to an agreement.” This time, Harry cannot suppress the shiver. His mind crashing through different interpretations of the statement, questions, rejection, fear and confusion warring inside him. Voldemort squeezes his shoulder once more, meaningfully, before his wand retreats. There is a second where their gazes meet, Voldemort’s darkly amused, satisfied and… heated. Harry’s is questions and outrage, before the older wizard turns, smirking slightly and strolls away. Harry is left choking on his disbelief that he survived this so simply. He can’t believe that that was it.
A pointed clearing of a throat makes Harry swivel around, back towards his potion’s professor. Mortification and embarrassment catching up with him at his opposite’s carefully blank stare. “Good to see you’re enjoying yourself, Potter, while everyone else does their utmost to ensure your survival.”, the older wizard sneers, before he grabs his student’s arm and apparates them back to Little Winging.
Harry returns to the predictability of loneliness and abuse from his relatives, but Voldemort’s words spin in circles through his head. Sometimes he feels a vindictive rage that is not his own, or sadistic amusement or curiosity, sometimes satisfaction. And their connection deepens. It takes Harry a while before he realizes just how easily Voldemort could weaponize him. As he writhes on the floor of the ministry of magic, Voldemort shows him how easily he could have done that this whole year, how he could have assumed control of his limbs and slaughtered all of Hogwarts from the inside. It’s a dark promise. One, Harry doesn’t fail to notice, he hasn’t yet fulfilled.
When he returns to Hogwarts as a student for a final time, Dumbledore tells him about the Horcruxes, finally. They hunt them together and Harry feels Voldemort’s pain and rage and anguish. And an uncomfortable realization dawns on Harry. He hasn’t forgotten Voldemort’s words; worse, he arrives at the certain knowledge that Voldemort had been right. Even if Dumbledore hasn’t told Harry explicitly, yet, Harry knows that to ultimately defeat Voldemort, he has to die. He finds Snape’s choice of words in the pensieve oddly fitting. A pig for slaughter, indeed. There is a sense of inevitability in him now. And when Voldemort’s voice floods Hogwarts’ grounds, penetrating everyone’s minds, inviting fear into everyone’s hearts, crooning at Harry to come and meet him, Harry goes. Because he wants to live. But more than that, he doesn’t want others to die because of him.
He goes to meet Voldemort. He goes to offer a trade.
His staying alive in Voldemort's care in exchange for a ceasefire.
Because he will find a way to force Voldemort into killing his last Horcrux, otherwise.
Voldemort welcomes him with a satisfied grin as a heated possessiveness burns through Harry’s mind.