Freezingflames7 - FreezingFlames

Harry Potter is incapable of looking mid he is very very pretty no matter what. same goes for voldemort like he is always ridiculously beautiful and I am 100% indisputably correct

LMFAO I need more of this

“Expulso!”

The force of the magic slammed him through one wall and into another, and Harry could not breathe. It felt like the time Dudley sat on top of his chest, pressing all of the air from his lungs. He gasped and choked to no avail, the sensation of breathlessness more distressing than the stars dancing before his eyes and the ringing of his ears. 

He was dying, dying, dying.

After a too-long moment Harry managed a shuddering inhale, getting a lungful of concrete dust for his troubles. He doubled over, coughing violently. His wand. He needed his wand.

His right arm was screaming in pain, and Harry squinted through hazy eyes to find a bone sticking out of it at a decidedly odd angle, having ripped through his shirt and robes. Harry had a half-hearted thought of relief that Lockhart wasn’t here to vanish all the bones, which was strange because he should be focusing on the fact that he still couldn’t breathe properly. 

He blinked blearily and twitched his left hand with a desperation that had his wand—blessedly whole—slapping into it. Harry wasn’t used to casting with his off hand, but he was still able to twist it enough to cast a bubble-head charm. 

The spell was silent, because he had no breath for words and no time to think that he couldn’t manage. He had to.

Harry gasped again, this time into a clean pocket of air, and the panic receded a little more at the hard-won oxygen. The pulsing of his temples began to ease on his next breath, but the world still looked too-bright and decidedly crooked. 

“My Lord,” came a smooth, even voice, “shall I take his wand?”

Harry’s eyes focused slowly on the two figures in front of him as his fingers tightened almost compulsively around his wand. His.

“Let the child learn his lesson in full first,” said Lord Voldemort generously. 

Harry swallowed around a dry mouth, glad to taste no blood. At least he hadn’t bitten his tongue or gotten any teeth knocked loose. He inhaled deeply again, revelling in his ability to do so, though the motion made him notice an ache in his sternum as well. Bruised ribs, maybe?  

‘Lesson?’ Harry wondered blearily, a few beats too late. 

Though perhaps he said it out loud, because Voldemort replied, “That you are no match for Lord Voldemort.”

Of course he wasn’t. What a stupid point to try and make. He was fifteen. He barely knew any magic at all. Voldemort had been given decades to learn, versus Harry’s five years. Any competent adult—and wasn’t that an oxymoron—could easily outmatch him, nevertheless a Dark Lord. 

“Well,” Voldemort’s voice came dryly, “you have more sense than I expected, having been raised on Dumbledore’s knee.”

Harry let out a vague approximation of a laugh. He hadn’t known Voldemort had a sense of humour. Dumbledore couldn’t even stand to be in the same room as him. They’d spoken—what, six times since he was eleven? Dumbledore hadn’t so much as looked his way the entire year. 

Not that Harry exactly wanted his attention. He was still angry with the Headmaster for that stupidity with the Triwizard Tournament, and his assault after returning from the Graveyard, and the resulting announcement made (on Harry’s behalf, as if he had any right to speak for him) that Voldemort was back. Really, Harry could have avoided a year of carving ‘I must not tell lies,’ into his own hand if it wasn’t for Dumbledore deciding to tell the world about Voldemort’s resurrection. 

Or maybe not, if Umbridge was one of Voldemort’s and he’d told her to torture Harry for revealing his return. Who knew? That would certainly have been a neat, simple solution. The woman was prejudiced enough to be on par with Malfoy, and he was a Death Eater. But if being prejudiced was the only qualifier to being a part of Voldemort’s army, or movement, or whatever the hell it was, then everybody would get an invite. Dudders could be a Death Eater; make his parents proud. 

“He has quite a mouth on him, My Lord.”

Wow, how observant. Snape would love this guy. 

Was Harry concussed? That was weird. Normally if he was concussed he stayed very, very still and quiet until he was able to sleep and his magic saw him to rights. If he got talkative with a head injury, the Durlsey’s would’ve probably dropped him at an orphanage like they always threatened, or maybe just left him in the middle of nowhere in hopes that he’d drop dead.

“What nonsense is he blubbering about?” the voice said again, and the trace of discomfort was slight but obvious to a boy who had been forced to pick up on such subtleties to survive. Did he not like to hear about the fact that some kids did not get coddled?

Did Death Eaters coddle their kids? Like, as a whole? Draco Malfoy had definitely been coddled; he acted just like Dudley, if not as stupid. He’d definitely grown up with a bed and food and people that would say ‘yes’ to his whims. He just had that sense about him.

Not that Harry wished that the boy hadn’t grown up with that stuff. Harry wouldn’t be intentionally cruel enough to hope for that. Just, he didn’t have to rub it in people’s faces so much. Then again, the brat would have to have manners or something not to do that, and with each passing day Harry was becoming increasingly sure that no witch or wizard actually possessed any matter of manners at all. Everyone was so rude, all the time. Well actually Riddle hadn’t been rude at first, but then he sicced a basilisk on Harry, which was not only rude but also attempted murder. 

Wait, where was he again? Oh. Halfway into the wall he had flown into after bursting through the first. Attempted murder again. That made sense.

The only question was, why was Voldemort so bad at actually murdering him? That had to be a little embarrassing. Oh wait, no, ‘lesson’. The man wanted to teach him something. Harry wondered if he wanted to be a good student for the Dark Lord, or if he’d rather just decline the opportunity. So far, he taught like a muggle.

“A muggle?”

Ouch. Harry’s scar hurt more than his arm; how did Voldemort do that? Harry needed to learn so he could hurt the man right back. Fairs fair.

A finger pressed cruelly into Harry’s brow, right over his scar. It hurt it hurt it hurt it hurtithurt!

“Just like a muggle,” Harry gasped out. Physical violence. Just like Vernon. Voldemort. Vernon. Maybe everyone in the world who had a V-name was the worst.

Cold fingers felt surprisingly nice against Harry’s overheated face. The pain of his scar ebbed abruptly, leaving a dizzying confusion in its wake. Harry might throw up sometime soon.

“Would you like non-physical violence, boy?” Voldemort asked.

Harry carded through the options. Isolation and containment. Starvation. Maybe mental violence, the kind that Snape preferred. Verbal violence of Petunia’s ilk seemed a bit below the Dark Lord, but then her words about how much of a worthless, unnatural freak Harry was did circle his head to this day, so there was no doubt that kind of thing was effective. Just, probably it would’ve been effective if Voldemort had started before he could remember like Petunia had. 

“Do you have a non-violent option? Or is there a box I can check to be killed quickly? Is this a survey? I would rate your services as abysmal. Or wait. Uh. Troll. That’s it, right? Yeah. Bad… bad grade. Probably your first. You’ve failed pacifism. A truly bleak thing for a Dark Lord. You have my greatest sympathies. Surely this will hurt your future career options and they’ll have to lower your salary.” 

Are revolutionaries paid? Or does Voldemort take his own payment? What would be a suitable payment for a Dark Lord? The bodies of his opposers? But then, all his opposers are magical, and didn’t Riddle have that Magic is Might thing? Or was that just something he said? The man had ordered the death of Cedric, who had been the most worthy of age wizard at Hogwarts according to the cup. Apparently Cedric’s completely attractive competency hadn’t mattered, because Voldemort hadn’t hesitated to kill one of the brightest of a generation when a stunner and memory charm could’ve worked just as well. 

Then again, he’d wanted to kill a baby, once, and the death toll of the last war had officially been tallied at one-hundred and seven magicals, after Harry’s parents, so obviously he could care less if he was decimating their population, so long as he got to rule the world or whatever. 

“Potter, do shut up.”

Huh? Had Harry been talking?

“Rambling,” the voice of the oddly not simpering sycophant chimed in helpfully. 

Well. That was something. Normally Harry went very quiet when he was concussed and waited for his magic to—oh. His magic. Harry had magic. What had he done last summer, when Sirius was no longer an adequate threat? He could probably just… 

Harry looked down to see his wand in his left hand. He set it down very gently, then stared blankly at said hand for a long, long moment. Then the air around it began to do that cute little vibrating thing that his magic would do when it hadn’t been let out for long enough, because of the stupid Dursley’s, and the stupid rules, (why the fuck weren’t students allowed to use magic at all over the summer? Didn’t it make them feel like they were going to burst apart with all the suppressed energy? It was near painful sometimes unless Harry found some way to use it, which invariably the Dursely’s gave him.) 

A hand grasped over his wrist and held him at bay. “Do not do whatever you are considering, you stupid, reckless child—”

Harry was a child, and he had chosen to be reckless when he had chosen Gryffindor over Slytherin, so he let his wrist spark with electricity that was enough to get the touch away from him. Why did people always feel so entitled to touching him? He shivered in revulsion even as he placed his hand to his head and let his eyes fall shut.

His magic went to work, effective as always. This was only the second time it hadn’t waited until Harry was asleep. That was very nice of it.

“Thank you,” he told it quite seriously, in the middle of its work. It buzzed against his temple, a current of energy, and Harry quieted and let it continue.

When Harry re-opened his eyes, his vision was not blurry, his head not pounding, and the world not an unsteady bouquet of water colours with a diagonal slant. When he opened his eyes, he met the red gaze of the Dark Lord Voldemort, and swallowed.

“Oh. Just… lovely. Hi?”

The man behind the Dark Lord snorted. Harry spared him a glance—no features were visible beneath his cloak and mask. 

Harry’s throat worked around a swallow. “Fancy seeing you here,” Harry offered, and then set his hand on his arms, because why not, and winced when his bone snapped back into place. 

Ithurtsithurtsohshit. 

Voldemort’s eyes were gleaming with an odd sort of hunger. “I wonder if you will be so eager to talk now, Harry Potter? Tell me… when was the last time you encountered me treating you politely?”

Voldemort didn’t know about the Chamber?

Harry swallowed. “Okay,” he said.

Voldemort stared. “Just like that.”

 “It’s not like I’m opposed to you knowing. I thought you already knew, but apparently you and Tom Riddle weren’t as connected as he implied. Though, you know, if you want me to spill all, you should at least say please.”

Harry’s scar ached, but his arm didn’t any more. Unlike his ribs. “Pardon?”

“You would actually prefer to use Crucio than say please,” Harry noted. “That says mildly concerning things about you, you know. Common courtesy—Troll.”

“He’s stalling,” the Death Eater noted, when Voldemort moved as if for his wand. 

“Of course I am,” Harry rebutted. “He’s clever; you should keep him around to control your terrible temper.”

Why was Harry doing this? Was he waiting for a rescue that would never come, or an opening that was twice as unlikely given the multitude of people involved. 

The Death Eater laughed, and Harry saw a flash of green light. Heard his mothers scream. 

“Oh,” he said, eyes going a bit wide. “There’s two of you.”

Both figures went unnaturally still. “Why would you say that?” The cloaked Voldemort asked. 

Harry tilted his head. “Your laugh,” he said simply. “Your voice is different, but your laugh is the same. Also, you’re not nearly frightened enough of ‘Your Lord’’.”

The cloaked figure hummed, then lowered his hood. “Clever boy,” he said lightly, eyes just as intent and intense as Voldemort’s own, though they were dark rather than bright. His hair was curly, Harry noticed, longer than Tom had kept it when he was in school, though this man didn’t look very old at all. He still had his nose, though his cheekbones were sharper than they had been as a boy, and unlike Voldemort he had lips as well. Harry catalogued these differences with some interest. The evolution of Voldemort, he thought vaguely.

“Technically,” he adds, as he finishes taking the other Dark Lord in, “I’d be doing the both of you a favour by sharing the story of my Second Year.”

His implication was clear. He wanted two pleases. 

“You’re positively suicidal, aren’t you?” the human Voldemort murmured. “Very well, Harry. Please tell me about the circumstances surrounding your encounter or encounters with Tom Riddle, as well as the encounters themselves.”

Harry watched him thoughtfully. “What are you going by?”

“Marvolo,” the cloaked man answered easily. 

“Marvolo,” he repeated thoughtfully. “Your middle name. Tom wrote it in the air for me—rearranged the letters to spell,” he gestured to Voldemort with his newly healed arm. It didn’t so much as twinge. He was more than a little impressed with his magic. 

“How did you take the revelation?” said Voldemort, something cruel in his voice. 

Harry's lips quirked. "I told him he was nothing special," Harry admitted easily. "I told him Dumbledore was the greatest wizard in the world. Mostly, I just wanted him to shut up. He kept asking questions,” he allowed his gaze to drift over both of them, mouth speaking absently even as calculations flashed through his mind. How was he going to get out of this unscathed? There had to be something… some way… 

“He was desperate to know about the night you lost your body,” he told Voldemort. “He thought I would have the answers, somehow. I told him it was my mum. Muggleborn,” he informed Marvolo, in case he didn’t know. Harry’s lips curled in amusement. “He didn’t like that very much. Went on and on about how alike we are. Then he decided it was luck and chance that had saved me, said I was nothing special, and called the basilisk.”

“Maybe I proved him wrong when I killed it and then shoved a basilisk fang into the diary.”

Rage bloomed in two sets of eyes, but it was Voldemort that hissed, “You what?”

“Well, I was dying too at the time,” he defended. “I’m nothing if not spiteful. If I died, I was going to take him with me.”

“Yet here you are,” Marvolo said with clear menace. “Apparently you did not get close enough to death.”

Harry watched him, unimpressed. “The diary wasn’t the only thing that got stabbed with a basilisk fang.”

“You lie,” hissed Voldemort, redrawing Harry’s gaze as if he’d ever truly lost it. 

Harry’s eyes narrowed. “Who’s the liar, here? My parents died begging you for mercy?”

“Didn’t they? Your father begged for his wife's life, and yours. Your mother for yours alone.”

Harry’s lips pressed tight. “Really fucked yourself, didn’t you? You told my mum ‘very well’, when she begged to trade her life for mine. You agreed. You didn’t think she was powerful enough to form an unbreakable vow without the official bindings? You would think you would be smarter than pureblood rhetoric when you’re hardly pure yourself.”

“That's it?” Marvolo murmured, tilting his head thoughtfully. “You couldn’t tell me that?” He glanced at Voldemort, then straightened. “You didn’t know.”

Harry felt the silent chastisement in the words. ‘How is it that a child realised what you didn’t?’

Not to mention the fact that Israel sniped another journalist, and gunned down their OWN HOSTAGES who were holding a white flag.

Another Al Jazeera journalist had lost over 20 members of his family today. Mo'men Al Sharafi had lost his mother, father, siblings, nieces and nephews who were all taking refuge in Jabalya refugee camp in Gaza and were targeted by Israeli shelling that destroyed the whole block.

He was asked why was his family in such a dangerous area in Northern Gaza, and he explained that his family had to move five times already and that his father, an 87 year old man, refused to be forced to leave his home again, stating that he didn't want to repeat the what was done to him during the Nakba.

This is just heartbreaking.

This is canon and you can't convince me otherwise

Voldemort: *monologuing about how he killed his father because he hated him*

Lucius: *noticing the headstone says 'Tom Riddle' on it*

Lucius: Phew. He definitely won't mind that I lost his dad’s diary if he hates him this much. What a relief.

Thank you for the art trade!! for @belphi 🌹 ▶️Dark Harry Thank you for giving me this wonderful opportunity! [Short plot for this pic] Harry intends to destroy the dark forces from within and finally destroy Voldemort. But things are not going well. Harry's resolve seems to be crumbling at any moment in the face of so many deaths. And worse, through his obsession with Harry, Voldemort's madness grows worse. Harry must fight this monster, even if what himself becomes in the end...

I’ve been reading a lot of Tomarry fanfiction.

Based on the idea that Malfoy could not get the vanishing cabinet to work effectively, and decided to mention, instead, that Hogwarts was taking the Great Hall wards down for a six-fucking-week course on Apparation. This is what wouldn't happen. But it's where my mind went, first. Warning: Graphic Violence

A loud crack signified the first successful Apparition. 

Harry’s eyes, closed in preparation for his own attempt, snapped open and his head turned. It wasn't a student standing at the other end of the Great Hall, though. Harry jolted for his wand as other students began to turn to the cloaked figure, but before he could take aim there were four more sharp cracks. 

Dark-robed, masked Death Eater’s were apparating directly into the Great Hall, the only place the castle wards were down for Hogwarts students to learn how to do the same. 

Bellatrix LeStrange was the first to appear sans mask, having no need for discretion. She took in the scene with a cackle, batting away Harry’s immediate curse effortlessly as she cooed, “Aww, look at the wittle student's trying to learn!” 

In his periphery Harry saw Neville lift his own wand, and they cast simultaneously. This time, Bellatrix twisted out of the way. “Do the wittle babies wanna play?”

“Sectumsempra,” Harry hissed with malice, fully aware of the spell's effects, now. Bellatrix’s eyes widened a bit even as she turned out of the way, quick as a dancer. The Death Eater behind her fell to their knees as their body was pulled apart by deep, horrible gashes. 

More cracks sounded; Harry began to send out indiscriminate stunners, hoping to catch the intruders before they realised they were being cast at. They all came prepared for battle to have begun, shield charms springing around them immediately. 

“Bombarda!” Ron called grimly. 

“Expulso!” shouted Neville. 

“Protego Maxima,” murmured Hermione. “Accio Susan Bones. Protego. Stupefy—students to the teacher's entrance!”

The frozen bodies of some of their yearmates seemed to jolt, realisation settling. Many students turned tail and ran. 

Susan Bones, having narrowly been pulled out of the way of a powerful cutting curse that had gouged into stone walls by Hermione, was casting stunners, petrification hexes, and disarming charms. Harry was not nearly so restrained, once he realised the stunners were ineffective. Sectumsempra broke through shields like a battering drill and Death Eaters were falling, ripped apart by his fury. Curses flew from Harry's wand as fast as he could think of them: conjunctivitis, blasting, jelly-fingers, reductors, even slug-vomiting. He conjured six venomous snakes that shot off without instruction, knowing his will. Yet again and again, Harry came back to the Half-Blood Prince’s spell, the most devastatingly effective of them all. People were dying from its effectiveness, but Harry didn’t care, because they had dared step foot in Hogwarts—  

A horrible pressure was building in Harry’s head as half the hall emptied. A wand prodded Harry’s spine, and he stilled, shaking with rage and adrenaline. “Call—call off the snakes, Potter,” a somewhat familiar voice demanded shakily.

“I’d rather they bite your father, Nott,” said Harry coldly. “Drop your wand before I have to make you regret it.” 

The wand trembled, for a moment, against his spine. “C-Cruci—”

Harry drove his elbow back, hard, and slammed down one foot on Nott's. The taller boy stumbled back in pain, and it was no great difficulty to stun him. He hit the floor, hard, and Malfoy’s grey eyes were large and frightened as he stared at Harry, still as prey. 

At once, Harry realised what he had done “You,” he said, scar pulsing horribly. “You did this. You brought war to a school filled with literal children, you stupid, useless brat. You're scared of what Voldemort will do to you? Just wait, Malfoy. His punishment would be bliss compared to what you deserve for this.”

“Such a temper, Harry Potter,” came Lord Voldemort’s cold voice. He had made no sound as he apparated, not like his followers, but Harry’s viciously prickling scar had made his imminent arrival clear. “You have done well, Draco. You will be… rewarded.”

Malfoy’s eyes darted in fright from Harry to the Dark Lord, and Voldemort was barely in time to hiss “Stop,” to the snake that had snuck up on the boy. 

“You don't obey him,” Harry hissed, “you’re mine. Do what you’re made for, dear one.”

Draco turned just in time to see the snake strike out at his neck. It vanished before its fangs could load the boy with venom, and Harry turned his hateful scowl to Voldemort, who’s gaze already rested upon him, intent, heavy and fascinated. 

“Deal with it, Hermione,” he snapped. 

“Harry—” came Hermione’s warning voice, but Harry couldn’t listen, had to dodge out of the way of Voldemort’s spell. The Dark Lord tilted his head, stare thoughtful, and then turned his yew wand… away. 

Harry watched him with a wariness not misplaced: Romilda Vane, nearly out of the Great Hall via the Professor’s entrance, fell to the cruciatus curse with a cry of pain. 

“Drop your wands, children,” the Dark Lord said, red eyes still locked on Harry as his soft, cold voice echoed through all corners of the room, carried by wandless magic. 

Harry grit his teeth at the seeming opportunity, well aware of Voldemort's objective. And yet, truly, he could not have picked a worse target to try and bring Harry under his control than the girl who had nearly raped him. He cast a wordless sonorous on himself to refute the order: “Don't give an inch. There are First Years in these walls. Do to them what you would to Umbridge. They're twice her threat. Any student who raised a wand to help Voldemort’s sect will be treated as hostile. See how I handle my enemies, Goyle, and ask yourself if that cheap shot is worth your life.”

Even as he spoke, Harry turned from Voldemort, dismissive, and focused on thinning the herd. Thirteen Death Eater’s still stood, including Bellatrix, who was engaged with Neville and Ron. Harry used every spell that came to his mind, even those from the Half-Blood Prince’s book he had not tested before. One man was effectively eviscerated, much to Harry’s disgust. He only used that spell once.  

When he saw one of his snakes change course he pulled the magic from them, an effective banishment, cold eyes finding Voldemort again. He had not heard the man speak parseltongue, and indeed he was still holding the crucio, face twisted strangely as he watched Harry. 

“My, my,” said Voldemort, immediate once he had regained Harry’s attention, two more of his people fallen, “so vicious, little snake. Does Dumbledore know you have venom?”

“I don't give a fuck what he knows,” Harry said harshly. “This is a school.” This is my home. “Focus on the bloody Ministry, and leave children out of it.”

Voldemort had the gall to laugh, high and cold. “This is not merely a school, Harry Potter,” he said. “There is a reason you children stand your ground and fight. This is where Dumbledore trains his small, young army to go to war and die, as their parents did before them.” 

Wrath bubbles in Harry, heavy and explosive, and he must look as unhinged and inhuman as the man watching him as he cages it behind his teeth. He flicks a shield charm around Bones and Abbott before a reductor hits, and a disarming charm hits the perpetrators back. He breaks the dark-wooded wand into two pieces the moment he catches it. 

“You truly think Dumbledore has taught us anything? Even my ‘private lessons’ with the man are just memories of your life, as if I care that you got away with murder when you were still sixteen.” Hermione pulls Vane’s still writhing body from the room, and Voldemort’s cruciatus ends, but he does not seem to notice or care, eyes locked on Harry. “The only reason I fight is because I do not believe in the world you are trying to create. Because you say things like ‘magic is night' and still try to subjugate witches and wizards, as if the fresh magic in their veins is poisoned by the muggles they're born to. I defy you, Lord Voldemort, because you decided your best course was killing a baby over a half-heard prophecy, and still try to kill me to this day. I am not going to stand here and let you. I don't believe ‘magic is might’. I've already killed many of your people tonight… but that—that wasn’t over ideology. That is because I will kill as many as it takes to keep your grasping, greedy fucking hands out of my school.”

First attempt at a Tomarry comic ✨

Kissing on a swing! Kissing on a swing!!

The afternoon sun was just starting to set.

He was the last one left at the park as usual. Every other teenager or group had left long ago for dinner and cool air conditioning.

Harry didn't want to return to the Dursleys. Even though his stomach was growling something fierce, it wouldn't have mattered. They wouldn't give him enough food to help the ache in his stomach so for now, he was happier being away from them instead of easing his ever-present hunger. 

He sat on the swing and watched the cars as they passed on the road far away on the other side of the field. There was nothing else to do other than that. Dumbledore had forbidden him from leaving the safety of the Dursleys in case Voldemort or his death eaters tried to attack.

"Yeah, right," He thought. "The only thing I am safe of is a full meal."

A few moments later, he felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up as a presence came up from behind him. Before he could turn his head, he felt two hands grab the chains next to his head, pull back and then let go as the same hands pushed him forward.

"Hey-" was all Harry said as he started swinging. The same hands appeared on his back again as he swung backward to push him.

He started to turn his head around when a familiar voice he had not heard in several years said "Don't look. It's the only way I can speak to you."

Harry did not know what to do. It felt too surreal: Tom Riddle pushing him on a swing in the middle of the summer in a muggle neighborhood. At least he thought it was Tom Riddle. He didn’t sound as high-pitched and… horrible as Voldemort. What would he look like if he turned around? Would he see a handsome youthful face or one of a deformed snake-human hybrid that haunts his nightmares? 

“Don’t overthink it,” Tom said after a moment of silence. “You’ll just stress yourself out.”

“Okay, make it simple then. How are you here?” 

“You.” So simple an answer that explained nothing. 

“Me? I don’t want you here. Go away.” Harry dug his feet into the ground to stop the swing. 

Strong and strangely wet hands grabbed his head preventing him from turning around. “If you look I’ll leave.”

“Yeah, that is the whole point,” Harry snarled. 

“Who would talk to you then?” Tom pointed out. “Your relatives? Your neighbors? They all hate you.”

“You hate me.”

“No, I don’t. He hates you.” The hands became gentle as Harry stopped trying to turn around.

“Lord Voldemort is my past present and future,” Harry quoted.  “You two are one and the same.”

“Not today.” There was a strange tone in Tom’s voice. 

Harry thought Tom was playing some elaborate joke on him, but he was willing to play along for now. “What do you want then?”  

“To help you, for something in return.” 

Again, Harry grew irritated. “Oh no. I know how this goes. You are not doing to me what you did to Ginny.”

To Harry’s annoyance, Tom laughed. “I can’t. Not you, and maybe not anyone ever again. But I can get the next best thing.” Tom's right hand moved so out of the corner of Harry’s eye, he could see it dripping in ink before it brushed the bottom part of his lip. 

“I still have an instinct to take your soul even though I can’t. It’s beyond my reach now. I want instead … is your first kiss.” 

The words made Harry freeze with shock and embarrassment. “My what?” 

“You heard me.” Harry could just hear the grin forming on Tom’s face as he spoke. “ It means something to you, so it’s everything to me. I’ll help you get out of this horrid little town and away from your relatives. No one will be hurt. It will be totally painless, Harry. You might even look back on this moment fondly.”

“You’re joking,” Harry said uncertainly. 

“I’m completely serious, Harry. Or were you saving your lips for someone special? Had anyone in mind?”

“No, it’s just… why?”

“Because it means something to you, and you’ll always remember it was me who took it from you. That is all.” Hands moved so they covered Harry’s eyes. He could feel the ink dripping down his cheeks now. “Aren’t you hungry, Harry? Don’t you want something to eat? Or maybe you are more starved for affection. I can give that to you instead… Just say yes and I will help you.”

Harry was silent for a moment, his stomach and heart aching with hunger. “No one will get hurt?”

“No one will get hurt,” Tom promised. 

“...Okay.”

Tom smiled, “Remember. Keep your pretty eyes closed.” His hands left Harry’s face only for a moment as Tom walked around to face Harry. As promised, Harry kept his eyes closed and when he felt Tom’s hands touch his face again it was gentle as he tilted his face up towards him. 

Ink dripped onto Harry’s face, down his neck, and soaked his shirt. He could feel a cold breath on him before even colder lips pressed against his. They were surprisingly gentle and made Harry’s heart race at the feeling. The kiss was chaste at first, and Harry thought it wasn’t so bad until Tom deepened the kiss and a familiar taste of ink entered his mouth. 

Harry didn’t know what to do. Tom’s tongue was inside him and tasted stranger than what he would imagine a first kiss would be. But Harry kept his hands tight on the swing so he wouldn’t be tempted to fight. 

When it was over, Harry didn’t think he would ever look at a quill the same again without thinking of Tom. When he was brave enough to open his eyes again, he was alone, but the ink remained. 

Walking home was a challenge with how dazed he was, but his relatives did not comment on his appearance when he walked through their doors. It was like they couldn’t see the ink on him at all, and Harry knew his aunt would have something to say about his appearance. 

Before he had a chance to wash it off, Remus and the Order appeared to take him away, but they did not comment about the mess on him either. In just a few hours, he was sitting with his friends and Sirius eating a fabulous dinner made by Mrs. Weasley with Tom’s voice echoing in his head “Because it means something to you, and you’ll always remember it was me who took it from you.”