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“You see, I take the parts that I remember and stitch them back together
to make a creature that will do what I say
or love me back.”
— Richard Siken, Litany in Which Certain Things are Crossed Out.
Harry was twenty-eight years old when Tom buried him in the cold, unforgiving ground. The funeral took place mid-December, shortly before the winter solstice. People brought candles, tiny spots of light in the sea of darkness that Harry had left behind. There were tears, too, streaking the faces of Harry’s friends and family—the glittering proof of their shared pain.
Tom did not cry. He remained somber, aloof, distant. He caught the soft, pitying gazes thrown his way and met them with indifference because none of it mattered.
Harry was dead.
Tom had always been morbidly fascinated with death. How inescapable it was. Its power over a helpless population. Mostly, he had sworn to evade its clutches. Now that Harry was dead, his obsession fell under new, painful scrutiny. The question he had previously wondered at was now urgent and agonizingly present.
How to reverse death?
Several days later, after the various stages of grief had been experienced and discarded, Tom sat alone, in the dark, on the floor of their shared flat. The flat he shared with Harry. Tonight was the longest night of the year—he’d heard it declared so on the radio that morning.
Tom was ten days away from turning twenty-nine, but twenty-nine was young. He could be twenty-nine and in love with Harry Potter. At twenty-nine, a multitude of golden memories from the past year remained close to his heart.
The year after, he knew, would ruin him. To be thirty and without Harry would be unbearable. Thirty was a milestone he’d thought to reach with the love of his life by his side.
He deserved to have a future with Harry. Harry deserved to have that future too.
Tom had—he’d nursed so many plans. So many hopes and dreams. Plans for them to get married and travel. Things had gotten in the way—work commitments, family commitments. Petty nonsense that shriveled in comparison to the ugly, gaping hole Harry left in his life.
But no longer.
There was still time. Twenty-nine was young, Tom thought, but it was not too young. He was no ordinary wizard. He was clever and ambitious. He was the brightest mind of their generation.
There were no gods in this world. Or, if there were, they were unjust and uncaring gods. To fix that, to make right the wrong that had been committed against him, against Harry—
The solution was simple.
To return Harry to the world of the living, to reunite himself with his love, Tom would become that higher power. He would become a god.
Tom quit his job. Harry had left him nearly everything and money had never been a concern for them. They had savings. They had investments. There was more than enough for Tom to live comfortably, if frugally, for at least a few years before he would have to consider alternatives.
For now, his goal of becoming omnipotent was all that mattered.
Tom told no one of his plans. He let the rest of the world believe what they wanted. It was depression that drove him to lock himself away. It was grief, it was pain. None of that was a lie—Tom grieved his losses every day—but he also nursed a delicate, beautiful hope that someday his agony would end.
Spare rooms of the flat were transformed into work spaces. Even the kitchen became host to piles and piles of arcane books.
The room that remained untouched, of course, was the one he and Harry shared.
Tom spent some nights there, nights when he felt particularly lonely and vulnerable. He’d wrap himself up in one of Harry’s jumpers and inhale the warm, familiar scents buried in the soft, worn threads of cotton. He’d curl into a ball on top of their bed, careful not to disturb the atmosphere too much lest his Preservation Charms fail, and stare at the lifeless corpse of his love until his eyelids drooped shut.
He’d taken the body the day after the funeral, unwilling to let it remain out of reach. Then he’d tenderly mended each wound, superficial or otherwise, and adjusted each unruly lock of hair before resealing the body with several dozen embalming spells. Harry would be safe with him until a solution was found.
Other people often came around to knock on the door of the flat—Harry’s friends and family checking in out of some sense of duty. Tom kept the door locked shut and told them to leave. They protested, of course. They threatened to break in and drag him out.
Tom kept himself calm. It was alright. They couldn’t possibly know the importance of the monumental task he had taken on. He warded the flat to the high heavens and only left to buy necessities at odd hours of the night.
When it was all over, he thought wearily, they would thank him.
Tom’s self-imposed deadline of a year would look absurd to any outsider—who could crack godhood in one year’s time?—but Harry was everything. For Harry, Tom was willing to raze all of humanity to the ground.
It was not until June that Tom stumbled upon a possible solution to death. Wizards had mocked it as fantasy, a children’s tale. The world’s most renowned magical experts had declared it impossible.
But Tom knew better. He knew better than to laugh at magic, however ridiculous the concept seemed to be. He was sure that if he followed the threads of this tale, if he walked this precarious line of truth to the center of its web, he would discover the answers he sought.
He would become the Master of Death, the owner of the Deathly Hallows.
To find all three Hallows would require a man to be powerful, intelligent, and ruthless, but Tom’s hands were not clean and they had never been. Not before meeting Harry, and certainly not after losing him. Their time together had been a singular period of peace only because Harry had knocked the axis of Tom’s world off-kilter from the moment they’d met.
There was no benefit to lacking morals if Harry disapproved. Harry wanted him to be better and Tom could accept the challenge—get what he wanted without resorting to immoral actions—if it meant Harry would stay. Would smile at him. Would be proud of him.
Anything for Harry.
A bloody trail followed Tom’s quest for the Hallows. Bodies were mutilated, memories were wiped, and houses were ransacked in the name of his mission.
The true surprise came when Tom learned the Potter’s family cloak was one less Hallow for him to find. The cloak had hung in Harry’s closet since they had moved in together. The Potters had never asked for it, and so Tom had kept it.
It was fitting that the cloak belonged to Harry’s bloodline, just as the Resurrection Stone had belonged to Tom’s. It reassured Tom that he was doing the right thing.
On October 31st, Tom broke into the hotel room of Albus Dumbledore, the esteemed Headmaster of Hogwarts, and murdered him.
It had taken a month of planning to get the old man out of Hogwarts. The castle was far too secure for Tom to attempt a theft there, and so his best chance had been to lure the man away from his familiar territory. Dumbledore was a powerful wizard, but he was not as clever as he was lauded to be. His heart bled easily. A forged letter from an old Hufflepuff student in need was all it took for the elderly Headmaster to come running.
Tom disposed of all the evidence, covered his tracks. Killed the student he had impersonated and burned both bodies to ashes before dissolving the remains in conjured acid, his hands trembling all the while—not with fear, but with excitement.
And then, when it was done and the Gaunt ring rested on the ring finger of his wand hand, the hand now clutching the Elder Wand, Tom slid the Cloak of Invisibility around his shoulders and let the heady, untapped powers of Death flood his soul.
Vivid, watery eyes blinked several times. They were even more beautiful than Tom remembered. The sight filled the deep, aching hollow in his chest, a puzzle piece fitting back into place.
Tom sucked in a long, greedy breath and took Harry’s hands—warm, callused, real—into his own. They were in the bedroom, their bedroom. All the stasis spells on the room had been reverted in preparation for this moment.
“Harry, darling, it’s me,” Tom said as Harry looked at him in bewilderment.
“Tom?”
“Always. I love you.” Tom brushed at Harry’s forehead, sweeping aside the bangs that covered his scar, which was the only remnant of the horrific accident that had robbed them of their life together. Tom pressed a kiss there, laying his claim on that space, leaving the promise of Harry’s continued safety and eternal life while under his protection.
“What happened?” Harry asked quietly.
Tom pulled back to examine his love’s face. “Everything and nothing.” He smiled, drew further back, and kept hold of Harry’s left hand as he dropped to one knee. Tom could not part with the Gaunt ring since he needed the Resurrection Stone to maintain his power, so he had fashioned from scratch a matching stone and band for Harry to wear instead. “Will you marry me?”
“I—yes,” Harry said. “Yes, of course I will.” He still sounded confused. “How did we get here?”
Tom slid the ring onto Harry’s finger and offered his fiancé an adoring smile. “Does it matter?”
There was a period of adjustment. This period was harder on Harry than it was for Tom—Tom went around adjusting the memories of everyone, fiddling here and there. Then he went and adjusted all the Ministry and Muggle records. Soon enough, it was an absolute truth of the world that Harry Potter had never died.
Harry Potter had never died, and now he was engaged to be married.
“We’ll have a summer wedding,” Tom promised. “A small gathering of friends and family. Whoever you want. However many people you want. Anything at all, darling, and I will make it happen for us.”
“But Tom—” Harry would say, only what he was protesting, exactly, was unclear. The sentence never finished, and so Tom was content with the way things were. Harry was content with the way things were.
In the meantime, Tom continued to test his new powers. Now that all was well, he had the time and the countenance to experiment. Tom found his abilities extended beyond recalling souls claimed by Death. The paths of destiny were visible to him, malleable and vulnerable to his manipulations.
During all this, Harry was quiet and watchful, but Tom was overjoyed. All that he had ever dreamed of now lay within reach. The world around them was his to shape as he wished.
In short order, Tom was on track to become the youngest Minister for Magic in the history of magical Britain. Harry decided to quit playing Quidditch and took on the mantle of Defense professor at Hogwarts.
They were unstoppable. Nothing could go wrong—Tom made sure of that. As a child, adrift and alone at the orphanage, Tom had always dreamt of power, absolute power, and now that dream had been realized.
Minds were easily changed, errant thoughts rearranged like pawns on a chess board. It was thrilling. It was intoxicating. He could end entire lives with the touch of his hand.
Opposition existed only in the past. Tom claimed the title of Minister and set about rebuilding the institution that was magical Britain in his own image. Radical reform was to be rolled out in all departments. Tom had a vision in mind and would not be deterred.
Such massive changes were unwelcome at first. People liked to talk and spread their discontent in the form of brainless gossip. That was, they did until Tom put an end to it. A little mental nudge and suddenly Minister Riddle was their ideal candidate. Or, if Tom found the offender to be particularly irksome, they would experience some tragic misfortune or another.
Tom wiped out entire branches of the magical population, either removing them from existence entirely or sending them abroad where they would no longer be a nuisance to him. The rest he molded to his liking. Even the most incompetent follower could become competent. The fabric of the universe was his to unravel, the threads of fate his to alter at will.
The world was so much more agreeable this way. There were less reasons to fight amongst themselves and more reasons to exist in harmony. Everyone was happier, and if Tom slowly trimmed away Weasley’s crippling insecurities and snuffed out Granger’s narrow-mindedness, what Harry did not know would not hurt him.
Harry read the paper every morning with a frown on his face. The Prophet’s contents were under Tom’s control, of course; each sentence printed was a sentence approved by his public relations team. There were no protests. There was no resistance. Those that Tom deemed undeserving were made to think that they were quitting of their own volition, then quickly and quietly removed from their positions.
“I’ve taken care of it,” Tom said simply, when Harry asked after this person or another. “I’ve disposed of them.”
“You can’t just dispose of everyone you disagree with.”
“I don’t see why not.”
“It’s not right.”
Tom raised a brow. “Would you rather I dispose of them in the permanent sense? Consider this a mercy, Harry. Let them find greener pastures elsewhere. There is no place for such people in our new world.”
Their new world. The world Tom built for them, for their love. The wedding was weeks away—it was forecast to be the grandest event of the decade despite its limited guest list. There would be no reporters save for Luna Lovegood, who was Harry’s dear friend, and they would select a few choice photographs to send off to the papers.
“You’re taking away their choice. Their free will.” Harry set his paper down on the table and stood up. “I understand what you’re trying to do, Tom, but this is too far. The world isn’t a chess board. People aren’t puppets.”
Tom sighed and rose to his feet. He positioned himself in front of Harry so that they were facing each other, so that Harry had to look up an extra distance of a few inches. Then Tom took Harry’s shoulders in hand and gave them a gentle squeeze.
“Your kind heart is one of the many reasons I fell for you,” Tom said softly. “I greatly admire and respect your courage, your determination.” He touched a hand to Harry’s chest, to where Harry’s beating heart lay, beautifully and miraculously alive. “But all that I do, I do for us. For our future. Wizarding Britain will become a truly incredible nation so long as we have the strength to lead it there.”
Harry took a step back. “Then do it right.”
“What would you have me do?” Tom asked rhetorically. “If they are useful, I will convert them. If they are resistant, I will remove them. There is no use for those who oppose the new order.”
“And me?” Harry asked after a pause. “If I oppose you?”
Tom shook his head. “Whatever disagreements we have with each other, they will be resolved in time.”
Time ticked on, but Harry’s disapproval did not fade. Even the upcoming wedding failed to provide enough of a distraction; Tom grew increasingly irritated with the state of their relationship. He had brought Harry back to life. He had saved Harry.
Harry’s judgemental gaze struck more deeply these days, but Tom never looked away. He could stare into those eyes for all of eternity and never grow bored. There was so much to see, so much to feel.
But Tom also had a feeling that their cold war would soon come to an end. Harry possessed such a temper, fiery and passionate and glorious to behold. Emotions like those, like a forest fire, could not be contained. Therefore Tom was unsurprised when Harry confronted him a week before they were due to be wed.
“Tell me,” Harry said in a calm, level tone, “how did I die?”
Tom was prepared. “It was an accident.” His tone was casual and the circular motion of the spoon in his cup of tea did not falter.
“An accident? Really?” Harry asked skeptically, lips pursed in a deep frown.
The shameless disbelief, the lack of trust—sent Tom careening over the edge. All the tension of the past few weeks had come to an agonizing head. He could not stand the judgement in Harry’s eyes.
“A pointless motor vehicle accident,” Tom snapped, setting his spoon down with a sharp clang. “Does that make you feel any better? Knowing that your life was thrown away for nothing?” Wizards were sturdier than Muggles, but they were not invincible. Not even wizards could survive having their necks snapped.
Harry lifted a hand to his own forehead and prodded the scar there. “I’m not stupid, Tom. Only dark magic leaves scars like these.”
Tom laughed, the sound rising to coat the inside of his throat like tar. “Harry, I tried everything. Dark magic was never out of the question, not when it came to your life. Do you not understand how much you mean to me? I have drowned myself in sin to keep you alive because you are all that matters.”
“I never asked you to do that. I never asked you to save me.”
“I dug up your body,” Tom said loudly. “Your dead, mutilated body. I pulled you from the wretched, frozen ground and preserved you. I laid you to rest in our room. I slept next to you. I talked to you like you were there. You may speak of your suffering, Harry, but—” And here Tom laughed again, as bitter as he’d been on that very first day, the day he’d gotten the horrible, terrible news that Harry was gone. “What of mine? What of the scars your death left on me?”
Harry’s face contorted in pain. It hurt to see that. Tom did not like to see Harry in pain and he liked it even less knowing that he was the cause.
“You think you’re doing this for me,” Harry said finally. “But that isn’t it.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. Of course it is. I did this for you. For us. So we could be together.” Tom softened, hoping that his gentle words would help Harry understand the situation better.
“It might have been at the start, but not anymore. What you do with Britain—that has nothing to do with me. I don’t want a nation bowing and scraping at my feet. That’s what you want.”
The words rankled. “I am keeping us safe. I am creating a better world for us to live in.”
“No, you’re messing with things you don’t understand! You—you’re toying with lives, Tom. This isn’t Hogwarts, where the worst that happens is you get expelled for breaking the rules. When you make these changes, when you erase people’s—people’s choices and personalities, that’s murder. It’s murder.” Harry jabbed a finger at him. “You’re killing people.”
“The only person who has been killed was YOU!” Tom said, smacking Harry’s hand away. He was furious. He could feel magic rolling over his skin in hot, heavy waves. Harry didn’t understand, didn’t know how much he had suffered to fix things. “You died, and now that will never happen again. I’ve made sure of it.”
“You’ve gone mad,” Harry declared numbly. “You’re mad, Tom. I’m sorry my death upset you, but this isn’t right. None of this is right. You should have let me be, mourned me and let go—”
“Yes,” Tom said.
“Yes?”
“Yes, this isn’t right.” Tom shook his head. “You’re not seeing things clearly. This is my fault. I shouldn’t have told you the truth. It’s upsetting you.”
“What?” Harry asked. “What are you talking about?”
“It’s alright,” Tom promised. “I still love you, Harry. Nothing ever changes that. We’ll be married soon and all will be well.”
Harry took half a step back. It did not escape Tom’s notice that Harry’s wand hand was inching towards his holster. “Tom…”
“I love you,” Tom repeated, “so, so much.” He stretched out his hand. “We can move past this together.”
Harry hesitated before placing his hand in Tom’s. “I love you, too. That’s why I’m trying to explain this to you.”
Tom wrapped his arms around the love of his life and closed his eyes, inhaling the familiar scent that was wholly Harry. “I know you are. You are the one person I trust. I know you would never intentionally hurt me.”
Harry laid his head to rest upon Tom’s shoulder. “Of course not, Tom. You mean the world to me.”
Tom slid his hand to the nape of Harry’s neck, fingers brushing through the soft hair there. There was comfort in the solidity of touch, comfort in knowing that Death would never touch his precious Harry ever again. Tom pressed a kiss to the side of Harry’s head and offered Harry a silent apology for what he was about to do.
This conversation had not gone well. Harry could not possibly prefer being dead instead of being here, by Tom’s side. Harry was confused, that was all.
Tom cradled Harry closer. He gently pressed a hand to the back of Harry’s head and sent a mild pulse of magic into his palm, guiding it towards the place where Harry kept his memories.
Harry had never been adept with Occlumency, but even if he had been, Tom’s power was unmatched. It was so very simple to unwind the threads that made up the memory of their disagreement. A light twist would ensure that today’s conversation was removed—
Tom was aware, distantly, that he was committing the exact crime he’d been accused of. The crime that Harry had accused him of. But Harry didn’t recognize the necessity of what was happening. He was traumatized from dying, from the ugly truths that Tom had impressed upon him. Tom should never have mentioned retrieving the corpse. That had been his mistake.
After a few seconds, Harry lifted his head. His eyes were bright and clear. They were happy.
“Not that I’m complaining,” Harry began, “but were we going to stand around all night or are we finally going to dinner? I made that reservation for us yesterday.”
Tom smiled, relieved, and ran his hand up Harry’s back in an affectionate gesture. “Anywhere with you is where I want to be, my love.”
“Sap,” Harry said playfully. “Don’t forget to save some for the wedding.”
“I have more than enough to spare when it comes to you,” Tom murmured, and was gratified when Harry’s expression softened, green eyes filled with love and adoration.
“I’m so happy we’re finally getting married,” Harry said. “I just—we’re going to spend the rest of our lives together. It’s amazing to think about.”
They would have more than that, now. They would have all of eternity to enjoy each other. “Not as amazing as you are,” Tom said. “My beautiful fiancé.”
None of this would have been possible without Harry. The pain and grief that Tom had suffered, it paled in comparison to the endless joy that awaited them.
Harry blushed and dropped his gaze. Tom tightly wrapped his arms around Harry then Apparated them away.
The wedding came and went. It was the happiest day of Tom’s life, a day of jubilation and euphoria for everyone involved. It was an honour and a privilege to declare Harry as his husband. He was sure that Harry’s smile had never been more brilliant, more blinding.
Every glance they shared sent Tom’s heart soaring with elation. He had never been more sure that yes, this was where his life was meant to lead. This was the proper way of the universe, this universe where he and Harry were perfect for each other in every conceivable way.
There was no one else for Tom and there never would be. Harry loved him and that would never change.
Harry continued to read the paper every morning. A habit held over from living with an Auror as a father, no doubt. James Potter liked to go over the news in agonizing detail to make witty comments and scrutinize the politics. Now that Harry worked at Hogwarts, however, he only took breakfast at home half the time—some weekdays and most weekends.
Still, Tom listened to Harry with attentiveness, making note of the articles that Harry found most upsetting so that their topics wouldn’t show up again.
“Ron stopped by the other day while you were at work,” Harry said, folding the paper up and vanishing it with a burst of wandless magic. “It was the funniest thing, actually.”
“Oh?”
“It was just for a chat,” Harry clarified, “some tea and biscuits. Ron made some comment about Quidditch, and it reminded me of Cedric because he played Seeker.”
“What about him?” Tom would never forget his past rival for Harry’s affections, regardless of how many years had passed.
“Well,” Harry continued, “Ron told me that he’d moved to Peru to work as a curse breaker. It was the strangest thing. Cedric hated Ancient Runes. The only reason he’d taken the class at all was because his dad wanted him to. And now he’s making a whole career out of it. In another country, no less.”
“Adulthood does wonders for one’s sense of perspective. Perhaps he found he now enjoys the subject more than before?”
“Maybe.” Harry shrugged. “I just remember he was really adamant about not having anything to do with it. I hope he wasn’t pressured into it by his dad.”
Tom tapped his fingers on the wooden table. “People do change, you know.”
Harry nodded slowly. “Yeah, you’re right. I guess I’m still a bit hung up that he couldn’t come to the wedding.”
Tom had to remind himself that Harry believed they were all friends. “Curse breaking is a very busy lifestyle.”
“Yeah.” Harry smiled, but it was a distant smile that failed to reach his eyes. “Anyway, enough about that! What do you think about this article—”
Tom responded with enthusiasm, and the subject of Cedric Diggory was forgotten for the rest of the day.
When they settled into bed that night, Tom recalled the masked disappointment in Harry’s voice. Disappointment caused by Tom, who had sent Diggory away. Tom did not want Harry to be sad, to miss someone who did not even matter. Diggory was doing just fine in Peru, revelling in the pleasant life that Tom had so generously given him. Any second spent thinking about Diggory was a second wasted. He and Harry were happy here, together. That was what mattered.
Tom touched his index finger to Harry’s scar and felt the raised tissue there. Harry didn’t have to carry this burden. The burden of missing someone and worrying about them. Tom could take it away. He could take all of it away and leave a clean slate behind.
“Tom?” Harry’s sleep-thickened voice was music to Tom’s ears. “What’re you doing?”
“Nothing, darling.” Tom kissed the tip of Harry’s nose. “Go back to sleep.”
“Then stop pokin’ me,” Harry mumbled, but he acquiesced, rolling over so he could toss an arm across Tom’s chest and snuggle close.
Tom rubbed Harry’s back until Harry’s breaths evened out. While Harry slept soundly, Tom cradled the side of his husband’s face, smoothing his thumb over Harry’s warm cheek. Magic hummed faintly in the tips of Tom’s fingers.
“I love you,” Tom whispered. Then he pressed an index finger to Harry’s temple and began to wipe away every shred of Cedric Diggory’s existence from Harry’s mind. The memories would remain intact, but Diggory’s face and voice would blur, the details fading as if lost to the sands of time.
When it was done, Tom kissed Harry’s forehead and imagined how the new void would be filled up with love. With his love.
“I love you,” Tom repeated, wondering if the sentiment could reach Harry through the thick fog of sleep.
There would be more work to do tomorrow, more minds to alter, but for now… for now, Tom would sleep well knowing that Diggory would not cause any more trouble. He would sleep well knowing that when Harry woke, he would be lively and happy once more.
Tom could never quite pinpoint the exact moment where Harry really, truly changed. Perhaps the transformation was so complex that there was no way of knowing. Change was not necessarily precise, not necessarily decisive. Sometimes change was gradual, a slow corruption that crept up without warning.
But the past was the foundation upon which the future was built, and a person could not be built on a fracture, could not hold steady while resting upon uneven ground.
A mind could only last so long before the cracks spread and it began to fall apart.
Every morning, Harry read the paper, as was his habit to do. Every morning, he took his tea the same way, with two milks and two sugars. Every morning, he greeted Tom with a smile and a kiss to the cheek.
Then they would sit there.
Tom had exorcised every discomfort from their lives. The nation of magical Britain was peaceful and prosperous, and Tom Riddle would forever be known as the most successful Minister for Magic of all time. Not only that—Tom Riddle would be the last Minister for Magic of all time.
“Anything interesting?” Tom asked over breakfast, which was toast and marmalade.
“Nothing much, no.” Harry flipped the page and took a sip of his tea. They took breakfast together every morning now. Everyone understood that the Minister and his husband required a great deal of private time together.
“Not even Quidditch?” Tom prompted.
Harry glanced up. His eyes were bright, his smile cheerful. Harry liked Quidditch. “Now that you mention it—” Then Harry began to recite, nearly word for word, the very article Tom had requested yesterday afternoon. At Tom’s insistence, the Chudley Cannons had added one of Harry’s favourite Quidditch players to their roster.
Tom listened attentively to Harry and commented in all the right places. “I’ll obtain tickets for us,” Tom promised. “Top box, nothing less.”
“Can’t wait. I'm sure it’ll be fun.”
They went back to eating in silence. Tom tried to remember how breakfast used to be, how animated Harry had once gotten over his stupid favourite Quidditch team. The line between before and after was wobbly and unclear. Over time, the details had slipped away from him.
Tom pushed his plate away, no longer hungry. The scrape of the plate on the table caught Harry’s attention.
“Are you feeling unwell, Tom?”
“I’m not hungry, that’s all.”
Harry frowned and reached across the table to lay his hand over Tom’s. “Are you working too hard again? Even you have limits, you know.”
Tom smiled wanly. He hadn’t had to truly work hard in years. Most of his time was now occupied with private research projects that caught his fancy. Everything he had once wanted, he now had. There was little left for him to achieve unless he wanted to take over the world, but recently he found that notion unappealing.
If he took over the world, he would be lording over a larger version of what he already had, and where would the point in that be?
“Your concern is appreciated,” Tom said. “Why don’t we spend the day together, then? You can help me relax.”
“I have classes to teach,” Harry said in a tentative tone.
Tom waved it off. “It’s only for one day. Skip them. Have Weasley fill in for you.”
“Well, alright.” Harry paused. “I suppose they can do without me for one day,” he added with a grin. “I'll go send Ron an owl. Let’s hope he’s awake!”
Tom watched him leave. Harry hadn’t always been so agreeable, had he? Tom knew that Harry took pride in teaching, in providing consistent, quality lessons for his students, but it was only one day of classes. McGonagall couldn’t begrudge Harry one day off. If she tried to say no, then Tom would simply have to—he would have to—
Harry came stumbling back into the dining room and shot Tom a dazzling smile. “All good to go!”
Tom shelved the thought for later. Time with Harry was time to be cherished. He took his husband by the hand. “Why don’t we sit in the park today? The fresh air may help.”
“Okay,” Harry said, still smiling. He squeezed Tom’s hand. “Sounds great.”
Harry never asked for much, and for that, Tom wished to give him the world.
Nothing wasn’t Harry’s fault. That much Tom could admit. It was not Harry’s fault that—that Tom could no longer hold a gaze without unease pooling in his gut. Without wanting to turn away.
Those eyes that Tom had once adored, they were now… shallow. They were green, vibrant, and alive, but they were not Harry. The heart and soul lurking behind them was a pale imitation of who Harry had once been. The quirks of Harry’s personality had been washed away, defiled by Tom’s misguided hands.
All that remained was an empty shell, a ghost that walked and talked like Harry but wasn’t Harry at all.
“I've been thinking we should move again.”
“Oh?” Harry put the paper down to smile at Tom. “Already tired of this one, are we? Thinking of something larger?” Tom’s continued choice of larger and larger mansions had once been the frequent subject of good-natured ridicule on Harry’s part.
“Something smaller, actually. I think… I think we’d be more comfortable there.” The House-Elves kept the household in perfect condition, but the multitude of empty rooms invoked a peculiar sense of loneliness in him even when Harry was home.
“That sounds nice.” Harry nodded and picked up his paper again. “Let me know what you decide on.”
“You don’t like large spaces,” Tom said.
“I don’t, but—” Harry paused. “It’s just a house. So long as we have each other, does it really matter?”
It was a good answer. It was, daresay, the perfect answer.
Tom gave Harry’s memories back. That was to say, he reassembled them as best he could and restored them. There were inconsistencies, irrecoverable moments that Tom could not replicate, but he thought he had enough to fix the problem, to bring Harry—his Harry—back to him.
It didn’t work.
Harry cried and screamed. He threw things at the walls and trashed half the rooms in the manor. But worst of all, he begged.
He asked Tom why.
It wasn’t right. It was not his Harry that stared at him with an expression of anguish—it was a vapid version overwhelmed with years of complex emotions and memories.
Tom could offer no adequate apology to the horrifying result of his folly. The people around him were caricatures, their behaviours robotic and predictable. He’d lost track of the spark that made people real and human. But what could he do? He couldn’t leave. He couldn’t leave Harry. The mere thought of doing so was utterly abhorrent.
So he took the memories back. He wiped the trauma away and settled Harry’s unconscious body in their bedroom to rest. Harry slept soundly, unaware of the day’s horrors, but Tom lay awake late into the night, unable to forget them.
“You seem upset lately. Have I—have I done something wrong?”
“No. No, of course you haven’t. Never think that.”
“Okay. Is there anything I can help with?”
“No. I’m afraid not.”
“... Okay. I love you.”
“I love you too, Harry.”
Tom was miserable, trapped in a hell of his own making. It was a hell where he lived forever with the perfect Harry by his side. A Harry who never argued. A Harry who gave in to whatever Tom wanted. A mindless, agreeable automation who adored Tom Riddle no matter what.
It was becoming clear to Tom that he could not undo the damage he had caused. His callous, indifferent tampering had set him down an irreversible path. The memories required to piece his Harry back together no longer existed.
To recreate his Harry, the Harry he loved, the hands of time would have to be rewound.
Tom made a copy of Harry’s remaining memories and stored them in a Pensieve for safekeeping. He placed Harry’s soul, precious and whole, into the locket of his ancestors. He would not make the same mistake twice; if he failed again, he could not bear to lose what little he had left.
Several years later, magical Britain was sealed off from the rest of the world. Other magical governments attempted to contact the Minister for Magic, Tom Riddle, to no avail. The entire nation had simply vanished into thin air.
Fleamont and Euphemia cooed over their newborn son, James Potter, as he slept in his crib.
Behind them, unseen and unheard, Tom stood in the corner, observing the picturesque, panoramic scene. In his hand was the Cloak of Invisibility. He had given the Potter family a replica, a cloak as powerful as he could make it, though it was nothing compared to the original.
Tom would watch over the Potters to ensure everything went according to plan. Everything would be as it was—or else as closely as he could manage. The souls he recalled would recreate the history he had so carelessly eradicated. When the time came, he would integrate the remainder—Muggleborns like Harry’s mother and Hermione Granger—and pray that it would be enough.
If it was not enough…
In the crib, James Potter woke and began to cry. Tom listened with detachment as the Potter parents sang softly to their son. It was an old wizarding lullaby that Tom had previously heard Harry hum to soothe children. Soon enough, baby James slipped back into a peaceful slumber and was laid to rest in the crib by his loving mother.
Tom had studied Euphemia Potter’s memories only a week prior to this moment. He knew, without looking, that baby James was still smiling, even in sleep.
In response to this thought, the locket around Tom’s neck seemed to burn. He fingered the locket’s chain, noted the metal was cold to the touch. Knowing that Harry was close, even in an inanimate form, helped to center him.
There was an incredible amount of work to be done and little room for error. James Potter’s childhood needed to be perfectly replicated. James needed to attend Hogwarts and meet Lily Evans. They needed to get married and sire a child together.
For Harry, Tom would settle for nothing less than perfection. He would rebuild the Potters and the Evanses into the same family that Harry had grown up with. He would restore the Weasley family and all their glaring imperfections, imperfections that Harry accepted and adored. He would restore the Grangers, the Diggorys, and everyone else.
For Harry, Tom would raise all of magical Britain from the grave, from infancy to adulthood. The population would be reset again and again until each soul was properly reinstated in the fabric of the universe.
Fleamont and Euphemia Potter switched off the bedroom light, leaving their child to sleep. Tom stepped into the gap and loomed over the edge of the baby’s bed. So long as his eyes were shut, James looked exactly like an infant Harry.
With a sigh, Tom pulled away from the crib. He had an entire library of preserved memory phials and hundreds of souls frozen in stasis while he waited for his Harry to be returned to him. He could afford to be patient.
All of eternity stretched ahead of him, after all. That was plenty of time to play god.
END.
