lomonaaeren

Chapter Seventeen.

Chapter One.

Title: Lightning and War (18/?)
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Pairing: Harry/Tom Riddle, a few het and slash background pairings mentioned
Content Notes: Established relationship, angst, violence, dimension travel
Rating: R
Summary: Harry and Tom are pursuing Harry’s cousin Jonquil Potter into Tom’s dangerous, paranoia-ridden world. In addition to finding Jonquil, they need to deal with Dumbledore, Tom’s associates, and dangerous fluctuations in Harry’s magic. Sequel to Jonquils and Lightning.
Author’s Notes: This story involves a lot of background that won’t make much sense without having read the prequel. At the moment, I don’t know how long this story will be or if it will be the last in the series.

Thank you again for all the reviews!

Chapter Eighteen—Wild Magic

“Aren’t you interested in the books that Abraxas mentioned he has in his library?”

Harry glanced up from the book of history that he was reading. He needed to know more about Tom’s world if he was going to make his home here. “Yes,” he said, and waggled the book at Tom before he turned back to it.

Tom draped his arm across the pages. Harry sighed and looked up, to meet a pair of eyes so intense that it was like swallowing water. “I meant the books on the rituals and vows that the Potters can use to claim their wild magic.”

“I know, but I didn’t think we would look at them this soon,” Harry started to say. He paused at the furious gleam in Tom’s eyes. “We are, huh?”

“I want to know what kind of family I’m marrying into,” Tom said, reaching down and removing the book from his lap. “And what kind of rumors we can start spreading.” He tugged Harry to his feet with one arm around his waist, and started steering him back among the bookshelves. Harry assumed Abraxas must have told him where to find the books.

“You’re marrying into my family.”

Tom stopped walking for a second, and they stood in the shadow of a bookshelf. Harry’s heartbeat was loud enough that he wondered if Tom heard it, and if he should have said that.

Then Tom’s fingers dug into his shoulders. He turned Harry around for the most penetrating kiss Harry thought he’d ever received. He shuddered and ran his own fingers down the side of Tom’s face.

“Yes,” Tom said thickly, drawing back. He glanced around at the bookshelves as if reminding both of them that they were in a library and he couldn’t just fuck Harry right here. “I know that. But I’d like the extra power if we can cultivate it, to make sure that the both of us are protected.”

“Of course, that’s the only reason.”

“It can be the main reason without being the only one, Harry.”

Harry nodded and drew Tom’s hand to rest on his shoulder again as they walked deeper into the shelves. Harry hadn’t been able to figure out how the Malfoys kept their books organized yet, but he did know that the shelves were arranged in a spiraling pattern. There must be some mystical significance to that, but Harry didn’t care enough to ask Abraxas what it was.

Tom at last looked up and nodded at a large green book that projected over the edge of the top shelf of the bookcase they stood next to. “That would be it. The Malfoys have long made a point of keeping notes on their enemies.”

“And Abraxas would just let us borrow that?” Harry asked, feeling his eyebrows rise as Tom Summoned the book down with a casual flick of his wand.

“Why not?” Tom caught the book with both arms and then opened it by tracing his wand across the cover. There were still golden sparks as the pages began to flip, but Harry supposed he’d disarmed whatever traps guarded it. “I am his lord.”

Harry nodded thoughtfully. He still didn’t understand all the methods Tom used to exercise control over his Knights.

Then again, he probably never would, because Tom simply didn’t relate to Harry that way, and Harry wasn’t one of the politically powerful pure-bloods or disgruntled Muggleborns Tom had mostly recruited to his army.

“Ahhh,” said Tom as he paused on a few pages. “I wish that I’d known some of these things when I was first trying to fight Dumbledore.”

Harry smiled at him tolerantly and leaned on the shelf next to Tom. He would let him look at all the secrets that the Malfoys had probably collected over the centuries. Honestly, Harry wanted Tom as part of his family just by speaking words, not with rituals and all the rest, but if this was what Tom wanted, Harry would support him.

“Here.”

Harry leaned over Tom’s shoulder. There was an illustration on the page Tom was pointing to that took him a moment to make sense of. Then he realized it was a picture of a green garden enclosed within a golden cord. The garden looked like it was wild and overgrown. In the center was a human figure that almost blended into the plants, its hands raised and its head thrown back.

Harry squinted. “Are those ferns growing from its head?”

“His, Harry. That is obviously supposed to be a man.”

“Nothing obvious about it,” Harry muttered, but he stepped back and let Tom examine the book more closely. He seemed to be reading the words and pictures more clearly. Maybe it was just Harry’s glasses.

“Yes, I think I begin to see why this wouldn’t work for other families like the ancestral Malfoys who tried it,” Tom murmured, flipping the pages back and forth. “The Potters were trained in how to create a ritual space, and to enter that space with their wills and minds entirely focused. That would have included a sincere desire to repay the wild magic back immediately. Another family attempting to imitate that kind of ritual for power alone wouldn’t have convinced the magic.”

“Then we probably can’t use it,” Harry said, and sighed.

Tom snapped his head around, attention snagged like a fishhook. “What do you mean?”

“Because you’re not interested in becoming a Potter or having this magic for reasons other than power, Tom. Be honest.”

Tom dropped the book, making a puff of dust rise from the pages. Before Harry could point out that Abraxas probably wouldn’t like Tom damaging it, Tom had forced Harry back against the shelf behind him and pinned Harry there with hands on either side of his face.

“I want to become a Potter because of you,” Tom said, voice like steel. “I would want to take your name if it was a less prestigious one or a Muggle one, because it’s yours. The power is tempting and so is the chance to resurrect a family line that most people believe is dead, but you are the heart of this, Harry. Don’t you dare believe otherwise.”

Harry struggled for a moment, but Tom clenched his hands down and prevented him from moving, eyes intense. “Do you understand?”

“I just—if that’s true, why are we here researching the wild magic at all? Why not just conduct some sort of ritual to make you a Potter and have it done with?”

“Because I want everything, of course. You and the magic if I can have it. The prestige if we can convince others that Potters are powerful again. I am saying that, if I had to choose between you and the other benefits, I would choose you. But I see no reason not to try to grasp at everything I can.”

Harry calmed down. Yes, he could understand that, and it was Tom enough that he shouldn’t have been surprised. “All right, fine. I’m just saying that I think it’s unlikely that we’re going to get what we want?”

“Oh,” Tom said, “I don’t think I could focus my mind like that without intense study, and I can convince myself to be respectful to the wild magic, but it will take time. But you? You could do this now if you knew the proper rites, Harry.”

“What? Why?”

“Because you respect so many things, so many people.” Tom’s hands tightened on his shoulders and he pressed another kiss to Harry’s forehead, just beneath where the diadem rested on his hair. “You are the only wizard I know of, in any world, who considered a house-elf one of his best friends.”

“There was also,” Harry began, and then fell silent. Actually, there wasn’t much point in telling Tom about Regulus Black.

“The only wizard I know,” Tom repeated firmly, and kissed the side of Harry’s cheek this time. “And the wild magic is the sort of thing that most wizards have not been taught to respect. The land, the earth? We think of it as something we walk upon, and gather Potions ingredients from, and sometimes harvest or use in rituals. But I think you see it as more than that.”

“Yes,” Harry murmured. He thought back to long summers working in the Dursleys’ garden, and how he felt when he walked under the trees of the Forbidden Forest.

“And you also feel that way about animals, or why become a healer for them?” Tom’s hand moved, sweeping back Harry’s hair as if he wanted to look at his scar. From him, Harry didn’t resent the gesture the way he would have from so many people. “You can do this.”

“So what should we do first, then? Show that I can master the magic of the ritual, or start spreading the rumor that you’re a Potter?”

“It will not be a rumor by the time we are spreading it, Harry. You will claim me first.”

“I—thought the claim was somehow tied in with the ritual?”

Tom leaned towards him, eyes shining even in the little light that seemed to penetrate this part of the Malfoy library. “Oh, it could be. But there are other ways to do it, and I’m going to insist on you making an honest man of me.”

*

Tom glanced sideways at the terrified man who clutched the camera next to him. “And is he actually going to take the flattering pictures that you claim he will, Shara?” he asked, barely moving his lips.

“Of course, my lord.” Shara smiled at him and stepped back so that she could look at his robes from a distance. She came back and adjusted the fall of a dark sleeve. It was made of velvet and trimmed with ermine, and heavier than Tom would usually have worn, but then again, dress robes often were. “I have something precious to him under threat.”

Tom sighed. “We discussed what would happen if Harry found you were threatening hostages, Shara.”

“Not that, my lord! Truly not that.” Shara twitched her head, and Tom followed the direction of the motion with his eyes. Shara was gesturing to the photographer’s groin.

“I am impressed,” Tom murmured. He knew the kinds of charms that Shara had waiting, which would make the photographer’s bollocks feel as if they were continually under threat, were not easy to master.

Shara tilted her head down, laughter lurking in the corners of her mouth. “Thank you, my lord. And congratulations on your marriage.”

Tom nodded, not displeased with her calling it that, though in truth it was more like a ritual claiming, one that could be called by many different names. What mattered was that Tom would carry a powerful last name after today.

And he would have Harry tied to him in a way that no one could contradict.

That is the important thing, Tom thought, as Shara escorted him outside to the small grove of trees behind Malfoy Manor. The Malfoys tended to use it as ritual space or for celebrations, both of which would be happening today. I cannot set him free, but this is a way of ensuring he will not want to be.

Harry was already waiting there with Abraxas next to him, and the Knights spread out in concentric circles throughout the grove, for both ceremony and defense. Harry looked up as Tom drew nearer.

Tom’s breath caught. Whether or not this was a marriage, or a claiming, or called something else, Harry was utterly beautiful. He wore dark green robes with a hem of gold around the bottom. He hadn’t wanted to, but Tom had pointed out that it looked similar to the picture of the wild magic rite they’d found in Abraxas’s book, and there were Malfoy robes that could be adjusted to fit Harry.

The effort had paid off. Harry didn’t care about looking beautiful for himself, but he did care about what Tom thought.

He came forwards now, his hands extended, and Tom reached out to clasp them. He didn’t know what he had done to deserve this luck. Harry, beautiful, powerful, devoted, smiling at him as if Tom was the only reason he existed.

Tom did manage to check his own possessiveness by remembering the Knights who stood around them (although Abraxas’s discomfort came across to him as more hilarious than anything). He nodded to Harry, who nodded back, and they both faced Shara. She was conducting the questions as part of the claiming since she was the Knight Harry seemed most comfortable with.

“What name do you ask for?” Shara asked, her wand lifted next to her.

“Potter,” Tom replied, and Harry followed only a beat behind him. It should have been in unison, Tom thought, but that hardly mattered next to the intent. Already, the air around them was thick and buzzing as if with excited bees. Harry’s eyes were wide, and the jewel in the diadem he wore had brightened—which Tom privately considered an excellent sign.

“Why do you ask for the name?”

This time, Harry kept quiet, as he was supposed to, looking at Tom and awaiting his answer. Tom smiled a little. “For power. For beauty. For love.” The Knights began to murmur around him when he spoke that word, probably because they’d never thought he would speak it in a non-mocking way.

“For love,” Harry said, lifting his chin. “And because I bear the name already and wish to welcome Tom into my family.”

Shara nodded and flicked an eyelash at the photographer, who began frantically clicking away. Tom didn’t turn around to make sure that the man was getting his best profile. It was hard to look away from Harry’s shining face.

“What will you give in return for the name?”

“My love. My devotion.” Tom looked at Harry and bowed his head a little. “My strength. I will guard and protect my husband who also bears the name Potter with all the strength I have.”

Harry blinked hard. Even though he must have known Tom felt that way, he probably hadn’t thought Tom would speak the words aloud, either.

I do love being able to surprise people, Tom thought, with a faint smile, as he waited for Harry to recover.

“I will give my own strength, my love and devotion, to shelter Tom and make sure that he feels welcomed into my family,” Harry said then. “I will make sure that he has everything he needs. I will provide gladly for him, give him my body and my heart and my mind and my soul.”

And that is the vow that means more, Tom thought, although he noted that the Knights weren’t murmuring the way they had when Tom spoke it. Did they underestimate Harry’s value, or did they simply think it was less surprising, because Harry came across as the kind of wizard who had always believed in those things? Tom didn’t know, and at the moment, he didn’t care. He let his eyes roam across Harry’s face, and was content.

Besides, if most people didn’t realize how valuable Harry really was, then Tom would have less competition for him.

“The name requires proof of the devotion,” Shara said. “What proof do you offer?”

Tom reached into the pocket of his robes and drew out the crystal vial of his blood he had prepared ahead of time. He could have bled during the ritual, but that would change the meaning, as well as the vows that they would need to make to each other. Besides, the land and the ritual didn’t require absolutely fresh blood, and Tom hadn’t wanted to carry a knife to this ceremony.

It felt…wrong.

Well, that was something he need never admit.

“I offer my blood,” he said, “to say that I forsake my blood family and welcome the Potter name. Whatever blood I shed from now on, let me do it beside my beloved and in defense of the Potter family, the household I now belong to.”

Harry was watching him with brilliant eyes, for all that he had known the words ahead of time. In return, he took out a lock of his dark hair from his robes. He hadn’t wanted to cut it during the ceremony, for the same reason that Tom hadn’t wanted to shed blood. “I offer a lesser price, as I belong to this family by blood and blood would not be appropriate. I offer the lock of hair that could be burned in mourning, but is offered now in rejoicing, because a husband has come to me.”

Tom bent his head a little as Shara reached into her own robes and withdrew a thin silver chain with a hollow crystalline pendant on it. Harry poured the vial of blood that Tom had brought into the pendant, and then forced his own lock of hair through the narrow neck, and hung the chain around Tom’s neck.

There was a soundless explosion, and the movement of a powerful wind through the trees. The Knights actually cried out. Tom bit down on his lip to hold back the smile. Some of them must not have thought this would work. How faithless of them.

Harry reached out a shaking hand. The chain held no hair-and-blood pendant now, but two solid crystals, both of them engraved with the old Potter family crest. The second pendant unleashed itself from the chain the instant Harry touched it.

Shara was already taking out the second silver chain. Harry attached his pendant to it, but Tom was the one who put it over his chest. The pendant fell to rest over his heart and began to shine with the same clear blue light as the jewel of the diadem on Harry’s forehead.

Tom’s followed a moment later.

“Behold, Tom and Harry Potter!” Shara cried out, and a burst of green and golden sparks from her wand rose up to the treetops and rained down. The Knights followed with applause like a sound of raindrops. Tom leaned forwards and kissed Harry, and felt Harry’s hand tighten on his shoulder.

Yes, family was important to Harry, as was visible from his absurd tolerance of Jonquil. He wanted one. And Tom thought Harry should have everything he wanted.

I will give it to him.