[Broken Glass Series] Chapter Six of 'Glassfall'- Actions of a Prince

[lomonaaeren]

“Why is Professor Yaxley staring at you?”

Harry blinks. He’s actually surprised that Hermione is speaking to him. In the last few days, she’s seemed to have developed a policy of “stare sadly from a distance and say nothing” when it comes to him.

“I didn’t know that he was,” he says, keeping his eyes down as he waves his wand over the intricate wooden puzzle in front of him. Yaxley assigned them all to work out a Transfiguration that would change the puzzle into a different one without losing any of the pieces, and Harry has to admit that he enjoys the challenge.

“Well, he is.”

“I don’t know.”

There’s a pause when Harry thinks Hermione might have given up. He doesn’t raise his eyes from the puzzle to see. When he manages to Transfigure part of it into a maze-like structure, he smiles, and Hermione speaks again.

“Maybe if you turn your head casually towards Neville’s desk, you can see him do it.”

Harry kind of doesn’t want to—what if Yaxley is really spying on him for Voldemort, what if his father doesn’t trust him?—but curiosity gets the better of him. He leans back in his seat and stretches like his neck hurts, rotating his head towards Neville’s desk.

Yaxley is standing over Neville and explaining something in that patient monotone voice he uses. And he turns his head, and their eyes meet.

Yaxley doesn’t do anything unusual, though. He gives a small, brief nod, then starts talking to Neville again.

“It looks as if he were just glancing over to make sure I was doing my work or something. Or maybe because I’m famous.”

“Or maybe because he’s a Death Eater?”

Harry doesn’t think Hermione knows that for sure; she’s probably guessing based on the last name. Still, he shrugs and sighs. “I have nothing to do with him. I don’t know what kind of mission he has here if he is a Death Eater.”

“You should find out.”

“Why?”

Hermione looks so puzzled for a moment that Harry feels a wave of fierce longing. He’s seen her look like that so many times, and he wishes they were still friends so he could see her look like that even more—

But the time for that is past.

“To keep people safe?” Hermione says, voice slipping and sliding over the words. “There was a time when you wouldn’t have let this rest. We didn’t let the mystery of Flamel rest in first year!”

“Yeah, but you’ve told me that because of my past, you don’t trust me anymore. Why are you encouraging me to do this?”

“I’m giving you a chance to prove that you’re still the boy I used to know. But I suppose you don’t need it, right?”

Harry just shakes his head and stands up to attract Yaxley’s attention. The man nods to him in what could be seen as a shallow bow by the suspicious, but Harry doesn’t turn around to face Hermione’s accusing eyes and see if she’s among them. Instead, he carries his Transfigured puzzle over to the professor.

“I wanted to know if this would pass the requirements of the assignment, sir.”

It will be interesting to see Yaxley’s response, Harry thinks, as the man bends over the puzzle and touches a corner of the wood that Harry changed into a maze. After a second, Yaxley shakes his head and steps back and away from Harry. “I wanted it to be Transfigured completely, Mr. Potter. This is not completely.”

“You’re right, sir. Sorry.”

“You chose to do this on purpose?’

Yaxley’s voice is mild, his eyes studying Harry as if he’s an interesting Potions ingredient and nothing else. Harry looks evenly back.

“I wanted to see what your style is, sir. Professor McGonagall taught the class very differently.”

“My style.”

“Yes, sir.”

After a moment, the smallest possible smile flickers across Yaxley’s face, and he inclines his head. “Two points to Gryffindor for fulfilling the precepts of your House, Mr. Potter. But you still need to sit down and Transfigure your puzzle.”

“Yes, sir.”

Harry goes back to his seat, noting that Hermione has moved over to the other side of the class to whisper with Ron, and Theo and Draco have both moved closer to him. He probably shouldn’t take as much pleasure as he does in hearing Yaxley remove one point from Gryffindor for his former friends talking, but, well. It’s the little things.

“Are you all right, my lord?”

No one is sitting near them, and Harry is pretty much resigned by now to Theo calling him “my lord.” He nods. “Hermione was just making a point that turned out not to be true.”

Although, when Professor Yaxley calls for him to stay after class, Harry wonders if Hermione might have had a point after all.

*

“Sir?”

The Dark Prince approaches Corban warily, his eyes trained on Corban’s wand hand and the side of his robe where he might take something out of a pocket. Corban is sorry for it, but he can’t think of a way that he could have reliably told the Prince exactly what he wanted in front of the other students.

Better, in fact, that they should think their Transfiguration professor has no real connection to the Prince or the Dark Lord.

“I wanted to speak to you about your past, as I believe you would put it.”

The Prince pauses, then tucks his hands behind his back. “You overheard my conversation with Hermione.”

“I did.”

“Why were you interested in it?”

The Prince has dropped the title “sir.” Corban feels an obscure relief. Of course he must keep up the charade of being a professor and nothing more to fool the watching eyes in the school, but it has started to grate on him to hear his future lord refer to Corban as someone with authority over him.

“Because I wanted to know if she was going to gain your friendship back or not.”

“Oh. No, there’s not much chance of that.”

Corban nods. It’s what his own observation has told him, but it’s nice to hear it confirmed. “Did your father tell you why he sent me here?”

“Not—really? Just that you would be here to watch over me and maybe send reports on the school.”

“That is true. And I am also here to undertake a few experimental spells that he might not have let me cast otherwise. It is the first thing I have to thank you for. I might never have got those experiments done if I had remained no more than an ordinary Death Eater.”

“The first?”

The Prince’s voice is spiraling up into a squeak. He doesn’t look much better when Corban drops to one knee. In fact, he looks as if he might faint.

So much for Corban’s suspicions that the Prince might be trying actively to recruit followers. Corban speaks quickly, before his future lord can actually faint or bolt out the door. “I am willing to pledge myself to you. The Dark Lord promised me a place in his court if I served him, but I do not think that he will grant it to me. Or that I would want it if I did.”

“I can’t—I can’t go against my father!”

“Who says that you would be going against him? If we spin this the right way, then he would be delighted that you are expanding your court.”

The Prince hesitates. Then he murmurs, “He was happy that I Marked Pansy when he didn’t think I would Mark anyone before the holidays.”

Corban nods and smiles in encouragement. “I would be the one willing to break the news to him, if you are afraid.”

“I couldn’t let you do that.”

“Why not?”

“He might hurt you!”

The Prince speaks with passion, his eyes flaring with a deep green light. Corban sighs and bows his head. He started down this road for the sake of a place in a court, but now he really knows that this is the man he wants to serve for the rest of his life. It does not matter how young the Prince is or whether he uses Dark Arts or not. His spirit shines through the skin.

“I believe that you would intercede for me.”

The Prince hesitates. Then he says, “He might say to my face that he wouldn’t hurt you, but then do it later.”

“If you ask him for something, my lord, he will grant it.”

Corban is speaking the truth as far as he knows it, not just because Lucius and Severus—before his death—complained about that when it came to the Dark Lord and his son, but because he has watched the way that the Prince interacts with his courtiers. They would do anything for him, even die for him, Corban believes. Even the Malfoy boy who apparently was at odds with the Prince for five years.

“I—don’t know that I trust him that much.”

“Will you ask for my sake?”

The Prince’s eyes flicker. Corban bows his head, knowing that he’s asked the right thing. The Prince might suffer in silence for years or rage at his father to make a point, but he will ask for someone else what he wouldn’t ask for himself.

“He still might not let you—serve me.”

The words sound as if the Prince is plucking a disgusting insect from a delicious dish. Corban hides a smile. Yes, this is the man he wants to serve.

“Ask for a lesser boon first, then. Ask that I be allowed to serve you for the rest of the term. Position yourself as if you are simply thinking about integrating more courtiers into your court. I believe he will like that.”

“He’s a Legilimens. He’ll know I’m lying.”

Corban has to confess himself intrigued by the notion that the Dark Lord can use Legilimency on his heir from miles away. But he says simply, “Then you must think for yourself and truly believe that you wish to have me in your court.”

“I would do it if the alternative is him hurting you,” the Prince mumbles. “But—I don’t know what else you’ve done. What else you would expect to do.”

“What do you mean, my lord?”

The Prince flinches from the title, but that is all right. Corban has seen him grow used to the title from his courtiers and greet it with only eyerolls. “I’m not going to let you go around casting Dark Arts spells left and right. And I would forbid those experiments that you talked about, too, if I didn’t like them.”

Corban takes a deep breath. He anticipated this objection. And he didn’t come up with a good response in his own head. But now that the moment is here, he is only—

Thrilled.

Thrilled that the Prince cares enough in the first place to question Corban, take him to task, instead of issuing commands and expecting them to be obeyed.

“It is true that I have used Dark Arts in the past to kill my enemies on the battlefield. But I will swear any oath you like that I have not used them on innocents, or to torture in cold blood.”

“Any oath I like?”

“Yes, of course, my lord.”

Corban wonders the next moment if he should have said that, because the Prince’s eyes go narrow and his head tilts back as if Corban punched him in the throat. Then he nods and says, “I’ll tell you what I think about it later,” before striding out of the classroom.

With that, Corban has to be content. At the very least, he thinks the Prince will give his proposal some consideration.

And that is more than he has received from the Dark Lord.

*

“What did Yaxley want, my lord?”

“I’ll tell you in a minute.”

Theo nods and follows Harry as he strides down the corridor in the direction of their meeting room, a secluded place deep in the dungeons that they’ve walled and warded to the point that someone coming within a corridor of it makes their teeth ache in their heads. Theo studies Harry as he strides along, and relaxes a little at what he sees.

Harry isn’t angry. He’s thinking, so deeply that he’s probably not aware of how he walks at a frantic pace, but Yaxley gave him no cause for rage.

It means that Theo probably won’t have to go after the man.

Draco and Pansy are waiting for them when they come into the place that Theo is beginning to think of as Harry’s throne room, although the only furniture in it is conjured and Transfigured chairs. Theo eyes his fellow courtiers, wondering if Harry summoned them silently.

Neither Draco nor Pansy looks back at him. Both are focused on Harry, who paces with his hands linked together behind his back.

A sharp hiss breaks out from near his neck. Harry takes down the Disillusioned Basilisk and speaks to her, face so close that Theo can’t help but think how courageous his lord is. Theo would have a bit of trouble being that close to a venomous snake.

Of course, Basilisk is Harry’s bonded familiar and would have no reason to lunge and bite him, but still.

“Basilisk says that Yaxley has been watching me for weeks,” Harry finally says. “Not in the way that a Death Eater would watch someone they’re bodyguarding.”

“And what did he ask you now?” Theo asks, because Draco and Pansy both seem to be hesitating. Idiots. They should know by now that Harry won’t snap at them for asking a question.

Harry halts and turns to face him. “To become part of my court.”

“What?” Pansy gives a little shriek, which Theo is ashamed to admit he’d like to do himself. But since she did it, he doesn’t have to.

“Yeah.” Harry takes a deep breath. “I—I don’t know what to say about it, honestly. He said that he would be willing to swear an oath not to cast Dark Arts spells, and that he’s only used them in battle, not to torture people. But.” He bites his lip.

“You don’t trust him, my lord?” Draco asks.

“I’m not even sure it’s that, if he were to swear an oath,” Harry says slowly. “It’s that I don’t want to shelter and protect someone who’s done those kinds of things in the same way that I wanted to shelter and protect you, who might have been forced to do them.”

Theo stands quietly, the fireworks about what Yaxley wants going off in his head. Harry turns towards him with a little frown. “Theo? Do you have anything to say?”

“Much, my lord, but I don’t know that you’ll want to hear it.”

Harry rolls his eyes, and their bond bounces like a branch in a high wind. “Say it, Theo.”

“I wonder if you have considered how the Dark Lord will react to having you claim a Death Eater as part of your court. And alter his Mark.”

“Wait, what?”

“The Dark Mark binds faithful Death Eaters to act in the best interests of their lord,” Theo says patiently, but he does hide a smile when he feels Draco and Pansy both glaring at him for a point they were too careless to bring up. “You would have to replace his Mark with your own for his loyalty to be to you.”

“I—didn’t think of that. And he didn’t say anything about it, either!”

“He might not have thought about it,” Theo says, and shrugs delicately, although he enjoys the way that Yaxley seems to have fallen in Harry’s regard. “It’s very rare that someone already Marked by one lord would seek to give their allegiance to someone else, after all.”

“What does it mean that Yaxley is doing it?”

“My lord?”

Harry squints at Theo, and their bond squirms and hardens. “That’s the tone you use when you’re trying to avoid answering the question, Theo.”

“I just really don’t understand what you mean.” Theo is vaguely aware that Draco and Pansy are watching him and Harry the way they might watch a Quidditch game. He pushes the awareness away. He needs all his concentration right now to serve his lord.

“Doesn’t the Dark Mark compel loyalty to the Dark Lord?”

Theo snorts before he can help himself. “Of course not, Harry, or he never would have been betrayed.”

“Well—but if someone doesn’t want to betray him, they just want to…”

“You don’t think seeking the allegiance and service of another lord would be a betrayal, my lord? I would see it as one. Which is why I would kill Yaxley if he swore to you and it turned out to be a sham.”

“You don’t have to kill people for things like that, Theo.”

“Yes, I do.”

“Why?”

Theo smiles and tells the truth as he understands it, although he doesn’t know if Harry is really ready to hear it. “Because you might need someone to do things that you shy away from, my lord. And it doesn’t really matter why you shy away. I am ready to be your hand in this and kill those who need killing, so that your own hands need not be stained.”

Harry stares at him with huge eyes. Draco and Pansy seem like they wish for Quidditch stands to sit in.

Harry’s bond with Theo trembles and jerks and bounces. Theo waits it out. He’s sure that Harry will never turn on him, no matter what commands he might issue.

Then Harry takes a deep breath and shakes his head. “Thank you, but I don’t think it’ll be needed here.”

“Are you sure, my lord?”

“Yes,” Harry says, and his voice grows from a thread into a hard stretch of stone that invades his bond with Theo. “I’ll ask my father. It might be that he won’t want to lose Yaxley at all, and that’ll be the end of it.”

“Then you won’t stand against your father for Yaxley?”

“I barely know him at all, and it seems to me that he might want to swear to me mostly because he thinks that he’ll be able to talk me around and let him torture people after all. But I’ll speak with my father.”

Theo bows, well-satisfied. He wishes Harry could see himself as others see him, as the shining paragon of harshness and justice, power and mercy, that he is. Theo can’t even blame Yaxley for wanting to be part of Harry’s court. Maybe he knows that he’ll never be part of the Dark Lord’s.

But at the same time, Theo’s duty to his lord comes first. Unless he can question a prospective courtier extensively, the way he and Draco did with Pansy, he won’t be comfortable allowing just anyone in proximity to Harry.

And now…who knows? A lot will depend on the outcome of Harry’s conversation with the Dark Lord. Whom he now calls father.

Harry is changing, but it’s for the better. And Theo will be there to gently guide the change, as his other courtiers will be.

*

Lord Voldemort’s mind is full of golds and reds and blues and blacks, light like obsidian, soft like terror, sliding through his thoughts and coiling back around as he stares at his son, his Horcrux, his heir, his Harry.

Harry bites his lip and leans back on the shelf behind him, which itself is part of Lord Voldemort’s conjuring for the dream. He looks uncomfortable, but not terrified (soft) the way he would have been when they first discussed who he has always been. He asked for something, and he is waiting to see how Lord Voldemort will respond.

“You want me to give Corban to you.”

“He wants to be my courtier.”

“It is the same thing, my son, my heir.”

Harry hesitates, then shrugs. “Maybe.”

“Do not say maybe. If you wish him to be yours, then claim him. Call him by what name he will bear if he is part of your court.”

For a moment, Harry blinks as if he does not understand, and Lord Voldemort despairs. Has he not done his best to raise and teach the boy form the moment he understood that he has a boy? Did he not kill the Muggles to lay Harry’s old ghosts to rest?

It is disappointing to see the ghosts still coiling in his eyes.

Then Harry raises his chin and says with the arrogance he has the right to have inherited, “He will be Corban Yaxley, my courtier.”

“Perfect, my son.”

Harry gapes at him for a moment, but restores himself before Lord Voldemort can be disappointed in him. He says slowly, “You wished to have me take him as a courtier?”

“No. That is not why I sent him to Hogwarts. But how can I be anything but pleased when someone else understands how powerful and magical my son is? Corban is not seeking service with another lord unconnected with me, or defecting to Dumbledore’s side. He will remain connected to my magic.”

Harry seems unconvinced by that, which Lord Voldemort thinks unfair. Has he not changed his whole way of life, his goals and his methods, for this boy? Has he not accepted that this Horcrux is the best of them? The best of him?

“All right,” Harry finally says in English. “Then I’ll tell him he can serve me.”

“You may.”

“And the Dark Mark? I have your permission to replace it with my chimera?”

The mere thought would have filled Lord Voldemort with blinding rage not long ago. But he has learned better now. He has begun to think and dream and make plans that he will not share with others until he is ready, but there is no harm in showing this much off to Harry.

“You do, my son.”

Harry swallows and stares at him as if he’s the only person who has ever existed in the universe. Lord Voldemort basks in the feeling, the connection, but it doesn’t take long for his son to turn his head away and mumble, “I should go,” and then vanish from the dream room as if he himself has never existed.

Lord Voldemort stays where he is, even when the visionary bookshelves and the like decay around him and he floats in nothing more than a mindscape. He comes back to his body only when Nagini hisses and rests her head on his foot.

“You were gone a long time.”

“I was speaking with my son,” Lord Voldemort says, and bends down to touch the head of the Horcrux who best understands him. Until recently he would also have called her the best and his favorite, but things have changed.

“Does he still refuse to accept that you will do anything for him?”

“He may be getting closer to learning that. He dared to bring up something he would not have dared to bring up previously.”

Nagini curls herself into a ball in response. She has little interest in Harry except as his actions concern Lord Voldemort, or when he is physically present. She is not jealous, but then, she is a snake, and snakes rarely are.

Lord Voldemort allows his dangling bare foot to move, stroking her scales, as he stares into the fire. He ponders, and ponders, and ponders, and still can see no better plan than the one he has been thinking of.

Of course, it will take him a long time to explain it to Harry. It would take him much longer to explain to anyone else.

But he need not explain himself to anyone else. He is Lord Voldemort.

And his plans are the mixture of black and blue and gold and green that is the best.

*

Albus closes his eyes as he stands at the threshold of the room holding the artifact he has sought out. Even now, he wonders if it is too late to turn back and simply find another way to combat Harry and Voldemort.

But even as he thinks that, he knows it is. Of course it is. Harry has fully embraced being Voldemort’s son and turned his back on the friends he once loved and valued. And Albus can think of only one way to make him turn back and care about the war again.

He opens the door and strides into the room.

Whispers filter around his ears at once, brushing teasingly past him, leaving little cold tendrils on his face. Albus manages to ignore that as he stares at the Veil of Death blowing softly at the top of the dais it sits on.

He would never try this if not for all the circumstances. There is no magic that can compel the dead to return as they were.

But Sirius Black may not be quite dead, falling through the Veil as he did.

And Albus carries the Elder Wand.

Albus takes a deep breath, holds it.

And strides into the Veil after Harry’s fallen godfather.