Chapter Text
Tom Riddle’s most recent diplomatic endeavors as Undersecretary to the Minister for Magic have been intentionally scheduled to coincide with the Quidditch World Cup qualifiers. This series of globe-trotting matches may as well be a formality for the British squad this year. They are the heavy favorite for eventually taking the title, which Tom finds both politically expedient and unfortunately tedious. He attends nearly every match alongside the Minister, an elderly and mostly-not-there Cornelius Fudge, in a show of national pride and unity.
The Kyoto Arena holds up to eighty thousand people. Today, it sounds like it holds more. Tom has been in many crowds, but few have ever pressed together like this. Swaying forward and leaning back as if one being: host to a soul that cheers for the players, for the goals, and for the win. Privately, Tom thinks they may be cheering for something else entirely. For a place to belong.
He watches the sky.
Britain’s star Seeker, Harry Potter, enters a death-defying spiral at a truly dazzling speed. Just as Tom thinks that he will splatter into the grass – in a mangle of limbs, a headline, and a terrible headache for Tom to sort out – he wrenches his broom back up with a breakneck fury. A blink later, he snags the Snitch out of a bright blue sky, roaring with triumph.
Bright. Impossible. A glimmer of golden promise. Like a crystal chime, spinning in the sun.
Tom blinks, and it’s gone.
Britain smashes the home team, 210-30, to raucous cheers from the many visiting fans. Tom claps with performative enthusiasm in perfect view of several cameras. As the Undersecretary ought.
He finds Fudge besieged by reporters near a memorabilia stand. Dozens of posters, pins, and trading cards are plastered with Potter’s smiling face – the youngest Seeker to ever start on a professional squad. A Hogwarts drop-out on special exemption to join the Falmouth Falcons. In his first year, he had come one game shy of a perfect season, winning every Snitch but one. Then, shortly after, he had delivered Britain its first World Cup title in over fifty years.
Potter’s printed gaze is almost accusing. The Minister is fond of such collectibles, but the odds of him completing a purchase successfully are very low.
As evidenced.
Tom could rescue him, but then he would have to wait for him to buy something regardless. Quicker to slip into the memorabilia line and simply buy it himself.
Perhaps a badge this time. There are a few with a sakura design that will do.
He spots a banner of Potter’s winking face. “THE BOY WHO FLEW” is emblazoned across the bottom in bold, eye-searing text. His mouth twists, rueful. A callback to Potter’s first headline. A reminder of how this whole farce with Quidditch had begun, some four years ago.
some four years ago
Tom is the media’s darling. As Britain’s newest Undersecretary – handsome, clever, and accomplished, even his sneeze is news. He relishes the attention.
But, almost overnight, it stops.
Coverage shifts. Tom’s achievements fall by the wayside. It is as if all of the oxygen has been stolen from the air to fuel a second, even more meteoric rise.
Harry James Potter.
The name is on everyone’s lips.
Tom, of course, recognizes it from his earlier, less glamorous days in the Ministry. Potter had been a promising talent in the youth leagues. But in the years since Tom’s rise to Undersecretary, the boy had seemingly had an awakening of his own.
An athletic genius, or so everyone insists.
The green-eyed wonder quickly supplants Britain’s previous favorite, one Nolan Abernathy, and rises to staggering new celebrity heights with a speed that Tom finds… interesting.
Any figure with that much public goodwill is either an asset or a liability.
Tom prefers to know which, in advance. He could even forgive Potter for stealing the limelight so long as he can wrap him around his little finger.
Disappointingly, it becomes apparent that any moments of brilliance are constrained to Potter’s time on the pitch. His good looks are accompanied by a vacuum between his ears. His exploits with a new girlfriend each week splashes the headlines for months on end. The downfalls of an influential but weak-willed family have never been more clearly illustrated. The man is every inch a spoiled brat.
Tom attends several matches before they are ever formally introduced. It is prudent, and he extends this courtesy to any rising figure who might one day require managing. He keeps a record. Notes on Potter’s favored approaches, his preferred hand, a diving style so committed to the point of recklessness that it makes the entire stadium hush and draw in a breath – and when Potter emerges victorious, the stands explode into a deafening roar.
The man moves on a broom as though gravity is a rule that applies to lesser people.
Potter’s face, form, and string of unbroken successes consumes more of Tom’s attention than he would like to admit. He is most certainly not jealous. But he is quite over it.
He meets Potter, officially, in the top-floor box seats reserved for VIP guests.
Tom extends his hand and shifts his face into his most dazzling smile, the one that is sure to make any man or woman with taste swoon on their feet.
“A mesmerizing performance tonight, Mr. Potter,” Tom says. “Not a single soul in the arena would dare to look away.”
Potter smiles up dopily. He is a shockingly small creature for how much larger than life he seems from afar. Here in the flesh, he is almost an entire head shorter than Tom. He places his warm, calloused hand into Tom’s own and grasps it with surprising confidence.
“Thanks. Kind of you to say,” Potter says. They stare at each other for a long, frozen moment. Then the younger man’s face twists into something decidedly ugly – and stupid.
Tom holds his smile firm. “Nothing but the truth, of course.”
“Right,” Potter replies with a grimace. “Er… Who are you again?”
There is a small ripple of nervous laughter in the bubble around them.
It is truly a miracle that Tom does not curse Potter dead on the spot.
But his smile does not twitch. He is a consummate professional.
He does, however, despise Potter’s character and everything attached to him from that moment on.
On several occasions – particularly when Potter finds himself back in the headlines for some daredevil save – Tom looks into ways to knock him down a peg or several. Unfortunately, the harlot’s many sordid engagements have made him maddeningly immune to blackmail. The public is irrational in its adoration. Willing to forgive any number of flagrant indiscretions. There is nothing that Tom can pin on him. He is forced to give up.
It is only made worse in how he finds Quidditch an abysmal sport.
Most sports are abysmal sports, but Quidditch has a particularly nonsensical scoring system and, tragically, captures the hearts and minds of wizarding Britain.
Up until now, they have had infamously terrible international performances. With Potter’s arrival, Quidditch is where all the important faces make themselves known. Therefore, Tom must now also be present at every match of consequence. An eye-catching icon of the Ministry’s unwavering support. It is important for him to be there.
As he ought.
now
Tom excavates Fudge from under the mob of reporters. Eventually.
The next day, the British trade delegation returns to Tokyo. Negotiations for unfettered access to Japan’s mineral spring waters go off without a hitch in large part thanks to Lucius Malfoy’s commitment. At the eleventh hour, he had successfully retrieved the necessary materials to persuade their royal family.
Lucius is not on the Ministry’s payroll, but he does as Tom bids. Many do.
Tom is glad to return from Japan a day earlier than scheduled.
His flat is nestled within London’s Clipeo. It is a 20-storey building that caters to very exclusive clientele. Unplottable, and proud of it, its monthly invoice would bankrupt the average witch or wizard. For the price, it offers convenient access, dedicated amenities, and most of all, discretion. Through a complex series of wards and arrays, the building assures absolute privacy. Tom would never run into any of his neighbors if he did not will it, and they would never run into him. Certain comforts are worth the cost.
His flat receives him the way it always does. Silently. Floor-to-ceiling windows are hidden behind their thick emerald curtains. The space is sunken into its usual gloom, and everything is in the place where Tom had left it.
When he enters, he is normally in the habit of removing his shoes. While it may be a simple Scourgify to keep the floors clean, he finds hardwood polished clean by a well-motivated hand far more gratifying. The result of attentive service, rendered on hands and knees. His bedroom is strictly off limits, but for every other inch of his flat, he enjoys how the floors sparkle when he returns from abroad.
Today, however, Tom does not remove his shoes.
Something in the air is quite literally amiss. The slightest bitter trace. Floo powder.
He shoots a quick silencing charm at his feet and pads noiselessly through the entryway. Past the kitchen, into the living room – velvet green plush and dark ebony wood – until he is standing before the mantel.
For public movements he exits through the lobby in full view of the press. When discretion is required, he punches straight through Clipeo’s wards with silent apparition: a skill he keeps carefully concealed. Travel records are simple enough to falsify, but when you are a wizard of Tom’s talents, why go to that effort at all? As such, his floo only exists for late night firecalls from either the state or his Knights.
His floo powder is for show.
His floo powder, which is missing just a pinch.
His first impulse is violence. This is an outrageous transgression of his property – of his person. Anyone not keyed into his elaborately constructed wards should never be able to use his floo. A brief review shows no indication of anything unusual. The maids had come through the previous evening, as expected, and no one else.
It is fortunate for the trespasser that Tom had not caught them. Murder in defense of one’s home is an airtight plea in wizarding court. It would likely bolster his reputation, if anything. A firmer hand than feckless Fudge. Useful for when he eventually replaces him.
Tom releases a humorless laugh. He may as well not bother. For all intents and purposes, he already runs Britain – and it is convenient to throw Fudge situations that require a figurehead but no figurebrain.
His second impulse – unwanted, but bubbling up nonetheless – is to learn more about this mysterious individual that had broken into Tom’s home. It is a prickling curiosity.
The last attempt on Tom’s life had been well over five years ago, and he’d thwarted it easily. Afterward, he had ruthlessly suppressed any willful elements that remained. Only an exceptionally bold or foolish wizard would have the gall to target him. And this one, surprisingly, has some modicum of talent. It’s no simple feat to slip through Clipeo’s wards – at least for anyone that isn’t Tom. They had even been alert enough to sense his unexpected return in time to flee.
Tom draws his wand and casts a Hominem Revelio. When it comes up clean, he cancels the silencing charm on his feet. He shrugs off his jacket and finally toes off his shoes. They float obediently to their rightful homes. A quick examination shows that nothing else in the flat has been moved or otherwise disturbed.
For insurance, Tom adds an anti-apparition layer to his wards. He also makes a mental note to purchase faux floo powder and replace his current supply. Next time, and he is certain there will be a next time, the intruder would not be so lucky.
Surprise handled, he goes to his walk-in closet – considerably fuller than a man of his methodical habits has any real business keeping. He pins his most recent acquisition to the corkboard inside.
There is a quiet knock on his door. He accepts a light dinner from Clipeo’s in-house chef, eats it without tasting while reviewing several dockets for the next day, and turns in for bed shortly after. Before he can fall asleep, an idea occurs to him.
He pulls his wand out from underneath his pillow and prowls over to his welcome mat. Beneath it, he sets an array that will explode into a column of Fiendfyre should anyone enter without his express permission. More than sufficient to torch a grown man to a crisp. The trap sizzles into the floorboards with a reddish glow and then fades into a mild char. He tugs his welcome mat back into place and returns to his still-warm covers.
When his uninvited guest decides to return, he hopes they like it.
A week later, he returns from Belgium. It had been two centaur-napped British nationals, an overzealous herd, and nightly negotiations overly dependent on the revolution of stars. A slog.
He steps into his flat with a decisive clack.
And nearly slips.
His welcome mat has turned to a pile of ash. There is no body to accompany it. Only a note. A torn off scrap from his notepad on the coffee table, scrawled with his quill.
Good try.
Do you always order delivery? That can’t be healthy for an old man like you. Besides, you’re a bit pale. Deathly, even. You ought to look into that.
-a much younger concerned citizen
Tom flushes with an unfamiliar heat, hand twitching toward violence.
His appearance is a meticulously crafted facade. He would prefer to keep himself at peak attractiveness but, now in his late forties, he is forced to manufacture at least a hint of aging, to prevent suspicions regarding his mortality. So, in addition to concealing the color of his eyes, his glamour now adds a few greying strands at his temples. They make him look smart. Dignified.
Witches and wizards alike titter about how it suits him well.
His stalker is baiting him.
Tom will not fall for it.
A thorough inspection of his flat reveals that there are two additions this time. First, a surveillance array singed beneath his master bathroom vanity; he scrubs it away easily. Second, and much more ghastly, there is a half-kilo bag of oranges next to his spotless and entirely unused fridge.
Everything Tom does is deliberate.
He does not look deathly, and he most certainly does not need more vitamin D.
A quick scan shows nothing special about the oranges. He tosses the note and the bag of fruit into the kitchen bin with a resounding thud.
Whoever is stalking Tom keeps track of his schedule better than his own assistants.
As a national figure, most of his movements are available for review. His stalker tracks all of them. It’s invasive enough to put him on edge for the first time in decades.
He experiments with using his floo for a week so that there is no way to directly observe him leaving. He is dismayed to find a fresh note in his flat each time he returns. No matter how many scanning charms he uses, he cannot determine just how his stalker is managing it. Between the stalker’s observations about Tom’s dining habits at home, as well as their uncanny ability to break in as soon as he leaves the building, there is only one logical conclusion.
His unwelcome admirer must be very nearby indeed.
He makes a quick trip to the building manager’s office and filches a copy of the tenant record. He scans through a dozen well-known musicians, a handful of politicians, including the Head of the Department of Magical Transportation, and an array of other celebrities.
The 18th floor is occupied by Tom Marvolo Riddle and two others.
First, Candace Germaine, a well-beloved Wizard Wireless pundit. Entirely toothless.
Second, Britain’s very own star, Harry Potter.
He stares at the line, momentarily stunned.
He reads it again, still baffled. His personal record marks Potter’s residence in the rural highlands of Scotland. But how long has Potter owned a unit in Clipeo? And how had Tom not noticed?
He frowns. It is no matter. The man catches a ball for a living. Tom has met goldfish with more wit.
He tosses the tenant record into his fireplace with a click of his tongue. Every useless name had already been memorized with a glance, and no one possess sufficient magical prowess to be his stalker. His eyes drift back to the ember curling over Potter’s name. He dismisses the thought before it fully forms.
It has been several weeks since the unwelcome intrusions began, and Tom is stymied. He has even been forced to put a pause on his maid service lest they get caught in the crossfire. The upstart breaking into his home somehow has an advanced understanding of veiled magical warfare. Every trap, illusion, and ambush that he has set has been dismantled seemingly effortlessly, and his only rewards are snarky notes and the odd gift. All variations on the same impudent theme.
So far, he has received calcium supplements, heated socks, and a life journal that directs him to fill it out with his ‘story’ – to pass onto any progeny that he most certainly does not have and will not ever have.
He has also been called stale, frail, and creaky.
The most recent note had dubbed him ‘a crumbling monument to the impermanence of youth.’ As if his stalker has a direct line to Tom’s very last nerve. Impossible, considering the appalling chicken scratch that these offensive sentiments arrive in. His stalker is clearly an idiot. Such idiots should know their place.
In a fit of definitely-not-pique, Tom pens a reply and leaves it on his dining table.
Growing older is a privilege denied to many. If you insist upon this silly little game, you will number among them.
-Your Better
Pointedly, he uses a whole sheet of his notepad for it. Perhaps the ingrate will learn the proper use of stationery by example.
As he opens his front door, bag in tow, ready to depart for Bolivia, he turns around with the intent of burning his petty reply to a crisp. But an odd mood overtakes him.
Would they reply?
He leaves it untouched.
Bolivia goes well.
The next stage of World Cup qualifiers are hosted in the capital, La Paz, nearly four thousand meters above the sea. He stops by briefly between meetings as part of his continuing show of patriotic support. The pitch sits high enough above the world that the sky is a different color. A deeper, darker blue – with the black of space bleeding through at the edges, where the atmosphere runs out. It is the kind of blue that makes everything beneath seem faded and far away.
Except Potter. On a broom, he is transformed into a different creature entirely. One that earns the ardent devotion of his many fans.
Tom claps at the appropriate moments and tells himself that he is watching the match for intelligence – Potter’s form this season, his preferred entry angle on the Snitch, any sign of an injury that could complicate Britain’s World Cup odds. It is the sort of knowledge a politically-minded man ought to have. He keeps records on everyone who might be leveraged or become a liability.
Potter is no exception to this rule. That is why Tom looks.
He watches Potter bank into his descent. The man moves with a simple, physical confidence that cannot be taught. It is… attractive. Indifferently magnetic as only rare things are. A golden bauble that commands attention, its very existence stoking desire in men. Enough to drive thousands to travel across the world for the hope of a single glimpse.
It is a complete inversion of someone like Tom.
Tom hides. He has a private self, far more precious for being difficult to grasp. No one ever sees him, and it is by design. Except, apparently, for his stalker. In a way that Tom does not examine too closely, he finds it flattering. To be watched in the way that he watches others. To finally be seen.
After the match ends, he finds himself oddly reluctant to return to the Bolivian Ministry.
There are only a few loose ends to tie up on the updated trade accords, and by all accounts, today’s business has been a success. It takes a moment to pinpoint the source of his reticence, and he is startled when he does.
Work is not the issue.
It is just that he would much rather go home.
His note is gone when he returns to London. Beside his torn notepad, a reply.
Good luck with that.
-your better-er
Even if the signature makes his lips curl with distaste, he finds himself strangely pleased.
And he replies again.
It becomes a correspondence, like the world’s most contrived penpal agreement. One that is set against the backdrop of a lethal game.
The rules are simple.
If Tom catches his stalker first, they will die.
If his stalker catches Tom, well… Tom would not die, but he has put in substantial effort to position himself to where he is today. He really would be rather put-out if his schemes were foiled by a pest.
His stalker always attempts to spy on him in more and more elaborate ways. The most recent eavesdropping device had been a muggle microphone sewn into the lining of one of Tom’s favorite overcoats. Points for creativity.
In return, Tom devises increasingly intricate traps. His stalker breaks them. In fact, they have taken to leaving pithy little suggestions for what Tom might try next.
The snark would be intolerable except for how Tom finds himself actually entertaining their ideas. A challenge. One-upsmanship. Tom is not one to shy away. His idle mind occupies itself with the ever more entertaining puzzle of ensnaring his mysterious opponent.
During discussions over budget allocations, it is a pleasant diversion.
This quarterly meeting runs for two consecutive days: a laborious affair where Tom’s attention is entirely meaningless. His pre-arranged plans for next fiscal quarter will be carried out no matter how fervently Granger petitions. She will be a formidable force someday, but for the moment, she lacks the savvy to sway wallets, having won only a handful of hearts.
Tom’s mind returns to the latest volley in his game.
Creative for a senile bastard. Flubbed the execution though. Maybe you might’ve even gotten me if you’d replaced all the air in your flat ahead of time.
-the clever-er one
Tom had rigged an aerosolized paralytic to spring from under the kitchen sink the moment the cabinet door opened. Obviously, it had not worked, and the note only further inflames Tom’s desire to catch them. Perhaps he would not even have to kill them. It could be amusing. And he can be very persuasive.
He turns over the proposal in his mind. Replacing all the air is a novel idea. His stalker would be on the lookout for such a ploy, but what if Tom could find an odorless, colorless concentration? Perhaps with a nitrogen base, or—
Granger’s continuing motion is finally shot down. Tom hides a smirk.
Heart never pays the bills.
A little over three months into their odd little dance, Tom arrives home, from a rather harried trip in Melbourne, to an unexpected smell within his flat.
For one heart-stopping moment, he fears for his own life.
He does not fall over dead. He would not have died for long, of course. Tethered as he is to the mortal plane by his horcruxes, his Knights would revive him quickly. But it is still scant comfort.
The reality is that he had walked through his own front door with neither a sweep nor a shield. The knowledge sits in his chest like a curse; a bitter layer of ash on his tongue.
Tom had let his guard down. He, who trusts nothing and no one.
He could have died.
All because he had been distracted by thoughts of today’s reply.
Fortunately, the smell is innocuous. He is alive and mostly well.
He strides into his kitchen to find the source on the counter: a small uncovered tin with half a dozen chocolate chip cookies. Beside it, the note that had occupied his mind.
Been trying to get more into baking. Can’t finish the batch by myself and, honestly, it’d be a shame. So here we are.
They’re fresh. Let me know what you think.
Tom draws his wand and runs the tin through spell after spell. All come up clean.
Every rational fiber of his body says that there is no sensible reason why he should eat something from an anonymous individual who breaks into his home and clearly wants more from him than he is willing to give. He does not even enjoy sweets.
To have a cookie would be absurd.
He drops the note and the tin of fresh cookies into the kitchen bin with an echoing clang. He stands with his hands braced against the counter and stares at it for a long moment.
Today, his stalker had not signed their note.
Tom is not sure what to make of it.
You threw my cookies away?!
):<
I do not eat sweets.
The French delegation visits London and insists upon discussions at a sprawling resort off the Côte d’Azur. Both the French Minister and Tom are entirely aware that this is functionally the same thing as hosting the visit in France instead. The power play is as transparent as it is grating – which is to say, very. Every plenary session is a circus. Masseurs, infinitely replenishing punch bowls, accompanying drunk politicians. On days like these, Tom regrets his decision to take over Britain with pen rather than wand.
Nevertheless, Tom corners the French into a number of bilateral agreements that cleave nicely against his own interests – and against the interests of his opponents in the continental bloc.
He bids his fondest farewells. Unsubtle threats are traded along with a smile. He pulls aside his assistant at the earliest opportunity to wrap up any loose ends and portkeys back to his office in the Ministry. He had been on the verge of turning the Azure Coast red. He takes only a brief moment to center himself, and then apparates directly into his flat.
The aroma that wafts from the kitchen is a welcome balm.
A Japanese curry, one of his favored meals. Its ceramic dish is held in some type of a stasis; a piece of spellwork Tom has never seen before. He pokes at it with idle appreciation as he skims the accompanying note floating beside it, spinning gently as if in a breeze.
Stop thinking so hard. Every time I look at your empty fridge and empty flat it makes me sad. If you don’t at least try it this time, I will find a way to turn your entire head grey.
By the way: you’re welcome.
There’s a triple underline under the last word. Tom can practically hear the sass in it, and he smiles despite himself.
With a never-used spoon dug from his cutlery drawer, he takes a bite. It is surprisingly, frustratingly good. It certainly beats anything Clipeo’s kitchen can manage. When done, he snags the floating note out of the air and pens his response on the back.
A lovely curry. It has been well-received.
He is not the type to give thanks, but he sees no reason to be dishonest. A quick wave of his hand cleans the dish, and he sets the note back into a hover.
Then he begins to hunt for the latest device. His stalker never misses the chance after all.
He wanders through the house, wand in hand, scanning every surface. It occurs to him that he is enjoying this. He looks forward to it at the end of each trip. He cannot remember how long it has been since he had last felt anything so sincere.
He finds it in his headboard: a small muggle camera, buried deep and spelled with a strong Notice-Me-Not charm. A glint and nothing more. Impossibly out of place in an otherwise cheerless room. He had very nearly missed it on his first pass.
Tom kneels on his bed and holds it in his palm. The excited rush bleeds away, and the longer he looks, the more unsettled he feels. His hand is perfectly steady; the rest of him is not. It is almost as if someone is inside it, waiting for him to come home.
He brushes a thumb against the lens.
“Are you watching?” he asks quietly. The camera is much too small for a microphone, but his words spill out regardless. “Does it upset you that I have found your little trick, once again?”
He pictures it.
His stalker, flustered, furious, and having spent all day waiting in front of a monitor just to be there for the moment that Tom would inevitably find it. A grin spreads on his face, shockingly genuine.
He crushes the camera, but it is too late. It had already caught his smile.
He is torn between hoping that they had seen it and feeling strangely disturbed if they had.
He adds a second line to his reply.
With a placement like that, I might get the wrong idea about your intentions.
The next time, he finds a small black box along with his stalker’s note.
Look familiar? I know more than you think.
You’re right to be concerned.
His breath stills.
Inside the box, there is a small lapel pin. A silver snake with an emerald inset for its eye. He lifts it from the box and turns it over in the light. A chill passes through him; gooseflesh on his arms. The gem winks, as if it contains a promise.
That Tom had been a member of Slytherin house is common knowledge, but, unlike some, he does not flaunt this. His tastes are generally very private. His fondness for snakes, for example.
The truth of his bloodline is even more closely guarded. For various reasons, he had found the Chamber many decades ago and decided against awakening the Basilisk deep within. Only one among his Knights knows of his relation to the Gaunts – and Slytherin.
Somehow, he has the impression that this gift was selected with precision.
A threat.
Could his Inner Circle be compromised as well?
His resolve hardens into stone. If so, things are much more urgent. He will need to identify his inexplicably talented, terribly impertinent stalker – and soon. Perhaps this gift would be exactly the opening he needs.
He brushes a thumb against the design. It really does suit him after all.
He wears the pin. He rarely wears adornments, but few would ever notice such a small change. For those that do, he carefully gauges their responses. None are suspicious so far, but he need only be patient.
Later that same week, the final qualifying match for the British squad is scheduled to take place in Lisbon. They have already mathematically secured first seed in their group; the Portuguese, however, are on the brink of elimination. Accordingly, the mood in the stadium is grim for the home team fans.
The British team spills into the terrace box to greet their VIP sponsors before the game starts, as they often do. Potter leads the pack, dark hair wild as ever, gait easy with the confidence of a man for whom victory is a foregone conclusion.
Eventually, he makes his rounds to the Minister. And Tom.
While Potter chuckles at some poor joke from Fudge, Tom braces himself for a doubtlessly abrasive conversation. On cue, Potter turns to him with a grin.
“Undersecretary Fiddle! Looking good today!”
“Undersecretary Riddle,” Tom corrects. His voice is carefully smooth, but when he smiles it does not reach his eyes. “I see four years of practice is still not sufficient for you to recall.”
“Sorry,” he says unapologetically. “I’m awful with names. Just total pants at it. I hope you don’t take it personally.”
“I would never,” Tom replies evenly.
“You sure? I mean, your face—”
Potter stops short. His impertinent mouth stills mid-word.
Tom blinks.
Potter’s eyes are locked on something.
“Are you alright?” Tom asks with practiced concern, tracing the angle of Potter’s gaze. It is pinned to his left breast, near his heart.
To be precise, it is pinned on his lapel.
The room quiets, or perhaps Tom has simply stopped hearing it, as if all the air had been sucked away. Time stills, and the entirety of Tom’s focus narrows onto this one ridiculous man.
“Is there something wrong?” Tom asks again, automatic. He is surprised his tongue even manages to move. To himself, he sounds muffled, like his voice is in another room. Distantly, he realizes the cause. He can hardly hear himself over his own heart, hammering so hard that it feels like it might burst.
Potter jolts. “Ah!”
It comes a beat late.
Tom tilts his head, inspecting the strange specimen before him.
Potter’s eyes are far brighter than he had ever realized. A bright, otherworldly green. The color of Tom’s second favorite spell. Of death. He has never gone to the trouble of lifting thoughts from Potter’s presumably vacuous mind, but he finds himself reassessing his assumptions very quickly indeed. When his magic brushes against the edges of the man’s consciousness, he is firmly rebuffed by airtight, almost military shields.
Something tightens behind his ribs. Unfathomable. Undeniable.
“I just remembered something I have to do,” Potter says breathlessly. He flushes a deep red, spreading down toward his throat. “Urgently. In the lockers.”
“Urgently,” Tom echoes.
His eyes are glued to the delicate, pinkened skin at the base of Potter’s neck. He wants to bite it open and taste it for himself. He’s always found the man attractive, but his beauty strikes him anew. The blush, the quickened breath, the steady violence that shines only in his eyes. It steals Tom’s thoughts.
Even to Tom’s well-developed magical sense, every inch of Potter screams mediocre. A cut below average. But a second, closer examination shows that it’s almost too normal. Wrapped in a drab, grey shell. Designed to make someone like Tom look right past it, as he has for all this time.
But for that brief, unmistakable gleam.
Now Tom knows.
Potter has been deceiving the wizarding world. Chasing after Tom and his secrets. Playing to win for not months, but years. A darling thing, transcendent on the field, and somehow, inconceivably, more.
Tom’s prize, right beneath his nose.
His stalker.
His Harry.
His hand lifts and the movement makes Harry jump. Not with fear, but anticipation. In fact, Harry has subtly drawn his wand, handle reversed in his palm, tip hidden but pointed in his sleeve. Slipped into a loose, readied grip without Tom following how.
Finally baring his teeth, finally in Tom’s grasp.
No wonder Tom could never look away.
Harry’s eyes dart around the box, as if in search of rescue.
Tom watches more closely. No. Not rescue. Calculation. Harry is analyzing the consequences, the losses, if he chooses to engage here in the terrace box, with several dozen witnesses. Potential victims.
A sharper edge slips into Tom’s smile. Harry does not want to fight him here, and he is perfectly content with that. He would hate to end their game now. Something this important, this crucial, this utterly life-changing should not be done with an audience.
“Your urgent matter?” he prompts. “A busy man such as yourself has many things that require his attention, I imagine.”
“Right,” Harry says, clipped. He bobs his head once, notionally polite. “Er— Bye.”
Then he spins on his heel and strides away.
Every instinct in Tom’s body yearns to reach out and grasp onto the tail of Harry’s robes. To stop him and demand the whole truth. But Tom resists. Harry’s strangely timeless gaze sits vividly in his mind.
He needs to know everything about him. Even more than that, he needs to have him.
He wants to pluck each secret like ripened fruit and swallow them whole. To own them in their entirety. What he covets for himself is never to be shared. It is axiomatic. And what he covets in this moment is Harry most of all.
He wants those deadly green eyes fixed on him. And him alone.
And for that, Tom needs to plan.
When he finally arrives home that night, he goes immediately to his notepad. The message is already composed in his mind, but his hand still trembles as he dips his quill into the ink. He steadies it with a tight breath.
Can we meet?
Dinner at mine. 7pm, this Friday. My cooking will not disappoint.
You are welcome to glamour, Polyjuice, or whatever you see fit to protect your identity. I will also wear a blindfold as an added precaution.
-Tom
The thing with being the Master of Death – among many other more tedious things – is that you have a very long time to get good at very many things.
Like ward breaking, for instance. Four lives ago or so, Harry had been the best ward breaker in the Northern hemisphere, and he’d been hot on the tail of the Ward Witch of the South. Except, he was forced to jet out early, only in his mid-forties, because some muggle broke him in half with a car and he didn’t die. He’d asked as calmly as he could to be re-attached, which unfortunately, unsurprisingly did not work.
So yeah. A pity.
But that was a long time ago. In this life, Harry had chosen to come back to Quidditch. It felt a bit like coming home: fully embracing one of the few talents he had sharpened in his very first life. Content to be superbly middling in everything else, he’d let all of himself out on his broom. His existential angst, which had never converted into good poetry despite his best efforts. His sadness, the same. The ticking clock of this life’s end. None of it mattered while he was soaring through the skies.
But it’s not like his other skills just go away in between lives. And his long years of experience allow him to conclude one very important thing about the walk-in closet in Tom’s bedroom:
It is not to be fucked around with.
Layered with more wards than even the poshest wedding cake had tiers, each one had enough firepower to vaporize the room. Worse still, and far more troublesome, each would send a Protean message at the slightest touch. Harry doesn’t even try to crack it. Even a light magical prod would require letting the message go through.
One guess as to where – or who – it would go to.
Whatever was hiding inside that unassuming little space would be Tom’s deepest, darkest secret. His plans to lay waste to this defiant world, conquer the groveling masses, and crown himself Lord above all.
Harry’s learned to not bet against Tom Riddle and his determination to defend his secrets.
Of course, Harry doesn’t come into each life looking for Voldemort. Most of the time, the bastard never even appears. Coming here, to a modern, peaceful Britain, Harry had thought that it would be another holiday. He enjoys having a family but hates starting over as a baby, so he’d simply shown up on the doorstep at about eleven years old, bird’s nest hair and all, and asked Fleamont and Euphemia Potter to claim him. A small show of faux trauma works every time. It wasn’t too difficult to situate himself into the Potter family as a coddled child after that.
Eventually, he’d learned that this universe’s Tom was a rising star in the Ministry – a major mover-and-shaker.
In the Department of Magical Games and Sports.
He’d laughed himself sick.
Voldemort and Quidditch. He’d never thought he’d see the day and had been happy to leave it at that.
Then, in sixth year, Tom’s name popped up all over the papers. Youngest Undersecretary of all time. Harry had taken one look at Tom’s handsome face and his all-too-knowing smile on the front page and known that this was the beginning of the end. Long years of chasing Snitches had taught Harry that even the smallest glint could change the game. He’d been fooling himself, really, to think that Tom would ever be content with a quiet life. Yes, maybe this Tom was slower to climb the Ladder of Evil for reasons unknown, but it would go against the very core of him to simply stop. Just like it would go against the core of Harry to lie back and do nothing about it.
So he’d poured himself into Quidditch and chasing after Tom.
Over the years, Harry’s surveillance has evolved in ways that he will admit are difficult to defend on professional grounds. It had started sensibly enough – monitoring Tom’s contacts, his movements, and his areas of research. He had a working theory that Tom still kept in touch with his Knights from his Hogwarts days, including their children. He kept news clippings, photos, and a detailed record of Tom’s comings and goings pinned to a board.
Objectively, the board makes him look like a lunatic.
Also objectively, it’s for a good cause.
He tells himself this same thing when he decides to start breaking into Tom’s flat.
It’s not that he’d particularly wanted to see the inside of it. Tom is just – predictably – fastidious in covering his tracks. Harry knows he’s up to something nefarious, but he hasn’t been able to nail down a piece of definitive proof. Tom’s flat in Clipeo had seemed tailor-made for secret-keeping. Harry’s certain that he’ll find what he needs inside. He rents out a unit on the same floor as Tom. Waits until he has an opening when he knows that Tom is still in Japan. And nearly gets caught right away. He’s a lot more careful after that.
And his board grows into less of a surveillance operation and more of a portrait. Some (ungenerously) might call it a shrine. Really it’s a memorial. For a quietly sad life.
After every undoubtedly wearisome trip abroad, Tom returns to a silent flat, a barren fridge, and stacks of documents that he reviews by himself, bleary-eyed, late into the night. Most of these files are perfectly innocuous – the mundane machinery that keeps wizarding Britain a functioning society from day-to-day.
Harry knows. He’s looked.
And the more he looks, the more he realizes that he’s skating over the surface of something – someone – deeply lonely. Something Harry knows a thing or two about. Home: an empty room.
Being the bleeding-heart moron he is – always gets him into trouble, baked into his very bones – he just couldn’t very well leave it be. His game with Tom moves well past his ‘duty’ to wizarding kind. He’s known this for a while. He’s just been enjoying himself too much to stop.
It’s not until he leaves a camera for the first time that he finally admits he’s in too deep.
In front of his dinky little monitor, the black and white feed plays. Tom enters the room, wand drawn, sweeping over every surface with laser-focused attention. He looks deadly. He looks beautiful. And when he finds the camera, and his lips form silent, unknowable words – when he smiles at Harry with unfiltered glee – Harry’s stomach swoops in a way that cannot possibly be of professional interest.
It’s a problem. Despite his many faults, he isn’t entirely delusional.
He knows that he’s let this thing between them carry on for many months past what he should have. In fact, the first time he’d stepped into Tom’s flat and nearly been turned into a walking kebab was already a bridge too far. Yeah, self-defense is legal but Fiendfyre is not. If he was acting in good faith, he should’ve turned Tom into the DMLE right away and left it to the ‘experts’ to figure out the rest of his crimes.
But something about Tom – definitely evil, definitely could be worse – blunts his edge.
So: the taunting notes. The sarcastic gifts.
He’s been having so much fun with it. Terrible, awful, ‘feet-kicking with laughter because he’s spent half the night thinking about the next way to piss off Tom’ kind of fun. And now he has solid evidence that he’s not the only one. Tom’s getting a kick out of this thing that Harry’s not supposed to be enjoying in a way that suggests Tom’s not supposed to be either.
After a showmatch in Mexico City, Harry and the rest of the British team hit the streets. They drink themselves silly and end up on the magical half of La Ciudadela artisan’s market. Harry walks past the pin, but it snags in his mind like a loose thread.
It reminds him too much of Tom.
He goes back to buy it the next morning.
A week later, he’s exhausted. He’s still recovering from Tom’s most recent trap – a curse woven into an invisible tripwire that had actually managed to knock him on his arse. A sobering reminder that he can be too cocky for his own good.
He pulls on his Quidditch gear on autopilot and stumbles through his floo to the meeting point with the rest of the British team. A Portkey whirls them to Lisbon for the last match of their quals. After this will be a nice month-long break before the finals. Traveling less will be good for him. Get his head on straight. In the meantime, he needs to buck the fuck up.
He stands before the door to the VIP terrace box.
Tom’s on the other side. He tries not to overthink it.
He loves everything about Quidditch as long as he’s actually playing it. The rest, well, he bears with ill grace. The schmoozing, the purses, and most of all, the man he cannot get over. It’s really quite cruel of reality to make Tom so stupidly attractive, even with his fake wrinkles and greys. Each time Harry sees Tom in the flesh, his traitorous thoughts follow him home. And then dream-Tom haunts him for days.
Harry knows the man is a right berk, but his libido seems to have lost the memo.
The team’s Keeper is giving a small pep-talk about the importance of schmoozing before they head inside. It’s really more of a rant. One of their Chasers had offended the wrong wallet at their last match, and everyone’s still sore about it. She wraps up with a bright smile and turns to Harry, expectant. For him to lead the way.
He doesn’t want to. He really doesn’t want to. But the dog-and-pony show is a necessary evil. And he’s the most important dog-slash-pony of the lot. He clenches his hands and lets out a slow, calming breath. Then he plasters on his trademark look, vapid and sufficiently happy, and pushes inside to mingle with the purses. It’s not just his job. He owes it to the team.
After delaying as long as he can, he finally goes to greet the Minister and his Undersecretary.
He has his fun at Tom’s expense. And then everything goes off the rails.
The pin.
It was more of a taunt – ‘I know who you really are’ – and honestly, Harry hadn’t expected much of a reaction at all except maybe deadlier traps. He didn’t think Tom would ever wear it.
But he is.
In that terrace box, with Tom looking so very handsome and casually sporting Harry’s gift which he was never supposed to wear in the first place, well—
Harry absolutely fucking flubs it.
He straight bellyflops his reaction so hard that the only thing he can think to do is run away.
Frankly, he expects Tom to try to kill him immediately. Bloodthirsty bastard finally figures out who’s been busting into his flat for a year and change. Of course, he would make it his mission to put Harry into an early grave as soon as humanly possible.
But the attack never comes. As each day passes, and not a single hair on Harry’s person is harmed, he’s strangely wrong-footed. Half of him is convinced that this is one of Tom’s mind games, and he’s watching Harry squirm. The other half suspects that Tom just thinks he’s stupid. Either way, nothing happens. It’s freaking him out that nothing’s bloody happening. He makes mistakes at practices that he hasn’t made in years because he’s always looking over his shoulder. Jumpy. All he wants is a sign – any sign – that Tom knows.
After a week of this hell, he finally caves and goes back to Tom’s flat. It’s almost a relief to find the note asking him to dinner. He’s just baffled that it doesn’t call him out by name. He can’t imagine for the life of him, why Tom wouldn’t gloat.
Maybe he didn’t bungle his reaction as hard as he’d thought? Tom really had just written him off. Socially awkward jock, as advertised.
Or maybe it’s a trap.
He stares down at the note.
“This is fine,” he says to no one at all.
He’s not a coward; he’s a survivor. And he’ll survive this, too.
After all, every good thing must eventually die. Nature always runs her course. And if the implication is that Harry isn’t a good thing, well… He had never been the best at metaphors. Probably why his poetry had never panned out.
Anyway. What matters is that Tom’s just teed up the perfect chance to get into his closet. Harry would be daft to not take a swing.
He goes back to his own flat and digs out his potions kit. All the while, his thoughts keep going back to the note, like a bird coming back to roost. Over and over.
Dinner at mine.
Bloody hell. Like it’s some kind of date.