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The Man With Two Faces:

Use the boy... Use the boy...

Let me speak to him... face to face...

I have strength enough... for this...

"Harry Potter..." it whispered.

"See what I have become?" the face said. "Mere shadow and vapor... I have form only when I can share another's body - but there have always been those willing to let me into their hearts and minds... unicorn blood has strengthen me, these past weeks... You saw faithful Quirrell drinking it for me in the forest... and once I have the Elixir of Life, I will be able to create a body of my own... Now... why don't you give me that stone in your pocket?"

"Don't be a fool," snarled the face. "Better save your own life and join me... or you'll meet the same end as your parents... They died begging me for mercy..."

"How touching..." it hissed. "I always value bravery... yes, boy, your parents were brave... I killed your father first, and he put up a courageous fight... but your mother needn't have died... she was trying to protect you... Now give me the stone, unless you want her to have died in vain."

Harry sprang toward the flame door, but Voldemort screamed "SEIZE HIM!" and the next second Harry felt Quirrell's hand close on his wrist.

"Seize him! SEIZE HIM!" shrieked Voldemort again, and Quirrell lunged, knocking Harry clean off his feet, landing on top of him, both hands around Harry's neck - Harry's scar was almost blinding him with pain, yet he could see Quirrell howling in agony.

"Then kill him, fool, and be done!" screeched Voldemort. Harry jumped to his feet, caught Quirrell by the arm, and hung on as tight as he could. Quirrell screamed and tried to throw Harry off - the pain in Harry's head was building - he couldn't see - he could only hear Quirrell's terrible shrieks and Voldemort's yells of, KILL HIM, KILL HIM!" and other voices, maybe in Harry's own head, crying, "Harry! Harry!"


The Very Secret Diary:

"Hello Harry Potter. My name is Tom Riddle. How did you come by my diary?"

"Lucky that I have recorded my memories in some more lasting way than ink. But I always knew that there would be those who would not want this diary read."

"I mean that this diary holds memories of terrible things. Things that were covered up. Things that happened at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."

"Of course I know about the Chamber of Secrets. In my day, they told us it was a legend, that it did not exist. But this was a lie. In my fifth year, the Chamber was opened and the monster attacked several students, finally killing once. I caught the person who'd opened the Chamber and he was expelled. But the Headmaster, Professor Dippet, ashamed that such a thing had happened at Hogwarts, forbade me to tell the truth. A story was given out that the girl had died in a freak accident. They gave me a nice, shiny, engraved trophy for my trouble and warned me to keep my mouth shut. But I knew it could happen again. The monster lived on, and the one who had the power to release it was not imprisoned."

"I can show you, if you like," came Riddle's reply. "You don't have to take my word for it. I can take you inside my memory of the night when I caught him."

"Let me show you."

"You wanted to see me, Professor Dippet?" said Riddle. He looked nervous.

"Oh" said Riddle. He sat down, gripping his hands together tightly.

"No," said Riddle at once. "I'd much rather stay at Hogwarts then go back to that - to that-"

"Yes, sir," said Riddle, reddening slightly.

"Half-blood, sir," said Riddle. "Muggle father, witch mother."

"My mother died just long enough to name me - Tom after my father, Marvolo after my Grandfather."

"You mean all these attacks, sir?" said Riddle, and Harry's heart leapt, and he moved closer, scared of missing anything.

"Sir – if this person was caught – if it all stopped --"

"No, sir," said Riddle quickly.

"I had to see the headmaster, sir," said Riddle.

"Evening, Rubeus," said Riddle sharply.

"It's all over," he said. "I'm going to have to turn you in, Rubeus. They're talking about closing Hogwarts if the attacks don't stop."

"I don't think you meant to kill anyone. But monsters don't make good pets. I suppose you just let it out for exercise and –"

"Come on, Rubeus," said Riddle, moving yet closer.

"The dead girl's parents will be here tomorrow. The least Hogwarts can do is make sure that the thing that killed their daughter is slaughtered..."

"Stand aside," said Riddle, drawing out his wand.

The Heir of Slytherin:

"She won't wake," said a soft voice.

"She's still alive," said Riddle. "But only just."

"A memory," said Riddle quietly. "Preserved in a diary for fifty years."

"it won't come until it is called," said Riddle calmly.

"You won't be needing it," he said.

"I've waited a long time for this, Harry Potter," said Riddle.

"For the chance to see you. To speak to you."

"We're going to talk now," said Riddle, still smiling broadly, and he pocketed Harry's wand.

"Well that's an interesting question," said Riddle pleasantly. "And quite a long story. I suppose the real reason Ginny Weasley's like this is because she opened her heart and spilled all her secrets to an invisible stranger."

"The diary," said Riddle. "My diary. Little Ginny's been writing in it for months and months, telling me all her pitiful worries and woes - how her brothers tease her, how she had to come to school with second hand robes and books, how" – Riddle's eyes glinted – "how she didn't think famous good, great Harry Potter would ever like her..."

It's very boring, having to listen to the silly little troubles of an eleven-year old girl," he went on, "But I was patient. I wrote back. I was sympathetic, I was kind. Ginny simply loved me. No one's ever understood me like you, Tom... I'm so glad I've got this diary to confide in.... Its like having a friend I can carry in my pocket...."

"If I say it myself, Harry, I've always been able to charm the people I needed. So Ginny poured out her soul to me, and her soul happened to be exactly what I wanted. I grew stronger and stronger on a diet of her deepest fears, her darkest secrets. I grew powerful, far more powerful than little Miss Weasley. Powerful enough to start feeding Miss Weasley a few of my secrets, to start pouring a little of my soul back into her..."

"Haven't you guessed yet, Harry Potter?" said Riddle softly. "Ginny Weasley opened the Chamber of Secrets, she strangled the school roosters and daubed threatening messages on the walls. She set the Serpent of Slytherin on four mudbloods, and the Squib's cat."

"Yes," said Riddle, calmly. "Of course, she didn't know what she was doing at first It was very amusing. I wish you could have seen her new diary entries... far more interesting they became.... "Dear Tom" he recited, watching Harry's horrified face, "I think I'm losing my memory. There are rooster feathers all over my robes and I don't know how they got there. Dream Tom, I can't remember what I did on the night of Halloween, but a cat was attacked, and I've got paint all down my front. Dear Tom, Percy keeps telling me I'm pale and I'm not myself. I think he suspects me.... There was another attack today and I don't know where I was. Tom, what am I going to do? I think I'm going mad.... I think I'm the one attacking everyone, Tom!"

"It took a very long time for stupid little Ginny to stop trusting her diary," said Riddle. "But she finally became suspicious and tried to dispose of it. And that's where you come in, Harry. You found it, and I couldn't have been more delighted. Of all the people who could have picked it up, it was you, the very person I was most anxious to meet...."

‘Well, you see, Ginny told me all about you, Harry," said Riddle. "Your whole fascinating history." His eyes rolled over the lightning scar on Harry's forehead, and their expression grew hungrier. "I knew I must find out more about you, talk to you, meet you if I could. So I decided to show you my famous capture of that great oaf, Hagrid, to gain your trust –"

"It was my word against Hagrid's, Harry. Well, you can imagine how it looked to old Armando Dippet. On the one hand, Tom Riddle, poor but brilliant, parentless but so brave, school prefect, model student... on the other hand, big , bundering Hagrid, in trouble every other week, trying to raise Werewolf cubs under his bed, sneaking off to the Forbidden Forrest to wrestle trolls.... but I admit, even I was surprise how well the plan worked. I thought someone must realize that Hagrid couldn't possibly be the heir of Slytherin. It had taken me five whole years to find out everything I could about the Chamber of Secrets, and discover the secret entrance... as though Hagrid had the brains, or the power!"

"Only the transfiguration teacher, Dumbledore, seemed to think Hagrid was innocent. He persuaded Dippet to keep Hagrid and train him as a gamekeeper. Yes, I think Dumbledore might have guessed.... Dumbledore never seemed to like me as much as the other teachers did...."

"Well, he certainly kept an annoyingly close watch on me after Hagrid was expelled," said Riddle carelessly. "I knew it wouldn't be safe to open the Chamber again while I was at school. But I wasn't going to waste those long years I'd spent searching for it. I decided to leave behind a diary, preserving my sixteen-year-old self in its pages, so that one day, with luck, I would be able to lead another in my footsteps, and finish Salazar Slytherin's noble work."

"Haven't I already told you," said Riddle quietly, "that killing Mudbloods doesn't matter to me anymore? For many months now, my new target has been – you."

"Imagine how angry I was when the next time my diary was opened, it was Ginny who was writing to me, not you. She saw you with the diary, you see, and panicked. What if you found out how to work it, and I repeated all her secrets to you? What if, even worse, I told you who'd been strangling roosters? So the foolish little brat waited until your dormitory was deserted and stole it back. But I knew what I must do. It was clear to me that you were on the trail of Slytherin's heir. From everything Ginny had told me about you, I knew you would go to any lengths to solve the mystery – particularly if one of your best friends was attacked. And Ginny told me the whole school was buzzing because you could speak Parseltongue...."

So I made Ginny write her own farewell on the wall and come down here to wait. She struggled and cried and became very boring. But there isn't much life left in her... She put too much into the diary, into me. Enough to let me leave its pages at last.... I have been waiting for you to appear since we arrived here. I knew you'd come. I have many questions for you, Harry Potter."

"Well," said Riddle, smiling pleasantly, "how is it that you – a skinny boy with no extraordinary magical talent – managed to defeat the greatest wizard of all time? How did you escape with nothing but a scar, while Lord Voldemort's powers were destroyed?"

"Voldemort," said Riddle softly, "is my past, present, and future, Harry Potter...."

"You see?" he whispered. "It was a name I was already using at Hogwarts, to my most intimate friends only, of course. You think I was going to use my filthy Muggle Father's name forever? I, in whose veins runs the blood of Salazar Slytherin's himself, through my mother's side? I, keep the name of the foul, common muggle, who abandoned me even before I was born, just because he found out his wife was a witch? No, Harry — I fashioned myself a new name, a name I knew wizards everywhere would one day fear to speak, when I had become the greatest sorcerer in the world!"

"Dumbledore's been driven out of this school by the mere memory of me!" he hissed.

"That's a phoenix..." said Riddle, staring shrewdly back at it. "And that –" said Riddle, now eyeing the ragged thing that Fawkes had dropped, "that's the old school Sorting Hat –"

"This is what Dumbledore sends his defender! A song bird and an old hat! Do you feel brave, Harry Potter? Do you feel safe now?"

To business, Harry," said Riddle, still smiling broadly. "Twice – in your past, in my future – we have met. And twice I have failed to kill you. How did you survive? Tell me everything. The longer you talk," he added softly," the longer you stay alive."

"So. Your mother died to save you. Yes, that's a powerful counter charm. I can see now... there is nothing special about you after all. I wondered, you see. There are strange similarities between us, after all. Even you must have noticed. Both half-bloods, orphans, raised by Muggles. Probably the only two parselmouths to come to Hogwarts since the great Slytherin himself. We even look something alike... but after all, it was merely a lucky chance that saved you from me. That's all I wanted to know."

"Now, Harry, I'm going to teach you a little lesson. Let's match the powers of Lord Voldemort, Heir of Slytherin, against famous Harry Potter, and the best weapons Dumbledore can give him..."

Riddle opened his mouth wide and hissed – but Harry understood what he was saying.... "Speak to me, Slytherin, greatest of the Hogwarts four."

"Kill him."

"NO!" Harry heard Riddle screaming. "LEAVE THE BIRD! LEAVE THE BIRD! THE BOY IS BEHIND YOU! YOU CAN STILL SMELL HIM! KILL HIM!"

"KILL THE BOY! LEAVE THE BIRD! THE BOY IS BEHIND YOU! SNIFF – SMELL HIM!"

"You're dead, Harry Potter," said Riddle's voice above him. "Dead. Even Dumbledore's bird knows it. Do you see what he's doing, Potter? He's crying."

"I'm going to sit here and watch you die, Harry Potter. Take your time. I'm in no hurry."

"So ends the famous Harry Potter," said Riddle's distant voice. "Alone in the Chamber of Secrets, forsaken by his friend, defeated at last by the Dark Lord he so unwisely challenged. You'll be back with your dear Mudblood mother soon, Harry... but Lord Voldemort got you in the end, as you knew he must...."

"Get away, bird," said Riddle's voice suddenly. "Get away from him – I said, get away –"

"Phoenix tears..." said Riddle quietly, staring at Harry's arm. "Of course... healing powers... I forgot..."

He looked into Harry's face. "But it makes no difference. In fact, I prefer it this way. Just you and me, Harry Potter... You and me...."


The Riddle House:

"Later," said a second voice. This too belonged to a man – but it was strangely high-pitched, and cold as a sudden blast of icy wind. Something about that voice made the sparse hairs on the back of Frank's neck stand up. "Move me closer to the fire, Wormtail."

"Where is Nagini?" said the cold voice.

"You will milk her before we retire, Wormtail," said the second voice. "I will need feeding in the night. The journey has tired me greatly."

"A week," said the cold voice. "Perhaps longer. The place is moderately comfortable, and the plan cannot proceed yet. It would be foolish to act before the Quidditch World Cup is over."

"Because, fool, at this very moment wizards are pouring into the country from all over the world, and every meddler from the Ministry of Magic will be on duty, on the watch for signs of unusual activity, checking and double-checking identities. They will be obsessed with security, lest the Muggles notices anything. So we wait."

"Certainly I am determined, Wormtail." There was a note of menace in the cold voice now.

"Without Harry Potter?" breathed the second voice softly. "I see."

"I could use another wizard," said the cold voice softly, "that is true...."

"And so you volunteer to go and fetch me a substitute? I wonder... Perhaps the task of nursing me has become wearisome for you, Wormtail? Could this suggestion of abandoning the plan be nothing more than an attempt to desert me?"

"Do not lie to me!" hissed the second voice. "I can always tell, Wormtail! You are regretting that you ever returned to me. I revolt you. I see you flinch when you look at me, feel you shudder when you touch me..."

"Your devotion is nothing more than cowardice. You would not be here if you had anywhere else to go. How am I to survive without you, when I need feeding every few hours? Who is to milk Nagini?"

"Liar," breathed the second voice. "I am no stronger, and a few days alone would be enough to rob me of the little health I have regained under your clumsy care, silence!"

"I have my reasons for using the boy, as I have already told you, and I will use no other. I have worked thirteen rears. A few more months will make no difference. As for the protection surrounding the boy, I believe my plan will be effective. All that is needed is a little courage from you, Wormtail – courage you will find, unless you wish to feel the full extent of Lord Voldemort's wrath –"

"If?" whispered the second voice. "If? If you follow the plan, Wormtail, the Ministry need never know that anyone else has died. You will do it quietly and without fuss; I only wish that I could do it myself, but in my present condition... Come, Wormtail, one more death and our path to Harry Potter is clear. I am not asking you to do it alone. By that time, my faithful servant will have rejoined us –"

"Wormtail, I need somebody with brains, somebody whose loyalty has never wavered, and you, unfortunately, fulfil neither requirement."

"That is true," said the second man, sounding amused. "A stroke of brilliance I would not have though possible from you, Wormtail – though, if truth be told, you were not aware how useful she would be when you caught her, were you?"

"Liar," said the second voice again, the cruel amusement more pronounced than ever. "However, I don't deny that her information was invaluable. Without it, I could never have formed our plan, and for that, you will have your reward, Wormtail. I will allow you to perform a task for me, one that many followers would give their right hands to perform...."

"Ah, Wormtail, you don't want me to spoil the surprise? Your part will come at the very end... but I promise you, you, will have the honor of being just as useful as Bertha Jorkins."

"Wormtail, Wormtail," said the cold voice silkly, "Why would I kill you? I killed Bertha because I had to. She was fit for nothing after my questioning, quite useless. In any case, awkward questions would have been asked if she had gone back to the Ministry with the news that she had met you on her holidays. Wizards who are supposed to be dead would do well not to run into Ministry of Magic witches at wayside inns...."

"We could have modified her memory? But Memory Charms can be broken by a powerful wizard as I proved when I questioned her. It would be an insult to her memory not to use the information I extracted from her, Wormtail."

"One more murder... my faithful servant at Hogwarts... Harry Potter is as good as mine, Wormtail. It is decided. There will be no more argument. But quiet... I think I hear Nagini...."

"Nagini has interesting news, Wormtail," it said.

"Indeed, yes," said the voice. "According to Nagini, there is an old Muggle standing right outside this room, listening to every word we say."

"Invite him inside, Wormtail. Where are your manners?"

"You hear everything, Muggle?" said the cold voice.

"I am calling you a Muggle," said the voice coldly. "It means that you are not a wizard."

"You have no wife," said the cold voice, very quietly. "Nobody knows you are here. You told nobody that you were coming. Do not lie to Lord Voldemort, Muggle, for her knows... he always knows..."

"But I am not a man, Muggle," said the cold voice, barely audible now over the cackling of flames. "I am much, much more than a man. However... why not? I will face you.... Wormtail, come turn my chair around."

"You heard me, Wormtail."

The Dream:

"You are in luck, Wormtail," said a cold, high-pitched voice from the depths of the chair in which the owl had landed. "You are very fortunate indeed. Your blunder has not ruined everything. He is dead."

"Nagini," said the cold voice, "You are out of luck. I will not be feeding Wormtail to you, after all... but never mind, never mind... there is still Harry Potter...."

"Now, Wormtail," said the cold voice, "Perhaps one more little reminder why I will not tolerate another blunder from you –"

"Crucio!" said the cold voice.

Flesh, Blood, and Bone:

From far away, above his head, he heard a high, cold voice, say, "Kill the spare."

"Hurry!"

"Now..." said the cold voice.

"Robe me," said a high, cold voice from behind the steam, and Wormtail, sobbing and moaning, cradling his mutilated arm, scrabbled to pick up the black robes from the ground, got to his feet, reached up, and pulled them one-handed over his master's head.

The Death Eaters:

"Hold out your arm," said Voldemort lazily.

He extended the bleeding stump, but Voldemort laughed again.

"The other arm, Wormtail."

"It is back," he said softly, "they will have noticed it... and now, we shall see... now we shall know..."

"How many will be brave enough to return when they feel it?" he whispered, his gleaming red eyes fixed upon the stars. "And how many will be foolish enough to stay away?"

"You stand, Harry Potter, upon the remains of my late father," he hissed softly. " A Muggle and a fool... very like your dear mother. But they both had their uses, did they not? Your mother died to defend you as a child... and I killed my father, and see how useful he has proved himself, in death...."

"You see that house upon the hillside, Potter? My father lived there. My mother, a witch who lived here is this village, fell in love with him. But he abandoned her when she told him what she was... He didn't like magic, my father..."

He left her and returned to his Muggle parents before I was even born, Potter, and she died giving birth to me, leaving me to be raised in a Muggle Orphanage... but I vowed to find him... I revenged myself up on him, that fool who gave me his name... Tom Riddle...."

"Listen to me, reliving family history..." he said quietly, "Why, I am growing quite sentimental.... But look, Harry! My true family returns...."

‘Welcome, Death Eaters," said Voldemort quietly. "Thirteen years... thirteen years last we met. Yet you answer my call as though it were yesterday.... We are still united under the Dark Mark, then! Or are we?"

"I smell guilt" he said. "There is a stench of guilt upon the air."

"I see you all, whole and healthy, with your powers intact – Such prompt appearances! – and I ask myself... why did this band of wizards never come to the aid of their master, to whom they sore eternal loyalty?"

"And I answer myself," whispered Voldemort, "they must have believed me broken, they thought I was gone. They slipped back among my enemies, and they pleaded innocense, and ignorance, and bewitchment...."

"And then I ask myself, but how could they have believed I would not rise again? They, who knew the steps I took, long ago, to guard myself against mortal death? They, who had seen proofs of the immensity of my power in times when I was mightier than any wizard living?"

"And I answer myself, perhaps they believed a still greater power could exist, one that could vanquish even Lord Voldemort... Perhaps they now pay allegiance to another... Perhaps that champion of commoners, of Mudbloods and Muggles, Albus Dumbledore?"

"It is a disappointment to me... I confess myself disappointed...."

Voldemort began to laugh. He raised his wand.
"Crucio!!"

"Get up, Avery," said Voldemort softly. "Stand up. You ask for forgiveness? I do not forgive. I do not forget. Thirteen long years... I want thirteen years repayment before I forgive you. Wormtail here has paid some of his debt already, have you not, Wormtail?"

"You returned to me, not out of loyalty, but out of fear of your old friends. You deserve this pain, Wormtail. You know that, don't you?"

"Yet you helped return me to my body," said Voldemort cooly, watching Wormtail sob on the ground. "Worthless and traitorous as you are, you helped me... and Lord Voldemort rewards his helpers...."

"May your loyalty never waver again, Wormtail," said Voldemort.

"Lucius, my slippery friend," he whispered, halting before him. "I am told that you have not renounced the old ways, though to the world you present a respectable face. You are still ready to take the lead spot of Muggle torture, I believe? Yet you never tried to find me Lucius.... Your exploits at the Quidditch World Cup were fun, I dare say... but might not your energies been better directed toward finding and aiding your master?"

"And yet you ran from my mark, when a faithful Death Eater sent it into the sky last summer?" said Voldemort lazily, and Mr. Malfoy stopped talking abruptly. "Yes, I know all about that, Lucius.... You have disappointed me.... I expect more faithful service in the future."

"The Lestranges should stand here," said Voldemort quietly. "But they are entombed in Azkaban. They were faiithful. They went to Azkaban rather than renounce me.... When Azkaban is broken open, the Lestranges will be honored beyond their dreams. The dementors will join us... they are our natural allies... we will recall the banished giants... I shall have all my devoted servants to me, and an army of creatures whom all fear...."

"Macnair... destroying dangerous beasts for the Ministry of Magic now, Wormtail tells me? You should have better victims than that soon, Macnair. Lord Voldemort will provide...."

"And here" – Voldemort moved on to the two largest hooded figures – "we have Crabbe... You will do better this time, will you not Crabbe? And you, Goyle?"

"The same goes for you, Nott" said Voldemort quietly as he walked past a stooped figure in Mr. Goyle's shadow.

"That will do," said Voldemort.

"And here we have six missing Death Eaters... three dead in my service. One, too cowardly to return... he will pay. One, who I believe has left me forever... he will be killed, of course... and one, who remains my most faithful servant, and who has already reentered my service."

"He is at Hogwarts, that faithful servant, and it was through his efforts that our young friend arrived here tonight...."

"Yes," said Voldemort, a grin curling on his lipless mouth as the eyes of the circle flashed in Harry's direction. "Harry Potter has kindly joined us for my rebirthing party. One might go so far as to call him my guest of honor."

"Ah, what a story it is, Lucius" said Voldemort. "‘And it all begins – and ends – with my young friend here."

"You know, of course, that they have called this boy my downfall?" Voldemort said softly, his red eyes upon Harry, whose scar began to burn so fiercely that he almost screamed in agony. "You all know that on the night I lost my powers and my body, I tried to kill him. His mother died in the attempt to save him – and unwittingly provided him with a protection I admit I had not foreseen.... I could not touch the boy."

"His mother left upon him the traces of her sacrifice.... This is old magic, I should have remembered it, I was foolish to overlook it... but no matter, I can touch him now."

"I miscalculated, my friends, I admit it. My curse was deflected by the woman's foolish sacrifice, and it rebounded upon myself. Aaah... pain beyond pain, my friends; nothing could have prepared me for it. I was ripped from my body, I was less than spirit, less than the meanest ghost... but still, I was alive. What I was, even I do not know... I, who have gone further than anybody along the path of immortality. You know my goal – to conquer death. And now, I was tested, and it appeared that one or more of my experiments had worked... for I had not been killed, though the curse should have done it. Nevertheless, I was as powerless as the weakest creature alive, and without the means to help myself... for I had no body, and every spell that might have helped me required the use of a wand...."

"I remember only forcing myself, sleeplessly, endlessly, second by second, to exist.... I settled in a faraway place, in a forest, and I waited.... Surely, one of my faithful Death Eaters would try and find me... one of them would come and perform the magic I could not, to restore me to my body... but I waited in vain...."

"Only one power remained to me. I could posses the bodied of others. But I dared not go where other humans were plentiful, for I knew the Aurors were still abroad and searching for me. I sometimes inhabited animals – snakes, of course, being my preference – but I was little better off inside them than as pure spirit, for their bodies were ill adapted to perform magic... and my possession of them shortened their lives; none of them lasted long...."

"Then... four years ago... the means for my return seemed assured. A wizard – young, foolish, and gullible – wandered across my path in the forest I had made my home. Oh, he seemed the very chance I had been dreaming of... for he was a teacher at Dumbledore's school... he was easy to bend to my will... he brought me back to this country, and after a while, I took possession of his body, to supervise him closely as he carried out my orders. But my plan failed. I did not manage to steal the Sorcerer's Stone. I was not to be assured immortal life. I was thwarted.... thwarted, once again, by Harry Potter...."

"The servant died when I left his body, and I was left as weak as ever I had been," Voldemort continued. "I returned to my hiding place far away, and I will not pretend to you that I didn't then fear that I might never regain my powers.... Yes, that was perhaps my darkest hour... I could not hope that I would be sent another wizard to possess... and I had given up hope, now, that any of my Death Eaters cared what had become of me...."

"And then, not even a year ago, when I had almost abandoned hope, it happened at last... a servant returned to me. Wormtail here, who had faked his own death to escape justice, was driven out of hiding by those he had once counted friends, and decided to return to his master. He sought me in the country where it had long been rumored I was hiding... helped, of course, by the rats he met along the way. Wormtail has a curious affinity with rats, do you not, Wormtail? His filthy little friends told him where small animals like themselves had met their deaths by a dark shadow that possessed them...."

"But his journey back to me was not smooth, was it, Wormtail? For, hungry one night, on the edge of the very forest where he had hoped to find me, he foolishly stopped at an inn for some food... and who should he meet there, but one Bertha Jorkins, a witch from the Ministry of Magic."

"Now see the way that fate favors Lord Voldemort. This might have been the end of Wormtail, and of my last hope for regeneration. But Wormtail – displaying a presence of mind I would never have expected from him – convinced Bertha Jorkins to accompany him on a nighttime stroll. He overpowered her... he brought her to me. And Bertha Jorkins, who might have ruined all, proved instead to be a gift beyond my wildest dreams... for – with a little persuasion – she became a veritable mine of information."

"She told me that the Triwizard Tournament would be played at Hogwarts this year. She told me that she knew of a faithful Death Eater who would be only too willing to help me, if only I could contact him. She told me many things... but the means I had used to break the Memory Charm upon her were powerful, and when I had extracted all useful information from her, her mind and body were booth damaged beyond repair. She had now served her purpose. I could not possess her. I disposed of her."

"Wormtail's body, of course, was ill adapted for possession, as all assumed him dead, and would attract far too much attention if noticed. However, he was the able-bodied servant I needed, and, poor wizard though he is, Wormtail was able to follow the instructions I gave him, which would return me to a rudimentary, weak body of my own, a body I would be able to inhabit while awaiting the essential ingredients for true rebirth... a spell or two of my own invention... a little help from my dear Nagini," Voldemort's red eyes fell upon the continually circling snake, "a potion concocted from unicorn blood, and then snake venom Nagini provided... I was soon returned to an almost human form, and strong enough to travel.

"There was no hope of stealing the Sorcerer's Stone anymore, for I knew Dumbledore would have seen to it that it was destroyed. But I was willing to embrace mortal life again, before chasing immortality. I set my sights lower... I would settle for my old body back again, and my old strength."

"I knew that to achieve this – it is an old piece of Dark Magic, the potion that revived me tonight – I would need three powerful ingredients. Well, one of them was already at hand, was it not, Wormtail? Flesh given by a servant..."

"My father's bone, naturally meant that we would have to come here, where he was buried. But the blood of a foe... Wormtail would have had me use any wizard, would you not, Wormtail? Any wizard who had hated me... as so many still do. But I knew the one I must use, if I was to rise again, more powerful than I had been when I had fallen. I wanted Harry Potter's blood. I wanted the blood of the one who had stripped me of my power thirteen years ago... for the lingering protection his mother once gave him would then reside in my veins too....

"But how to get at Harry Potter? For he has been better protected than I think even he knows, protected in ways devised by Dumbledore long ago, when it fell to him to arrange the boy's future. Dumbledore invoked an ancient magic, to ensure the boy's protection as long he is in his relations' care. Not even I can touch him there.... Then, of course, there was the Quidditch World Cup.... I thought his protection might be weaker there, away from his relations and Dumbledore, but I was not yet strong enough to attempt kidnap in the midst of a horde of Ministry wizards. And then, the boy would return to Hogwarts, where he is under the crooked nose of that Muggle-loving fool from morning until night. So how could I take him?"

"Why... by using Bertha Jorkins's information, of course. Use my one faithful Death Eater, stationed at Hogwarts, to ensure that the boy's name was entered into the Goblet of Fire. Use my Death Eater to ensure that the boy won the tournament – that he touched the Triwizard Cup first – the cup which my Death Eater had turned into a Portkey, which would bring him here, beyond the reach of Dumbledore's help and protection, and into my waiting arms. And here he is... the boy you all believed had been my downfall...."

Voldemort moved slowly forward and turned to face Harry. He raised his wand. "Crucio!"

"You see, I think, how foolish it was to suppose that this boy could have ever been stronger than me," said Voldemort. "But I want there to be no mistake in anybody's mind. Harry Potter escaped me by lucky chance. And I am now going to prove my power by killing him, here and now, in front of you all, when there is no Dumbledore to help him, and no mother to die for him. I will give him his chance. He will be allowed to fight, and you will be left in no doubt which of us is stronger. Just a little longer, Nagini," he whispered, and the snake glided through the grass to where the Death Eaters stood watching.

"Now untie him, Wormtail, and give him back his wand."

Priori Incantatem:

"You have been taught how to duel, Harry Potter?" said Voldemort softly, his red eyes glinting through the darkness.

"We bow to each other, Harry," said Voldemort, bending a little, but keeping his snakelike face upturned to Harry. "Come, the niceties must be observed.... Dumbledore would like you to show manners.... Bow to death, Harry...."

"I said, bow," Voldemort said, raising his wand – and Harry felt his spine curve as though a huge, invisible hand were bending him ruthlessly forward, and the Death Eaters laughed harder than ever.

"Very good," said Voldemort softly, and as he raised his wand the pressure bearing down upon Harry lifted too. "And now you face me, like a man... straight-backed and proud, the way your father died...."

"And now — we duel."

"A little break," said Voldemort, the slit-like nostrils dilating with excitement, "a little pause... That hurt, didn't it, Harry? You don't want me to do that again, do you?"

"I asked you whether you want me to do that again," said Voldemorot more softly. "Answer me! Imperio!"

And Harry felt, for the third time in his life, the sensation that his mind had been wiped of all thought.... Ah, it was bliss, not to think, it was as though he were floating, dreaming... just answer no... say no... just answer no....

I will not, said a stronger voice, in the back of his head, I won't answer....

Just answer no....

I won't do it, I won't say it....

Just answer no....

"You won't?" said Voldemort quietly, and the Death Eaters were not laughing now. "You won't say no? Harry, obedience is a virtue. I need to teach you before you die.... Perhaps another little dose of pain?"

"We are not playing hide-and-seek, Harry," said Voldemort's soft, cold voice, drawing nearer, as the Death Eaters laughed. "You cannot hide from me. Does this mean you are tired of our duel? Does this mean that you would prefer me to finish it now, Harry? Come out, Harry... come out and play, then... it will be quick... it might even be painless... I would not know... I have never died...."

Voldemort was ready. As Harry shouted, "Expelliarmus!" Voldemort cried, "Avada Kedavra!"

"Do nothing! "Voldemort shrieked to the Death Eaters, and Harry saw his red eyes wide with astonishment at what was happening, saw him fighting to break the thread of light still connecting his wand with Harry's; Harry held onto his wand more tightly, with both hands, and the golden thread remained unbroken. "Do nothing unless I command you!" Voldemort shouted to the Death Eaters.

"Stun him!" he heard Voldemort scream.

"Stand aside! I will kill him! He is mine!" shrieked Voldemort.


Seen and Unforseen:

"I have been badly advised, it seems," said Harry, in a high cold voice that pulsed with anger.

"I don't blame you, Rookwood," said Harry in that cold, cruel voice.

"You are sure of your facts, Rookwood?" asked Harry.

"Avery told me Bode would be able to remove it."

"Stand up, Rookwood," whispered Harry.

"You have done well to tell me this," said Harry. "Very well... I have wasted months of fruitless schemes, it seems.... But no matter... We begin again, from now. You have Lord Voldemort's gratitude, Rookwood...."

"I shall need your help, I shall need all the information you can give me."

"Very well.... you may go. Send Avery to me."

The Only One He Ever Feared:

"Can't I Potter?" said a high, cold voice.

"So you smashed my prophecy?" said Voldemort softly, staring at Harry with those pitiless red eyes. "No, Bella, he is not lying.... I see the truth looking at me from within his worthless mind.... Months of preparation, months of effort... And my Death Eaters have let Harry Potter thwart me again...."

"Be quiet, Bella," said Voldemort dangerously. "I shall deal with you in a moment. Do you think I have entered the Ministry of Magic to hear your sniveling apologies?"

"I have nothing more to say to you, Potter," he said quietly. "You have irked me too often, for too long. AVADA KEDAVRA!"

"What —?" said Voldemort, staring around. And then he breathed, "Dumbledore!"

"By which time I shall be gone, and you dead!" spat Voldemort. He sent another killing curse at Dumbledore but missed, instead hitting a security desk, which burst into flame.

"You do not seek to kill me, Dumbledore?" called Voldemort, his scarlet eyes narrowed over the top of the shield. "Above such brutality, are you?"

"There is nothing worse than death, Dumbledore!" snarled Voldemort.

And when the creature spoke, it used Harry's mouth, so that in his agony he felt his jaw move....

"Kill me now, Dumbledore...."

Blinded and dying, every part of him screaming for release, Harry felt the creature rising in him again....

"If death is nothing, Dumbledore, kill the boy...."


The Secret Riddle:

"Professor?" repeated Riddle. He looked wary. "Is that like ‘doctor'? What are you here for? Did she get you in to have a look at me?"

"I don't believe you," said Riddle. "She wants me looked at, doesn't she? Tell the truth!"

"Who are you?"

"You cant kid me! The asylum, that's where you're from, isn't it? ‘Professor,' yes, of course — well, I'm not going, see? The old cat's the one who should be in an asylum. I never did anything to little Amy Benson or Dennis Bishop, and you can ask them, they'll tell you!"

"I'd like to see them try," sneered Riddle.

"I'm not mad!"

"Magic?" he repeated in a whisper.

"It's... it's magic, what I can do?"

"All sorts," breathed Riddle. A flush of excitement was rising up his neck into his hollow cheeks; he looked fevered. "I can make things move without touching them. I can make animals do what I want them to do, without training them. I can make bad things happen to people who annoy me. I can make them hurt if I want to."

"I knew I was different," he whispered to his own quivering fingers. "I knew I was special. Always, I knew there was something."

"Are you a wizard too?"

"Prove it," said Riddle at once, in the same commanding tone he used when he said, "Tell the truth."

"Of course I am!"

Riddle's expression hardened for the most fleeting moment before he said, in an unrecognizable polite voice, "I'm sorry sir. I meant — please, Professor, could you show me —?"

Riddle stared from the wardrobe to Dumbledore; then, his expression greedy, he pointed at the wand. "Where can I get one of them?"

Riddle threw Dumbledore a long, clear, calculating look. "Yes, I suppose so, sir," he said finally, in an expressionless voice.

Riddle did not look remotely abashed; he was still staring coldly and appraisingly at Dumbledore. At last he said in a colorless voice,
"Yes, sir."

"Yes, sir," said Riddle again.

When he had finished, he turned to Dumbledore and said baldly, "I haven't got any money."

‘Where do you buy spellbooks?" interrupted Riddle, who had taken the heavy money bag without thanking Dumbledore, and was now examining a fat gold galleon.

"You're coming with me?" asked Riddle, looking up.

"I don't need you," said Riddle. "I'm used to doing things for myself, I go around London on my own all the time. How do you get to this Diagon Alley — sir?" he added, catching Dumbledore's eye.

"There are a lot of Toms," muttered Riddle. Then, as though he could not suppress the question, as though it burst from him in spite of himself, he asked. "Was my father a wizard? He was called Tom Riddle, too, they've told me."

"My mother can't have been magic, or she wouldn't have died." said Riddle, more to himself than Dumbledore. "It must've been him. So — when I've got all my stuff — when do I come to this Hogwarts?"

Riddle nodded. Dumbledore got to his feet and held out his hand again. Taking it, Riddle said, "I can speak to snakes. I found out when we've been to the country on trips — they find me, they whisper to me. Is that normal for a wizard?"

A Sluggish Memory:

"Stop"

"Yes, I speak it," said Riddle. He moved forward into the room, allowing the door to swing shut behind him. Harry could not help but feel a resentful admiration for Voldemort's complete lack of fear. His face merely expressed disgust, and perhaps, disappointment.

"Where is Marvolo?" he asked.

"Who are you, then?

"Marvolo's son?

"What Muggle?" said Riddle sharply.

Voldemort was gazing at Morfin as though appraising his possibilities. Now he moved a little closer and said, "Riddle came back??

Lord Voldemort's Request:

"I brought you flowers," he said quietly, producing a bunch of roses from nowhere.

"Mr. Burke would like to make an improved offer for the goblin-made armor," said Voldemort. "Five hundred Galleons, he feels it is more than fair —"

"I am ordered here because of them," said Voldemort quietly. "I am only a poor assistant, madam, who must do as he is told. Mr. Burke wishes me to enquire —"

"I'd be glad to see anything Miss Hepzibah shows me," said Voldemort quietly, and Hepzibah gave another girlish giggle.

"A badger," murmured Voldemort, examining the engraving upon the cup. "Then this was...?"

"Slytherin's mark," he said quietly, as the light played upon an ornate, serpentine S.

"Oh yes," said Voldemort quietly. "Yes, I am very well...."

"Thank you," said Voldemort, and he took the seat to which Dumbledore had gestured — the very seat, by the looks of it, that Harry had just vacated in the present. "I heard that you had become headmaster," he said, and his voice was slightly higher and colder than it had been. "A worthy choice."

"That would be welcome," said Voldemort. "I have come a long way."

"They do not call me ‘Tom' anymore," he said. "These days, I am known as —"

"I am surprised you have remained here so long," said Voldemort after a short pause. "I always wondered why a wizard such as yourself never wished to leave school."

"I see it still," said Voldemort. "I merely wondered why you — who are so often asked for advice by the Ministry, and who have twice, I think, been offered the post of Minister —"

"I have returned," he said, after a little while, "later, perhaps, than Professor Dippet expected... but I have returned, nevertheless, to request again what he once told me I was too young to have. I have come to you to ask that you permit me to return to this castle, to teach. I think you must know that I have seen and done much since I left this place. I could show and tell your students things they can gain from no other wizard."

Voldemort's expression remained impassive as he said, "Greatness inspires envy, envy engenders spite, spite spawns lies. You must know this, Dumbledore."

"Certainly," said Voldemort, and his eyes seemed to burn red. "I have experimented; I have pushed the boundaries of magic further, perhaps, than they have ever been pushed —"

"The old argument," he said softly. "But nothing I have seen in the world has supported your famous pronouncements that love is more powerful than my kind of magic, Dumbledore."

"Well, then, what better place to start my fresh researched than here, at Hogwarts?" said Voldemort. "Will you let me return? Will you let me share my knowledge with your students? I place myself and my talents at your disposal. I am yours to command."

"My friends," he said, after a moment's pause, "will carry on without me, I am sure."

"You are mistaken," said Voldemort.

"You are omniscient as ever, Dumbledore."

Voldemort looked coldly surprised. "A job I do not want? On the contrary, Dumbledore, I want it very much."

Voldemort sneered. "If you do not want to give me a job —"

Voldemort stood up. He looked less like Tom Riddle than ever, his features thick with rage. "This is your final word?"

"Then we have nothing more to say to each other."

Horcruxes:

Dumbledore landed beside Harry just as Riddle asked, "Sir, is it true that Professor Merrythought is retiring?"

"I don't know that politics would suit me, sir," he said when the laughter had died away. "I don't have the right kind of background, for one thing."

"Sir, I wanted to ask you something."

"Sir, I wondered what you know about... about Horcruxes?"

"Not exactly, sir," said Riddle. "I came across the term while reading and I didn't fully understand it."

"But you obviously know all about them, sir? I mean, a wizard like you — sorry, I mean, if you can't tell me, obviously — I just knew if anyone could tell me, you could — so I just thought I'd ask —"

"I don't quite understand how that works, though, sir," said Riddle.

"How do you split your soul?"

"But how do you do it?"

"Encase? But how — ?

"No, sir, of course not," said Riddle quickly. "I'm sorry... I didn't mean to offend..."

"Yes, sir," said Riddle. "What I don't understand, though — just out of curiosity — I mean, would one Horocrux be much use? Can you only split your soul once? Wouldn't it be better, make you stronger, to have your soul in more pieces, I mean, for instance, isn't seven the most powerfully magical number, wouldn't seven —?"

"Yes, sir, of course," said Riddle quickly.

"I won't say a word, sir," said Riddle, and he left, but not before Harry had glimpsed his face, which was full of the same wild happiness it had worn when he had first found out that he was a wizard, the sort of happiness that did not enhance his handsome features, but made them, somehow, less human...

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