Who Am I to Say?

By Angelis Raye

Basis: What if Harry grew up with Tom Riddle's soul (Horcrux) dominant?

Chapter 5: Seeing into the Soul

Silence. It was wonderful, really. Too bad it was all going to end in just another week. Harry was really going to miss having silence surrounding him, swallowing him whole when he was alone, and just doing what he wanted to.

That was another thing: doing whatever the hell he felt like doing. He’d long for these days when Draco came back from winter holidays. ‘What a let down’, was all he could think of, his mind wandering off when he read about a reference to dragons in the text he was reading.

‘Tell me about it,’ came the nearly customary voice in the back of his head.

Harry doubted that he was going crazy, mostly because he’d always heard it, to a certain extent. It was just louder, now, that he was alone at the school. Perhaps it had something to do with the fact he was in a place so concentrated with magic? Either way, it was a handy little thing to have, especially when he needed answers to things he would normally be completely stumped on.

Before the weekend, Harry had run into Dumbledore at the mirror on his second time there during the previous week. Dumbledore, of course, had asked him what he’d seen, saying that he saw himself holding a pair of new socks. As if Harry believed that….

--

“Mr. Potter,” the headmaster addressed him as he stepped into the room, only slightly surprised to see the man sitting there to the side. “I am here to tell you that the mirror will be moved, shortly. Please, don’t go looking for it.”

Following a heavy silence, Harry nodded, prompting Dumbledore to continue talking: “Many a man has wasted away in front of this mirror, Mr. Potter, and I do hope that you won’t be among them – moving the mirror will be as much for your safety as for anything else.”

“I know, Headmaster,” the boy replied, his voice somewhat quiet.

“Good, I’m glad,” he returned, smiling, a twinkle in his eye. “How is the House of Snakes treating you?”

“Well, I would suppose,” Harry told him, not wishing to talk any longer. The voice in the back of his head was a constant hiss of discomfort and dislike, whispering warning about what to say and what not to say in front of his seemingly-harmless old man.

“Not really sure, yet, are you? I guess it’s a bit early to tell, isn’t it, Harry?” he asked with a small laugh. “That’s all right, though. No worries. Just tell me if anything happens?”

Obligingly, Harry nodded, saying that he would. ‘As if that’ll ever happen,’ the sarcastic voice within him muttered, putting off feelings of resentment towards the white-haired professor.

“If you’d tell me, I’d like to know what you saw in the mirror, Harry,” Dumbledore said, nice and docile, with an edge to his voice as he did.

Shrugging, Harry shifted his weight from the right to his left, almost going to look up at the headmaster as he did, pulling off the perfect lie, but the voice urged him very much not to look into the professor’s eyes. There was no explanations given, but Harry knew well enough from experience just to trust the dark monster inside of him.

“What do you see, Professor Dumbledore, sir?” he asked, instead, holding back a grin, his face etched with innocent inquiry.

“Myself, hold a new pair of socks, of course,” the headmaster replied with ease, smiling once more at Harry.

After that wonderful exchange, Harry was disappointed that he didn’t get to look into the mirror once more, but knew that it was for the best, in the end. Perhaps he’d come across it at a later time, despite what Dumbledore said.

--

Then, there was the previous time, when he’d first seen the mirror. Ah, that was amazing, of course. To see himself as such… was it possible?

‘Only if you follow the right path,’ the devil within him reminded, as it has said when he’d first asked upon seeing the reflection in the mirror.

So, that was his heart’s desire, was it? To be the Dark Lord – take the place of the one that had killed his parents and stuck him with those horrid Aunt and Uncle of his?

It didn’t make much sense to Harry at the moment, but, he’d rather it be something to figure out and investigate than be obvious so suddenly. If it was easy, what would the fun be in figuring it all out? Besides, it was only simple people who had simple desires, so it was said.

--

“Reading Abdul Alhazred’s Necronomion,* are you, Mr. Potter?” Professor Snape asked him, shaking Harry out of his memories of the mirror and Dumbledore.

He merely nodded his head, preferring to keep reading, rather than answer the question, yet, entranced.

“I’ll leave you be, then – tell me when you’re ready to be social, Mr. Potter,” the man continued, pulling out his own book as he sat next to the only one of his house present in the school at the moment, casting a sideways glance at the boy and the book once more before settling down.

Upon finishing a particular part on raising a dead man’s spirit intact, Harry closed the book slowly, savoring the knowledge he gained from it. Even the normally commentary inside was rather silent, surprisingly; it was also feeling very relaxed and fulfilled, which was a strange feeling for Harry. But other than that, here was Professor Snape that he had to deal with, now.

“Good afternoon, Professor,” he greeted, polite but to the point.

“I do think that you’re a bit too young to read that, Mr. Potter,” Professor Snape warned him, his voice a bid disapproving. “You are reading the one out of the Restricted Section, right?”

“No,sir,” Harry replied, a bit confused. “I got it from one of the libraries around my house. I didn’t have the proper title on it, when I picked it up, but it was calling to me, sir, that’s all. So, I asked to borrow it for over school term and they let me – no one else borrows it, apparently.” As he told his teacher this, he closed the metal clasps adoringly, smiling as he gazed at it.

Needless to say, the man was a little taken aback. He hadn’t realized that there were still more copies out in the Muggle world, outside of those few places that they were allowed by the Ministry of Magic. After all, they were supposed to be kept well-checked and in plain sight. And yet Potter got hold of one, himself? Of course, this, he’d keep from Dumbledore for a while, unless it proved to prove too dangerous. It wasn’t as if an eleven year old Slytherin was going to conquer the world, just based upon his reading of a book, right?

‘It’s time,’ moaned the beast inside of Harry’s soul, aching to be let loose and do what it does best: mischief and terror. Amongst other things, of course, but there was a limit to how much It could do with someone so young and still somewhat innocent.

Harry whispered back the best he could, reasoning with the demon within, trying to persuade it with the logic that the Professor would suspect him of something if he just up and left so suddenly…. But the dark thing wouldn’t heed these pleas, making Its own claim stronger, more insistent, which took its told on Harry, most certainly.

“Professor… I’m going to go study in the common rooms, now… I hope you have a splendid night, sir,” Harry told Snape with a grin, bowing slightly, hugging the book close to himself, caressing the binding with his thin fingers.

“Do you have your assignments done?”

“Yes, sir, I do have them completed.”

“Then I expect you to hand in the Potion’s essay in to me tomorrow,” the Professor said, flatly, going back to his own reading as Harry excused himself. He was glad that Potter was such a good student. That and that Draco had chosen a good person to get along with – the thin, scrawny boy might appear weak, but that was merely the physical. Severus Snape could sense that there was power that was larger than was possible for someone so young. He waved it off, though – that could be dealt with at another time when he was less occupied with trying to find out exactly what Quirrell was up to.

--

The last time It had free reign was when It had convinced the child that he needed to kill the troll. Of course, this was brilliance on his part, but it wasn’t with the normal methods that It killed the beast. All of this so that nothing detrimental to Its cause happened to the boy, Its vessel, of sorts.

Its other part was somewhat close, It could feel that. And it wasn’t all too pleasant to think of how It might be limited in Its movements because of the presence of this other part of Itself floating around, taking another body hostage. Nothing nearly as complete as It had over his vessel, Harry, but had a more active and forthcoming approach, It could feel. Harry was beginning to understand some things, but not nearly as much as It knew.

And It would get the upper hand in the end. Oh, yes… Victory will come with time. Now, It merely had to be patient, feed Its knowledge bit by bit to the boy until everything was perfect. Then, and only then, would It be totally victorious.

--

Waking up at the same time as always, Harry found that he felt much more refreshed from the nocturnal activities he indulged himself in last night, mostly in part to the voice inside himself. Speaking of which, he had no idea what to call this voice, really.

‘You can call me whatever you wish to,’ It supplied, almost sleepily, as if It had just woken up as well.

Like that helped any. Now was the time to put his creativity to work… or not. Harry could just call the thing like it is – ‘the voice’. At least he decided on a specific thing to call it, though. Not as if it got him much of anywhere.

But, concerning last night, Harry was singularly impressed by the fact that he’d gotten back from the Forbidden Forest alive and intact, without any detention or expulsion. He put that up to the Voice’s careful directions and guidance. No way would he have been able to think of doing some of those things to that deer, either. The Voiceconstantly told him to start out small, work up to things like humans, but he’d already killed the Troll. Not in the manner that they usually did, but, it was close enough. The thrill of the hunt and the kill were still present, although not in the level that they had been last night, cutting up the deer with some quick flicks of his wand, then…

He couldn’t remember what happened after that, to tell the truth. What had happened, then? Something he was sure that he didn’t really want to remember, as shudders slithered down his spine, something akin to horror at the very thought of the thing dragging its icy fingers down his back.

‘You’ll learn it, eventually, but it’s not for something you to know, at the moment,’ the smooth reassurance of the Voice whispered to him, comforting him a little in the face of something so terrible.

--

Unfortunately, it was close to the end of the winter holidays when Harry finally got around to approaching Professor Quirrell, offering his help around the classroom. This was mostly due to the fact that the Voice kept telling him to use the utmost caution concerning the man, although Harry couldn’t exactly see why, unless it had to do with how the man was able to break into that vault at Gringotts. Which was impressive, as the vaults were supposed to be impenetrable.

The professor was obviously thrilled that one of the students didn’t mind him enough to help him out with trivial things like neatening the stacks of paper, and other small things that needed to be done around the place. Harry had a very pointed ulterior motive when it came to Quirrell, and he didn’t doubt that the professor didn’t have a clue that he was the target of the cunning little Slytherin.

At the end of the week, Draco, the pest, and boy who ruined all good plans with his need to be constantly babysat to avoid the terror of the Gryffindors. As if Harry minded that the Gryffindors were harassed by the blonde boy, but he knew that the very doing of such things was going to draw attention to Draco, who, of course, lead to the drawing attention to his “friend”, Harry Potter. And that was not something acceptable. Not in the slightest.

So began Harry’s second part of the school year.