Perhaps, Voldemort thought to himself, there was an ancient Siren's bloodline in Harry. How else might the child tempt and lure so many happy victims into disadvantageous and often overpriced endeavors? (And at that, Voldemort did not miss the irony; he, himself a happy victim to Harry's whiles occasion upon occasion… It was most likely beyond time to implement an allowance on the boy, in both coin and mercy). Harry's victims fell upon him in apparent bliss, with smiles for days and purse strings loose. It was very different from the victims Voldemort was used to seeing (blood, terror, pleading for one's life, sometimes the occasional vomiting; the usual checklist down a Dark Lord's victimization rubric).

The unobserved observer, Voldemort watched Harry bat his eyelashes, stroke shoulders; yes, yes, the German Prime Minister would be more than happy to donate her collection of whatever shimmering distraction Harry fell in love with this month (an expensive crystal statue of Helga Hufflepuff here, a series of erotic troll paintings there; Harry seemed to have passion for things. Perhaps it was the deprived childhood. Harry's only defense was "It's not like we're Marxists, darling"). The boy never gained much in the way of learning the touch of subtlety, and… never needed it, to be frank. It seemed the more obvious Harry's ploy, the more willing his audience was to buy it.

Voldemort would say he didn't understand, if only watching Harry work did not burn him with an insatiable need to have him always. He would admit; half was an inherent incestuous obsession. An infatuation of self in all the ways Voldemort saw his own influence reflected in the shape of Harry's being. That Harry would forever be preserved by and pregnant with Voldemort's soul. It was spurring to forge Harry in his own image, one that was all his (particularly with the whole of the world watching; Dumbledore from his portrait frozen and unable to stop it, Harry's poor, worried friends. Was it too obvious that Voldemort initiated sex most often where others would know?)

Voldemort supposed the other half of his inexplicable yearning was due to Harry himself. Voldemort was not incapable of recognizing merit. His lovely flesh, soft and pink in vulnerable places, his bird-like legs and boyish face. He had all his extremities, the right number of toes and fingers, so he was of acceptable form for a human, though no feature was especially striking or exemplary (and it was why he would suspect Siren blood, as despite all Harry's mediocrity, Voldemort found he could not ever look away). Except for perhaps his eyes, those luminous portals of… Well, Voldemort was no poet. But his eyes seemed to hold unsuspecting persons under an unbreakable enchantment, and when Voldemort looked into them, those incandescent orbs… The point was, his eyes held some effect or power or a very uncomfortable, incurable disease at the very least. (Whatever the case may be, Voldemort was mightily afflicted).

Aside from his form, Harry could be described second to only Albus Dumbledore as doubtlessly the most obnoxious type of creature to ever crawl upon the face of the earth or any other yet undiscovered life-supporting planet in the cosmos. Headstrong, not too bright. Opinionated about everything, despite being a shameless charlatan who farmed all of his knowledge from others. And perhaps it was his own fault for being so lenient, but he'd come to accept that being infuriated by Harry was their Monday through Sunday, and that he'd most annoyingly realized he liked it. (This would not be so terrible in and of itself if Harry didn't also know it. You see what he meant by affliction, surely).

"Yes, I so look forward to receiving your Jörmungandr bones, Prime Minister," Harry said, ushering the blinking woman to the fireplace with a smile and a wave, glancing down at his pocketwatch. "Do have a careful trip back; watch your step. Ta! Auf wiedersehen!"

The dazzled Prime Minister stumbled into the fireplace with a hesitant smile, then disappeared into the Floo Network before she could rightly comprehend what had happened, leaving them alone in Harry's office.

The office itself was a room of some dimension with decorations of some notability (and Voldemort found he didn't have much of an opinion for interior design; Harry could criticize him all he liked for his musty laboratories and dust-caked chambers, but when exactly was Voldemort expected to keep house in between all of the Dark Lording? It was much easier to force his Death Eaters to host meetings and avoid the argument altogether. Dumbledore, many many years ago, had once told a young Tom Riddle to choose his battles wisely. He'd never admit to following any advice from the likes of Albus Dumbledore. But damned if he didn't suddenly understand it when handling a Harry who could wax for hours about why Voldemort would benefit from living in a house that could pass a health inspection).

"I think that's a new record," Harry announced, smiling his Prince Charming smile (literally; Witch Weekly had labeled several of Harry's smiles in their articles, from Bad Boy Heartbreaker to Boyfriend Material. Voldemort's personal favorite was Wicked Mischief) and tapping his watch. "Ten minutes. Do you know what this means?"

Voldemort oozed out of the shadows and sat behind Harry's desk in Harry's chair just to see the boy's face pinch in annoyance. "Idiocy is contagious."

Harry's eyebrows lowered in a particularly endearing way. They should consider labeling his scowls too. Voldemort would call this one Spoiled and Foiled.

"Very bloody funny. Your talents are wasted as a Dark Lord. Clearly, you belong in Weasley's Wizard Wheezes."

Harry seemed to often mistake Voldemort's honest statements as jokes.

"What I was going to say, is this means we have fifteen minutes before Zabini comes to remind me I have a meeting with Shacklebolt."

He was already throwing a locking charm at the door, waggling his eyebrows the whole way, and pulling Voldemort to the fireplace.

"I'm dying to get out of here. Merlin, is it too early to retire?" Harry groaned.

"You've been Undersecretary for ten months."

"Practically a lifetime!"

He threw the ash at their feet and barked "Chamber of Dirty Secrets!" in between his rant.

"I thought being rich and powerful meant delegating the work out to other people," Harry was complaining as he unfastened his robes a layer at a time and threw them carelessly about the foyer of the Chamber of Dirty Secrets (Harry's idea of a good joke).\

Home was a simply made slab on the isolated bank of Norwegian lake Gråsjøen. The international Floo rate was exorbitant (not that Harry hadn't hustled his way to a discount), but Harry insisted it was well worth the galleon to have a secret retreat where even his most tenacious secretary could not track them down (Voldemort tended to agree, but he put up resistance to most of Harry's propositions on principle, as he suspected Harry did to him).

He turned to pin a look on Voldemort as though to suggest it was his fault Harry had to work so much.

"I wouldn't be able to withstand you if you were unemployed."

Imagine all the extra time they would have to spend together.

Harry snorted.

"Says the unemployed, self-assigned Dark Lord mooching off my honest, hard-earned government money."

Voldemort could admit half the satisfaction was that it was government money. A puppet government which he mostly controlled, but nonetheless.

Harry turned in a circle for Voldemort, now completely nude and shameless. "Really, if I had known how many hours I would be working, I would have just let you kill me. I don't deserve to suffer this way."

Voldemort hummed, closed the distance between them and grasped Harry by the neck.

"Then I will show you how you are meant to suffer."

He tore them from the receiving room to the bedroom with the force of apparition, and with a great push, shoved Harry onto the bed where Nagini was already curled. She reared her head back and hissed at being disturbed.

"Nagini," he purred. "Bind him."

"Excuse me?" Harry gasped, but Nagini was already slithering along Harry's bare skin, and the heat which flooded Voldemort upon seeing his two greatest treasures twined together was all consuming. Harry became flushed as he seemed to realize Voldemort's feelings, and ceased fighting the coiling of Nagini's body up his arms and around his neck. Her tongue flicked against his cheek, teeth bared. Voldemort could see her great muscled body tightening on instinct, and he found himself jealous of her; that she could mould herself to Harry's form, around and around, rub every contour and bring rise the sting of fear through their connection.

"This seems unnecessarily risky," Harry whined weakly. "Nagini, let me go."

"You are not my master," she replied, jaw snapping.

"Very good," Voldemort told her, shedding his own robe like a skin and placing a knee upon the bed.

"You know, when I made that joke about a threesome the other day, this was not exactly what I had in mind."

Voldemort placed his hands on each of Harry's knees and yanked them apart. "You should have specified."

Harry meant to say something more, he was sure, but Nagini decided she had heard enough and squeezed her bulk around his neck. If there was one consistency about Harry, it was that he never seemed to be at a loss for words.

"Hrngh."

Unless Voldemort strangled him, of course.

"Do you remember," he asked softly, fingers trailing around Harry's sensitive navel, not scratching but aware of the potential, "the first time I truly touched you?"

Harry gave him a deadpan look.

"Ah, I knew you would," he sighed. "You were bound then as well, to my father's grave. You were the first my newborn body touched; isn't that something? Perhaps I imprinted on you. And how you screamed. I will cherish this shared memory forever."

Voldemort thought there was something to it even all the way back then; Harry even more young and vulnerable, pinned to a headstone and always, always brave, had simply looked exquisite.

Who knew he could be so romantic? Voldemort was constantly surprising himself.

"If only you were still so young and manipulable."

At that, Harry glared (and who was Voldemort kidding? Harry may have at one point been slightly more naive than he was now, but no less stubborn or obstinate; he supposed even he was susceptible to romanticizing the past). Harry's eyes were swimming and his face was turning a lovely shade of purple as Nagini kept the pressure steady.

Voldemort pressed his thumb against Harry's exposed hole, rubbing slow circles into the skin, and Harry's body bent and bowed. "Perhaps you are still a little manipulable. Docile. There are spells, ones which could give you a wet cunt always ready to be fucked."

Harry's face was puckered and red with horror, though his flushed arousal twitched against his belly. Voldemort grinned, hissing.

He summoned oil to his fingers, slid them in the clutching warmth. His fingers were accepted easily, met with no resistance, and Voldemort spoiled Harry with gentle strokes to his prostate.

"Though it seems you're halfway there already. Preparing you these days is a mere empty, if polite, gesture."

Voldemort had always considered himself generous.

It became apparent Harry was losing consciousness, only twitching bodily and gurgling in his throat. He thought about letting him faint, playing with his lax and pliant body, waking him only when he was stuffed full and stretched wide. It was a thought worth exploring later.

Harry had to be back at the Ministry soon, after all. Pity.

"Nagini," he hissed, and his faithful serpent uncoiled herself from around Harry's neck.

Harry gasped, began coughing.

"Do not," he wheezed, managing to wriggle an arm free of Nagini and batting at Voldemort's hand between his thighs, "do any sort of modifications involving cunts or anything else. Leave my arse be, for god's sake!"

Voldemort smiled. He caught Harry's flailing wrist and kissed the palm. "Right now?"

Harry glared at him before slumping back against the mattress. "No, not right now! Finish fucking me at least."

He did. He forced Harry's captured hand to stroke oil onto his arousal before grasping his knees once more and lining up. He rolled his back and hips forward, inhaled and savoured the first plunge. Harry hissed in approval.

Their connection always blurred during sex, and Voldemort could feel the echo of Harry's sensations along his spine, could feel his body burn in that warm-blooded, mammal way, could remember the feel of sweat coming from his pores and other such bodily afflictions he was no longer subjected to. Burrowed within Harry as he was, Voldemort was thankful he retained at least some bestial function. It had been difficult to predict how the ritual would reconstruct his body, mixed as the ingredients were. This serpentine, humanoid vessel did very well; in both harnessing and releasing magic masterfully, as well as fucking Harry beyond speech. A win-win, by all accounts.

He went to command Nagini to strangle Harry again because he was starting to miss the look of flushed panic in the boy's eyes, and found the lout sleeping, her head tucked against Harry's pulse, completely immune to the jostle of their coupling (and not surprised really; she'd more than once fallen asleep mid-dinner, the twitching legs of an unfortunate Death Eater—ex-Death Eater, he should say—sticking out of her relaxed jaws. He'd offered to cut her dinners into portions, but she considered the idea unappetizing). He could feel their links blurring, her lethargy and contentment, Harry's ecstasy, and Voldemort's own perpetual rage mingling within him a most tasty mixture. One day, he would have to bed Harry with the rest of his remaining Horcruxes just to feel the sensation of wholeness and companionship- with himself of past dispositions and personalities. (If he could ever trust to have all of his Horcruxes in the same room as Harry. Perhaps with a blindfold and without his knowledge).

Probably not the threesome Harry had had in mind either.

When they finished, Harry's mouth gasping against Nagini's scales, his belly splashed with Voldemort's efforts, they lay side by side. Harry grumbled, pushed and wiggled on Nagini until she grew grumpy and slunked off to find some other spot to nap. Voldemort sighed, a little sad at her going when they'd been having such a beautiful moment.

Harry rolled to face him, sticking his cold feet on Voldemort's lukewarm thighs and wiggling his toes. "I feel it my duty to tell you: your relationship with your pet probably crosses the line of what is considered socially and ethically acceptable."

Voldemort hissed, waved a hand to clean himself. Pondered. "I thought you didn't like to be called pet."

Harry scowled and attempted to smother him with a pillow which ended with a sort of violent wrestling that devolved into further frottage.

Voldemort was just sliding his tongue next to his fingers into the mess of Harry's arse, when in the distance, the sound of a buzzer going off alerted to them the passage of time.

"Curses," Harry moaned and covered his head with the very pillow he'd used to attack Voldemort.

Voldemort rose from Harry's arse and wiped his mouth.

"NO- don't stop, you bloody- aaaah..."

Voldemort resumed. He sealed his mouth over Harry's hole and pressed the flat of his tongue there, only to stop short when the clock above the fireplace buzzed again.

"Ignore it."

Voldemort was about to suggest they try the firecall set-up again, Harry face down in the hearth, arse up, taking care of Ministry business on one end and, well… business of an altogether sort on the other. It had worked perfectly well up until Harry came and embarrassed himself in front of an entire committee of Magical Mishaps liaison officers.

The clock buzzed in quick succession and with particular force, in time with Harry's secretary beating on his office door back at the Ministry.

"Fire and damnation!" Harry shouted, shoving off the bed and slipping his trousers back on, wet arse and all. He looked back at Voldemort, pointing. "We will continue this conversation later."

Harry went for the door, seemed to rethink it a few seconds, then backtracked so he could plant a sloppy kiss against Voldemort's mouth before storming out, yanking his bare arms into a discarded robe. Voldemort hoped it wasn't one of his or there would be streaks of dried come all over the inside front.

Voldemort lay in silence for a minute or two, before deciding he had work to finish as well. Harry didn't know the first thing about being a Dark Lord if he thought it counted as unemployment. Voldemort happened to be very stimulating for the economy, thank you very much. He created jobs! What would Harry say to that?

He dressed, which consisted of slipping a single robe over his head and running a hand over his smooth scalp. He thought about spelling the bed clean of their copious fluids, but would rather annoy Harry, so he left everything as it was and turned on the spot.

Hermione Granger jumped as he appeared unannounced into her office, then looked annoyed at having been startled in the first place.

"Wasn't Harry supposed to tell you to stop tearing through the Ministry wards just to remind everyone you're keyed into them? It sets off alarms all over the place," she groused. As if Voldemort would do something simply because Harry asked! He was not so domesticated. "I thought we agreed on noon. It's past three o'clock."

"Something came up."

She looked as if she knew exactly what that something was, and glanced at Voldemort's hands as if to discern whether he had washed them or not. (He hadn't). Voldemort wiped his mouth on the back of his arm self-consciously, and Granger's face pinched like she had something sour in her mouth.

"Well, in any case, I have the results of our research here, and let me tell you," she said, leaning over and hefting a large stack of papers from a side table to her large desk, "it's complicated."

They leaned over the culmination of their results, that which they orchestrated together and compiled what they had gathered separately.

The Muggleborn Question. Rather, questions.

With a team of both Muggle and Wizard informed Unspeakables (and a private team constructed by Voldemort himself in secret), they had spent the last year looking into the cause of Muggleborns. Was it a recessive gene buried deeply within a string of non-magical generations triggered just-so into manifesting the ability to wield magic? Children conceived on solstices or born when the planets are aligned in a certain way, on eclipses or other particularly magical days? A mother's unknowing passing contact with magical energy that penetrates the womb and settles there? Was it a case of child trafficking, Wizard infants kidnapped and dropped into the wrong homes? Babies swapped at birth?!

"Yes," Granger said in despair. "To all of that."

She held up the graphs, the pages of calculations, the files on every British Muggleborn in the last three-hundred years, and threw them away in the air.

They slumped in unison in Ganger's office chairs, staring blankly at the reports as they fluttered to the ground. They would have to start over. Increase the sample size, the variables.

"The existence of Muggleborns, from case to case, is… purely circumstantial?" She asked no one in particular, voice weak. "No divine intervention or rhyme or reason. Just… magic."

She looked up at Voldemort, eyebrow raised. "Throws a kink in your plan to eradicate them, yes? How exactly is your regime going to prevent something that cannot be predicted, isolated, or manipulated?! These children… they simply are. This is not genetics, which can be fought with eugenics, or a question of Muggles having accidental contact with Wizards. You can't segregate the magic that flows in every facet of the earth from them!"

She pinched her brow.

"I imagine killing them isn't an answer."

Granger looked up, furious. "You came to me with this because you wanted a clever solution that would appease our coalition. Any time you feel like breaching our agreement, let me know, and we can resume the war."

Well, war was certainly more exciting than sitting all day crunching numbers and getting soft around the middle. Couldn't he have just one more raid? A little one? For old time's sake? What it would do for his nerves to just torture one little Muggle… Voldemort sighed. He had better save it for an anniversary if he was going to try to weasel out a little murder and keep with the agreement. If only so he could avoid listening to Harry make ridiculous ultimatums and declarations, threats of taking his own life and all that rot. (Not that Voldemort thought he'd be very successful anyhow. Voldemort hadn't yet broken to the boy his suspicions, but he was fairly certain that the reason the killing curse had rebounded that night in 1981, wasn't because of a love spell, but because he was a Horcrux, vessels which were known to be particularly difficult to destroy. It was short only by a miracle the boy hadn't died when he'd been stabbed by a Basilisk fang all those years ago, one of the only substances powerful enough to destroy Horcruxes. So long as Harry didn't go around getting stabbed by Gryffindor's sword, he'd be joining Voldemort on a walk through immortality. Voldemort wasn't sure when he'd share this tidbit. But he wasn't going to willingly bungle things up if he'd have to hear about it for the next millennia.)

"Then if this solution is not in prevention, we must revitalize efforts for assimilation. And since, for reasons I cannot comprehend, that cannot be done by total enslavement of the Muggle population," and at this Voldemort glared at Granger, because he still thought it was a perfectly viable strategy, "we must decide what to do with Mudbloods once they are discovered. Afterall, our coalition guarantees segregation from Muggles to the fullest extent. Unless, as you said earlier, you wish to resume the war?"

Granger scowled.

"Why does your ideology have to be based on hating large populations of the human species? Why couldn't your platform be 'down with working Saturdays' or something?"

"Don't be ridiculous," he scoffed. "Working Saturdays are supremely efficient."

They lobbied back and forth, but as usual, they made one another so furious, it was no longer conducive to be in the same room unless Voldemort really did want to use up all of his murder allowance for the next hundred years. They saved the argument for another day, Voldemort storming out of her office and leaving a hurricane behind.

Granger was a bitingly intelligent girl, with venomous barbs in her arsenal. It was useful when they had enemies in common, but less so when they had only each other for targets. Voldemort had peered into her mind before, in the early days of the consolidation of their new government, found her thoughts racing and churning, constantly evolving as she examined and compartmentalized information at a blinding rate. She was a genius, in a way that made him nostalgic, of himself in his youth. Tom Riddle would have enjoyed Granger's mind, when he was in a position to manipulate her into his fold. Voldemort mostly found her irritable, and "2000% off limits", in Harry's words.

He sometimes wondered what it would have been like if she, by fate or happenstance, had wound up as his Horcrux instead of Harry. While Harry was resourceful and intuitive, she was smarter, more dedicated to her work, had an insatiable hunger for knowledge. She was largely responsible for Harry's survival through the years. She had set an academic record, not breaking Voldemort's own overall scores, but coming very close. She had her own published book, on the history of House Elves and other such unpleasant creatures, and it was critically acclaimed. Would she not have been the better choice if he could have had one?

Why Harry, anyhow?

Voldemort looked down. Harry grinned up at him from where he was on his knees, Voldemort's cock resting against his cheek. The tip of a tongue peeked out, blush pink, brushing just close enough to gather the drop of moisture from the head of his arousal before disappearing again. Harry hummed appreciatively.

Ah. Yes, that.

His little whore, he thought affectionately.

Voldemort lifted his foot, pressed it into Harry's sternum and kicked until Harry landed on his back, his foot pressing down on the boy's throat. Harry didn't fight all that much, squirming and rutting into the air like the depraved boy he was. Voldemort rubbed himself furiously, thanking whatever deity deciding he deserved such a sexually compatible, hedonistic lover and showing his gratitude by stroking himself to completion and aiming so that he came on Harry's panting face and parted lips.

He supposed if he couldn't have his raid, then he could settle for this for now. It was awfully difficult to work up a murderous rage right after literally fucking Harry into the ground. It seemed Harry had unintentionally stumbled upon the drain to Voldemort's bloodlust when he had so boldly crawled in his lap at the beginning of all of this and had been abusing it since. In any case, he could put off his ultimate plan for world domination for a few decades while Harry got this whole morals thing out of his system. Voldemort wasn't much of a long-term planner, but he could be patient if absolutely necessary. Besides, if he really, really wanted to, he could always double-cross the boy, annihilate the other half of the government, and lock him in a tower until he came around. They had the time, and Voldemort had it on good authority (that was, his own) that he was very persuasive.

But.

Voldemort mercifully lifted his food and leant down to grasp Harry's arms. He helped him up on wobbly legs and the boy teetered and nuzzled against him, rubbing his sticky face into his chest and sighing in relief as his heated forehead came into contact with Voldemort's cool skin.

They headed for the tub where, barring an actual apocalypse and only an immediately life-threatening one, they intended to take a long soak, Harry's responsibilities be damned.

Of all the terrible and painful things he could imagine doing to Harry, Voldemort had to confess to himself that he had come to rather like the after bit.

They sank into the simmering water and Harry moaned, long and obscene. Voldemort looked down at his own loins, alarmed that things were stirring so soon. Merlin, immortality wasn't going to be all that long if Harry kept sucking the lifeforce out of him at this rate, the incubus.

"Did you ever use the prefect bath at Hogwarts?" Harry sighed, closing his eyes and tilting his head back. "We need one of those here."

He looked at Harry across the steaming bath where he was leaning his head back against the rim beside Voldemort's crossed feet. He fished around in the water until he found Harry's ankle and began digging his nails into his sole. Harry moaned. Voldemort prodded him with a toe and Harry chased it with a playful snap of his teeth.

"Granger will have some news for you tomorrow."

He hummed.

"Not calling her my Mudblood any longer, I see. What character development."

Voldemort pinched his heel and Harry squalled.

"Ah, my apologies, child."

Harry rose his head enough to squint at him, just to make his displeasure known, before resting back again.

"And you've got to stop this whole," his pruned fingers made quotations in the air, "childe business. It's really uncool. You don't want all our employees at work to laugh at me, do you? Besides..."

Harry seemed to forget what he was going to say, trailing off with a blissful sigh as Voldemort continued to rub at his foot.

"I can see you're in agony over it."

Harry's toes wiggled.

"Mmmm."

Voldemort rather forgot what he was saying as well. The miasma of the bath and the tender instep of Harry's foot was making him imagine kissing up his leg and migrating to warmer waters, as it were. You see? How could he possibly focus on spearheading a violent and glorious revolution in this state? The future was not looking bright.

In Granger's office again, they were attempting to break the stalemate.

"We must release our findings to the public."

"No. With the little peace we have now, you will disrupt the natural order-"

"If by natural order, you mean unscientific, nonsensical-"

"Hatred and bigotry are never scientific! And the world continues to spin."

They glared at one another until Granger's new secretary cleared his throat nervously. "Um, Miss Granger, ma'am. My Lord… Sir. Sorry to int-interrupt, but ah. The press is here for their segment for tomorrow's paper?"

They continued to bore into one another's eyes, unflinching, until even Voldemort could see it was becoming a bit ridiculous.

"Very well," Granger grit through her teeth. "Tell them I'll be out in ten while we wrap this up."

They decided to present only the most basic ideas of the study, enough to provide the theory needed for the upcoming reformations. The rest of the data would be handed over to the archives of the Unspeakables for later consideration when the advancement of magical theory and technology could once again review the question of how Muggleborns were made.

At the present, the Wizengamot would vote on the drafts for how to deal with Muggleborns in a more efficient manner that would help contain Muggle taint in Wizarding culture. The war, Voldemort was informed, had apparently left a lot of orphans, and they needed some place to go. His first suggestion was a settlement of sorts, where Muggleborns could live segregated from the rest of society, in their own housing and workforce controlled by the Ministry.

"A concentration camp," Granger said, deadpan. "You want a looming prison of thousands of Muggleborns draining the system and ruining our reputation with foreign affairs? I know you grew up in the age of Auschwitz and the Gulag, but does your selective memory not recall how it stains German and Soviet history forever?!"

As it turned out, the settlement would not be constructed.

Adult Muggleborns would continue their jobs undisturbed, with Granger's pesky 'Nondiscrimination Clause'. It seemed, once humans enjoyed the garnishes of rights and freedom, they were keen to keep it. However, over a ten year separation process, Muggleborns were expected to have ceased all contact with Muggles. Marriage between Muggles and Wizarding folk would be prohibited or would have to be taken elsewhere, and only authorized Ministry personnel could retain possession of Muggle products for study and the possibility of repurposing.

"That is totally impractical. You're saying I'll go to prison for being found with a mechanical pencil?" Harry asked, slashing through a line in the declaration.

What the hell was a mechanical pencil?

"I refuse to forward it."

Well. It was a draft, anyway.

...And only authorized Ministry personnel could retain possession of Muggle products deemed as dangerous or damaging to Wizarding economy or environment.

"That is much better. Now take this down to Hermione's department so they can whip up a five page definition on 'dangerous' and 'damaging'."

Voldemort stared hard at Harry who was holding out the heavily edited paper and looking over a log of expenditures. Had he just ordered Lord Voldemort? Dared to do it and not look him in the eye?

Harry looked up in confusion, seemed to review the previous fifteen seconds and grew visibly sheepish. Voldemort heard him gulp.

"I'll have Zabini send it?" he amended.

Voldemort towered over Harry, considered. "No, I'll take it."

"Why are you smiling like that?" Harry asked, words coming out fast. "Stop it, it's scary."

"It has been a while since I made an appearance within the Ministry itself. They probably need a reminder of who sits as king." Voldemort grabbed Harry's chin forcefully, nails scratching. "I think you could do for a reminder as well, child."

"No," Harry stuttered, jerking to his feet. "Not necessary. Either of those things."

"Then if you don't want the task of filling a sudden number of vacancies within this building, I suggest you reflect on your future conduct."

Harry glowered, probably already scheming on how to best suck up (most likely with literal sucking involved), but he sat back down and mumbled a quick, "Yes, My Lord."

There was a blush on the back of Harry's neck, and Voldemort felt warm stirrings as the sight. How pleasant it was to see Harry embarrassed and bruised about the pride. He was such a strong willed boy, especially when forcing himself through political and economic planes, but here with just the two of them, Voldemort could twist him and play him and—

Voldemort caught a glimpse of Wicked Mischief on Harry's face and felt his good mood sour.

Weeks later, the bill detailing the Muggleborn problem would finally circulate for signatures, passing resolutions for present and future Muggleborn citizens. The bill officially recognized and funded a Muggleborn department within the Ministry offices which would be responsible for ensuring all children were given proper processing and identification so that they could pursue all of the basics of living upon reaching adulthood (jobs, housing, application for financial aid should they need it, etcetera), for regulating the altered memories of Muggle parents for flaws, for ensuring all contact between Muggles and Wizards was pre-approved, and that present Muggleborns be given supplemental seminars for culture and additional education. There was much, much more, but Voldemort found the fine print cramped his eyes.

The end result was a children's home system, to be funded by half the government and by half private donation. Regular screenings for Muggleborn infants would take place in hospitals and Muggle homes in the United Kingdom territories, children discovered would be adopted—

"Kidnapped!" Grander balked.

—adopted from their Muggle families and either taken in by a Wizarding home or placed in the orphanage where each child would receive attention from a minimum of three adults full time. And while Voldemort insisted he believed they should have their own school, Granger reminded him that it would cost more and they'd have to expand the Muggleborn department for coordination and extra budgeting and… There was a reason Voldemort's expertise was in war strategy and not bureaucracy. So, the Muggleborns would go to Hogwarts with the rest of the children, though none would be allowed in Slytherin House.

The grand opening of the orphanage came and went, and the response seemed to have been miraculously positive.

At least that was the end of his having to "think of the children!"

"Don't you want to go with me for my visit to Dumbledore's Home for Gifted Children?" Harry asked not a second after that thought had formed. Voldemort sighed.

"Dumbledore was responsible for you suffering at the hands of Muggles. It seems like misplaced gratitude to name a refuge for him."

"History has a sense of irony. And it was for the Light's vote." Harry paused. "And really, I wouldn't have suffered at the hands of Muggles if you hadn't killed my parents, and yet."

He gestured to the general vicinity as though to say 'Here we are'.

"The greatest irony in history," Dumbledore said from his portrait.

"Shut up," they replied in unison.

Voldemort did end up going to the orphanage. It was… very different from his experience. Children cringed and cowered away from him as usual; that was the same at least. But the overall atmosphere… other than children getting over being ripped from their biological parents, it was surprisingly happy. Harry was predictably popular with them.

Harry spent the afternoon playing quidditch in the front yard of the home, and they all but wept when he told them he had to leave for 'boring Ministry nonsense'. Harry passed over the last child to one of the staff reluctantly and sighed.

"Don't you want one?" Harry asked wistfully as they hurried their way to the home's office to floo.

Harry had another meeting and Voldemort would be going to Siberia for... a personal research project that most definitely would not offend the few sensibilities Harry had left if he knew the details.

"I already have one headache of a child. Why would I be in want of another?"

"Rude!" Harry whined, then seemed to consider it with a grin. "You're right, though. I'd develop some sort of only-child syndrome and become wildly jealous if you had to split your attention from me… Daddy."

Sometimes, Harry was truly incomprehensible to Voldemort.

I promise this update is as surprising to me as it is to you. Somehow, it became imperative that I write from Voldemort's point of view. It really is finished now.