A/N: Okay, so this is project number three that I'm working on. Not sure how I feel about it, to be honest. I haven't worked on three stories at once siiinnnccceee...To Fly With Broken Wings, I think. Or maybe it was Another Chance At Life. Either way, it's been a long time. Nonetheless, I hope you enjoy it!

Disclaimer: Nope.

Warnings: Slash, dub-con later?

Chapter One... "The reason it hurts so much to separate is because our souls are connected. Maybe they always have been and will be. Maybe we've lived a thousand lives before this one and in each of them we've found each other. And maybe each time we've been forced apart for the same reasons. That means that this goodbye is both a goodbye for the past ten thousand years and a prelude to what will come." -Nicholas Sparks

The Wizarding World was in a state of joyous celebration for the first time since the Potter murders sixteen years ago. The Dark Lord Voldemort had been vanquished. Again. There were some speculating murmurs of 'What if he returned once more? What if he couldn't be properly killed after all?' but they were quickly silenced by the swelling of enraptured voices proclaiming the greatness of the Boy Who Lived. The only one not celebrating was the Boy himself.

The newly christened Minister of Magic stood in the midst of a Ministry press release, silent and pensive. Only one other person on Earth knew of the turmoil that the youth's face had held: the Dark Lord's right hand man. Lucius Malfoy had been the only one to actually witness the truth. Harry Potter and Lord Voldemort had not been enemies, rivals or pawns in a game of fate. They had been lovers, the sort of tender devotion that comes only once in a thousand years. They had loved one another with a passion that rivaled even the power of death. He had seen the so feared Dark Lord curled up with the boy, sharing a book in front of the fireplace. He'd perceived their happiness firsthand and seen the world get in the way. Lucius had witnessed when the two had gone to battle for the fate of the world, only for the moment to come when Lord Voldemort's wand was captured. He had looked on his young lover with all of the resignation and care that a man could possess. In the end, it had been his decision to allow Harry his victory. Voldemort had seen to his beloved's care after his passing and allowed himself to fall but the Malfoy patriarch knew that they could both see the shattering in Potter's eyes as crimson orbs faded and closed for the last time. He had been there on that hill side when the skies had darkened and a sleepless, unspeakable malice had filled the air, crow feathers raining from the sky.

Lucius had been there...the night that the demon came.

The night that Harry Potter had made a contract with the Devil.

Crouching down at side of the love of his life, emerald eyes somehow managing to shine ever brighter through the tears cascading unchecked and uncontrolled down his face.

"Please...just bring him back. My soul, my magic, my everything, it's yours! Just bring him back..."

The demon seemed eternally amused at the murderer sacrificing everything to bring back the lover he had killed. Amused enough that it accepted the contract. When the darkness lifted and that creeping malevolence had faded away, Harry Potter was nowhere to be found. All that remained of his existence was an innocuous wand of elder and a Dark Lord waking as if from a heavy sleep.

Lucius would never see his Master's love again.

O`._.`O

The night swirled around me, a cool evening full of the sounds, smells and tastes of the Scottish moors around me and I sighed heavily, adjusting the cloak over my shoulders with a brief flick of annoyance. I would never get accustomed to these pretentious Victorian clothes. And people thought that Wizarding clothes were unusual? Bah. There was no Hogwarts in this 'verse, only empty land where hairy cattle and goats grazed on the heather. My home was gone in this world but still, I found myself drawn to the same haunts. King's Cross. Ottery . Church Lane in West Country where Godric's Hollow would have been, should have been, and here. This empty stretch of moor reaching out by the deep, dark loch that in my world would have been home to a squid, a herd of centaurs and easily four hundred students. The forest was there. The lake. Bloody hell, even the Whomping Willow still stood and yet...It was as if the Wizarding World and any traces of them had been erased from the pages of this world's story books. I had found myself floundering in a strange world of nobility, carriages and crooked, underground politics.

On second thought, maybe it wasn't much different than the Wizarding World, after all.

In both worlds, I had my own personal demons, except in this realm, the concept was a little more literal. I was the only wizard in this entire 'verse. I was alone. Or rather, at the current moment, I was wishing that were the case.

I had been tracked.

The interloper received a furious snarl as he stepped from the shadows, seemingly from nowhere. Just a single amused glance from those vermillion eyes had my blood racing with red hot rage.

Eyes the color of embers and poppies and blood, blood, blood. Eyes the color of his.

No! No, I was not going there. The relation chilled my stomach to it's core. It had been too long to allow my mind to drift to such a place, especially in the face of Sebastian Bloody Michaelis. I carried a part of my beloved inside of me always but I wouldn't sully the memory of what we had with comparisons to this creature.

The demon was wearing a butler meat-suit, it looked like, and yet vanity, as always, had won out in it's creation. Michaelis was as handsome as he was sinful, as ready to seduce a person as he was to consume them. Dark hair as black as my own fell to his shoulder and amber eyes that could shift between shades as quickly as one could blink stared up at me balefully, observing my unconcerned lounging on the long bough of the Not-So-Whomping Willow.

"Harry, my little raven, you're looking as reproachful as ever." The demon purred, a condescending smile spreading across his pale face.

I didn't even dignify him with a response, to his complete lack of surprise. This standstill between the two of us had lasted for a good hundred and fifty-three years so far, though I knew that time in my original time line ran much differently than it did in this 'verse. I didn't have proof of such a thing, but it was a feeling that lingered with me, a disconnected sensation, like the feeling of the ground rising up beneath you or of having each foot standing on ground of different heights. A perception of being out of sorts. He was eternal, but I was persistent in my derision. Call it Gryffindor stubbornness, I suppose. A moth flitted over to settled lovingly in my open palm, drawn to my magic and the pale glow of my skin in the moonlight. No, literally, I was practically a glowstick beneath the moon. An unfortunate quirk of my condition but it did give me some slight pleasure, no matter how much amusement the ponce below derived from it. Even after what had been done, I was a creature of light, even in the darkness. His polar opposite. The radiance to his shadow. That was something that he could never take from me, no matter what else may have been stolen. My emerald eyes focused on the beauty of the tiny creature in my hand instead of on the stain that stood waiting below.

"What is it that you want?" I had no patience tonight, especially with such a fiend as he.

Sebastian didn't even pretend to be affronted. He had only ever found my reticence and dislike a delight, the berk. The vague thought of testing that incredible patience until it broke danced across the glassy surface of my thoughts, disappearing into the night on silver wings.

"My, you are about as patient as my new young master and he's only twelve years old. The two of you would get along famously in your disdain for me." The same Master who named him after his old dog, huh? Sound like a bloke after my own heart, "That us actually the reason that I've sought you out. I want you to come stay at the Phantomhive Estate. I wish to have you nearby from now on."

A spike of...something shot through me. Nervousness? Cold chill? Anger was there certainly, but also an emotion that made my fingers twitch with it, dispersing my fragile little night time companion. I hated him for making me feel uncertain like this. I didn't want to go to England again. What was the point? To see more reminders of what I had lost?

No Hermione. No Weasleys. No more Christmases, birthdays or new beginnings. No Tom...

"Well your wishes are just going to have to be disappointed, then."

I could find no reason for him to want to keep me close. None except for his own twisted fascination with me and I saw no reason to permit his bizarre attraction. He was grating enough from a distance. His head tilted to the side like a curious feline, observing me intently. Sebastian didn't appear to be at all dismayed by my refusal. In fact, he rather seemed as if he had been hoping that I would deny him. Ruddy parasite.

"Now, now, my little raven, why so disagreeable? Have I not given you your space? Have I not given you plenty of time to yourself? I have been very...patient up until now. Indulgent, even. I could have sent you to Hell to serve my legions but I allowed you near perfect freedom." Freedom? What a joke. My disdain must have shown on my face but he continued as if he had never stopped at all, "I have not been unkind and now all I desire is simply your presence. Is having you near such a gruesome task?"

Yes. No, but yes. There was always more to Sebastian's "simple requests" than appeared at first glance. When he was concerned, I couldn't trust anything to be as it seemed.

"I'm sure you can handle one twelve year old noble on your own, Michaelis. My presence is hardly required." He had as good as said it himself, after all. He wanted my presence, not my assistance with his master. I had avoided England like the Bubonic Plague had taken residence there, and yet...

Crimson eyes flashed, irritation at last rearing it's ugly head. I tried to keep the jolt of nervousness from his skillful eyes, though whether I was successful, I didn't know.

"My Master is of no consequence in the matter. I desire your presence from now on. You have done enough running about on your own and it is time for you to take your rightful place. This isn't a request, Harry. It's an order." The word that flowed from his hateful lips resounded throughout my awareness and my very perception of the night quaked with it. A heat seared throughout the flesh of my back, alighting a sickly, wicked purple in response to the command.

I resisted. I don't know why. It never worked after all. I always gave in but it had become just a piece of this disturbing ritual between the two of us. He gave an order, I refused for as long as I was able before I eventually gave in. The important thing was that I continued to resist, though. There was still fight in me. The heat turned to pain and quickly became unbearable. My vision blackened even as the feeling of arms pulling me from my perch invaded my senses. Cold night air hit the skin of my back and I shivered. I could never-! He always won out in the end. His magical ties to me were binding and absolute. After all, he owned me. A rasping, slick tongue ran up the radius of the enormous mark spanning the entirety of my back, tracing my spine all the way up. Sebastian paused at the back of my neck, teeth scraping just enough to make me aware of them. Making sure I knew that if he wishes, he could bite, pierce, claim. It was what he wanted, had wanted for years now, but I outright refused. A constant companion at his side always. I would rather be alone. Alone and buried in a bloody iceberg with obnoxious 70's reruns from the Beeb playing back to back for all of eternity. I staunchly ignored the shudder that raced up my vertebrae, following the trail his tongue made. The matching shine from the Faustian Mark on his hand reflected a strange, unholy light on the area around us as my eyes began to clear. He was pressed against my back now, no doubt using whispering in my ear as an excuse to get so close.

"Obey, Harry. I will meet you there, my little raven."

The order pulsed in my skin in agony and before he could get a laugh of delight out, I had disappeared, cloak and all. How did I manage to get myself into these messes? Sebastian could threaten me with Hell, but in my opinion, I had been in it for the last one hundred and fifty years. No family, no home, no friends and everything that had once been familiar and comforting no longer existed. My own humanity had been erased along with Hogwarts.

I was a demon contracted to another demon.

Now if that wasn't the saddest thing I had ever heard.

A/N: So I wrote this some time ago and finally went back and reread it and it gave me chills! :) I hope all of you enjoy it as much as I did!