for those who did not read the warnings in the first chapter: underage, suicidal thoughts and actions, depression, anorexia, very dark themes, etc. etc. If these do not sit well with you, please do not read.

BOOK II: ACT I

THE GRAVE, THE WONDERLAND, AND THE DINNER PARTY

Harry wanders the grounds, listless and hollowed out, thoughts and feelings disregarded.

It has been two months now since—

(two months, eight weeks, fifty six days, give or take a few hours)

Since the day Harry hauled her way to the bowels of Hogwarts and arose Lord Voldemort back from the grave. Two months since the only thing she'd ever known, the only thing she'd ever lived for, went silent. Not even a whisper. Sometimes she likes to pretend she can still hear him, makes up the answers to her questions in a fashion she thinks he'd answer them in. But it never works. Tom was always clever and quick, always had a way of surprising her.

Her feet take her nowhere and everywhere. She has nowhere to be and nothing to do.

She's surprised the Dark Lord even let her stay with him at all.

Well, she is his horcrux. He doesn't like her out of his sight for too long.

He doesn't like her, period.

She tries not to think about that; how much it hurts to see those familiar eyes look at her with apathetic indifference, to watch as he drifts past her without a word or look of acknowledgment, as if she doesn't exist.

Tom is gone, she does not think—never thinks—lest she well and truly break into pieces. As it is she has held herself together somewhat. The sadness is overwhelming, but Harry continues on anyhow.

Harry is alone, again.

It has been a long six years since she has felt this way, but the sadness seems to cling to her like a familiar, old friend. A desperate friend; toxic, volatile, and ready to ruin her, but a friend all the same, and she has none of those anymore.

Tom would make her feel better. But Tom isn't here, anymore.

Harry pauses in the middle of the overgrown garden, suddenly finding it hard to breathe. She thinks she might be choking, her breath comes out in hiccups, and her shoulders seize up. Don't think about it. Just keep walking. To where? Well, we'll find out eventually, won't we? Harry focuses on her feet, on the dried up earth starved for water in the heat of the summer. It is nightfall now, and the brutal sun has gone away, chased off by the moon.

Harry is in the graveyard, again.

She feels calmer here, among the dead. They are so silent, but that's okay. For a long time, she was silent too. She didn't have anyone to talk to, anything to say. And now, she will return to that silence; she once again has no one to talk to, and nothing to say.

She looks up at the gravestone. Tom Riddle. The reaper perches upon the side of the slab of marble, watching her with ravenous eyes.

Harry lays down on the cool, dry grass, and pretends to be dead too.

She awakes in her room, though she cannot recall how she got there.

.

.

.

She is Alice in her own little Wonderland, exploring the tangled halls of this spacious mansion. The house elves told her that it used to be a very sorry sight to see, but then the evil Lord Voldemort returned and had every single inch of it torn down and replaced anew. She cannot imagine what it used to look like, a haunted mansion at the top of a hill. Now it sits in gardens and splendor, the home of a king. It reminds her more of Malfoy Manor than it does any of those houses from the ghost stories she used to read.

Everything is sparkling and clean and so, so, empty, and ripe for her curiosity. She disappears behind tapestries only to come out somewhere new; she finds little servants stairs and dummy waiters to hide in; secret rooms in the eaves of the attic, small enough just for her, endless sunlight pouring in through the windows.

For a time or two she forgets about Tom, about the living wraith that stalks these halls, and instead pretends to be Alice in her everlasting wonderland, or Mary, in search of her secret garden. She finds friends again among the mice and the servants and the spiders.

Harry keeps to the back passageways, to the unused tea rooms and day beds. The real hallways are wide and grand and terrify her; her every step echoes down the hollow corridors, bouncing on all the crystal and glass and gold. But in the servant corridors she can pretend to be just another speckle of dust trickling in the sunlight; a little mouse scurrying about the floorboards.

It doesn't feel so bad, being alone, when she has her adventures to occupy her.

Every day is something new; the months and weeks become endless and insignificant, and Harry loses herself in an imaginary world full of secrets and mysterious magic. Who knows what she will find today? It is easier to pretend this way—it is easier to forget that she is once again completely, utterly, and irrevocably alone.

But she is not Alice, or Mary. She is Harriet. And Harriet's life does not revolve around secret gardens and wonderlands.

Every night Harry's feet take her out to graveyard of their own accord. No one ever stops her; a little girl in a white nightgown taking down the stairs barefoot, escaping through the side door, wandering through the hedge stones.

Harry wiggles her toes in the dirt; it is cool and soft.

She finds her way to her favorite grave—Tom Riddle Senior. She imagines it must be Tom's father. Is this Tom's family's house? Harry turns around, scrutinizing the sprawling mansion, every window still lit with a warm, magical light. The surrounding grounds are impeccably groomed, so much so Harry is surprised there aren't peacocks and Pegasus roaming about. Is this where Tom grew up? But that can't be true; he never spoke of his childhood, but she knew enough to infer that he did not grow up in wealth.

But this is a mystery for another day. Harry returns her attention back to the grave in front of her, flopping in a heap on the ground. When she opens her eyes the stone reaper peers down at her, framed in a halo of shivering stars.

"Hello death," she greets. The statue does not respond.

"Hello Tom Riddle Senior," she adds, just to be polite.

He doesn't respond either.

Harry waits until dawn before she returns to her chambers. She is not used to such luxury and open space, and it makes her uneasy. She has never once slept in the palatial bed in the center of her bedroom, full of plush pillows and fine, silken sheets. Instead there is a bundle of sheets in a pile in the back of her closet, commandeered by the house elves. Harry feels far more comfortable sleeping there than she ever will in a bed like that, in a room like this.

Fortunately she is tired enough from her late night rendezvous with the skeletons that she crawls to the back of her closet, to the nest of blankets she calls home, and falls right asleep.

.

.

.

Harry continues her exploration long into the summer. She knows the gilded halls of the dark lord's manor by heart now, and all the secret passageways within. She knows all the dark lord's house elves; Mimsy, Wimsy, Pokey, and Pin—and all the names of the skeletons that call the Riddle Manor graveyard home.

She does not miss Privet Drive, and while she likes Riddle Manor, she wouldn't quite call it home either. But then, Harry does not know where home is.

She deliberately avoids the Dark Lord as much as possible. He does not seek her out.

Or at least, he hadn't so far.

Harry is in her favorite room at the very top of the mansion when the Dark Lord finally finds her.

Lord Voldemort seeks her out one day, as she reads in the sunlight.

There is a small child sized door swept behind an end table with a lattice tablecloth thrown over it, and if one crept underneath the cloth and out the other side one would find the door. Behind the door is a narrow spiral staircase that leads from the dungeons to the tower, with many rafters and secret, small spaces in between them.

Harry crept under the tablecloth, opened the door and climbed the stairs until she found her way into an unused room at the top of the house; everything is coated in a fine film of dust, and heavy tarps are thrown over all the furniture. The curtains are closed shut, until it is dark enough that the shapes seem to take lives of their own, but still light enough to crawl about them. She's never used the real door, so she doesn't know how to get to this room any other way—but she should have remembered that there really was a door, that this wasn't actually her secret world.

It opens one day, and she is so terrified she drops her book onto the ground with a thud and a rising clout of dust.

The dark lord stands, framed in the light of the hall, bearing down at her.

"Harry," he intones, and maybe somewhere lost in his voice is a memory of Tom.

She is too terrified to say anything.

"Dinner is at six this evening. We have company; dress appropriately."

And then he was gone, as abruptly as he had entered, leaving her shaky and disoriented.

It had been so long since she had heard his voice… in the chamber of the Mirror of Erised, and once when he gave her a portkey to his manor and told her to pack whatever she had and be there by ten am sharp. Maybe a couple times in between. It sounded all at once like everything she remembered, and yet so foreign it was unfamiliar.

Dinner, company. Right. Better get on that.

Her days are long and endless, but full of people, to her surprise. Lord Voldemort does not have the patience to sit and wait around—already he has plans in place. His followers have returned to him, they come in and out sporadically during the day, and Harry always makes sure to make herself scarce during those intervals. They are almost always confined to the first floor, or the dungeons, so Harry has the rest of the mansion to herself on most days.

It was working out rather well, until Lord Voldemort himself requested her presence.

Harriet is nervous, in a way she hasn't been in a long time.

There is no Tom to tell her she's being dramatic, telling her to sit like a lady and comb her hair properly—Tom was always about looking proper—and chew with her mouth closed and look like she was engaged in the conversation. He told her not to let the squalor of the Dursley's detract from her etiquette (he confessed, once, that his situation was not dissimilar to her own as a child, that he too was not born from wealth) and that it was all the more reason to pay more attention to her manners. She stares at herself critically in the mirror; her appearance has never meant much to her. It is the exterior personification of an apathetic interior. She looks pale and small; none of her dresses fit, even though they are supposed to magically adjust to her size. She has a feeling those charms are applied to children's clothing in the assumption that they will grow bigger, not grow smaller and smaller. She is practically colorless, only her hair and eyes to even remind anyone she was human at all.

It turns out she needn't have been so worried—their company ends up being a family she is very familiar with.

A recognizable blonde boy looks mystified to be standing in the middle of the greeting parlor, casting wide eyes about the room.

Harry was watching the door from a secret spot up by the crystal chandelier, and immediately hops down when she realizes who it is. She holds the hem of her dress up so she can dart down the stairs, smiling widely.

"Draco!" She says, drawing his attention.

His eyes grow very wide. "H—Harry!" His mouth opens and closes. "But… but what are you doing here?"

"I'm staying here," she hedges, vaguely, because she doesn't know if she's simply a temporary guest, or if Lord Voldemort actually intends to let her live here.

"Oh." His eyes are still very wide.

"Draco, darling, please don't run off—" The floo erupts again, and this time the impeccable Mrs. Malfoy is gracefully ducking out of the fireplace, not a speck of dirt or dust on her immaculate ball gown. "Well hello there my dear!" She says with delight, walking quickly to envelop Harriet in a quick hug, kissing both her cheeks.

"Hello, Mrs. Malfoy," Harry replies, feeling awkward in her own skin. But then, she always does when someone touches her. "How do you do?"

Narcissa brings a hand to her cheek, sighing. "Always ever so polite," she murmurs, smiling. "I'm quite well, thank you. I hadn't realized you would be attending dinner this evening! Now I know why the dark lord wanted Draco to come as well."

At the mention of the dark lord, Draco looks terrified, his face rapidly losing color. Harry spares him a sympathetic glance; she knows exactly how he feels.

"You can sit with me," she tells him, smiling. "And afterwards we can go explore the gardens." Which is a better alternative to waiting around while the adults make conversation. Harriet would love to know what they were talking about—but something told her that they would never approach any interesting subjects while the children were about. Maybe she'll find a way to listen in from outside.

"Oh. Alright." Draco breathes shakily.

Mr. Malfoy is not far behind, dipping his head to her in greeting. He eyes her shrewdly, not looking at all surprised to see her there. This would infer that Lord Voldemort has mentioned her at some point—she finds herself feeling very peculiar. Does he talk about her? And if so, what does he say?

But this is foolish, she reprimands herself. Lord Voldemort does not think of her. She really ought to stop thinking about him.

"Come on," she holds out her hand to the blonde boy. "I'll show you the way."

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.

.

The dark lord dines like a king, in a splendid dining room fit for royalty, and an endlessly long table of fine marble that appeared to be able to house a small army of people. It is utterly lost on his current company, as there are so few of them they barely take up one corner of the vast table. There is also a feast of food, but Harry finds herself as hungry as she always is—which is to say, not at all. She takes a few bites to be polite, but doesn't touch them thereafter. The idea of eating makes her stomach roll. She is reminded with a stab of pain that Tom would have started a lecture by now; food is important, one should not squander it. Tom knew what it was like to be hungry all the time, to feel the empty burn clawing and eating you alive. He coped with his time in everlasting hunger by scheming ways of obtaining food, rationing out portions obsessively to always make sure he had enough. Harry copes by deciding she does not need food at all; that she can conquer the hunger by pretending it doesn't exist.

Harry very carefully keeps her gaze on her plate. She does not look to the Dark Lord; she does not wonder if he is scrutinizing her, if he is about to demand her to eat.

As she expected, conversation is either droll or too vague for her to understand.

Lucius and the dark lord discuss politics in depth, while she, Narcissa and Draco remain silent.

But when she and Draco are 'excused' for the evening, she has no doubt that more interesting topics will be broached. The Dark Lord's war; the fate of the wizarding world.

Listening in is a lost cause, and quite frankly, Harry doesn't care enough to know, in the same way Harry doesn't really care about anything.

Draco holds her attention well enough, but she finds even their light small talk exhausting. He's excited for the new school year, he can't wait to see all their friends again - but absolutely not Hermione Granger - and he's already bought all their books and has started reading through them. Only because he wants to, of course, not because he's trying to outdo Granger or anything.

Harry hasn't thought of the new school year at all. She hasn't thought about the future in any coherent manner. Her birthday had passed without remark from any of the constituents of the house - be that house elves or dark lords or even Harry herself - and that was really the only thing that marked the passing of time to her.

It's a sobering thought.

What is she living for?

Draco is her age, and he has plans and ambitions and goals for his life. He wants to be like his father; he wants to be better than that stuck up know it all mudblood; he wants the affection and affirmation of his parents; he wants to live up to the Malfoy name.

Harry has never had her own reasons to live. There was only Tom.

There was only Tom, and Tom was gone.

"H-H-Harry?" Draco stutters out, horrified.

"I'm fine," Harry says quickly, wiping the lone tear trailing down her cheek. "I had an eyelash get stuck in my eye."

Draco looks flustered and uncomfortable, nodding along. "Right… Is it, um. Do you need help?"

Harry waves him off. "No, no— I got it. I'm fine."

Harry makes a valiant effort to focus back to the conversation at hand, engaging Draco in a discussion over their Charms finals last term in an attempt to distract the boy. It works after a few moments, as Draco puffs up his chest and insists that he would have beaten Granger if Flitwick wasn't so biased against Slytherins.

Draco chances concerned glances at her when he thinks she isn't looking. Harry puts on an impassive face, and pretends everything is perfectly fine.

.

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BOOK II: ACT II

THE STONE, THE GHOST, AND THE FAREWELL

Harry feels as if she has lived this summer five times over. However, it has only been a mere four months. The days blend together into an immutable and homogenous mix of exploration and an overwhelming sense of abandonment. The first, Harry partakes in generously. The second, she pretends does not exist. Abandonment would infer that Harry felt as if she belonged somewhere in the first place; that there was someone who she felt she belonged to. But Tom was all a lie, or at best a distorted figment of reality, so there was no reason for her to feel so sad.

At any rate, Harry passes the unending days the same way; perusing the enormous grounds of the manor, and avoiding the Dark Lord at every turn. There are more people here now, but the rooms and parlors of the mansion are so vast it is easy for Harry to make herself scarce. Today she is resting on the grand steps leading off the veranda and into the well-tended gardens. The fairies in the fairy fountain behind her twitter excitedly; occasionally they flitter away from their home to curiously examine the color of her hair.

She politely allows the attention for a bit, but then they begin to pick at the hem of her dress, looking like they want to tear it apart to examine it, and she has to draw the line. The many dresses she wears appeared in her closet one day, and they are all made of the finest silk and crepe chiffon—the kinds of things Harry could have never imagined her wearing. There is only one reason why she would have them, and only one person who could have put them there, and she doesn't think he would appreciate her allowing the fairies to take it apart.

She shoos them away with a delicate hand, careful not to hurt them, before she straightens out the hem of her skirt.

This is why she does not find it particularly surprising to feel something brush against her side. Harry turns, irritated, ready to see another curious fairy giggling at her and watching her with big, shining eyes—she is quite startled to see an unfamiliar snake.

"Hello," Harry says, belated. "If you're hungry, I'm afraid you can't eat me."

"You're a bit too big." The snake agrees, nodding sagely.

It is not an entirely rare sight to find snakes perusing the gardens; the dark lord is, unsurprisingly, quite fond of them and has quite a few rare and exotic breeds scattered about the large grounds. The Malfoy's have peacocks; the dark lord has venomous and deadly snakes.

Harry blinks, before tilting her head. "Did you need something?" They may not be a rare sight, but it is rare for them to approach her.

Although it is just a snake, and Harry has seen them many a time, she finds this one particularly unnerving. It stares directly down at her, and does not blink at all.

"Yes." The snake replies.

When there is no explanation forthcoming, Harry raises a brow. "…And?"

"I would like you to follow me, little human girl."

"Follow you where?"

The snake jerks its head to the line of trees across the grounds. "The forest."

Harry swallows.

She's been in the forest many times. Enough times to know it is not a normal forest. "What's in the forest?" She asks, slow and guarded.

"Many things." The snake replies, to her annoyance. "But there is one thing in particular."

Harry thinks about it for a moment, before ultimately deciding she has nothing better to do then indulge the silly little thing. "Sure, alright then." She shrugs. "Lead the way."

The snake slithers off through the garden passes, the sun shining against its scales so brightly Harry has to squint to make it out. She still can't quite figure out what color it is—from beneath the glare it could perhaps be silver, or maybe a darker gray. She squints further. Or gold? Green? Red? It seems to change the further she looks.

Finally they reach the ends of the grounds, and she feels the moment they leave the bubble of the wards like a warm gust of air. The forest looms in front of them, and Harry gets the very odd impression that it is moving. The eaves seem to shift slightly, swaying in a silent wind, branches twisting around themselves, the very trees themselves bending out of her way.

She blinks rapidly, rubbing at her eyes. When she opens them the forest seems more sedated.

"What's so special about this forest, anyway?" She asks conversationally, as she ducks under a tangle of bramble bushes.

When the snake doesn't reply, Harry turns to her side, only to find it gone.

She halts abruptly, whirling around. Her breath catches in her throat. She couldn't have walked even five paces past the tree line, but when she turns around she can no longer see the manor. There's nothing but an endless landscape of painted trees, lush and dark greenery, as if she had crossed into a different world entirely.

She tells herself to calm down, and reaches into the pocket of her dress for her wand. Her eyes widen when her hands meet nothing but lint - she didn't take her wand today. It's exactly where she left it; sitting on her dresser in her room. If Tom were here he would have berating her to hell and back. If Tom were here, he would have never let her leave the house without it.

I can't do anything without him, she thinks, and she doesn't know if she feels scared or sad. Her heart hurts and she can't tell if it burns with fear or sorrow. Maybe it doesn't even matter.

Harry takes one last look at the towering forest behind her, before eventually moving forward again.

Where is that snake? Did it lead her here on purpose? Had it even existed in the first place? Maybe she hallucinated it. Maybe she's hallucinating all of this. Maybe she's finally gotten to that point of hunger and malnutrition again, just like she had in the cupboard that fateful day, and any minute now her conscious will fade away completely, taking the forest with it.

She cuts her musings off when the trees part to reveal a sun speckled clearing. Little spots of light trickle down from the thick canopy above, illuminating the hollowed, empty space. There's nothing but a carpet of dead leaves, dirt, and sprawling weeds.

No, that's not entirely true.

Curiously, Harry drifts into the center of the clearing, staring down at a peculiar little stone, half hidden behind a yellowing leaf.

She crouches down to pick it up with her thumb and forefinger, fascinated by its smoothness and the hollowed center. Harry straightens up, absently brushing stray leaves off her dress as she runs a finger around the perimeter of the stone. It is a very pretty, almost translucent stone the color of prasiolite. It's not so much a stone as it is a gem; it reflects the light so beautifully as Harry turns it around in her hands, sparkling rainbows striking off each and every facet, casting upon her skin with the slightest turn of her fingers.

It's too pretty to be found in a forest, and the shape is quite odd. Harry has never seen a gem with a hollow center; is it perhaps a ring of some kind. She slips it around one of her fingers. It's far too big for a regular finger, so it all but hangs off of Harry's thumb.

Harry frowns, turning it over in her hands a couple more times. It's not jewelry, then. It doesn't feel like the many dark objects Tom had warned her about either; it doesn't have a palpable magical presence at all. If anything, it seems to have no presence of any kind; it is neither hot nor cold, neither heavy nor light, not quite transparent but not quite opaque.

She tilts her head curiously, before finally holding it between her thumb and forefinger again, this time bringing it up to her eye, to see the world through it like she would a monocle. Perhaps it's an eyepiece of some kind?

Harry does not know what she sees, then.

She remembers the presence though, something cold but calm, an inevitable calamity.

And then she is falling.

.

.

.

What happened? Harry thinks, drowsily.

Everything hurts.

Filtered sunlight makes small dots across her face, and when she opens her eyes they bloom like large blotches of color, until everything becomes unrecognizable. The sounds of insects and birds fade in and out; beneath it, a lulling, constant hum. Water, Harry recognizes.

She lifts her face to find herself strewn about the bank of a small creek. Many feet above her a chunk of dirt falls away between the roots of two trees; evidence of her fall. Her limbs have been twisted into odd angles; her neck snapped. But nothing remains but a vague sense of discomfort and the unsettling feeling of matted blood over half her face. When she finally pushes herself off the ground, she realizes something is in her left hand.

The jewel.

More importantly, there is someone else here.

For a moment she thinks it's the snake, but for some reason there's a part of her that knows its not the snake. A part of her who recognizes this familiar presence.

Harry freezes, turning wide, frightened eyes to the figure beside her as she pushes up a little higher off the forest floor.

The Dark Lord looks incredibly out of place amongst the deceptively tranquil scenery. While the forest appears calm on the surface, with something foreboding and unnatural beneath it, there is no outer exterior to hide the true nature of the Dark Lord.

"I—" Harry at first attempts to explain herself, but eventually comes to the obvious conclusion that there is nothing she can say. She closes her mouth.

The Dark Lord's eyes are bright and utterly livid. "What have you done to yourself?" He hisses darkly.

Harry flinches. "I—I didn't mean to…"

He grabs her arm violently, and Harry has just enough presence of mind to drop the stone into a pocket before he can notice it. He releases her after a beat, only to return with a much gentler grip, as if realizing his current anger will not help the situation.

He seems to be making a conscious effort to stay calm. "Can you stand?"

Harry looks down at herself. The front of her dress is drenched in mud, and she is covered in equal parts dirt and blood. However, there are no cuts or bruises to be seen.

All the same, there is no strength in her legs, so she shakes her head.

Despite her futile protests, he tucks an arm underneath her knees, the other resting in the middle of her back.

"What happened to you?" He asks, piercing her with an irritated glare. "How did you manage to fall like that, you foolish girl? And what have I told you about wandering too far from the manor?"

"I - I…" Harry reflexively swallows, not sure what to say. She doesn't remember falling at all. When she looks back over his shoulder to where the dark lord found her, she sees that she did, indeed, fall. From quite a height as well. There is blood everywhere, in particular over one large river rock. Harry draws a shaky hand to the back of her head, feeling as if it was split open with a phantom pain. But her probing fingers find nothing but matted, bloodied hair.

He frowns at her. "You have a serious head wound," he remarks, sounding pensive. "Do you remember anything at all?"

She remembers everything clearly. She remembers the snake, the haunting, empty, soundless forest, the gem that burns a hole into her pocket. She doesn't remember the cliff, and she certainly doesn't remember the fall.

Harry shakes her head faintly. "...No. I don't think so."

Voldemort lets out an irritated breath. "What in Merlin's name possessed you to do something so stupid? How did you not see the cliff right in front of your eyes?"

Harry doesn't know what to say. He appears incredibly angry for some reason, even though Harry doesn't really think he has any reason to be. Well, she supposes he must have been in the middle of something important… yes, he's probably angry at being interrupted by a foolish little girl getting herself into trouble. Harry's gaze turns downcast. No wonder he hates her so much. She's really nothing but a nuisance.

"I'm sorry." She says, in a small voice.

"Good. You should be." He retorts, not mollified in the least.

Does she have any idea how close she came to dying?

A crackling, explosive energy had light up his spine in the midst of a meeting, stopping him mid sentence. It was not unbearably painful, but he could tell, intrinsically, that something was wrong. He had to cut the meeting short after that, sending his Death Eaters off with a clear dismissal and a glare, too caught up in his own thoughts to even remember what the hell they were talking about in the first place.

He knew, in his very bones, that something unthinkable had happened. Something irreparable.

His fear were confirmed. By Merlin, when he saw that much blood he near had a heart attack. He was absolutely certain she was dead. He could see the place where she must have lost her footing, an avalanche of upturned stone and dirt cascading down the cliff side. And he could see the place where she must have landed; right onto the large rocks around the river bed that the snakes of the forest liked to sunbathe on. She was laying face down right next to one, the rock and the ground beneath her drenched in blood, staining the water like a ribbon of crimson running down the stream. She must have hit her head on it when she fell. There was so much blood, and what could even be brain matter and bits of skull splattered across the rockface.

The sight was sickening; he would never be able to explain the peculiar feeling that overwhelmed him in that moment. He had seen such carnage before—dealt it himself, even, many times. But this was different. He felt as if he had failed, for the very first time in his life, as he stared down in horror at her limp and unmoving form. Why hadn't he kept a closer eye on her? How could he have let her wander off like that? How could he have failed her like this? He had never felt so stupid and inadequate as he had when he collapsed beside her and thought her dead. It was as if something had begun to strangle him, like his heart was about to give up on him; there was so much pain. He had never felt a pain like this before, so it was hard to identify what exactly he was feeling at first, but eventually it became crystal clear. Fear. This was what fear felt like. Fear and pain and sorrow. An endless, overwhelming, crippling sorrow.

And then she moved.

And all his fear turned to a cold, comforting, familiar anger.

He glances down at the girl in his arms again, as if to remind himself that she is still, indeed, alive.

Harry Potter lives to see another day. Her breath is shallow and near silent as he cradles her to his chest, covered in blood and as pale as the dead. Her eyes are open, but they don't seem to really see anything. It's nothing short of a miracle that she can even still open them at all. That fall should have killed her. Voldemort should be carrying a corpse home right now. But the idea of her death is unthinkable, so he refuses to think upon it.

His grip tightens around her. He cannot let this happen again.

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.

.

Harry could very clearly remember the events that led to her near death, but she couldn't remember much thereafter. She remembers Voldemort carrying her back to the manor; she remembers him being incredibly angry at her. She remembers a healer being summoned. She remembers being very sleepy, but coherent enough to consciously pull the stone out of her pocket and hide it under her pillow.

When she wakes up a few days later, she wonders if she really did die.

She lays in her enormous bed, staring blankly at the gilded, ornate ceiling above her. The more she thinks about it, the more she is convinced that it was no mere miracle.

Harry rolls over, intent on finding the gem she had hidden. She feels it stuffed in the tower of pillows behind her, and breathes a sigh of relief.

It's just as she remembered it.

"You're not normal, are you?" She whispers to it. She's not sure if she's referring to the stone, or herself.

Harry has only been awake and conscious for a total of fifteen minutes, and already she is contemplating dying again.

She wants to know.

It's the very first time she's ever felt this sort of burning determination rise within her. She has never wanted to do anything, she never cared about anything— not until now. Finally Harry understands what ambition feels like; this is what drove Tom to become the greatest wizard to ever exist; what drives Draco and Hermione to excel in school; what gets people up in the morning, day after day. This furious, endless drive and want. It gives her a strange surge of energy - excitement. This is what excitement feels like. Her breath quickens with anticipation and she has an intense urge to leap right out of this bed.

Harry reminds herself to stay calm. Death isn't going anywhere; in fact, it's inevitable.

And how exactly does she plan to die, anyhow? She doesn't think she could replicate the exact circumstances of her fall down the cliff. She remembers this part quite clearly as well. When Tom was seized with an idea so potent it drove him into an ambitious fervor, he would first grow excited, then calculated. He needed an actionable set of plans to reach his goal.

Harry frowns thoughtfully.

Well, how does one go about dying? There is the very obvious killing curse, but Harry doesn't think you can use that on yourself. She compiles a list of easily accessible access to death; drowning in the bathtub, falling from a high surface, impaling herself on a stake, like she's seen in the movies before. That's a little too ambitious, though. She vows to steal some kitchen knives from the house elves to hide in her room; undoubtedly those will be useful in this endeavor as well.

But first, the bathtub.

.

.

At first, Harry isn't entirely sure it worked.

As far as she can tell, she is still in the bathtub, and nothing seems to have changed. Frowning, she rises from the now lukewarm water, and reaches for one of the lush robes hanging on the wall, tying it around herself. Her hair is still soaking wet, leaving a trail of water in her wake. The marble tile feels cold underneath her toes. She enters her room, looking around. It must be near dusk, judging by the light. Her bed is still unmade, a pillow upturned from her haste to get out of bed.

The house is as silent as ever as she traverses through the empty halls. She looks around, wondering if she should try calling for Tom. She dismisses the idea immediately.

She reaches into the robe pocket, examining the stone once again. Perhaps she needs to return to where she had found it - although she isn't entirely sure how to do so. She doesn't even know how she had found her way into that not-world and that not-forest from before. The snake, she remembers. The snake had led her there. Harry frowns; but how will she find the snake?

At any rate she descends down the palatial staircase, through the cavernous ballroom, and towards the looming arched doors to the patio outside. Harry frowns, looking around. The fountains are all on, water shimmering in the dying embers of light. When Harry inspects them closer, feeling as if something is amiss.

She stares down at her reflection in the rippling water, frowning down at herself. She doesn't feel quite right, but she doesn't know why. Is this just wishful thinking, or is there really something different about her? About the world around her?

Frown deepening, she looks up. The stars are all where they're supposed to be. The sun is setting. The moon is ascending into the darkened sky.

Then Harry's eyes widen, and she draws her gaze back down to earth, whipping her head around.

Nothing.

No fairies; no water sprites; no birds chirping in the distance, no crickets crying out into the night. She can't even hear the rushing sprinkle of water from the fountain right in front of her.

Harry blinks, stunned.

She really did it, then?

She's really dead?

She finds herself moving in a daze. She's not sure where her feet are taking her – she is surprised they can take her anywhere at all. It appears as if she hasn't really left at all, as if she's in the same place she started at, even though there is a feeling of wrongness that overtakes her at the mere thought. She feels the stone in her pocket once again, as if reminding herself it is there. That it is real.

But is it real? Is any of this real? If Harry is really dead, is this what the afterworld is like?

When she finally emerges from her pensive thoughts, she finds herself standing in front of a familiar gravestone.

Tom Riddle Senior.

The grim reaper is still on his perch, still as stone. His eyes are hollow and devoid of life, but Harry shivers as she looks into them anyway. She tears her gaze away, focusing on the words etched into the tombstone.

"Tom Riddle Senior?" She calls, hesitantly. "… Are you there?"

No one answers her.

Harry shifts her weight uneasily, growing wary. Just where is she, exactly? Is there anyone else here, at all?

"Is anyone there?"

At first, Harry thinks she's the one who says it. Then she realizes her mouth didn't move.

She jerks upright, looking around.

"I don't know," she replies, at length. "Is anyone there?"

To her surprise, a figure peers out from the other side of Tom Riddle Sr.'s gravestone.

Harry blinks.

It's a ghost.

"A ghost?" She says, aloud this time. The ghost nods, perhaps a bit miserably.

The phantom rises over the grave, passing through it to hover near Harry. Upon closer inspection Harry can see that the ghost is a woman—a very pitiful looking woman, plain and small.

"You can see me?" The ghost whispers shakily, with big, hopeful eyes.

Harry nods. "Well… yes." Is that not obvious?

But the ghost looks so surprised. Perhaps this ghost has just never seen others? Maybe she is a new ghost, who has been wandering about waiting for someone to come.

"My name is Merope," the ghost introduces, perhaps a bit breathlessly. "Merope—… Merope Riddle." She manages to get out, with some difficulty.

"Riddle?" Harry repeats, surprised.

Merope nods, looking miserable once more.

"Riddle," Harry echoes, again, tone pensive. "So you're related to Tom, then? Both of them?"

The ghost nods, perhaps a bit guiltily, as she wraps her arms around her transparent form. "Yes… I am." She answers; so meek and quiet Harry can barely hear it.

She mumbles something Harry doesn't catch, all but hunched in on herself.

Harry frowns, leaning closer. "What did you say?"

"Mother…" The ghost breathes, through shaking lips. "I am his mother…"

Harry rears back in shock. "Mother? Whose mother? Tom Riddle Sr.'s?" The ghost shakes her head vehemently. Harry stares at her, stunned. She swallows with difficulty. "No—you're Tom's mother."

That would make sense why she is here, haunting the Riddle graveyard. She must have been married to Tom Riddle Sr. She's Tom's mother. Lord Voldemort's mother. Harry can't help but blatantly stare at the ghost, incredulous. This is Tom's mother? This pathetic, sorrowful creature? How can that be?

"I see." Harry manages to say, after a beat, composing herself once again. "Well, my name is—

"Oh, I know very well who you are," Merope rushes to say.

Harry pauses. "You do?"

"Oh, yes." The ghost nods readily – eagerly, even. "I've watched you this whole time, ever since you arrived here. I was quite curious, you know, when I saw a young girl living in the manor."

Harry eyes her warily. "Huh." She replies, vaguely.

Merope frowns curiously. "You come to this graveyard very often, I've noticed. But you've never noticed me before."

Harry nods. "Well, I've been trying to die, you see, so I think that's brought me closer to death. Maybe that's why you can see me."

Merope all but flies at her. "What?!" She gasps loudly. "Dying? What do you mean?"

"You know. Like death. If you're a ghost, you must have experienced it before." Harry points out.

"Yes but – but why would you want to?" Merope replies, perplexed.

Harry shrugs. "Why not?"

"You can't die," the ghost whispers, frantic and fretful.

Harry spares her a curious glance. "Why not?"

The tiny slip of a woman wrings her hands nervously, her big eyes full of haunting regret.

Harry has all the time in the world, so she leans situates herself comfortably on the gravestone, back against the grim reaper's scythe, and waits.

The ghost flutters around her, looking so small and sad and pathetic Harry almost feels bad for her. Finally she stops in front of Harry's perch, turning those big eyes towards her. They stare in different directions, but that is meaningless to a ghost.

"You can't leave." She insists, urgently, with an almost crazed look in her eyes.

"Leave where?" Harry returns, confused. Harry's not going anywhere. She's certainly not about to wander into the forest again. And on the subject of that, she wonders where, exactly, she is. The scenery is familiar, but it doesn't feel right in any sense of the world.

"Leave here." Merope answers, with a hitch of breath. "Leave him."

Harry blinks.

"That's what I did," she reveals, in a whisper. Her eyes close and intangible tears roll down her cheeks. "I died. I didn't want to live anymore—so I left him. I should have stayed… and taken care of him… raised him… been there for him. But I was so tired of living. I had never had much reason to live, and far too many reasons to die." Her hands cover her face, muffling her voice.

There is a long pause.

Harry cannot help but think of herself. She has never had much reason to live.

"I was so selfish." Her voice is small and hollow.

Harry spares her an apathetic look, watching her with a clinical interest. This however does not mean she isn't taking the ghost's words seriously. It makes something very cold grow in the pit of her stomach, crawling up her spine. Is that what she's doing? Leaving him?

"He needed me and I left him." Merope cries, sobbing in earnest. "How can I call myself his mother when I left him?"

Harry doesn't show it outwardly, but she is shaken by the ghost's words. She also realizes why Merope must have lingered around; her guilt would never let her leave this plane.

"But he doesn't need me anymore," Harry points out, ever the voice of logic. "He's been resurrected. What further use does he have of me?"

Merope lowers her hands enough to peer up at Harry from behind them. She blinks once, before her expression turns surprised. "But you can't possibly believe that." She says, at length.

Harry tilts her head. "Why wouldn't I?"

"You are the only thing that matters to him," she replies, well and truly surprising Harry. The young girl's cool, impassive expression breaks into wide-eyed disbelief. "How can you not know?"

Harry scowls at her. "How would I? We don't speak to each other, and he wants nothing to do with me."

Merope sighs. "Now that's not true," her hands come up to wrap around her arms, and if possible, makes herself look even smaller. "He cares for you, you know. Very much so. I have watched him for so long…" Her eyes turn back to Harry. "I've never seen him so smitten with anything."

"S—smitten?" Harry repeats, flushing.

"He worries over you constantly." She insists, suddenly pitching forward, until she and Harry are almost nose to nose. "But he just doesn't know what to do with you. He's never cared for anyone, you see…"

Merope trails off, and then suddenly burst into tears again. "That's my fault too." She sniffles.

Harry rubs her temples; she has no idea how to deal with a sad and miserable ghost—nor is she entirely sure why this particular ghost has decided to haunt her, or what to make of her revelations.

Well whatever. Either way this ghost was wrong. She didn't understand Harry and Voldemort's relationship, not at all. She was mistaken. Harry was meaningless to the Dark Lord— she could see it in his eyes the moment he returned to his true self and stared at her with those cold, impassive red eyes. That was the moment Harry realized that she was really nothing to the Dark Lord after all; just another pawn to use and discard once its usefulness has expired.

"Why don't you just tell him all this?" Harry suggests, exasperated, deciding to ignore Merope's obviously erroneous lapses in judgment. "Maybe if you explain this all to him, you wouldn't feel so bad about it that you haunt the living world out of regret."

Merope peers up at her from behind her fingertips. "But Harry," she starts, blinking. "I can't."

Harry frowns. "Why not?"

Her eyes are big and owlish. "No one can see me but you."

That would explain why Harry has never met her before, despite her many trips to the graveyard.

This gives Harry pause. "But you're a ghost, aren't you?" She and the rest of the students have no trouble seeing the Bloody Baron chase Peeves the Poltergeist down the corridors once a fortnight. She had assumed everyone could see ghosts.

"A ghost?" Merope frowns, thoughtfully. "Well I—I suppose so. Not as you think, though. Ghosts are usually an imprint of a person, left in the living world. We're not in the living world, though."

"So you're not an imprint," Harry realizes. "You really are Merope."

She nods her head sadly.

Harry looks around, blankly. "Am I really dead, then?"

Merope stares at her, horrified. "No." She breathes, eyes wide with panic. "No, no, no! No, that can't be true. Please, please let it not be true…"

She bursts into muffled sobs again, which doesn't help the situation at all.

Harry sighs gustily. "I'm pretty sure I'm dead as well," she insists, looking around. This looks just like the graveyard she remembers, though. "That's probably why I can see you. Where are we, anyway?"

Merope isn't really listening to her. She has broken down into tears, covering her face in her hands. "Oh Tom," she sobs. "My poor baby… I'm so sorry..."

"Oh, wait, no. Please don't…" Harry sighs again, realizing it is a lost cause to even attempt to console the ghost.

The ghost sinks to the ground, and Harry quite honestly contemplates just leaving her. There is no real cause for concern— Harry has died once, what does it matter if she dies again?

Except a chilling thought occurs to Harry then.

She has died before. And she knows how that happened. Death is easy to find— but how did she return? What made her open her eyes as she lay strewn across the riverbed? Harry sucks in a breath. How does she return? She has absolutely no idea. And a deeper part of her wonders if she really wants to return at all. Why would she want to return to a world that has no meaning to her?

Panicking never helps anything, although clearly no one has ever told Merope that.

Harry ignores the distraught ghost in favor of her own increasing alarm. She fishes the stone out of her pocket. She wonders if it has anything to do with it. Is it a charm of some sort?

Harry fingers it carefully, frowning as she stares down at it. It glints enticingly. Finally, Harry raises the stone up again to her eye.

Everything vanishes.

She opens her eyes, bolting upright. The water is very cold against her chilled skin. When she stumbles out of the tub, she realizes her lips have gone blue, and her face has lost all its color. It starts to return as she stares at herself blankly for some amount of time, but it is still nowhere near her usual pallor.

She touches her lips. They are still cold.

As cold as the dead.

So she really died, then?

She looks down at the adder stone, idly rubbing it against her thumb. She thinks she's supposed to be scared right now. Frightened. Confused. Fearful. Harry knows enough about Death to know most people are afraid of it— the Dark Lord most of all. But Harry is not scared. No, all Harry felt about her passing was pure relief. Her subsequent return to the world of the living, however, was accompanied by a resigned sense of misery.

She really did die.

Harry looks down at her hands, fingers wrinkly from so long submerged. Was that real? Did she truly die? She looks around, still feeling out of sorts, lost in her own skin. She sinks to the ground and curls in on herself, forehead resting against her knees. The soaked, white linen of her nightgown drifts around her, glowing hair sliding wet off her bare shoulders, floating in curls around her. She still feels as cold as death; even as her heart restarts its grueling, endless beating; even as she sits in a slice of sunlight in the middle of summer, hair and body long since dried.

She has a feeling she will never feel warm again.

But as she sits on the floor, sunlight streaming in from the wide open windows, she wonders if she's ever felt warm at all. It was always cold and drafty in the cupboard under the stairs; sunlight and warmth were foreign things to her. She unwillingly remembers the first time Tom showed her magic. Her eyes slip shut. That was what warmth felt like; something overwhelming flushing through her, from the tips to her fingers to the center of her heart. The same feeling that washed over her at the sound of Tom's voice, the way he could make anything sound beautiful, make anything interesting, just with the way he said words.

Harry's fingers fist into the soft material of her gown; she grits her teeth, squeezing her eyes shut.

She doesn't need warmth. She has always lived in the cold, anyway.

.

.

.

Harry leaves the dark lord, but not in the way Merope thinks she will.

Summer comes to a close. Harry has not seen the dark lord since the day she died on the river bank.

She keeps the stone with her at all times, winding a silver chain through it to keep it close against her neck. Her fingers always reach up to touch it, as if pulled by some foreign force. She yearns to feel it again; that beautiful, encompassing emptiness. She doesn't dare though. The dark lord all but put her on house arrest after her first incident— she has no idea what drastic measures he'll take if it happens again. Or rather, if he finds out it happened again.

She spends the rest of the summer lurking about the halls, keeping out of sight, as if she really was a wraith haunting the world of the living. Despite all the time in near proximity of him, she doesn't even see a glance of him. She can't help but wonder if it's intentional. Then she reminds herself it doesn't matter if it is, anyway.

Finally, the day comes. She has mail ordered all her books to the manor; packed up all her things and gotten dressed in her school robes. Her trunk is by her side as she stands listless and alone in the cavernous entry hall. She looks around, wondering if she should just leave. Perhaps she should find a way to call a car?

Then she hears footsteps from behind her.

The girl feels awkward and caught off-guard to see the imposing form of the dark lord strolling down the grand staircase and into the entryway, where Harry is standing with her bags all packed up. Summer has come to a close, and she's not quite sure how she feels about returning to Hogwarts—unsurprisingly ambivalent, but also a little excited. She has a feeling she'll be spending a lot of time holed up in the library this term, researching this new death development. At the very least, it's enough to keep her thoughts away from Tom, and the man he has become.

That man is now striding towards Harry in a way that makes her want to shrink back into the wallpaper.

"Harry," he intones, as he comes to a halt in front of her.

Harry dips her head wordlessly.

"You're off to school then?" His tone is impossible to read.

Harry nods again. "… I told Draco I would meet him at platform nine and three-quarters half past nine."

Voldemort stares at her for an uncomfortable amount of time, to the point Harry even wonders if he had heard her. Finally he seems to surface from his thoughts. "Ah, yes, the Malfoy's. On the subject of them, you will be staying with them from now on."

Harry blinks at him in a long moment of silence, uncomprehending.

"…What?"

"Obviously you will be at Hogwarts for the next few months," Voldemort continues as if he hadn't heard her, "but for the holidays thereafter Narcissa and Lucius have kindly offered to take you in."

Harry is still staring at him blankly. "Oh." Her stomach drops.

"Draco will be ecstatic to tell you all about it, I'm sure," the dark lord adds drily.

Harry looks away, finding it a bit hard to focus.

"I see." She finally says, stoically.

Voldemort studies her impassive features, frowning. "You and Draco get along, do you not?" He asks, perplexed by her behavior. He had assumed she would be far more amenable to the idea of staying with a school friend for the holidays, rather than here by herself in the manor.

Harry merely nods.

Voldemort frowns further. Perhaps the two have had a typical melodramatic pre-pubescent falling out of some sorts. Well, he's sure they'll have made up by the time the Hogwarts Express has departed, as children are won't to do.

At any rate, this is for the best.

It's better for Harry not to get too attached to him. Some distance will do her good – do them both good, really. It is also better for him not to get attached to her. He can privately admit that it… pains him to do this, but all the same it must be done. He cannot allow this weakness to continue, this parasitic residual emotion from the small part of his soul that has lived with her for the last twelve years. And after the chilling events of this summer, he doesn't think he's fit to be anything even approaching her guardian, either. She almost died once on his watch. He honestly doesn't trust himself to see to it that it doesn't happen a second time.

"Good," he says, deciding to ignore her odd mood. "The carriage should be waiting for you outside. Do well in your studies."

This is for the best, really. Harry is better off without him, and he is better off without this odd and incomprehensible infliction that pains him whenever she is around. Her injury this summer only proved to him just how deeply this ailment ran within him; it was a debilitating pestilence, and he must rid himself of it. He should not feel so deeply for anything, and it was clear from the overpowering fear he held that day that he feels far too deeply for her.

Harry will be better off with the Malfoy's, who are better equipped to raise a child of her age, considering they have one of their own.

The girl's expression is impossible to read; it is as if nothing exists behind that veneer of vibrant green. He knows firsthand that isn't true at all, that inside her is a beautiful, endless wellspring of pure, intoxicating emotion-

She blinks, turning away. "Thank you. I will be sure to do so." Harry replies, tonelessly. Then she walks out the door, without looking back.

.

.

.

BOOK II: ACT III

THE LOST, THE LADY, AND THE LAND OF TWILIGHT

Once upon a time there was a little girl named Harriet Rose Potter. She had nothing to live for but no real reason to die.

One day, that all changed. Suddenly her life had purpose, and she learned the joy and inspiration that came from being alive, she learned all the many reasons why people loved, smiled, and existed.

But she also learned how painful life could be. How oddly empty it became without purpose or meaning. What a waste it was to exist for nothing.

So Harriet Rose Potter does not find meaning in life, but she certainly does find meaning in death.

Harry feels as if she's drifting away, even as she sits in the middle of Charms, wedged between Draco and Hermione, who still refuse to talk to each other but also refuse to move away from her. Harry doesn't care what they argue about, in the same way she doesn't care about anything at all.

She goes through the motions anyhow, maintaining top grades for her year, excelling in everything she does. Perhaps there is some small part of her that wants to continue on this way, in memory of the man who refused to let her be anything less than her very best. Tom would not be pleased to see Harry skipping classes and lying out in the grass staring at the sky all day, even though that's what Harry would very much like to do. Tom is gone, but Harry can't stop herself from trying for him anyway.

Harry hasn't attempted to die yet, although the thought is tempting.

She thinks about death all the time, mainly because nothing holds her interest quite like death does.

When she thinks back on her time amongst the dead, she feels curious and invigorated. Despite dying twice, Harry really doesn't understand what it means to be dead. Aunt Petunia use to degrade and belittle her constantly, calling her a heathen that would end up in hell. Hell, as Harry knew it, was where dead people go if they can't go to Heaven. Heaven, supposedly, is up in the sky somewhere in a place full of sunlight and angels. Hell, meanwhile, is somewhere with no sky, trapped in fire and brimstone.

From what Harry can tell, what awaits her after death isn't all that much different than what she sees now. But Harry can't be entirely sure. After all, she didn't leave much time for exploration in either of her adventures into the land of the dead. Perhaps there was something beyond the forest, something more than just the manor and the ghost haunting its grounds.

Between Draco and Hermione though, Harry rarely has enough time to herself to think straight, let alone contemplate suicide. She decides to try it again during Halloween; it's the only time everyone in the castle— including Draco and Hermione— will be preoccupied enough to leave Harry well enough alone.

In the interim, Harry decides to consult some subject matter experts.

"Death?" The Bloody Baron repeats, his translucent form hovering a few feet above her.

Harry nods. "Yes. I wanted to ask you about death."

The idea struck Harry as Draco loudly and intermittently complained about Peeves nearly taking his head off with a suit of armor at breakfast that morning. If she wanted to know more about death, she should probably ask people who already died— and Hogwarts had plenty of those, starting with the patron ghost of Slytherin House.

The resident ghost of Slytherin looks somber as he digests this. "Death, hm?" He mutters, more to himself than to Harry.

It occurs to Harry that death is a rather personal thing, and perhaps the baron doesn't want Harry to know.

"It's okay if you don't want to speak of it," Harry adds hastily, tone apologetic. "I don't want to upset you, or anything."

"No— no, not at all." The baron assures her. "I've been dead for a thousand years, my dear. Believe me when I say I'm long over it."

Harry blinks. "But then why do you continue to haunt the living?" She asks curiously.

"That's not to say there aren't things I regret." The Bloody Baron answers. He looks a bit conflicted. "I was a very hot-tempered man, Miss Potter. There are quite a few things I regret."

Harry pauses, tilting her head. Perhaps the Bloody Baron was hot-tempered in life, but in death he appears to be the most level-headed and responsible of all the Hogwarts ghosts, at least in her humble opinion.

"And so that's why you stay here, in Hogwarts?" Harry prods.

"Yes, in a way." The Baron answers, enigmatic and distant. Then he shakes his head. "But in a way, I am not here at all. I don't exist in the land of the living, as you do."

"But you're right here." Harry points out.

"Yes, yes, and we ghosts can even interact with your world to a degree— as I'm sure Peeves has taught the whole school." Yes, Peeves' antics with dropping furniture and miscellaneou statues on unsuspecting students was quite infamous, even if it had never happened to Harry in particular. The Baron gestures to himself. "But as you can see, we are not all there, either."

Harry purses her lips, folding her arms as she leans back against the stone wall behind her. "So— death. What happens after death?"

"Well, I wouldn't know, Miss Potter." The Baron returns wryly. "As I am a mere imprint of a soul that is long gone, lingering here in the land of twilight."

Harry stands straighter at that, dropping her arms. "The land of twilight?" She repeats; she's never heard that term before.

"The plane between life and death." The ghost explains. "It is neither life, nor death. But let me caution you, child, it is no place you want to stay for long in."

Harry wants to ask why he decided to leave an imprint of his own soul in it, before deciding that might be a rather tactless thing to ask. She could only assume whatever guilt and regret he feels was enough to make him stay.

"And this land, this is where you go when you are no longer alive, but not quite dead?" Harry clarifies.

The Baron nods. "It is a sad and desolate place, full of lost, wandering spirits unable to rest, nothing but pain and suffering to accompany them."

Harry isn't quite sure she agrees. Last time she was there it actually seemed rather nice. Then again, Harry supposes if she had to spend an eternity there she could certainly see how it would be painful and sad.

"But I don't understand." Harry's brow furrows. "If it is so sad and desolate, why do you choose to stay? Why would anyone?"

"Regret," he is quick to reply. "Sadness. Anger, hate, fear, longing— there are many reasons souls stay in this purgatory. Or rather, there are many reasons why restless souls can't leave. I daresay no one ever chooses to stay here; there is always something horrible keeping them from leaving."

Harry thinks this over carefully. She supposes this is where Voldemort was, before Harry resurrected him. She remembers him saying that his other self must be experiencing a pain beyond belief, being a soul torn from its body, forced to remain between planes.

This is also where she was, the last time she died. Merope said she couldn't bring herself to truly cross over due to overwhelming guilt and regret over her son.

"How do you leave, then?" She finds herself asking.

The Bloody Baron ponders this. "I believe it is a choice. One must merely… let go of all they used to be."

Harry nods in understanding, brow furrowed in thought.

"I see. Well, thank you for explaining it to me." Harry says at length, after she's mulled this over in silence long enough.

Oddly enough, the Bloody Baron looks almost kind as he hovers above her. Perhaps he is even smiling. "Thank you for even bothering to ask. Most students come and go without ever thinking twice of us ghosts. Say, I suppose Nicholas hasn't yet invited you to his death day party, has he?"

"Death day party?" Harry repeats, surprised.

"The celebration of his day of death. It's on Halloween; you should come. He would be delighted to have someone among the living there to celebrate with him."

"Halloween," Harry's look turns crestfallen. "I'm not sure if I can. I'm very sorry." She apologizes sincerely; truly she would have loved to attend, if only to satisfy her curiosity, but it's the only day she has to create her own death day.

The Baron waves her apology off. "Ah, it's quite alright. He's already had five-hundred of them; if you can't come this year, there's always next year."

Harry stifles a bark of laughter. That's a lot of celebrations. "Next year, then." She agrees.

That is, if Harry isn't dead again by then.

.

.

.

Halloween comes, and Harry makes sure she is prepared for it.

She makes various trips to the Forbidden Forest underneath the cover of her invisibility cloak, in search of various potions ingredients. There were many potions that cause death, and Tom made sure Harry knew how to brew each and every one. But brewing such poisonous potions such as the moonseed poison, or the angel's trumpet drought would be time consuming and likely to draw the unwanted attention of a certain resident potion's master. Luckily enough, the key ingredients to both happened to grow naturally in the dank undergrowth of the forest, so Harry got her deadly poisons anyhow.

She feigns sickness the day before, so when she complains of a headache and tiredness the day after no one is surprised to hear it. She assures a worried Hermione that she doesn't need to go to the hospital wing, she just needs to lie down, and Hermione should go to the feast without her. Draco pretends not to be concerned, but is just as difficult to persuade. Afterwards she spells the curtains of her bed shut, and takes out a handful of moonseeds.

She tries to bite the first one, and promptly near vomits it out. Afterwards she summons a glass of water and gulps them down.

Then she lays down on her bed, and stares blankly at the ceiling.

The effects are almost immediate. She feels her body begin to numb, as her head clouds with dizziness and nausea. When she tries to lift her arm, she finds herself incapable of even lifting a finger.

It's as she's fighting to even blink her eyes open that she decides she rather likes death by moonseed. She makes a mental note to collect more at her earliest convenience, before her eyes slip shut for the final time.

And then, she lets go.

.

.

.

Harry's eyes flutter open.

She is warm and cozy under a thick blanket; sunshine pools in from a crack in her curtains. She rolls fully onto her back, and blinks wet, confused eyes to the ceiling.

Where is she?

Who is she?

It takes a long moment before her memory starts to return to her. The first thing she does is reach for her neck, where her adder stone is tied by a silver chain. She sighs in relief when she feels the familiar, smooth form.

Then she looks around, and wonders where she is.

Not the land of twilight, she thinks.

She looks down at her hands, which seem familiar enough. Then she pulls down the covers to examine her knees, then her toes. They don't look any different— although the clothes she is wearing are wholly unfamiliar. A pair of shorts she doesn't think she owns, and a plain shirt. The bed she stumbles out of is also unfamiliar; the room she studies around her equally as foreign.

When she looks at the mirror above the vanity, she sees her own reflection looking back at her.

There's a knock on the door.

Harry turns around, startled.

A beautiful woman with long, swooping red curls pokes her head into the room. Her eyes are a striking, sparkling green, and the smile she sends Harry's way makes Harry's heart twist.

"Harry, darling, you're awake." The woman remarks, warmly, "Breakfast is ready downstairs."

Then she softly shuts the door, leaving Harry staring wide-eyed and stunned.

Harry is beyond confused. She has no idea what's going on.

She opens the door and finds her way down the stairs anyhow.

The house is not big, but it's not small. It doesn't remind her at all of Riddle manor, nor of Malfoy manor. It's more similar to Number 4 Privet Dr., but it's far warmer and cozier than Aunt Petunia's immaculate house. Harry feels like another person as she stiffly walks down the hall, into the open kitchen full of sunlight.

The redheaded woman is by the stove, scraping the last of the eggs off the pan and onto a plate.

A man with dark, untamable hair sits in one of the four chairs around a modest wooden table in front of her, back turned, reading the newspaper.

Numb with disbelief, Harry stands at the threshold for some time. The woman looks up, catching her there in the doorway. "What's wrong, Harry? Sit down."

Harry feels like a marionette as she pulls out a chair, as if her body is no longer her own, and she is no longer herself. The woman sets down a basket of toast and a plate of eggs. Harry reluctantly sets a loaf of bread on her plate, but makes no move to touch it. Afterwards the woman seats herself, humming a little tune under her breath. The man to Harry's side flips a page in the newspaper.

"Anything interesting, darling?" The redhead asks the man, smiling over her tea cup.

"Hmm," the man says, noncommittally.

Harry notices he's reading a newspaper, but the words are all disfigured and the pictures are vague and blurry. He reaches for his own cup of tea, turning the page again.

The woman's attention turns to her. "Harry," she says, sounding a bit disapproving. "You don't want any eggs?"

Harry stares at her with big eyes, a lot like a deer in headlights. Her mouth is in a thin line, as she watches the woman across from her. Her smile, her shining green eyes.

"Mum," she says, finally.

Her mother smiles wider. "My, my, I see someone's not quite awake yet." She teases, as she sets her cup down. "Eggs, Harry dear, do you want any? You haven't even touched your toast."

Harry only continues to stare at her with wide eyes.

"I don't want any." She manages to say, finally.

"You're not hungry?" Lily sounds concerned. "Are you feeling alright? You seem very out of sorts this morning."

"Well, I…"

"Harry, it's not good to skip meals." The man sets down his newspaper, revealing a visage of a middle-aged man with glasses and hazel eyes. Her father.

She stares wildly at the both of them, gaze darting back and forth.

"Who are you people?" She scoots back in her chair, gripping the sides of her chair and wishing for her wand.

"What do you mean, Harry?" Her mother frowns, concern growing into true worry.

"You're not real," Harry says, frantically. She jumps to her feet. "You're dead. Both of you."

Lily looks up at her with alarm. "Harry—

Harry ignores her, darting out of the kitchen and down the hall. She doesn't know where she's going; she's never been in this house before. All the same she sees the front door and wrenches it open, sprinting into the open air outside.

There is sunlight but no sun. The house is surrounded by a modest, manicured lawn and afterwards a ring of trees that remind Harry of the trees she saw that day in the forest. She looks at them and feels wary. They are cloying and ominous, but they remain far past the open field, unmoving, as if in wait. As if there is something dark inside them, but as long as Harry stays here in the rolling fields, she is safe. There is only one tree in the yard, an old oak with a thick, gnarled branch low enough to tie a swing set to.

And there, in the washed out sky, is a large, domineering dome taking up most of the horizon.

Earth, she thinks, watching clouds drift over its blue surface.

Lily catches up to her, barreling out the door behind her. "Harry," she cries, worried.

"I see..." Harry takes a long, relieved breath, closing her eyes. "I'm dead, aren't I?"

She remembers, now. The moonseeds, the heady magic of Samhain.

Lily treads towards her cautiously.

Harry turns to her as she approaches, scrutinizing the woman as she stops just at Harry's side. She is so lovely; Harry looks an awful lot like her, now that she truly has time to compare. The woman's hair is much darker than her own, almost auburn while Harry's can sometimes be considered blonde depending on the lighting. Her face is rounder, more heart-shaped, where Harry's is all sharp angles. Lily looks back at her, blinking familiar eyes; she seems to be observing Harry just as deeply. She smiles. "You look so much like me," she observes, as if reading Harry's thoughts.

She breaks out into a grin, ruffling Harry's long vermillion curls. "Except for this hair!" She crows, delighted, running her fingers through the girl's thick mane. "This is certainly your father's hair. Have you even picked up a comb at all?"

Harry doesn't have any discernible reaction to this at all, staring at the woman with that same intense, but inscrutable look she's had on all morning.

Eventually, Lily's smile disappears. She drops her hand.

Harry frowns. "Are you real?"

Lily tilts her head, as if in thought. "I'm as real as you want me to be," she says after a beat.

Harry isn't really sure what to make of that.

She looks back at the sky, and the planet far above her.

How real does she want this to be?

What is real, anyway? What makes something real, as opposed to fake? If Harry wants this to be real— then in a way, isn't it real? If Harry wants this woman beside her to really be her mother, is there any reason she can't be? Reality is what you make out of it.

Harry touches the stone at her neck.

"Is it…" She looks down. "It is alright if I stay awhile?"

Lily looks surprised.

Then she smiles warmly, wrapping her arms around Harry. The girl stiffens in surprise, wholly unused to such a level of physical contact. And yet, she doesn't want to shy away from this woman's embrace, as if a part of her recognizes the arms around her from a long, long time ago; a distant memory of warmth and love.

"You can stay as long as you like, Harry." She murmurs into her daughter's hair. Harry leans against her.

"Okay," she says.