Revised version of In Death's Hands. Hope you like it, despite it being a short chapter. There is more to come, don't worry.

I do not own Harry Potter.

ONE

Hari wished for death to take her in its arms away from this pain that was threatening to drive her over the edge. She wanted to be with her parents, Sirius, Cedric, and now her first friend, Hedwig. Tears obscured her vision of her enemy's serpentine face, twisted in agony and crimson eyes wide in disbelief, as she felt her heart constrict tighter and tighter. She choked, her lungs full of her life's essence, and cried out, a strange sensation spreading from the tips of her fingers and toes to the rest of her limbs. She struggled to lift her head to face Voldemort and quickly flashed him a grin.

"Looks like it's the end of the line...," she said. And if it was, then what better way to end this then for her to drag him down into the Underworld with her?

"P...Potter...," he croaked back and, finally, collapsed. He made no movement; his chest no longer rose or fell. It fell silent.

Silence.

She didn't like it; not one bit.

Another burst of agonizing pain came, this time it was her heart, and for a moment, all she saw was black. Hari Potter, not for the first time, felt fear. She was going to die. She wasn't going to live past seventeen. She would never finish her last year of Hogwarts. She would never get to be an auror or even get the chance to fall in love and get married. She would never have a family of her own.

She was going to die and she didn't even know why she was dying after having finally fulfilled the prophecy.

All she did was defeat the Dark Lord Voldemort a second and final time when this began.

Then, everything came back into focus and the darkness was dispelled. All she saw was the grey sky above her, smoke from the fire that consumed Hogwarts loomed overhead and there were no birds present in the sky. All she saw were witches and wizards battling on broom against the Dark Lord's followers.

She couldn't feel anything.

There was no more pain to be felt, at least she had one less thing to worry about, however odd it was.

Something out of the corner of her eye shifted, her green eyes darted over to the left but she only saw black again. She was starting to hate the color black. Hari couldn't see. Fear gripped her heart once more as footsteps from that direction moved closer and closer to her. Strong, warm arms wound around her upper body and the back of her knees, she could feel this person shift her into a more comfortable position and leaned their face close to hers. The person smelled of autumnal decay.

"I will make it all go away, Mistress."

And then Hari Potter, for the first time in a long time, felt safe in those arms smelling that peculiar scent and let the exhaustion take over.

She knew no more.

The occupants of Wool's Orphanage were well aware of what the freak was capable of and made sure to never cross his path. That was the first thing they taught the new arrivals; no one wanted the freak to damage anyone else. Lord knew what he put the other children through.

All those children had ever told the rest of them was what some deemed as their imagination, but most couldn't debunk the evidence of those encounters with the freak either. Scratches, unexplainable instances of injury like one of their own, a boy, sudden tumble down the stairs, and a rabbit corpse left hanging from the rafters were among the evidence they had on freak. Though, the freak was never caught in these acts of violence and cruelty, the staff and children of the Orphanage knew he had done it.

There was something about that freak that didn't feel right and anyone with enough common sense knew this as all.

Until The Man came that is.

The Man was thin, too thin to be normal, with too pale skin and ink black hair that was slicked back without a single hair out of place. His eyes were a milky, crystal blue; unnatural. It gave them the impression of a dead man walking amongst the living, having just escaped his coffin after the funeral had just finished. A couple of the children ducked behind their older counterparts as he made eye contact with him. He smiled.

He was also rather short for a man at 5"6 with gaunt features that had them wondering if he were ill. Dressed in a dark suit and carrying a cane with its handle in the shape of a skull, The Man stepped through the threshold of Wool's Orphanage with the hint of a smile on his thin lips.

His black, polished loafers clacked against the wooden floor towards Mrs. Cole's office as he pointedly ignored the children and teenagers gathering around the doorway of the playroom to give three sharp raps on the matron's mint colored door. It didn't take long for Mrs. Cole to rip the door open with a sharp "WHAT IS IT?" and the orphans were quite surprised to see the old bat's face shift from enraged to surprise when The Man merely smiled disarmingly at her.

"Good morning, Ma'am." he said as he held out a gloved hand to the head of the orphanage, "I hope I did not catch you at a bad time. My name is Marvin Peverell and I am interested in adopting one of your charges."

This seemed to erase all traces of Mrs. Cole's previously awful mood as she eagerly reached out and grabbed The Man's gloved hand, shaking it vigorously all the while saying, "Yes, yes, of course! My name is Elizabeth Cole. Please wait here a moment while I round up the children! It will be easier to line them up for you to pick-!"

The Man held up his gloved hand causing Mrs. Cole to freeze mid-sentence as a soft chuckle escaped from him as he interjected, "I am terribly sorry to have misled you so, Miss Cole, but I already have one child in mind."

Mrs. Cole blushed as she took a moment to collect herself as she turned to face Marvin Peverell, "Oh, I, well do forgive me. I was just rather excited, you see, I very much want for these children be adopted into a nice family that I..."

"It is fine," The Man said, "I was not very specific of my intentions to begin with. Your assumption would have been correct in any other situation."

Mrs. Cole ushered for Mr. Peverell to enter her office, the matron quickly shutting the door after glaring at the children and teens crowding the playroom's entry way. All they could hear was muffled conversation after that. Then the sound of Mrs. Cole choking on her tea after a brief moment of silence when The Man answered what was (presumably) Mrs. Cole's question followed by her coughing. There was more muffled conversation, the opening and shutting of a file cabinet, and the rustling of papers being passed back and forth before both adults exited the office with Mr. Peverell smiling in satisfaction and Mrs. Cole grimacing. The other residents of Wool's scurried away from the entranceway to their proper places scattered around the playroom as they looked back at the duo standing in the doorway to the head matron's office.

"I'll return with the Boy," was all she said as she hurried down the hall. They all gaped out at the open door of their playroom in shock, wondering if The Man was insane AND stupid. They could hear her stomping up the creaky steps to the rooms above. The Man merely headed for the bench outside of the office with papers folded neatly in half in his right hand and sat there, waiting patiently with that ever present ghost of a smile on his lips.

...

Tom Marvolo Riddle, in all of his years living under the oppressive roof of Wool's Orphanage, has never been on any of the 'prospective parents arriving on Wool's doorstep list of children to select from' or even experienced the joy of being adopted by anyone for that matter. He was sixteen, going-on-seventeen, and carried an aura about him that seemed to ward off muggles. He had long ago squashed down the feelings of hurt and betrayal that came with each subtle and not-so-subtle way the adult muggles went about avoiding him at a young age. He had even destroyed his hopes of one day being adopted by any muggle, in fact.

But, never had he counted on a magical whisking him away from this place.

The strong and foreign dark magic was what first alerted Tom to his presence as he drew closer and closer with every step he took towards Tom's room. That dark magic brushed against his own, unfamiliar and yet familiar in a sense that left the young wizard wondering where he knew it from and just what this man was capable of.

So, when The Man and Mrs. Cole entered the room, Tom fought to keep his neutral mask on as he stared down at the thin, small gentleman as the severe-looking old matron curtly introduced them to each other.

Peverell.

A name he had come across not too long ago in his most recent adventure into the Chamber of Secrets to indulge in his ancestor's research.

Peverell smiled thinly back at him, walking forward to meet him at a short distance to extend his hand in greeting and Tom numbly took it, shaking it politely as he smiled back. He immediately let go of the wizard's hand and continued his inspection of the man, not minding that Peverell was doing the same. Powerful for a man of his stature, Tom allowed his magic to brush the other's and nearly brought it back in fright as he felt something similar to horcruxes surrounding him. Peverell's magic crept closer to his until it drew back as the thin man nodded with a hint of approval in his milky, pale eyes.

Mrs. Cole seemed to grow tired of this as she turned to exit the door, "I want you gone within the hour, boy. Good day, Mr. Peverell."

"Good day, Miss Cole."

The door shut with a slam as Mrs. Cole left, they could distinctly hear her stomping back down the stairs. Peverell chuckled, breaking the silence that had fallen over them as he shook his head, and began to inspect his room.

As The Man slid his Sixth year Charms book from its place in his bookshelf, Peverell said, " You ought to start packing, Tom Marvolo Riddle. You heard the woman, she wants us gone 'within the hour'."

The young wizard stood there, rooted to his spot beside his bed and asked, "What are you?"

Peverell, who had been flipping through the book, stopped his inspection and hummed. The Man merely moved on in his inspection of his bookcase's contents, having seen through the glamours placed on the tomes, and then turned to face him.

Milky eyes pierced through him as he replied, "Someone who has been chasing you for a very long time. I have been following you since the very beginning to the very end. I made the choice of allowing you to leave when you were supposed to die that very night. You failed to take this chance that I gave you to live a life full of opportunities to do good in the world, in hopes of preparing the world for my Mistress to arrive as the seventh month dies in 1980. You failed and both of you paid the ultimate price. And all because of your foolish desire to escape ME."

Tom watched as the gaunt face of Marvin Peverell morphed into something much more skeletal and gruesome, rotting flesh and empty eye sockets. His eyes widened in horror, his grip on his wand threatening to snap the yew wood into two as he brought it up in preparation of a spell as the ghastly visage of Death Himself stood before him with His hands raised in an inviting manner and a mocking grin on his skeletal face.

"It's time that you pay the debt you owe me; one that has been long overdue, Mr. Riddle. My name is Death and I want to collect."