The Darkening of Your Soul

Chapter 29

Chapter 29

Harry had never been so happy in his life they had history first thing in the morning on Mondays. He excused himself to his friends, not really giving a reason, just saying he had something urgent to take care of. Without waiting for a reply, and counting on Binns’ inability to remember what year it was, let alone knowing which individual students he was supposed to teach, Harry rushed to the Room of Requirement.

He wasn’t angry, not really. Maybe a little bit. Mostly he felt tired to the bone about having to worry about Tom and what he got up to on any given day over and over again.

Harry thought about the drawing room in Grimmauld Place while he asked the room for a place to have a private conversation and that was exactly what he got when he opened the door and slipped inside. He sank down in a leather chair, released a deep, deep sigh, ran his hands over his face and got his mirror out of his pocket.

Tom answered after half a minute or so, dressed this time, thank fuck. “Am I to assume you saw this morning’s paper?” Tom asked without a hint of concern. He seemed mildly confused about Harry’s less than enthusiastic demeanour.

“Yeah,” Harry said, having trouble finding the words to describe how he felt, or why he even felt that way in the first place. “I saw. Why, Tom?”

“Why?” Tom seemed genuinely puzzled by that question. “I thought it would wrap everything up nicely. Hitting two nifflers with one spell, very quick and clean.”

“Why did you kill her?” Harry demanded, voice hardening and sheer exhaustion finally making way for burning anger.

“Kill her?” Tom asked, head tilted as he stared at Harry. “I didn’t kill her.”

“Huh.” Harry swallowed and licked his lips. “But you just said you wrapped things up and stuff. You did this, right?”

“Of course,” Tom said agreeably. “But I didn’t kill that child-raping witch. I simply put dear Dolores under the Imperius and had her do it.”

“Tom!” Harry briefly closed his eyes, trying desperately to reign in his temper which was about to explode, and he knew that wouldn’t be productive for either of them. “Tom, that’s the same thing.”

“Is it?” Tom looked as though he’d never heard of such a ridiculous thing. “I’m telling you, my dear, that dear Dolores hardly needed any prompting to unleash the killer within. I took a close look inside her mind and I’ve rarely met a person who is so completely rotten to the core, and I include Dumbledore and Voldemort in that list.”

“Look, I don’t care what you did to Umbridge, all right?” Harry ran a frustrated hand over his face. “Feed her to a dragon, hang her from Hogwarts’ highest tower by her titties, I don’t fucking care.” Harry could practically feel his gaze burning as he glared at Tom. “But you killed my love potion stalker witch. I’m not happy about that.”

“I see,” Tom said in the sort of tone that meant he didn’t have a clue what Harry was talking about. “You somehow find it acceptable that a grown witch sends love potions to a child?”

“Of course not,” Harry spat. “But I had the Auror department handling it. I’d sent them all the evidence ages ago.”

Tom released a hollow sound of derision. “The Auror department?” Tom’s eyes narrowed and his voice gained a razor-sharp edge. “Would you like to know what they did in response to her actions, Harry dear? They sent her a strongly worded letter warning her not to do it again, after she’s been sending you love potions for years. No, don’t deny it,” Tom said, cutting Harry off when he tried to interject. “I had Severus confirm this, and Wormtail at the ministry copied every scrap of parchment pertaining to your case for me.”