The Darkening of Your Soul

Chapter 42

Chapter 42

Harry paced the sitting room of his suite, rubbing his face with a soaked handkerchief he’d conjured about a litre of tears ago. He wasn’t sure how long ago Tom had arrived and sent him from the family room so he could put Sirius back to rights but Harry had, much to his everlasting shame, burst out into rather hysterical tears the moment he’d seen Tom enter.

Harry wasn’t sure he’d ever felt as relieved as he did when his soulmate came to his rescue, especially since his mind had kept coming up with horror scenarios as he’d waited for the cavalry to arrive. What if Sirius had succeeded in dragging him to Dumbledore? What if Dumbledore had forced his way into Harry’s mind, or simply emptied half a vial of veritaserum down Harry’s throat. Everything would have been lost and Dumbledore most likely would have immediately done away with Harry right there and then after he’d extracted all the useful information from him on how to defeat Tom.

And no matter that Harry knew he was essentially immortal, and so was Tom, and Tom didn’t even have any horcruxes anymore for Dumbledore to destroy, the scenarios his mind came up with resembled much of Harry’s worst nightmares those days.

So was it any surprise he had been a little bit upset when Tom stepped through the door?

Harry sniffed and wiped a hand across his face. He’d stopped crying now, finally, but his nose was still clogged and his whole face felt swollen, his eyes especially.

How long did Tom need to deal with Sirius? Harry wasn’t even sure what Tom was doing exactly, and he wasn’t sure if he really wanted to know. Harry was sure Tom wouldn’t hurt Sirius, but he also knew that Tom probably wasn’t being too gentle while trudging through Sirius’ mind.

A soft knock sounded on the bedroom door and Harry stopped pacing at once and stared as Tom quietly entered the suite.

“Is Sirius…” Harry wasn’t sure what he was asking.

“He’s sleeping thanks to a simple charm. He’ll wake up in a couple of hours.” Tom gestured at Harry to sit down in one of the chairs in front of the fireplace.

Harry wanted nothing more than throw himself at Tom and hug him until the end of time, but Tom’s expression was guarded and calculating and Harry didn’t think this was the time to test their new physical boundaries, whatever those even were. So he sat down with a small sigh and stared at Tom quietly, hoping his soulmate was going to explain what was happening without much prompting because Harry’s mind was still in turmoil and probably not yet capable of forming many coherent sentences.

“A small word of advice,” Tom finally said as he sat down in a chair opposite Harry. “Have people sign the secrecy contract before you spill your deepest, darkest secrets.” Tom briefly held up the signed secrecy contract in his hand before tucking it away in his trousers.

“Er…” Harry closed his mouth while his cheeks burned, feeling very foolish indeed he hadn’t thought of that. It would have saved him some genuine panic, not to mention if he’d done that and Sirius had managed to drag him before Dumbledore, he wouldn’t have been able to actually say why he was there or what he’d discovered about Harry and Voldemort.

“Sometimes I forget how young you actually are,” Tom said, expression relaxing into a fond smile while his eyes crinkled with amusement.

Harry huffed in sudden irritation. “I’m not actually eleven.”

“I know, my dear. But you are only eighteen,” Tom held up a hand when Harry started to protest, “Yes, I know you’re technically an adult, but take it from someone who’s just a few years older than you that you’re still very young and you still have so much to learn about life.”