Marauder's Daughter (Eventual Tom Riddle X OC)

Chapter 70: Willing Sacrifice

"That's because I trained the dork out of him." I say smugly with a shit eating grin, pride growing in me strongly. "Well, at least in battle." I add after seeing Harry trip over a piece of rubble and slam into Ron, who then flattened Hermione to the ground. "Oh that's painful to watch." 

I grimace, seeing Ron flustered and turning beat red and hovering over the fallen brunette. He kept not getting up off of her though, just shouting sputtering apologies to her. Hermione finally lost her patience and just grabbed him by the back of the neck. And right there, next to his family and with over half the hall watching them, she pulled Ron down and kissed him deeply to shut him up.

"Woohoo!" I cheer out obnoxiously while several others, mostly Ron's brothers, all wolf whistled and cheered. Shockingly, Percy was the loudest to cheer for his brother, grabbing the nearest person and bragging that he called it. 

"Ok, go get Harry before he dies from second hand embarrassment for his friends." I say between laughs to Ginny who is also doubled over with laughter. The kiss had ended and Ron was frozen like a statue as Harry lamely tried to help his friend up while Hermione buried her face in her hands to hide from the attention. 

Ginny moved quickly over to them and kicked Ron off of Hermione and then grabbed Harry and literally dipped him into a kiss of her own. While I cheered loudly for this one, none of her brothers cheered this time. And again, Percy was the shocking reaction. He stormed over and started to lecture his sister and threaten Harry before any of her other brothers could get to her. Guess he's making up for being so focused on work lately and not spending as much time with his family.

"Shut up, Perc." I walk over and shoved him over good naturedly. "But good to see you again." I add to him. He never broke off his contact and affection for his family like he did in the stories, but he's still been obsessively working with the Ministry so I haven't seen him in a minute.

I spend more time helping out before finally getting too tired and needing to head home. The soul of Voldemort was stored in my pocket since I didn't want to risk it near the diary in the pouch. I could feel the connection between us still though, the residual of the magic between us was still allowing some of his darkness to ebb into my mind, but it was low enough that I was able to brush it off. 

I left for home then with Dad, Remus heading to check on Tonks at her home, who he was now openly dating but told me he was reluctant to propose to. I just encouraged Remy to be a brave Gryffindor and grow a pair.

"What's the next step then?" Dad asks the next morning after we both crashed hard from the exhaustion of the fight. "What happens with Voldemort's soul piece? And with Tom?"

"I need to get Tom a body." I say sincerely. "A willing sacrifice, but without them knowing what it's for. Once I can get Tom into a new body, his remorse at his resurrection will be strong enough to sever his link to Voldemort. At that point, nothing will be tethering this," I pull out the vial, "To the earth. Voldemort will be sent to limbo and stay there for eternity."

"A willing sacrifice for an unknown cause?" Dad asks skeptically. "How are you going to find that?"

"By doing what I do best." I grin at him confidently. "The impossible."

I part with Dad and finally go to check in on Tom. As much as I've wanted nothing more than to see him again, I've been avoiding it. I'm not oblivious, I know exactly now what type of magic I used to overpower Voldemort when he almost took me over. It was seeing Tom almost die that snapped me to my strongest resolve. I just wasn't ready to admit it yet without him having a real chance at life. I'm still ready to admit it, even now.

"You're alive!" Tom calls out, running straight at me once we were in the realm together. He didn't seem to care at all that we couldn't touch as he threw his arms around me. They passed through me like usual, but he achingly lifted his arms to remain in a semblance of a hug around me, an action I matched as best I could in reciprocation.