Sadly, this story won’t be finished before HPB. That’s life...
This story was betaed by rambkowalczyk. Thank you!
Chapter Twenty “ Three : Severing the Ties
England
1969
The daylight was already weakening in the west. It was December and the fields of Yorkshire were coated in hoarfrost and ice. Leafless skeletons of trees grew into the grey sky.
Tom Riddle was walking, he wanted to savour the last hours of this stage of his life. Before the end of this day, he would cease to be Tom Riddle. He didn’t have a name yet for what he was to become, but it stood clear in front of his eyes. Perfection. Immortality. Power.
He wore a hooded cloak, but not against the cold. It hid a head bald and pale as a skull and eyes the colour of thick blood. All of his physical transformations were done. The blood of serpents rendered him immune against all poisons and illnesses. The heart of a serpent god kept him from ageing. The skin of the basilisk made his body nearly impervious to magic and spells. He came the closest to immortality and invulnerability any human had ever achieved. The only kind of beings that were closer to immortality were demons, beings whose life essences weren’t held together by a soul but simply by magic and who therefore couldn’t die, as you needed a soul to be killed by the killing curse. And Tom had found a way to become that kind of being.
Many complex and painful magical rituals had copied every part of his personality, his memories and his mind, so that now he possessed every part of himself twice, except for his soul, which couldn’t be copied. It was a process not unlike the creation of his diary, but much more refined. As soon as he triggered the process, the two copies would split, creating two separate versions of himself, one with a soul to hold the essence together and one with binding magic to hold it together.
He came here to trigger this process.
Passing by a stable, he walked up to the old manor that was his destination. It was a handsome, well-kept house on a small estate through which a small river flowed. A dog howled, a couple of pale horses with ruddy coats turned their heads. A black cat eyed him shrewdly from under an evergreen bush. He touched the knocker on the wooden door, but without knocking, the door gave away under his touch.
The hall was dark, the tall mirrors reflected only gloom and shadows. A shred of light came from under a door at the end of the hall. Noiselessly he walked over to it and pressed on the handle.
The room behind it was a brightly lit drawing-room. The interior was very expensive, early 19th century in style, with huge windows and plenty of bookshelves. Opposite the door there was a grate with a fire. His snake’s eyes could see the heat like a blazing sun. On the mantelpiece sat several clocks along with a golden hourglass. But all seemed to have stopped, just like time in this room.
It was impossible to tell which era it was, today or a century ago, not even from the wizard seated at the huge wooden table with his back to the fire. He was fair-haired, his age difficult to tell but his features sharp and handsome. His trousers, shirt and tie were, surprisingly, Muggle-style, but so old-fashioned that only a wizard would be wearing them. He was studying a set of cards before him on the table, the kind of cards used by fortune-tellers, with colourful, suggestive images.
The wizard was so absorbed by these images that he did not look up or acknowledge the intruder. Tom watched him as he picked up the cards and shuffled them and then he slowly walked closer, around the table.
The man did not look up, but a smile crept over his lips. “Punctual as ever,” he said softly. He began to lay the cards on the table once more, one by one, in an intricate pattern. The Magician, Justice reversed, Death.
“You expected me, Alphard, after twenty years? You’re a fool,” Tom said coldly. In the twenty years they hadn’t seen each other, he had transformed into a wholly different being, but Alphard didn’t seem to have changed one bit.
“Why, you came here, didn’t you? The cards told me so.” The Sun reversed, Strength reversed, the Hanged Man.
“The cards. So you still believe in that rubbish?” Tom laughed, but the sound surprised him and he stopped quickly. He hadn’t laughed since his latest transformation. It was a thin, high-pitched sound, alien to him.
Alphard shrugged and gestured at the many empty chairs. “Sit down, please. It’s nicer to talk that way.”
Hanging his black cloak over another chair, he sat down to the right of Alphard, who was sitting at the head of the table. Alphard glanced up at him for a long moment. By taking off the hooded cloak, Tom had revealed his new look: bald head, red eyes, skin as pale as a corpse. If Alphard thought him ugly or frightening, he didn’t show it. Instead he resumed the laying of the cards. Only now his hands were shaking a little.
“Do you like my new self?” Tom asked, deliberately disturbing the delicate process.
“Just as well as your old self,” Alphard replied evenly. Almost indifferently.
“Be careful with your words, Black,” Tom warned. “I’ve come to ““
“- kill me,” Alphard finished his sentence. “I’m aware of that. And if I were afraid of you, I would be running, wouldn’t I?” His tone was suddenly sharp.
“But you should be afraid,” Tom replied. He had not expected Alphard to know of his intention. The boy he had known had always had an uncanny liking for Divination, but now he seemed to have developed some serious skill. Still, Alphard amused him. He was laying his life into Tom’s hands, probably thinking that it would grant him mercy, but it wouldn’t.
The Tower, the Chariot, the Devil. Alphard said nothing more about the cards as he continued to turn them around and uncover their pictures, but Tom knew without asking that his future was being predicted. Despite himself, he was fascinated by the cards and their master. He did not believe in Divination and yet there were some true prophecies.
“Images of evil and destruction. Are you trying to make some kind of statement, Alphard?” he asked mockingly.
“The truth is not a statement. I do not believe in choices, Tom. I believe in fate. And without choices, there is no evil. Destruction, yes, but no evil.”
“You’re wrong,” Tom retorted. He was getting irritated. “I’m making choices. I am choosing to kill you.”
“So why are you choosing to kill me?” Alphard asked.
“To reach immortality. I have honed this body into a perfect shell. I’ve long surpassed the boundaries of humanity. One thing remains that makes me mortal, though. My soul.”
“A curious notion. Isn’t the soul supposed to be immortal?”
“The soul is nothing! This is merely a symbolic act to finish a ritual. I’ll appoint you as my tie to humanity. Normally that would be blood relatives, but as you well know I have none. By killing you, I’ll sever that tie. My soul will be split from the rest of me and that rest will no longer be human or mortal. Isn’t that a noble and worthy cause to be dying for? Your death will forever prevent mine.” Tom laughed. He was beginning to like the sound. It felt great to finally reveal his plan to someone. A plan as great as this one wasn’t meant to remain unknown.
“Forever is a measure too great to understand, Tom.”
“For human beings,” Tom answered derisively. “Not for me.”
“So you will cease to be human? Will you try to throw away all that has hurt you? Who will you be then, if you’re not Tom Riddle anymore? Lord Voldemort?” Alphard asked, his voice clipped and provoking. Tom could see that he was angry and knowing that Alphard would soon die, allowed him that useless emotion. The reminder of that childhood name surprised him though. Lord Voldemort. It was true, he had finally become worthy of that name.
“Why not? Lord Voldemort. Stolen from death. Your death will free me from humanity.”
To his surprise, Alphard suddenly smiled widely. In a surge of wariness, Tom probed into the other man’s mind, but he found no menace, only a strange emotion, blinding and somewhat hurting, something he couldn’t understand. He withdrew.
“That’s good,” Alphard said gently. “You’ll give me your soul. A nice parting gift, Lord Voldemort.”
And in the pattern of cards on the table, he uncovered the final one, standing at the end of the line: Love. Tom’s lips twitched angrily. Alphard was playing mind games, the way he always had.
“Enough,” Tom said angrily and got up.
Alphard passed a last look over the cards and gathered them into a neat stack. Then he got up, too. He reached into one of his pockets and pulled out an envelope with the seal of the House of Black. ‘Last Will’ it said in black ink. So it had not all been a lie. Alphard had expected Tom to kill him.
“When you’re done,” Black said softly, “don’t burn the house down, please. It is meant to be sold. I have a young nephew whom I’m quite fond of; the money is to be his. But now... proceed.”
He put the envelope onto the table and turned to Tom, eyeing him with a weary sadness. Tom pulled off his black gloves and for a moment they stared at each other openly. How many times had he now looked into a man’s eyes before killing him? He saw no fear now. He’s mad, he thought.
“I appoint this man my tie to humanity,” Tom said solemnly. Nothing visible changed, but he could feel the magic close in on Alphard as soon as he said it.
Tom raised his hands and put them around Alphard’s throat. The skin was curiously warm and soft under his touch, bringing up memories he couldn’t name or place.
“To sever the ties of humanity, they must die by your hand,” he forced himself to say.
“A tie of humanity,” Alphard whispered, sounding mesmerised for a moment. He closed his eyes and sighed.
“Death severs the ties,” Tom continued.
“You’re terrible. To tell me this right before you kill me,” he whispered, just as Tom curled his fingers around Alphard’s blond hair and pulled backwards with all his strength. The neck snapped with a horrible, final sound, and both killer and victim dropped to the ground simultaneously.
Like a blade made of lightning, it went through Tom, more painful than anything he had ever felt. All the changes he'd gone through, all the things he had had to endure flashed in front of his eye for a second, as if he was going through them again and again. All his bones seemed to snap in two, all his flesh was ripped apart, his blood was boiling and freezing, and he was splitting in two, splitting...
There was a world of darkness inside him, devoid of feeling.