Chapter One
Lord Voldemort sat on his bed and thought about his life.
Yes, he had a bed. He didn’t get to sleep in it, of course, because there’s no rest for the wicked. But he liked to keep it around anyway, so he could sit on it at times and think about his issues.
He hadn’t expected it to be like this.
All that work! The years of research…tracking down and finding the objects that would become his Horcruxes…hiding them in extravagantly inaccessible places…even the murders hadn’t been all fun…just to come back to this miserable life in which Dumbledore ruled the world, his best Death Eaters were Wormtail and Malfoy, and he had those stupid dreams about Harry Potter every night.
Not to mention his new embarrassing problem.
People were bound to find out about that soon.
“Avada,” he muttered grimly, jabbing his wand at a fly. “Avada K”…Avada K”…”
But he couldn’t do it. He hated the fly, he wanted to kill the fly, he had killed thousands such flies without trouble before…but as soon as he tried to complete the curse, he saw the green light, heard the screaming”and felt the pain, the agony of the spirit being shredded from the body and left to flutter naked on the edges of being.
‘It can’t possibly happen again,” he told himself sternly. “It was the biggest fluke in history. A once in a lifetime thing.”
The thing was, this was his second lifetime.
He nerved himself for another effort. “Avada K””
When Wormtail came in, Voldemort was curled in a ball on the floor, softly going “K-k-k-k.”
“My Lord?”
“K-k-k-k-k,” went Voldemort.
“My Lord? Are”are you all right?”
Voldemort moaned softly and said, “Mommy.”
After a single horrified second, Wormtail wheeled around to run for help. A peremptory voice brought him up short.
“Wormtail!”
He turned slowly. The Dark Lord was getting up, dusting off his robes.
“Just practicing a new spell,” he said airily.
“Really?” stammered Wormtail. “Wh-what kind of spell?”
Voldemort found himself forced to elaborate. “Old magic,” he said. “Using love,” he added; it was the best explanation he could think of for acting extremely weird. “That’s supposed to be the kid’s best weapon, so I figure I’ll use his own weapons against him.”
Long, long years of catering to James’ and Sirius’ egos enabled Wormatil to look completely convinced and say, “That’s brilliant, my Lord.”
“Don’t mention it to anyone else,” said Voldemort casually. “I want it to be a surprise.”
Wormtail bowed deeply. “Of course, my Lord.” Dismissed, he turned and did the Sycophantic Shuffle out of there, casting worried looks over his shoulder as he went.
Somewhere beneath all his evilness, Voldemort was embarrassed. But he had given himself an idea. His conventional weapon had never really worked against the kid, plus it wasn’t, haha, really an option at the moment. So he would change his tactics. Maybe Dumbledope was right about some things.
He would learn about love.