A Story of Mortality

Epilogue

The business trip had been going very well for Voldemort, and the year was nearly over. He was so close to getting the terms he demanded. He was in a meeting with the American ambassador when an owl flew in, dropping a heavy, black envelope on the desk in front of his.

He felt, more than heard, the thunk it made against the wood.

Voldemort's heart stopped.

It felt like forever as he stared at it, not daring to touch it. He did not want to discover that he was not imagining the document. But Voldemort was a practical man; he knew that he could not, would not, imagine such a thing. The ambassador looked uncomfortable.

"Ah, uh..." he stuttered, at loss for words. "I'm very sorry, Lord Voldemort. Take as much time as you need."

After he gathered himself and read the document, he went immediately to the Norway base, where he was greeted by a sharp-faced woman, whose stance was powerful.

"We're very sorry, Lord Voldemort," she offered her hand, and they shook, formal. Restrained. "I'm Celestia."

"May I see him?" Voldemort asked, hating how his voice cracked at the end of the sentence. He could not help this woman seeing him in his moment of weakness.

"Of course. We have not yet paid our respects to him; we felt that it would be appropriate for you to do so first. I'll be honest, I would not initially have thought even of writing to you, but... Well, I'll show you afterwards."

Voldemort nodded stiffly, and let Celestia guide him to the bedroom, where he had been lain to rest. The room was dark, with only the stubs of candles lighting the bed where Voldemort had last been with him almost a year ago. His whole body felt like lead as he looked over the man's body and the clothes he had been wearing in his death, a smart shirt and trousers. Harry's eyes were closed to appear in rest, and his heart clenched as he saw the watch he had given him as a gift, still bearing the words The Soul Never Gives Up. How he desperately wished that was true. Voldemort slowly extended his hand and placed it gently on Harry's face, hoping with his whole being that the man would suddenly warm up, lean into the touch, mumble something in his sleep. The cheeks remained ice cold. His head did not move.

He had never paid his respects to the deceased before. He had always seen a dead man merely as a corpse, an object now devoid of life. But he could not bear to see Harry that way. He needed to believe that Harry was elsewhere, that Harry would be able to hear him, because so many things had been left unsaid, so many emotions that Voldemort had yet to come to terms with. What would he say? In what few words could he convey everything he could barely comprehend himself, to a dead man?

Performing the spell, Voldemort paused before speaking.

"You've broken me," Voldemort said, voice hoarse. "You've chipped away at me, bit by bit, and then left me to bleed out alone. I... want you to forgive me. For not having the bravery to be as open to you as you have been to me. May your soul never give up."

One last time, he ran his fingers through Harry's hair, remembering their last meeting, and left for good.

"If you don't mind, Lord Voldemort," Celestia said as he returned, "we would like to get the legal rubbish over and done with as soon as possible."

He followed her again into the office, not bothering to sit down. He picked up the documents, flicking through the pages.

"The important thing to note is that he left pretty much everything to you. His money, his property; the only thing that has been left to us is the political documents. I think, or at least I hope, that he was trusting you to allow us to keep using his properties to meet on a regular basis. But that's entirely down to you, now."

"That's fine," Voldemort said immediately. He did not care for the properties; he had his own. So long as he could still come back to relive what Harry had given him when he fancied, he did not care.

"This, however, is more sentimental," Celestia said, bringing over a stack of parchment carefully. "This is what he had been writing when he died; we think it was a heart attack."

A heart attack. The knowledge stung Voldemort more than it should have. He was supposed to have been caring for Harry's heart, that was his sole purpose, though he had not realised it before. He had let Harry's heart grow weak. He had let Harry die.

He looked down the first page.

A Story of Mortality, it read as a title. Beneath: For Voldemort. Always for Lord Voldemort.

"I had a flick through, it's something of an autobiography, but there is a full section dedicated to you. Obviously it's quite personal, intimate information, and so I feel that it would be best if it was left to you whether or not it is published. If not, then naturally you may keep hold of it."

Voldemort nodded. Love. This was love. It was so painful and yet he did not resent Harry in the least for inflicting it on him. Love. Could he bear having his one weakness in such public display?

"Thank you for your assistance," Voldemort said to Celestia.

"Will you want to be involved in planning the funeral?"

"I ask only for an invitation, and the opportunity to speak."

The public funeral was never open-casket, the closest to the deceased already having said their goodbyes. Voldemort never got to see Harry again, other than the endless photographs of him flying around Britain and Europe. But they did not show Harry, they showed Lord Potter. Voldemort had not noticed a difference between the two until now. Now, it was painfully obvious.

There was hundreds of people who attended the funeral, wanting to share their condolences. Nobody was surprised to see their Minister in attendance: "He was a good man to work with," he would always say, and they would assume that his feelings ended there.

Too many people surrounding him to think at the funeral, he left shortly after the official ceremonies had ended, apparating to somewhere to find peace. Before he had met Harry, he had felt empty. He had been almost a shell of a person; he remembered well how he had been when he had first seen the man speak as a teenager, how different he had grown, and he felt he knew how he would have become if he had never met Harry. What he would have become. Now, he felt much the same. He felt empty, like he had in his childhood, but he suddenly felt older than ever before, the freedom of immortality doing nothing to boost his energy. His immortality was starting to feel more like a burden.

He had always thought that he knew what it meant to be mortal. He thought it meant weakness, he thought it meant fragility, and he was desperate to be rid of such a condition. But Harry had never been any of those things, and yet he was still undeniably, horribly mortal. Harry had never seen mortality as a weakness, or an obstacle to his goals. He had treated death so lightly, as if it were nothing to fear. He had been convinced of another world, another life, and Voldemort had mocked him for it. But now experiencing the effects of mortality first hand, he understood Harry better than he had ever done when he was alive. He wished the man was with him to witness the change. He could practically see Harry's smug face before him, laughing at his victory in changing Voldemort's mind on something he was so certain of.

Almost as he came to this realisation, Voldemort looked at where he had apparated to. It was the Gaunt Shack. A building shrouded by death and loss, certainly, but this was not the reason he had come here. This was where he had hidden his two horcruxes.

Maybe there was an afterlife. Maybe he would see Harry again. But those were not the most important things to Voldemort. In honour of Harry, Voldemort would become whole again. He would live as best as he could without him, and then he would die. He would dedicate the rest of his life to Harry, and his mortality.

Nothing felt more right in the world.