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The Black Lake flowed outside the window.
The air carried the ink-scent of old pages and the faint, elusive fragrance of black tea.
The Dark Lord toyed with the corner of a page, glancing up at him with casual indifference.
Jiang Fengyue paused.
He shrugged off his outer robe, still dusty from the trophy room, and with no time for the coat rack, tossed it onto the floor before striding toward the Dark Lord.
Voldemort’s gaze didn’t linger.
As if nothing had happened, he returned his attention to the page.
Jiang Fengyue came to stand quietly behind him.
He reached out and pressed his fingers to Voldemort’s temples, kneading in slow, rhythmic circles, working the tension loose.
Nagini slithered toward the door, seized the discarded robe in her jaws, and dragged it all the way to the laundry basket.
Task complete, she coiled herself back at Voldemort’s feet into a compact heap, the tip of her dark green tail fidgeting against Jiang Fengyue’s trouser leg.
“You’re back, my Lord.” Jiang Fengyue’s voice was soft.
Voldemort gave an “Mm.” “Where did you serve detention.”
“The trophy room.” Jiang Fengyue gathered a few stray locks from the Dark Lord’s shoulder, amusement in his voice.
“I even found your trophy.
Polished it very carefully, you know.”
The Dark Lord raised a brow.
“Which one.”
That heinously accomplished, top-of-every-subject student, Voldemort.
Taking advantage of standing behind him, safely out of Legilimency range, Jiang Fengyue rolled his eyes.
His voice, however, grew only sweeter.
“The Special Honors award.
Could it be you have other trophies, my Lord?
I only got through part of them today.
I’ll be sure to search more thoroughly tomorrow.” The one you got for ruining Hagrid and Myrtle, of course.
You magnificent bastard.
Voldemort let out a soft laugh and shut the book.
“What did that old fool Dumbledore say to you.”
“First he reprimanded me — said I shouldn’t have stirred up the conflict.” Jiang Fengyue chose his words carefully.
“Then he remarked that I hadn’t used any powerful offensive curses.
He seemed rather satisfied.
At the very least, he didn’t pay me any particular attention after that.”
“You’re clever.” A low chuckle.
“That old fool loves that sort of posturing.
You know how not to arouse his excessive suspicion.
Well done.”
The Dark Lord closed his eyes and let the warm, soft fingers work.
As if idly, he said, “It seems this generation of Slytherins will take orders from you now.”
Jiang Fengyue’s hands trembled, barely perceptibly.
He kept the massage going without a hitch.
“That’s all your teaching, my Lord.
And I have you to thank for lending me the tiger’s might.
Everyone knows the Malfoys are your most loyal servants.
On my own, I could never hold together a house of scattered sand like Slytherin.
Without that, I’d have made a complete fool of myself today.”
He added, with a thread of aggrieved complaint: “You heard them yourself in the Great Hall on the first night — these little snakes are completely devoted to you.
They’re always sneaking around asking me for news about you.
I’m practically your postal owl at this point.”
“Glibly honey-tongued.” The Dark Lord’s lips curved faintly.
Offhand, he said, “The serpent’s nest must be tended.
The Death Eaters always need fresh blood.
Pick a few clever ones to follow you, that’s sufficient.
Don’t take in every stupid fool and useless waste.”
A flicker of surprise stirred in Jiang Fengyue’s chest, followed quickly by quiet satisfaction.
He understood at once what lay beneath the words.
Voldemort was granting him permission to select a few worthwhile individuals as his own right-hand men.
This tyrant, who absolutely forbade factions among his subordinates and demanded absolute personal loyalty to himself alone, was clearly pleased with today’s events.
A small reward.
With one condition, of course: these people’s first allegiance would be to the Dark Lord.
Jiang Fengyue himself, only second.
The corner of his mouth curved up.
A shrewd gleam passed through his eyes.
Once it was sanctioned openly before the Dark Lord, who could restrain him afterward?
Having already gained the advantage, he played coy and pushed further.
“I really have been your postal owl for quite a while, my Lord.
They’ve nearly driven me out of my mind with their questions, and I didn’t let a single word slip.
Surely that earns some kind of reward?”
“It does.” The Dark Lord gave a derisive laugh, stroking Nagini at his feet.
“I’ll have Nagini go catch you some mice and rabbits right now.
Feed them to you.”
Nagini heard her name and lifted her head, flicking her tongue in a hiss as she nuzzled Voldemort’s hand.
Jiang Fengyue went very still.
Then, in the next instant, Voldemort uncrossed his legs, raised a hand, and seized Jiang Fengyue’s wrist.
He dragged him forward.
“However.
There is one thing you did poorly.”
Jiang Fengyue stumbled with the force of it, saw he was about to land directly on Nagini, and made a split-second decision, he let his legs go soft.
He ended up on the floor in a spectacularly graceless posture, both hands braced on Voldemort’s thighs as if to catch himself.
The Dark Lord gripped his chin and tilted it upward.
He leaned forward, and those scarlet eyes, deep as pools of blood, locked onto him and held.
“You were too merciful.”
The towering figure cast its shadow over him entirely.
“A few days’ detention.
Some Disarming Charms and Binding Curses.
You could have pressed right up against Dumbledore’s line and gone much further.”
The Dark Lord’s voice was cold.
“Your cleverness deserves encouragement.
Your mercy warrants punishment.”
Jiang Fengyue inwardly cursed.
He didn’t stop to think.
He burrowed straight into the Dark Lord’s arms, wedging himself between Voldemort’s legs, wrapping both arms around his waist, and pressing his forehead with pointed, cloying devotion against those eight-pack abs.
“Gentle?” The Dark Lord’s voice was low, something like amusement threading through something like a sigh.
He ruffled Jiang Fengyue’s hair, and slid his wand free from the arms locked around his waist.
Jiang Fengyue’s heart dropped.
But the anticipated Cruciatus never came.
The Dark Lord turned the wand over once, then pressed it back into his hand.
He pulled Jiang Fengyue fully upright, one hand resting loosely at his waist.
A twist of the wrist braced against his hip turned him, and Jiang Fengyue found himself seated sideways across Voldemort’s thigh.
The posture was mortifying.
He couldn’t exactly throw himself off without making it worse.
The next moment, the hand holding his wand was enclosed in Voldemort’s.
A coiled black serpent materialized in the open space of the room, transfigured from a teacup.
“Watch closely.” Voldemort’s tone was flat.
He began the incantation, guiding Jiang Fengyue’s hand through a precise arc in the air.
Jiang Fengyue watched with complete attention, pressing every subtle wrist movement and every knotted syllable into memory.
A piercing red light struck the black serpent.
In an instant, the snake’s skin and muscle peeled apart in clean, exact layers, as though invisible hands were dissecting it with surgical precision.
The split flesh bloomed outward, layer upon elegant layer, a lotus of blood and meat.
At its center, white vertebrae gleamed like bone china.
The serpent thrashed.
Its shriek of agony rang through the room.
The lotus kept expanding, kept unfurling, spreading along the entire length of its body, until the shrieking slowly, slowly died away, and the small snake had become something vast and terrible: a great red lotus of flesh and blood, built from its own skin, muscle, and bone.
Jiang Fengyue stared.
He could feel the sheer mass of dark magic coiled inside this spell, and the lotus still pulsed with a ghostly curse-light that no one but the caster could reverse.
The hand holding his wand trembled, faintly, with something closer to excitement than fear.
The Dark Lord’s soft exhale of a laugh warmed the air beside his ear.
“What spell is that?
I’ve never seen it in any dark magic text.” Jiang Fengyue breathed.
“Haemanthus coccineus.” The Dark Lord’s fingertip traced slowly across the soft flesh of Jiang Fengyue’s palm.
“Blood Lotus.
A small spell I invented when I was a Slytherin student.”
To create something this powerful, this dark, while still a student.
Truly.
The Dark Lord.
He released Jiang Fengyue’s hand and let him practice on his own.
They worked at it until Jiang Fengyue had the spell down.
Then Voldemort quizzed him on the difficult points of all twelve subjects, all twelve, and only once Jiang Fengyue answered every question with smooth, effortless precision did he let him slide off his lap and go bathe.
By the time Jiang Fengyue had washed and burrowed into the soft expanse of the bed, already half-asleep, the mattress dipped beside him.
The Dark Lord’s hand moved through his hair.
“You are not to go to Hogsmeade this weekend.”
“…Why not…”
The Dark Lord tucked the blanket snug around him.
He looked at the small figure with only a platinum-blond head poking out, and laughed, very softly.
“Your reward.
For doing things right today.”
➤ Next: Deciding Victory a Thousand Miles Away