Harry Potter :Diamond Heart

Why are you still trying to get stronger,' the portrait demanded from its place beneath one of the serpent effigies.

'I need to be more powerful,' Harry reminded him. He was a little puzzled by his ancestor's question; he'd answered it before and the painting never asked the same thing again once it received a satisfactory answer.

'For someone so set on dying you seem remarkably reluctant to accept it.'

'I do not want to die,' Harry told the painting from behind clenched teeth. 'I want to live. I want my dreams. I want my hope and I want my life.'

Salazar Slytherin blinked and peered at him closely. 'So you are not going to let them use and sacrifice you.'

'Either I am sacrificed for the gain of everyone, or I must use somebody for my own gain,' Harry replied sombrely. 'I'm not Tom Riddle. I will not destroy the lives of others just to preserve or improve my own.' 'Riddle stands at one extreme, you at the other,' the founder cried exasperatedly. 'See the middle ground! Walk it! Don't throw away your life because you're paranoid of emulating your predecessor.'

'Voldemort is not my predecessor,' Harry hissed.

'He was my heir before you came and proved to me you were more worthy. He is, without a doubt, distant family of yours. Do not delude yourself into thinking he is some personification of evil that you must avoid.' The portrait too had switched too parseltongue. 'I will tell you of the Tom Riddle I knew.'

Harry waited, fuming silently. He knew enough about Voldemort to know he should not be following in his footsteps. 'A boy came into this chamber, thin, ragged and alone. A child who dreamed of becoming something great enough to be remembered, to protect the few who had protected him. He was family, my heir, my legacy and I offered him my help. As the years past he withdrew within himself, cut off from the few he had trusted. Albus Dumbledore threw him back to the muggles that loathed him without a second thought for his well being, the students avoided him, not wanting to be dragged into his spiral to self-destruction. Within this chamber he learned he had the ability to be something great and he was determined to seize it. He swore he would be stronger. He promised himself to be powerful enough to be respected.'

'You said that you would tell me about Tom Riddle,' Harry interrupted, 'not me.' Salazar laughed coldly. 'I am.'

Harry blanched.

'Did you think you were so different?' The founder asked him more gently. 'Even accounting for the effect of the horcrux within you the two of you would have been similar. I have said nothing because I knew you would not want to listen, but I will not stay silent if it means you will throw away your life over it.'

'Perhaps,' Harry responded, still slightly horrified by the resemblance between Tom Riddle and he, 'it is best I do, if I am so like him. The world does not need or want a second Lord Voldemort.'

'Don't be a fool,' Salazar snapped. 'You are a hundred times worse than Godric. It took Rowena and I a month to convince him the first time he killed that he was still a good person and a good wizard. You stand here with only noble intentions and speak about dying before you become a dark wizard. Did you not listen when I explained to you the principles of magic?'

'There is no light and dark, only power, and the intent that directs it,' Harry remembered.

'Then there is nothing that needs to be said. You are like him, but you are not him. I am sure I am not the only one who sees the similarity, Dumbledore must as well, Riddle often spoke of the man as something akin to an idol.'

'He does.' The image of the headmaster's playing face when Harry flashed him Tom Riddle's blinding smile swam briefly in the eye of his mind. 'And has he ever shown any concern that you might become another Voldemort? He may be raising you to sacrifice, keeping you alive until your death suits him best, but he knows that the two of you are still different.' The founder straightened up and raised his chin proudly; a sure sign some pithy phrase was about to fall from his lips. 'The two of you are apples, fallen far apart, but from the same tree.'

I suppose it is better than some of his metaphors.

Harry felt more than a little relief that his ancestor did not believe him too similar to Tom Riddle. A small voice of doubt murmured that the painting had probably not known him as well as it thought it did if it had not been able to predict what he would become, but Harry allowed himself to be convinced. 'It still changes nothing,' he reminded the portrait. 'I have to die, or Voldemort will eventually find a way to return and many more will suffer.'

'The horcrux that anchors him has to be destroyed,' Salazar corrected, 'you do not have to die for that to happen.'

'Someone has to die. I won't use the Killing Curse to tear apart my soul just to save myself.'

'It will heal,' the founder insisted. 'If it works somebody who should die will be dead and you will remain unchanged. The soul reflects you. As long as your intentions do not shift down a darker path your soul will be fine and you will never so much as see Tom Riddle's footprints again.' 'I won't do it.' Harry wished fervently that the portrait would give up. He wanted to test his magic, not argue with his canvas ancestor and wrestle with the less selfless side of his conscience.

'So you say,' Slytherin lamented. 'I wonder how many more of your trusted friends will try to use you before you realise that you too are entitled to be selfish.'

'I have no trusted friends left,' Harry told him flatly. 'There is small chance of me being used as you seem to fear. Those that would not stand by me will drift apart and I will no longer care for them. I will find equals who understand, or I will die strong enough to be respected by all.'

'I would sooner the former, than the latter, but if you insist on following this selfless path, one even Godric would have baulked at, then I fear the latter is the best you can hope for.'

Harry shot his ancestor a cold glare and drew his wand from his sleeve.

The disillusionment charm was the first thing he cast, to check whether his perfect invisibility had been fluke.

'You mastered it,' Slytherin murmured, impressed. Evidently it had not been luck.

'Papilionis ,' Harry whispered, ignoring the painting.

The Chamber of Secrets was filled with black butterflies. They swarmed and swirled around him in a whirring demi-sphere of wings.

'The butterflies,' he heard Salazar grouse faintly beneath the thrum of his conjurations'. 'What was wrong with conjuring snakes, a proper Heir of Slytherin would conjure serpents. Anything would be more seemly than little butterflies.'

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