"From whom did you learn necromancy?" Voldemort hissed. All the great necromancers were dead, he was certain. He'd searched for years. The only one remaining had been Grindelwald, and when he had gone to request tutelage, the imprisoned wizard had laughed and laughed and laughed - had said he did not have the talent for it! Grindelwald had not trained Potter. There would have been no way to keep Dumbledore from discovering that.
Whoever they were, they would be teaching Voldemort once he was done with the boy.
"My mama," Potter said.
"Your mother is dead, boy. I spilled her filthy mud blood myself. Unless you refer to the Potion's professor Barty spoke of."
"That's the one," Potter said proudly. "My mama, the necromancer. And then to top it off, Death showed up and gave me some of its power. Death itself has sanctioned your demise. You've been fleeing from it for many years, and we are sick of your cowardice."
"You spoke to Death?" Voldemort sneered. "The Ancient Gods are mere myth, Potter."
"See, that's why it doesn't like you. You're a terrible necromancer. It's more than just resurrecting corpses and stuff, you know. And the fact that you're scared to die?" The boy threw back his head and laughed. The shadows and wind whistled and laughed with him. The boy's face revealed too many teeth and eyes as black as coals. "Honestly, Thomas. Pussy behavior."
"What!? You insolent boy!"
The duel continued with a quick volley of spellfire. The boy was not afraid to go straight for the kill, which was intriguing. Voldemort had expected some disarming and tickling jinxes from Potter. It was almost impressive. He would have tried to recruit the boy, had he not been the great Lord Voldemort's arch-nemesis.
Potter spun on his heel, wrapping himself in the Cloak and turning invisible. Voldemort sniffed the air with his snakey senses but could not determine the boy's location. With a flick of his wand, the ash from the burning corpses scattered into the air, the lot of it falling like snow and revealing the outline of Potter to his left, trying to sneak behind him. His inkblot shadows swallowed Voldemort's Cruciatus before it could hit.
Potter shifted back into sight, stepping into close combat range and putting Voldemort on the defensive. They were too close to dodge - if he could get one shot in -
"Will you just fucking die already!" Potter growled. The child's face twisted with anger, aged beyond his years. A hand reached out to grasp his wrist. Voldemort raised his other hand, wand to the sky to cast the killing blow when another hand wrapped around that wrist. Cold bone.
Voldemort turned and faced Death.
"Finally," it hissed. For the first time in a long, long time, Voldemort felt fear. In the hollow pits of its eyes, he saw his face reflected back. He saw his own terror and felt the inevitability of it all. The certainty. Calming in a way. It was already over. It was too late to stop it; the quiet hidden fear of a small child. The earth-shattering bombings of the Blitz. The unwanted baby in the orphanage. Alone alone alone.
Voldemort's wand fell from his grip, which had gone lax under Death's thumb. His end was coming and he was so, so afraid.
"You are my right-hand, little lichling. You need only will it. Send Tom Riddle to me." Death crooned.
The boy's hand tightened its hold and Voldemort's newly constructed flesh began to twist. Aging into wrinkles and pain and fatigue. Decomposing, rotting before his eyes, flaking off in strips down to the bone. It spread up to his elbow - shoulder - chest. Voldemort jolted and shook, reduced to that of an animal caught in a cage. He could taste blood in his mouth. And fear, so much fear. A heavy weight sank down his throat. Drowning him.
"Is hell real?" The boy asked, soft as the wind. Childlike as a seraphim, cruel as the devil. Unholy eyes affixed to the spreading line of agony reducing his being into atoms.
"Hm. Not as you understand it. But he can be punished. His eternal soul is yours to do with as you please, lichling."
Potter grinned.
And then, there was nothing.