Sooo in your fic is it canon that Voldemort is completely and utterly oblivious to how relationships/attraction works while Harry is objectively the more 'experienced' person? Cuz that's what it seems like tbh. Vee is SUCH an idiot sometimes. He wants to fuck Harry so bad it makes him look (and think) stupid.
Great question! I apologize in advanceāI can already tell this is gonna be a long Voldemort meta post lol.
My head canon for Voldemort more generallyābut particularly in the Heir de la Mortāis that he falls somewhere on the Asexual Spectrum (I donāt consider Cursed Child canon, btw). Specifically, I think of him as basically aroace with a big exception for Harry.
He may have had sex in his younger years as Tom Riddle, but if he did, it was purely transactional. Just another tool to manipulate people or get something he wanted.
A big part of his becoming āLord Voldemortā is that he tries very hard to shed any semblance of humanity because for him, it represents vulnerability and his humble origins as the poor, unwanted kid who grew up in a muggle orphanage. Part of that shedding of humanity is (at least outwardly) rejecting things like relationships and sex because he believes those are weak things that mere mortals do. So, once he fully adopts the persona of Voldemort, I donāt think he even has transactional sex anymore.
I do see him as having a general desire for human connection (though this gets more and more repressed the older he gets). But heās never actually felt sexual passion or desire, let alone romantic love, for another person.
That is, until Harry comes along.
I think Voldemort initially feels pulled to Harry because of the horcrux, even before he knows about its existence. The fact that Harry literally contains a piece of his own SOUL makes him grow to understand Harry in a way heās never understood anyone before, and that opens the door for him to start feeling emotions heās never felt.
So, long-story short, I guess, Voldemort is oblivious here because heās experiencing actual attraction to another person for the very first time in 70+ years! Up until now, heās been too single-mindedly focused on killing Harry to really notice anything unusual going on, or if he did, he probably just chalked it up to really, really, REALLY hating him and wanting him dead. But now that he isnāt actively trying to kill him, he has the opportunity to feel new things. At first through the horcrux connection, but as time goes on, that line will become more and more blurred.
It also doesnāt help that heās severely lacking in self-awareness more generally. Like, heās magically brilliant, no doubt. Heās very book smart, very clever, cunning, etc. And heās exceptionally good at manipulating others, which means he has to have some level of emotional intelligence⦠He just reaaaallly doesnāt have the self-awareness part. Or the empathy part (yet).
But Harry is a mirrorānot just because he contains part of Voldemortās soul, but also because heās the only one bold enough to stand up to him. Basically, through Harry, Voldemort is slowly being forced into a situation where he has to confront his own humanity and start actually learning empathy. But I donāt wanna say too much, so Iāll stop now :)