Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/2524769.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Graphic_Depictions_Of_Violence, Major_Character_Death, Underage, Rape/
      Non-Con
  Category:
      Multi
  Fandom:
      Harry_Potter_-_J._K._Rowling
  Character:
      Tom_Riddle, Voldemort, Draco_Malfoy, Lucius_Malfoy, Narcissa_Black
      Malfoy, Hermione_Granger, Harry_Potter, Bellatrix_Black_Lestrange,
      Bartemius_Crouch_Jr., Antonin_Dolohov, Diary_Tom_Riddle, Albus_Dumbledore
  Additional Tags:
      Resurrection, Alternate_Universe_-_Canon_Divergence, Torture,
      Psychological_Drama, Self-cest, Deliberately_Not_Listing_Ships
  Stats:
      Published: 2014-10-28 Updated: 2016-09-16 Chapters: 19/? Words: 91695
****** Transcendence ******
by ChapterEight
Summary
     Tom thought that maybe fifty years of utter isolation in a diary was
     a small price to pay to gain the advantages of being a living
     Horcrux, even if he was probably a bit mad from the experience. After
     all, being mad was no impediment to a Dark Lord.
Notes
     This is an AU based on the premise that Tom Riddle successfully
     escaped from the diary in CoS. It will be dark and probably gory in
     places. It's Tom-centric and not ship-centric, but there could be
     either homosexual or heterosexual encounters. The only thing I will
     tell you up front is that it won't be Tom/Harry or Tom/Ginny (even
     though I like both of those).
***** Prologue *****
Chapter Summary
     Tom Riddle confronts Harry Potter in the Chamber of Secrets.
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
Time is a funny thing when you aren't real. Or at least when you are not a part
of the real world, although Tom was real enough, in his own way. He was a real
being with a real personality and real desires and real feelings. It's just
that he didn't have a real body or any sort of real communication with the
outside world, and under those circumstances time had a funny way of losing any
real meaning.
He didn't know how long he had been inside the diary before he'd realized that
he had no idea how long he'd been inside the diary.
He had quickly learned that there was no way to mark the passing of time,
because his surroundings were only the manifestation of his own thoughts. It
was day if he wanted it to be day and night if he wanted it to be night. He was
at Hogwarts if he wanted to be at Hogwarts, but he could just as easily think
another thought and find himself on that godforsaken rocky beach he had
sometimes visited as a child.
It had taken him what had seemed like a long time (although since he had no way
of keeping track, he couldn't say how long it had taken with any certainty) to
learn how to discipline his thoughts in such a way that his surroundings would
remain the same until he actually wanted them to change, even if he allowed his
mind to wander to other subjects or places.
What had been worse was when he had discovered that the only things he could
invent in his surroundings were things he had already experienced. He could
think himself into the restricted section of the Hogwarts library, but he
couldn't read any of the books that he hadn't already read. They appeared on
the shelf of his mindscape because he had looked at the stacks before, but if
he pulled a new book off the shelf and opened it, the pages were blank. He
could fantasize about being on a tropical beach, but the sand and water didn't
feel real and the details were blurry if he tried to look at them.
In that way he supposed that it was something of a blessing that time had no
meaning to him, because if he had actually been able to count every second of
his isolation then he would have gone even madder than he had.
His other self—his real self—had communicated with him from time to time in the
beginning, but he had never given any sort of indication how long it had been
between communications. Real-Tom might have spoken with him every day or every
ten years for all he was able to tell, and by the time the communications had
stopped he was long past thinking about such things. For all he had known,
Real-Tom had last spoken to him only hours before.
He had been shocked to the very core of his being when the date had
materialized suddenly in his consciousness.
August 19, 1992.
He had wanted to know what the significance of the date was at first, because
Real-Tom had never seen the need to note any dates before. Then the next words
had materialized and he had realized that Real-Tom wasn't the person writing to
him at all.
Dear Diary…
Ginny Weasley had found him inside one of her secondhand textbooks (the
indignity of which was not lost on him who had long imagined that one day he
would never have to buy secondhand books with donated money ever again). It had
taken carefully worded questions and skillful directing of their conversations
to learn that Lucius Malfoy had probably been the one to slip him in with the
girl's things. He assumed that Lucius Malfoy was Abraxas Malfoy's son, and
although Lucius hadn't even been a twinkle in Abraxas's eye when Tom had been
put into his diary, he further assumed that Lucius must be a follower of Real-
Tom and that Real-Tom had been behind his diary ending up with Ginny Weasley.
He had therefore been content to follow the original plan meant for him… until
he had learned from Ginny about the fate of his real self.
Things had changed after that.
First Ginny had given him back some semblance of time. He had quickly worked
out her schedule from her inane ramblings about her classes, and so he had
begun to mark the passing of days and weeks. When she had become so addicted to
him that she spoke to him at every given opportunity—between classes, during
meals—he had begun to mark the passing of hours and even minutes.
Next Ginny had given him back his own purpose. The more he was able to find out
about recent history and in particular about Harry Potter, the more he turned
away from the purpose Real-Tom had given him. What did scaring Mudbloods away
from Hogwarts matter when Lord Voldemort had utterly failed at the hands of a
mere infant? He needed to find out the hows and whys. He began to think of
himself as real again, the madness from such utter isolation and intellectual
stagnancy slowly slipping away until he could once again clearly define the
boundaries between what was real and what was his imagination.
Ginny had also given him Harry Potter, although she had done her level best to
deny him that. He had been quite cross with her for stealing him back—after
all, what right had she to keep him from Harry Potter when she had been the one
to throw him away, to try to destroy him, in the first place? But that was no
matter in the end, because Ginny had been the reason the little hero had come
down to the Chamber.
The last thing Ginny would give him would be a body.
As he stared at her nearly completely lifeless body lying on the cold stone a
few feet from him, he had the fleeting thought that he should enshrine her for
all she had done for him. Then Tom smiled at his own romantic notion, because
he knew that in reality he would never spare another thought for her after she
was no longer in his direct line of sight.
The wand in his grip seemed more substantial now, and he squeezed his fingers
around it experimentally. He was almost completely corporeal. It had been so
long since he'd had a body that he really didn't remember what it was like and
had no idea how much more real he could get at this point, but he could feel
that Ginny was still alive, if only barely, so he knew that the process wasn't
completed yet.
Still, he gripped the wand tighter, just because he could, as he watched
Dumbledore's phoenix swoop down around Salazar's basilisk. What in Slytherin's
name was that fool snake doing? Honestly, the continued centuries of isolation
must have driven it completely around the bend, and Tom suspected, from his
interactions with the beast, that it had never been very smart to begin with.
"KILL THE BOY!" he screamed in irritation. "LEAVE THE BIRD! THE BOY IS BEHIND
YOU. SNIFF—SMELL HIM."
He watched with mounting annoyance as the serpent thrashed around, knocking
down great pillars as it spun. It would be absolutely annoying to have to
repair the Chamber after this. He had half a mind to leave the bloody basilisk
all by itself for another fifty years to punish it for its incompetence.
When it struck out at Potter, Tom thought at first that it had succeeded. Then
it fell over sideways, away from Potter, and, after a few feeble twitches,
stopped moving.
He couldn't see what had happened from where he was standing, but he could see
the broken fang lying on the floor next to the boy. Dumbledore's bird settled
on the cold stones next to Potter and laid its head on his arm.
Tom walked forward until he was standing over Potter and could clearly see the
gaping wound in the boy's arm. "You're dead, Harry Potter. Dead," he told him,
his emotions only barely discernable in his voice, as always. "Even
Dumbledore's bird knows it. Do you see what he's doing, Potter? He's crying."
The boy swayed, and Tom thought that he might fall over. He took a step back in
case the little wretch vomited or something equally as disgusting.
"I'm going to sit here and watch you die, Harry Potter. Take your time. I'm in
no hurry."
He smiled to himself again. He considered explaining to Potter about time, but
he figured that the boy was well past understanding why he would find it so
amusing that Tom's first moments experiencing real time in five decades would
be spent watching Real-Tom's vanquisher slowly dying in their Chamber.
"So ends the famous Harry Potter," he said instead. "Alone in the Chamber of
Secrets, forsaken by his friends, defeated at last by the Dark Lord he so
unwisely challenged. You'll be back with your dear Mudblood mother soon, Harry…
She bought you twelve years of borrowed time… but Lord Voldemort got you in the
end, as you knew he must…."
But even as he said it, he knew that something was wrong. Potter had stopped
swaying, and some of the color was returning to his cheeks.
His eyes fell suddenly on the phoenix, and in a flash it came back to him.
"Get away, bird! Get away from him—" Tom rose his wand to forcibly remove it if
necessary. "I said, get away—"
Then the bird took flight, and Tom remained frozen in his surprise.
"Phoenix tears… Of course… healing powers… I forgot…"
He wondered how much else he had forgotten. The years in the diary had been
stagnant and monotonous, and although he had attempted to keep himself
entertained at first, he had quickly tired of reading the same books and
experiencing the same things over and over. When time had no meaning, it didn't
really matter if he reread Magick Moste Evile for the thousandth time or if he
didn't do anything at all. No matter what he did or didn't do, time passed just
as slowly or as quickly, or moved not at all, or all at once—he wasn't sure how
to describe it, even in his own thoughts….
Clearly the time away had affected his mind. He sucked in a furious breath and
didn't even pause to reflect on how miraculous it was that he was breathing at
all.
"But it makes no difference. In fact, I prefer it this way." He peered down at
Potter and tried to convince himself that he'd feel better about all he had
lost if he directed his anger at the boy. "Just you and me, Harry Potter… you
and me…"
He raised Harry's wand and pointed it at the boy's chest.
He heard the bird over his head before he saw it, and it seemed almost as if
the diary appeared from nowhere in Potter's lap. Both he and Harry stared at
it.
Then Potter's hand darted out and grabbed the broken fang from the floor beside
him, and Tom felt something he'd never felt before, even before the diary. His
new heart seized in his chest, and his new muscles tensed so much that it was
nearly painful. He watched, almost as if time had slowed down, as the diary
fluttered on Potter's lap even as the boy brought the fang down.
It flew across the short distance and straight into Tom's chest just before it
would have been too late. Tom's muscles reacted a second later and he caught
the precious book fast against his body before it could fall to the ground.
Potter pulled up short just before the fang plunged into his leg where the
diary had been resting just a moment before.
Tom's heart was pounding now. If he had reacted just a split second later… If
he hadn't Summoned it in time… If the wand hadn't already been raised…
He swallowed thickly as his wide-eyed gaze met Harry's equally shocked green
eyes. It was as if time once again had no meaning, and he had no idea how long
they stood there. He didn't even feel the elation he'd thought he would—that he
certainly would have, before…—when he felt Ginny die and knew for certain that
it was done. He was real.
But it did prod him into action.
"AVADA KEDAVRA!" he screamed. Then, without pausing to cringe at the
uncontrolled tone of his voice, he span on his heel and ran deeper into the
Chamber, away from Dumbledore's bird and the fang and the bodies of Harry
Potter and Ginny Weasley.
Chapter End Notes
     Some lines and descriptions in this chapter are either direct
     quotations or paraphrases from Chamber of Secrets, Chapter 17, "The
     Heir of Slytherin."
      
     There are two main motivators for this story. First, Tom Riddle is
     one of my favorite characters, and it has always bothered me that
     Rowling wrote him as so incredibly stupid and slow to react in CoS
     when elsewhere she describes how brilliant he was. (But I suppose
     that Harry wouldn't have been able to win in the Chamber if Tom had
     been as smart as he was supposed to have been, and Rowling did need
     Harry to win….) So I thought about possible explanations for why he
     was the way he was in CoS.
     Second, the idea of Horcruxes is fascinating, and the diary Horcrux
     in particular acts so differently from the Horcruxes we see later in
     HBP that it can lead to all sorts of ideas. Tom (the diary) is
     apparently a separate entity entirely from Voldemort (the man), as he
     doesn't share memories or knowledge with Voldemort, and later on in
     DH we know that Voldemort himself also isn't aware of and doesn't
     have any connected with the diary or any other Horcruxes. Plus what
     if Tom had succeeded in getting a body… He would presumably still be
     one of Voldemort's Horcruxes even if he was in corporeal form, so how
     exactly would the mechanics of that work, and how would that change
     things with both Tom and Voldemort in the world?
     And so this story sprouted from the above thoughts.
      
     For anyone who is reading my other story, The Other Side, never fear;
     I have not stopped work on that story. In fact, I have been steadily
     pounding away at the next chapter and hope to release it in the next
     week or two, and I don't expect this story to interfere.
***** Life and Death *****
Chapter Summary
     Tom escapes from the Chamber and meets new old friends.
Chapter Notes
     Boy, the beginning of this chapter feels almost like a three-ring
     circus what with all the people Tom has to encounter!
See the end of the chapter for more notes
Tom Riddle did not feel fear. Or much of anything, really, but certainly not
fear.
Although he had often caused it in other people, he had never personally
experienced a racing heart or the feeling of jumping out of his own skin. He
had watched others wipe sweaty palms on their trousers and had seen their eyes
go wide in terror, but he had never personally experienced those sensations.
Until he had watched Harry Potter almost destroy him.
He supposed that was the difference between having a phobia of an abstract
idea, of something far off in the future, and almost watching it come to
fruition right in front of his eyes. Certainly he had a phobia of death, but no
matter how irrational his thoughts had been, his reactions had always been
rather rational. He had endeavored to find a way to defeat death. And he had
succeeded. He had defeated his phobia, conquered death.
Now, as he leaned heavily on a damp stone wall deep in the Chamber, bending
forward with his hands on his knees and his head hanging down, trying to
breathe deeply and calm his racing heart, he thought that perhaps this wasn't
the ideal time to contemplate his own psychology.
He was annoyed at himself for reacting this way. He was annoyed that he had
been robbed of the moment of elation he'd expected to enjoy when he got a body.
He was annoyed with himself for being annoyed.
And he had more pressing matters to deal with at the moment.
Ginny and Potter would be missed before long, if they weren't already, and that
thrice-damned bird would surely go running to its thrice-damned owner. The
longer he waited the more difficult it would be to get out of the castle. It
had only been a few minutes at the most, so hopefully he still had time.
He took a circuitous route back towards the entrance so as to avoid the main
chamber where it had happened. It was really too bad that there was only one
entrance to the Chamber, especially when he discovered a pile of rocks blocking
his way to the pipe. There was quite a large hole in the wall of rubble, and he
peered cautiously through it.
A pair of blue eyes peered back at him.
"Who're you?" demanded the boy.
"Tom," he replied truthfully. It wasn't as if he had anything to lose by doing
so.
The boy pulled back far enough that Tom could see freckles and ghastly orange
hair. "Where's Harry? And Ginny! Where's my sister?"
Ah, so this must be Ron, Tom thought.
"They're here with me, but they're injured," he answered, infusing his tone
with the urgency and near panic he felt for himself. "Is there anyone else
there who can help us? Do you have any professors with you?"
"No," replied the boy, clearly panicking now himself. "Let's make the hole
bigger, then we—"
But he didn't get any further, because Tom, satisfied that Ron Weasley was the
only immediate threat, aimed Potter's wand through the hole and said, "Avada
Kedavra."
He couldn't see Ron fall, but he could hear the satisfying thump as he hit the
stone floor like a bag of rocks.
It was only a moment's work to make the opening large enough for him to
comfortably crawl through. He stepped over Ron's body with barely a glance
downwards and quickly crossed over to the pipe leading up to the girl's
bathroom. There he met a blond-haired man who was sitting at the edge of the
pipe.
"Hello!" he greeted Tom cheerfully. "Who are you?"
"The boy said he didn't have any professors with him!"
The man smiled in agreement. "Oh, I'm sure he hasn't. I'd make an awful
professor."
Tom could only stare in astonishment. "Who are you?"
"Well, I don't know," he replied. Then, as if he found nothing worrying about
that fact, he asked, "I say, do you know where we are? Strange sort of place,
isn't it?"
There was really no telling whether the man was serious or not, but Tom had
quite finished wasting time. A moment later he was stepping over another body
and up into the pipe. He could clearly hear the lament of the phoenix from
behind him, still in the Chamber, and he hurried to levitate himself up to the
entrance. Then he stepped out of the sink only to come face to face with a girl
he'd never thought to see again.
"Tom?" she asked, clearly as incredulous as he was.
He hadn't known her in school. He had learned who she was after he'd killed
her, of course, but only because of all the articles in the newspaper and the
memorial service they'd for her. Still, he wasn't at all surprised that she
knew him—everybody knew him!—even if it was quite inconvenient. She could
easily identify him by name to anyone who asked. And certainly she knew now
where the entrance to the Chamber was, even if she hadn't before.
He sighed in defeat.
"It was you?" she continued, her voice going higher with each syllable, though
he wouldn't have said it was possible if anyone had asked him before he'd heard
it for himself. Then she spun in midair and streaked out of the bathroom,
screeching, "MURDERER! MURDERER IN THE BATHROOM! MURDERER!"
He sighed again, casting a Disillusionment Charm on his body and Muffling
Charms on his feet as he hurried out of the bathroom and down the corridor. He
slipped into the nearest classroom when he heard footsteps rushing towards him,
although he felt secure enough in the strength of his charm to stand just
inside the doorway and watch as a group rushed past his hiding place. He easily
recognized Dumbledore, although the man was significantly older than he had
been before Tom went into the diary—fifty years older, in fact. He could have
identified the man by his garish robes if by nothing else.
He didn't recognize the others, although he assumed that the two with orange
hair must be related to the Weasley children, probably their parents.
Ah well, he thought with an easy smile, fortunately for them they still have
five more children. For now.
After the group had passed by, he quickly stepped out into the corridor behind
them and made a beeline for the staircase before they doubled back to look for
him. And before anything else happened, with the way this night was going.
Fortunately it was the dead middle of the night, so no one else was around and
he was able to rush out the grand doors without further hindrance. He made for
the Forbidden Forest, because he figured that the first place anyone would look
would be towards the gates.
He was breathing heavily by the time he'd made it deep enough in to feel secure
about stopping and leaning against a tree. It was very clear to him that this
body was brand new and not at all used to physical exertion. Tom absolutely
reveled in the feel of his lungs burning and his legs aching. It was painful,
but it mean that he was alive, that he was real and no longer practically a
non-being stuck in some accursed book for all of eternity.
===============================================================================
He still had a grin on his face and his fingers wrapped around the diary in his
pocket when he Apparated into the front drawing room of Malfoy Manor. A house-
elf popped into the room, squeaked, and popped back out before he could react
to it, so Tom shrugged and settled onto one of the fine velvet sofas. The room
had been changed since the last time he'd been here, but he figured that wasn't
too much of a surprise, seeing as it had been fifty years. Even pure-bloods
redecorated at least once every half century or so.
He hadn't been waiting long before a tall wizard with shoulder-length blond
hair Apparated into the room a few feet from him. He appeared angry and
disheveled, and he was on the verge of storming out of the room when he caught
sight of Tom sprawled elegantly across his furniture. He scrutinized Tom with
such intense suspicion that a lesser wizard would have balked.
Tom stared right back.
"I do not believe I have had the pleasure," the man said, finally, his tone
stiff with formality and distrust. "Are you waiting for my father?"
Tom had thought at first that he was looking at an older Abraxas, but he
quickly realized that it couldn't have been. This wizard was probably only in
his late thirties or early forties, and anyway Abraxas would have recognized
Tom right off. (He had to wonder, of course, why Abraxas's son, apparently a
follower of Lord Voldemort, wouldn't recognize him, even a younger version of
himself, but he pushed the thought aside for later consideration.)
He was spared from having to answer when another man appeared in the doorway,
apparently having been summoned by the house-elf.
"Tom?"
He made no attempt to disguise the shock in his voice. Their eyes met over
Lucius's shoulder, and Tom could see the differences in their features now that
he could see them at the same time. Lucius's features were sharper than his
father's, and he didn't have Abraxas's wide jawline or thin lips.
Then the elder Malfoy seemed to recover himself sufficiently, and he crossed
the room in three long strides, shoving past his son in order to kneel in front
of Tom.
"Forgive me, My Lord. I forgot myself," he said with every appearance of
sincerity. His son made a wounded sort of sound in the back of his throat that
Tom could hear from where he was sitting. "Your appearance… You look just as
you did in school…. My Lord, how…?"
Tom realized that he was unlikely to be able to pull off a lie about being the
Lord Voldemort they knew if he couldn't even recognize his own followers at
first glance. However, he was confident that he could manage to simply omit
certain information for long enough to buy himself a bit of time to figure out
his next move. He hoped that it hadn't been a mistake to come to Malfoy Manor,
but he hadn't been able to think of anything else to do, given that he had no
money and had little idea about the differences between his own time and now.
Lucius had by this time come to kneel beside his father. "I beg your
forgiveness, My Lord. If I had recognized you—"
"Yes, I'm sure," Tom cut him off. "I can overlook your mistake this once. In
fact, I believe that I should reward you for the loyal service you have done
me."
He removed the diary from his robes and held it near to his body, where the
Malfoys could see it but had no chance of touching it.
They were silent for a handful of seconds before Lucius ventured to say, "My
Lord, I have constantly thought of how to restore you. Nothing could have
prevented me from helping you. I expect no reward for doing what any of your
loyal servants should have done."
He was lying, Tom knew. His voice contained an air of flattery and charm that
was the hallmark of a man who was trying to make someone believe something that
wasn't entirely true, for his own benefit. Tom had practiced tirelessly as a
small child to rid his own voice of any such obvious signs that he was
insincere.
What was more, Tom knew that there was no way Lucius could have known what
would happen when he gave the diary to Ginny Weasley. After all, Tom himself
hadn't known that he was capable of restoring himself to a body until he'd
actually undertaken to steal Ginny's soul just to see what would happen. Tom
would have thought twice about creating Horcruxes if he'd known at the time
that they were capable of manifesting themselves as he had now—it wasn't good
for business, after all, to have multiple versions of yourself liable to pop
out of the woodwork.
He offered the man a cold, humorless smile. Abraxas shuddered from his place on
his knees next to his son.
"I doubt that, Lucius." Malfoy looked ready to protest, but a lazy wave of
Tom's hand was enough to convince him to snap his mouth closed again. "Still,
you were the means of my return, whether you intended it or no, and Lord
Voldemort does not forget."
Abraxas finally raised his eyes from the diary to look him in the face. "Will
you remain as you are now, My Lord?"
"I imagine that I will," Tom replied confidently, although in reality he did
not know the answer. He had long since perfected the art of always appearing to
know what he was talking about, and even fifty years in utter social isolation
could not make him forget that skill. "I admit that when I created this
artifact when I was sixteen, I was not thinking of how my followers in later
years would react to a leader who looks as I did then, if I ever had need of
using it."
He did wonder privately whether he was legitimately a real person. Would he
age? Could he eat? Would he need to sleep? Could he be killed just as any other
person could? He would have to test these things for himself at the earliest
opportunity.
For now, his answer seemed to satisfy the Malfoys' curiosity on that point.
"Sixteen…" breathed Abraxas, eyeing Tom's features with a mixture of awe and
foreboding. "My Lord, I had no idea—That is, I never knew then that you had
already—that you had—"
Tom cut him off smoothly. "If I had wanted you to know, you would have known."
"Of course, My Lord. Forgive me."
The elder Malfoy looked properly humbled, although perhaps he looked a little
hurt as well. Tom wondered if his position of prominence among his followers
had carried over into their adult lives and beyond. Abraxas had been older, in
fifth year when Tom was in first, and he had been the first person to recognize
the potential of being close to the scrawny orphan who could speak Salazar's
language. Malfoy had sought Tom out long before his fellow first years had
learned the hard way that it was far better to be on his good side than his
bad.
"You are not wrong to think now of my fellow Death Eaters' reactions, My Lord,"
Lucius offered, his voice carefully measured so as to give the least offense
possible. "My father and his friends surely remember their school days with
you, but they never speak of it. Before tonight I had never thought of you
as—forgive me, My Lord—as someone who was once a normal boy."
"By which I am sure my son means only your outward persona, My Lord," Abraxas
rushed to add. "You were never normal, average."
Lucius, who had apparently not considered that his words could be interpreted
in quite that way, nodded along vigorously.
"Yes, quite so, My Lord; please forgive me if my words could have been taken as
anything else." Tom waved him along impatiently, and he hastened to say, "I
mean only that those of us who did not share childhoods with you know nothing
about that time. Why, I had not even known your given name before tonight; I
had only known your initials, from the diary."
Tom had learned more than he could have hoped to learn even if he had
engineered the conversation himself.
So I am not known by my given name—Abraxas was so quick to apologize for
calling me "Tom" that I truly must not allow anyone to speak of it.He curled
his tongue up against the roof of his mouth as he thought. It was a tick that
was undetectable from the outside, and he had long since trained himself to do
that rather than to bite his lip or tilt his head. Unless, of course, he wanted
someone to be aware that he was thinking about something, in which case he
would tilt his head with impunity. What could Lucius have meant about not
having ever thought of me as normal? Can my appearance have changed so much?
"And how do you think of me, Lucius?" he asked suddenly.
The man's eyes widened fractionally, although it was clear he was attempting to
control his expression. "My Lord?"
"Only as your lord?" Tom asked, as if the man had been giving him an answer and
not asking a question. "Not as Voldemort?"
"No, My Lord!" he cried. "I would never presume! I could never dare!"
Tom was more satisfied than he could have expressed.
===============================================================================
In the early morning hours of the last day of May, Tom stretched luxuriously
against the silky sheets in the Malfoys' best guest room. The room had been
constructed to house King William III, as the portrait of Brutus Malfoy had
been all too happy to inform him, when William and Mary had been expected to
visit Brutus at the end of the seventeenth century. However, the Statute of
Secrecy had passed in 1692, so, much to Brutus's chagrin, the expected visit
had obviously never happened. So the room had been updated with the latest
technologies and luxuries over the years, and Brutus's portrait was hung there
in commemoration, but otherwise it was kept mostly the same as when originally
built. Some sort of tradition, Tom supposed.
Lucius had installed Tom in the room late the night before, after he had
exhausted himself with research in the Malfoys' vast library. He had needed to
learn about everything he had missed, as he had told his hosts. If the Malfoys
assumed that he was only referring to the past ten years and not to the past
fifty, then he was not about to correct them.
It felt indescribably good to lie in a real bed and rub himself against real
sheets. And to eat real food and thumb through real books.
Tom never cried, neither from sadness nor happiness nor otherwise, but he
imagined that if he were the type of person who did, he would have been a
blubbering mess for the past twenty-four hours.
The thick carpet felt absolutely amazing between his toes when he finally got
out of bed, and even the cool bathroom tiles beneath his bare feet seemed like
an amazing luxury to him. He had no words to even begin to describe the hot
water running through his hair and over his body. He did have a few words he
could have used to describe the feel of slick soap and a firm hand against his
member when he indulged himself in the shower, but he figured that the wordless
noises he allowed to escape his throat were much more fitting for the situation
than any flowery description he could have provided himself.
He had long since forgot what it felt like to actually experience his senses.
Sight, smell, taste, hearing, touch—they had been all but lost to him in the
diary, but now he planned to revel in them as much as possible.
His eyes landed on the ornate toilet as he was stepping out of the shower. And
really, even the Malfoys' toiletswere over the top? He rolled his eyes
heavenward for a moment. Then it occurred to him that he had no need to make
use of the facilities, nor had he the day before, even though he had veritably
gorged himself with every food and drink his hosts had put in front of him. He
might have forgotten exactly what having a body felt like, but he remembered
the regular occurrence of certain bodily functions.
Researching the exact nature of his newfound body leapt up to number one on his
to-do list, in front of finding someone to shag, learning all he could about
what he had missed, figuring out what to do about his other self, and setting
up some longer term goals for his new reign.
(He scolded himself and reluctantly moved finding someone to shag lower down
the list, after learning all he could about what he had missed. He refused to
move it any lower.)
Although neither of them had mentioned it the day before, it was clear that at
least one of the Malfoys had taken note of the school uniform he was wearing
and had taken it upon himself to procure Tom some more appropriate clothing. He
gleefully burned his old clothes, not caring at all about the scorch mark he
left on the expensive carpet. It took him a few minutes to get used to the
slightly different cut and fit of his new modern clothes, but by the time he
joined the Malfoys for breakfast he was moving just as elegantly as he ever
had.
Three people rose from the table when he entered the room, and Lucius rushed to
offer him the chair at the head of the table.
"My Lord, I hope you slept well. Here, sit down and allow the house-elves to
serve you."
Tom mentally smiled at the man's over-solicitousness. It had been revealed the
day before, after someone finally thought to ask why Lucius had been Apparating
back to the Manor in such a furious state, that he had managed to get himself
ousted from his position as a Hogwarts governor. Tom hadn't been truly
angry—after all, he had never known that Malfoy was on the school board in the
first place, and it wasn't like he had formed any plans around it—but he had
thoroughly enjoyed acting like he was disappointed and watching the man
metaphorically dangle uncomfortably over the fire.
He waited until they were all seated to respond. "I slept very well. Brutus
Malfoy had the most interesting story to tell me about my room."
All three Malfoys immediately looked uncomfortable, and Tom delighted in
pointing out their hypocrisy. Abraxas had always insisted that his family had
never had any contact with Muggles, yet here Tom had found out that they had
originally been granted land in England by William the Conqueror and that they
had planned to house Muggle royalty in their home. He didn't truly mind their
family history, of course, but he always took pleasure in twisting pure-bloods'
beliefs to his own needs and for his own amusement.
Fortunately for the Malfoys—or perhaps unfortunately, as it would turn out—the
arrival of their morning post saved any of them from having to respond.
Tom could see the headline of the Daily Prophet as Abraxas picked it up.
THREE KILLED IN ATTACK AT HOGWARTS!
He blinked once in surprise. Three dead?
"Give me that!" he demanded, but he had already Summoned it out of Abraxas's
hands and into his own before the man had time to respond.
     Two Hogwarts students and one professor were killed in the early
     morning hours of May 30th. This is the culmination of a series of
     attacks at the school beginning last Halloween, although these are
     the first deaths. Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Lived, who was somehow
     involved in the events, was moved last night from the school
     infirmary to Saint Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and
     Injuries, but the details of his involvement and of his condition
     have not been released.
     Headmaster Dumbledore refuses to reveal any details of what took
     place at the school, but he assures this reporter that the monster
     has been destroyed. He says that the unfortunate deaths of Professor
     Gilderoy Lockhart and students Ronald and Ginevra Weasley, as well as
     the undisclosed injuries to Harry Potter, happened in the
     confrontation with the beast and that, while tragic, such an event
     cannot happen again.
Tom dropped the newspaper and slumped back against his chair in surprise. How
had Potter survived? He had hit him with a Killing Curse at almost point-blank
range!
Lucius, who had his own copy of the newspaper, addressed his father and wife.
"Listen to this: 'This reporter is far from convinced by Dumbledore's
reassurances; if he has nothing to hide and the monster really has been
destroyed, then why has he not released the full details of the events? Indeed,
I wonder at Headmaster Dumbledore's presence in the school on the night of
these events after the Board of Governors had voted to remove him from his post
due to his mishandling of the attacks earlier in the year. It seems that
Dumbledore orchestrated to have himself reinstated as headmaster and for Lucius
Malfoy, the concerned board member and parent of Draco Malfoy (second year), to
be removed from his position as a school governor. Malfoy had pushed for
Dumbledore's removal, citing safety concerns and Dumbledore's incompetent
responses to the attacks.'"
Narcissa clapped her hands in delight. "My dear, if you put the right words in
the right ears, you could easily have the entire school board ousted and
yourself reinstated by the end of the day!"
While the Malfoys celebrated this small victory, Tom stared hard at his
abandoned copy of the newspaper as if it might rise up from the table and give
him the answers he sought.
How had Potter survived?
"My Lord?" he heard, and he looked up to find all three Malfoys watching him.
He was sure it wasn't the first time Abraxas had called his name. "My Lord,
what are you doing to do? What would you have us do?"
Tom really had no idea.
Chapter End Notes
     Any vaguely recognizable Lockhart lines are modified from Chamber of
     Secrets, Chapter 17, "The Heir of Slytherin"; and Chapter 18,
     "Dobby's Reward."
     Myrtle's line is modified from Half-Blood Prince, Chapter 24,
     "Sectumsempra."
     Lucius's "slippery" attempt at taking credit is inspired by his lines
     in Goblet of Fire, Chapter 33, "The Death Eaters."
      
     The information about the Malfoy family history comes from
     Pottermore. According to this account, the first Malfoy on British
     soil was Armand Malfoy, who came over with William the Conqueror and
     was granted lands by him. After that the Malfoys maintained influence
     in the Muggle royal court for many centuries and built up their
     fortune by taking advantage of Muggles, and when the Statute of
     Secrecy was proposed in the late seventeenth century they were
     vehement opponents of it. However, after it passed they quickly
     adapted and soon were insisting that they had never interacted with
     Muggles at all.
     Abraxas is Draco's grandfather's name in canon, as he mentions to
     Slughorn in HBP. We don't know that he was a Death Eater, but I find
     it likely that he was at least a supporter even if he wasn't Marked,
     given Lucius's deep involvement. I don't imagine that he would have
     allowed his son to join if he hadn't supported Voldemort.
      
     Thank you to everyone who reviewed, favorited, and followed! Please
     do let me know what you think and what you like, especially if you
     have favorite and followed. I always appreciate it!
***** The Investigations *****
Chapter Summary
     Tom investigates himself, and Harry finds himself under
     investigation.
Tom leaned against the window frame and watched the sunrise through the floor-
length window in his bedroom. He hadn’t slept since the night before or eaten
anything since dinner two days ago. After hearing the news about Potter, he had
been too agitated to give it much thought. He had often gone without food or
sleep when he was deep into research or some other obsession, so it wasn’t
exactly unusual.
What was unusual was that he wasn’t the least bit tired or hungry.
It was clear that he didn’t have a human body, at least not exactly. Perhaps
his body was the Horcrux now, and not the diary? Maybe he had just switched
containers?
But he could eat and sleep and wank off and enjoy the contrast between the hot
summer air and the cool stone against his skin. What he needed to know was if
he had to be subject to the normal human needs and weaknesses.
It was possible that his other self would have some idea what was going on,
that he had gathered more information in his travels or in the actual practice
of making Horcruxes. Tom only had the knowledge he’d gained up until the time
he’d entered the diary and whatever he’d managed to learn in the Malfoy library
since his return. It was most vexing to feel as if his brilliant mind had been
wasted for fifty years, and he was indescribably jealous that his other self
had apparently been able to go all the places and learn all the things that he
had dreamed of while he was a student.
Well, he thought as he pushed himself away from the window and towards the bed
where he had left Potter’s wand, there’s only one way I’m going to learn
anything about this.
The first step, the most important litmus test to determine what sort of thing
he was, would be to figure out if he could be injured through normal means. The
diary, like all Horcruxes, was virtually indestructible (except, of course, if
one happened to attack it with something just as Dark as it was, such as
basilisk venom). His other self had never conducted any experiments on him that
he was aware of, so this knowledge had always been theoretical rather than
empirically tested. Until little Ginny Weasley’s actions had proved it to him
when the diary hadn’t been damaged by the water she’d tossed him in.
However, Tom had no intention of trying to drown himself, not in a toilet or
otherwise.
The dagger he conjured was plain but deathly sharp. It slipped into the skin of
his wrist quite effortlessly, like gliding through water. Dark blood
immediately poured from the wound.
Is it even blood? Tom wondered idly, his thoughts seeming almost detached from
the situation. Maybe it’s the potion used in the Horcrux ritual? Or ink.
He dragged the blade upwards towards the crook of his elbow. The pain made his
hand slip so that the gash curved inwards instead of making a straight line. It
was nothing to the pain of being made into a Horcrux, though, so he didn’t
allow that slight inconvenience to stop him. Skin and muscle and sinew
separated right down to the bone, and when he was finished making the cut he
stabbed downwards into the bone itself once for good measure before calmly
setting the dagger on the bedside table next to him.
It was difficult to see through all of the blood (or whatever it was), but he
was pretty sure that all of the anatomy looked to be in its proper place. It
was quite fascinating to see one’s own insides. He wondered why he’d never done
it before.
Then before his very eyes the horrific gash began to heal. It didn’t close up
or reknit itself or anything else to suggest that he was just a magically fast
healer. Rather it just… melted away, as if it had never existed to begin with.
He was left with an arm as pristine as ever, except that it was drenched in
thick, dark blood. He extended and contracted his elbow experimentally, then
twisted his forearm so that it was facing upwards then downwards.
There was no pain or any other sign that he had been injured.
Over the next half an hour or so he concocted increasingly painful and
injurious experiments to perform on himself, from burning a hole in his own
chest to removing one of his little toes from his body. No matter what he did,
whether the Muggle way or by magic, he came away in the end without a scratch
on him.
Tom had the urge to write all of this down, as he had always done with the
results of his experiments or any other new knowledge he had gained. However,
this particular field of knowledge was better left only in his own brain, and
perhaps that of his other self. Even if he put the very best protections he
knew how on his notes, then locked them in a safe box with another layer of the
very best protections, then threw the whole thing into the middle of the Arctic
Ocean, he still wouldn’t feel secure having such information about himself
written down.
A knock came at the door. “My Lord?”
“Come,” Tom had replied before he’d really thought about it.
He realized his mistake as soon as Lucius froze in the doorway, wide eyes
taking in his form. The man had called his name in shock and rushed across the
room before Tom had time to reassure him.
“My Lord, what is this? What’s happened?”
Lucius had seized his blood-covered forearm and was holding it closer to his
face to inspect it. No doubt he was looking for the injury that must be the
source of the all the blood that was splattered across Tom’s body and his
bedroom.
“Let go, Malfoy,” Tom ordered, although it came out much calmer than he was
sure Lord Voldemort would have been under the same circumstances.
The man dropped Tom’s arm as if it had burned him.
“Forgive me, My Lord! I meant no disrespect! I was thinking only of your
safety!”
“I know,” Tom replied in his eerily calm voice, “and that’s why I haven’t
removed your hand from your body.”
The truth was that he relished the physical contact, and it was only the
knowledge that Lord Voldemort would have never allowed his followers to touch
him without permission that had kept him from allowing Malfoy to paw at him to
his little blond heart’s content. It seemed that he was quite a bit more
tactile—that he enjoyed human contact a lot more—now than before he’d gone into
the diary, which was really no surprise, given the complete absence of physical
sensation for the past fifty years. Perhaps if Lucius had shown any sexual
interest in him…
But no, he hadn’t noticed any indication that the man would be a willing
partner in that. Unfortunately.
He stepped around Malfoy, who leapt out of the way so quickly that he almost
tripped backwards, and made his way to the bed, where he had dropped Potter’s
wand sometime during his experiments. It was only a moment’s work to put his
appearance to rights. He would leave the bedroom for the house-elves.
“Why are you here?” he asked the other wizard.
Lucius looked as if he desperately wanted to ask what Tom had been doing and
whose blood was still all over the room, but instead he schooled his voice into
an impressively level tone, given the circumstances, and explained, “I came to
see if you would like breakfast, My Lord—you must be hungry!—and to tell you
that I will be meeting with the Minister this morning to see about my position
on the school board.”
Tom had no intention of eating breakfast. Sure he desperately missed food, and
as early as twenty-four hours ago no one could have suggested to him that he
should willingly give it up. However, he was determined now to see if he could
go inhuman amounts of time without food or sleep.
“I’m not hungry. I expect you to return with information about Harry Potter.”
===============================================================================
Lucius had been reinstated to the school board, just as his wife had predicted.
They had all been amused by the article in the Daily Prophet proclaiming him
the victim of a scheming old man who had used his influence to get rid of his
opposition and reclaim his position. The public perhaps would not have been so
critical of Dumbledore regaining his position as headmaster if there hadn’t
been three deaths and one injured Savior on his watch, all of which seemed to
reinforce the idea that Malfoy had been right about Dumbledore’s inability to
handle the situation.
As for the accusations that Lucius had threatened to curse the families of the
other members of the board in order to get them to remove Dumbledore in the
first place, they were considered nothing more than a baseless attempt by
Dumbledore’s supporters to cover their own tracks and to continue defaming the
man who had called for their idol’s removal.
It seemed that Tom’s victory that night in the Chamber had more far-reaching
effects than even he could have imagined.
Still, the Ministry was reluctant to remove Dumbledore now that he was
reinstated. Lucius had succeeded in having the rest of the supposedly dirty
board removed and had installed some of Tom’s supporters in their places, but
he couldn’t select all of the new members. The other board members and Minister
Fudge were convinced that it would be political suicide to remove Dumbledore at
this juncture. Lucius’s hands were tied until Dumbledore screwed up again.
Most frustratingly, Lucius had been unable to dig up any useful information
about Harry Potter or the Chamber incident. It wasn’t really his fault, as
Dumbledore was keeping the boy strictly isolated in a private room at Saint
Mungo’s and had insisted that they had to wait until he was released from the
hospital to speak to him.
Still, Tom had been most displeased, and Lucius had been the most convenient
target for his ire.
When Lucius strolled into the library a couple of weeks later, in mid-June,
Tom’s hopes were renewed. He did not have the look about him of someone who
knew that he was about to be held under the Cruciatus Curse. Tom hoped that
meant he actually had something useful to say this time around.
“My Lord,” Lucius began, quickly bowing in Tom’s direction by why of greeting,
“Potter has finally been released from Saint Mungo’s. Dumbledore tried to keep
it quiet, and if not for Fudge’s interference I am sure that I would not have
known about the interview until after the fact.” Here he allowed himself a
brief chuckle. “The look on Dumbledore’s face when he saw me standing there
will be etched into my mind forever.”
Tom perked up, sitting up straight in his seat and pushing away the heavy tome
he’d previously been hunched over. He gestured for Malfoy to sit.
“And?”
Lucius gracefully lowered himself into a large wingback chair directly across
from Tom’s.
“I was able to cast doubt on both his story and, I am happy to say, his mental
faculties. I accused him and Dumbledore of having concocted the whole story
about the Chamber of Secrets in order to cover up Dumbledore’s incompetence.”
The Malfoys had a large Pensieve, which was quickly sent for. Tom was
momentarily uncomfortable at the thought of leaving himself exposed and
vulnerable while he was inside the Pensieve, but then he remembered his own
virtual invincibility and, with a cold laugh that seemed to unnerve Lucius,
pressed his face into the swirling liquid.
He landed in the entrance hall at Hogwarts, right in front of the grand
staircase. He was standing right next to Lucius, who was conversing quietly
with two other men. At the sight of one of the men he experienced the same
sense of surprise he’d felt when he’d first seen Abraxas looking so old. It had
to be Richard Mulciber, only fifty years older.
The other man he recognized only because he had seen the man’s picture in the
newspaper. Cornelius Fudge was standing directly on Lucius’s other side,
wearing a pinstripe suit and holding a lime green bowler hat in one hand.
The group stood assembled when Dumbledore exited the Great Hall with Harry
Potter a step behind him. The look on his face when he saw them was, as Lucius
had said, quite priceless.
“Cornelius,” he said, not exactly politely, “I wasn’t aware that we would have
an audience. Surely you understand that Harry isn’t strong enough for an
interrogation?”
“An audience, Albus?” Lucius answered before the Minister could speak. “Surely
you do not suggest that representatives from the Board of Governors do not have
a right to be present for this inquiry?”
Mulciber spoke up in agreement. “Quite right, Mr. Chairman. The members of the
school board think only of the safety of the students, and I’m sure that
Minister Fudge would never suggest that he or any other Ministry official be
allowed to questions a Hogwarts student without board oversight.”
Fudge looked rather more confused than not, but he nodded in agreement anyway.
“Yes, yes, of course!”
Dumbledore could not but agree, although he did not look pleased. “Very well. I
had planned to conduct this interview in my office.”
With that, he led the group through the castle and up the staircase behind the
statute, where Harry immediately dropped into a maroon armchair. Indeed, the
boy had looked to be swaying a bit on his feet, and Tom studied him with
curiosity tinged with hate.
He wished that he weren’t inside a memory, so he could try the Killing Curse
again. Next time he’d shove his wand right up Potter’s nose and cast it twice,
just to make sure it took.
Potter had barely got settled into his chair before Fudge said, “Now then,
Harry my boy, why don’t you tell us what happened?”
“It was Voldemort,” he stated immediately. Everyone in the room except
Dumbledore reacted immediately. There were shouts and shivers all around, and
Tom watched Lucius grip the handle of his cane so tight that his knuckles went
white.
“Preposterous!” cried Fudge. “You-Know-Who has been dead for over ten years!”
Dumbledore’s blue eyes were grave. “As I have told you, Cornelius, he is not
dead. He has merely been beaten back, not defeated, and it seems that now he
has returned.”
Fudge spluttered in indignation.
Lucius sniffed in disdain and demanded, “You expect us to believe that You-
Know-Who himself has been hiding out undetected in the school all year,
petrifying students and cats?”
“No!” cried Harry. “It was Tom Riddle’s diary! He had—!”
Mulciber, although he was clearly startled at the mention of that name, had
picked up on Lucius’s game by then. He cut off the Boy-Who-Lived with a
dramatic flourish of his hand. “I thought you said it was He-Who-Must-Not-Be-
Named! Now you say it was Tom Riddle!”
“You know as well as I do, Richard, that Tom Riddle and Lord Voldemort are one
and the same.”
Dumbledore’s eyes seemed to bore into the man, and Tom assumed that it was only
decades of experience under Lord Voldemort’s gaze that allowed him to hold firm
under the scrutiny.
“I know no such thing!” he declared hotly. “You always hated Tom, and you’ve
been accusing him of this since he discovered the culprit fifty years ago! You
didn’t have any evidence then and you don’t now!”
Harry sat forward in his seat, as if he wanted to leap to his feet but hadn’t
the strength to manage it. “We do have evidence! I saw him! He tried to kill
me, and he did kill Ginny and Ron!”
There was a minor uproar, and in between the people trying to be heard over
each other and Fudge’s exclamation of “Who is this Tom Riddle? Somebody tell me
who this Riddle is!” Lucius cracked his cane loudly against the stone floor.
When he had everybody’s attention, he sneered at Potter and asked again, “And
this Tom Riddle has been in the school all year?”
“It was his diary! He had possessed Ginny; she’d been writing to him all
along!”
Tom saw Mulciber stiffen and knew that he had some idea now what had happened.
It wasn’t exactly surprising, he supposed, given that he was one of Tom’s first
followers and had undoubtedly been there to witness nearly everything.
“Preposterous!” Fudge repeated. “I’ve never heard of any diary do any such
thing!”
Both Potter and Dumbledore opened their mouths to speak, but Lucius beat them
to it. “Now, Minister, I’m sure that we can easily clear up this mystery. Just
give us the diary, headmaster, and we can verify these claims for ourselves.”
Tom smirked at Malfoy’s cunning. He had known that there had to be a reason
Voldemort had given the man his favor and trusted him with possession of a
Horcrux.
Dumbledore frowned. “Unfortunately, we do not have the diary—”
“Because Riddle took it with him when he left!” cut in Potter.
Lucius looked for all the world as if he was terribly concerned and confused,
although Tom knew that he had to be immensely enjoying himself. “I thought you
said that Riddle possessed Miss Weasley through the diary? How is it that a
diary could carry itself away?”
Harry looked enraged now, and his voice was anything but calm when he tried to
explain. “He said that he had stolen her soul to escape from the diary, to make
himself a body. That’s how she died.”
Mulciber was staring hard between Potter and Malfoy now, an expression of
mingled shock and hope on his face. It seemed that Tom would have to solidify
his plans for Voldemort’s followers sooner rather than later.
“I see,” said Lucius, although disbelief was evident in his tone. “Even if this
is true, it does not explain what kind of monster perpetrated the attacks, or
why neither Headmaster Dumbledore nor any of the professors were able to find
and stop it. How did it come about that it was you, Mr. Potter, who finally
faced this monster?”
The headmaster looked rather more guilty than embarrassed, in Tom’s opinion. He
wondered how much Dumbledore had actually known, because he certainly didn’t
believe for one second that, with fifty years to think about it, a man as smart
as the headmaster hadn’t been able to figure out exactly what the monster was.
And that would certainly explain why his bird had shown up at the opportune
moment….
But why had he allowed things to continue, if he had known? Why had he allowed
Potter to come to the Chamber?
Tom had lost the train of the conversation while lost in his own musings, but
he was brought back to the present when Potter rose from his chair.
“I’m not making it up! I can prove it! I’ll show you the Chamber and you can
see the basilisk’s corpse for yourself!”
Tom looked at Lucius, who seemed rather alarmed at the suggestion. He assumed
that nothing bad had come of it, though, or else Malfoy wouldn’t have been
quite so happy when he’d returned to the manor, so he followed along behind the
group without any particular anxiety about the outcome of this little
adventure.
When they reached the second floor bathroom, Potter strolled right up to the
sink and said, “Open.”
Everyone watched in silence, but nothing happened.
“Open.” Potter tried again, but again nothing happened. He screwed his eyes
shut. “Open!”
Fudge chortled. “I say, Harry, this has all been a fine joke, but—”
“No! I can do it!” Potter cried. “It’s just difficult to speak Parseltongue
unless I’m actually talking to a snake!”
Mulciber huffed in exasperation. “Come now, I think we’ve heard enough! The
story is nothing short of fantastical, and neither Mr. Potter nor the
headmaster has been able to provide even a shred of evidence for any of it!”
“I am afraid that I have to agree,” said Lucius. “It seems that nobody here is
interested in telling us the truth.”
Dumbledore stared at him seriously. “Now, Lucius, you know that’s not true.”
Potter, who had been looking at the group with disgust, finally exploded. “YOU
KNOW THE TRUTH, MALFOY! YOU’RE THE ONE WHO GAVE RIDDLE’S DIARY TO GINNY!”
Lucius’s eyes glittered malevolently as he allowed his gaze to take the measure
of the boy. Mulciber was looking between the two of them with the same
expression as before.
“Mr. Potter!” exclaimed Fudge. “You cannot just go around making baseless,
disrespectful accusations about upstanding members of society like Mr. Malfoy!”
“Now, now, Cornelius,” Lucius’s smooth voice broke in, though his icy gray eyes
were still boring into Potter’s green, “I think that it’s quite clear Mr.
Potter has been coached to say these things.”
Potter and Dumbledore both protested, but it was too late. Fudge had taken hold
of the suggestion and clearly had every intention of running with it and never
letting it go.
“Yes…” he mused. Tom could almost physically see the thoughts as they took form
in his mind. “Yes, Lucius, Mr. Potter has clearly been dragged into this in an
effort to protect Dumbledore….”
Potter spluttered in indignation, and Dumbledore began, “Now wait just a
moment, Cornelius—” but the Minister would hear none of it. Lucius smiled
victoriously in Potter’s direction as he turned to follow the Minister out of
the bathroom.
Tom pulled out of the memory with a smirk on his face. Lucius was watching him
with a smile playing at the corner of his mouth.
“Are you pleased, My Lord?”
Tom acknowledged his pleasure with a nod, careful not to allow too much emotion
to show in front of his follower. “There is no chance that they will use truth
serum or perhaps a Pensieve to learn the truth?”
“No, My Lord. I suggested to Fudge that a wizard as powerful as Dumbledore,
given the weeks he has had alone with Potter, could certainly have implanted
false memories that would fool any measure we could come up with to test him.”
Although obviously Dumbledore had done no such thing, Tom knew that it was an
entirely plausible excuse. He himself had done it before, when he had framed
his uncle for the murder of his father and grandparents, and he’d only had a
couple of hours and about a hundred years less experience than Dumbledore.
“Will Dumbledore be removed?”
The smile slid off of Malfoy’s face. “I’m afraid not, My Lord. Fudge is quite
convinced, but this information is not public.”
And therefore it would be politically unpopular to remove him, Tom’s thoughts
supplied the rest.
He sincerely hated Dumbledore, he really did. The man had always been a thorn
in his side, and now after so long his influence and the cult of personality
that had grown up around him were major hindrances.
“But My Lord, the good far outweighs the bad,” Lucius’s voice broke into his
thoughts. “I’m sure that something will happen soon enough that will allow us
to oust Dumbledore, and Fudge is convinced that Potter is either mentally
incompetent or simply a tool for the headmaster.”
Tom nodded. “Yes, Malfoy, overall this is a victory. You have done well…. But
leave me to my thoughts now; you have left me a lot to consider.”
===============================================================================
                                        
A little more than a week later, on June 19th, Tom was reading quietly in the
library. He had long since finished reading the most reliable history books at
hand, and there wasn’t much else he could learn on that front unless he
actually got a follower—or Lord Voldemort himself—to fill in the blanks. Now he
was studying magical textbooks, refreshing his memory of things he had learned
long ago but hadn’t had an opportunity to practice in five long decades.
Next he would move onto more advanced areas. He had a lot of catching up to do
if he wanted even a small part of the knowledge he was sure his other self had
gathered over forty years of travel and practice, before he’d been defeated.
He was enjoying a thoroughly depraved guide to Memory Charms when his solitude
was interrupted. The Malfoys knew not to interrupt him in the library unless
the need was dire or the information more interesting than whatever he might be
reading, so he looked up expecting to receive important news from Abraxas or
Lucius. Instead he watched a smallish, shockingly blond boy cross the room to
one of the corner bookcases.
This must be Lucius’s son, Tom knew. In fact, he looked like a replica of
Lucius done in miniature.
Draco carefully transferred several books from the bag he was carrying onto the
shelf. Tom stayed silent and kept his seat as he watched these proceedings; the
best time to observe a person, after all, was when he didn’t know you were
watching him. Draco handled the books with love, placing them most carefully
into place, and before he turned away from the shelf he ran his hand reverently
over the volumes that had already been there.
Then he turned and caught sight of Tom, and he froze for a second before his
expression morphed into a haughty mask.
“Who’re you?” he asked as he sauntered over to the group of chairs where Tom
was sitting. “I’m Draco. Draco Malfoy. Are you here with your father? Father
told me he has an important guest, but of course all of the guests are
important or they wouldn’t be allowed to stay here.”
Tom raised his eyebrows in amusement. “No, I’m not here with my father.”
Draco dropped himself into the chair across from his.
“Really? How old are you?”
“Sixty-six,” Tom answered honestly.
The youngest Malfoy glared at him in annoyance. “If you don’t want to answer,
you just had to say so.”
There was a gasp, and they both turned to see Abraxas standing in the doorway
watching them with wide eyes.
“Draco!” He rushed to where they were seated, his robes swishing around his
legs when he came to a halt. He bowed low in Tom’s direction “My Lord, please
forgive my grandson’s impertinence. He had no idea who you are; he had not been
told yet of your return….”
There was complete silence for several heartbeats as they both looked at the
older man, then Draco turned to stare at Tom with wide, frightened eyes. Tom
could practically see the pulse point in his neck fluttering wildly. He seemed
frozen in place until his grandfather’s hand on his shoulder propelled him
forward. Then he fell to his knees in front of Tom’s chair.
“Please, My Lord, if I had known… I…”
He seemed to be at a loss for words.
Tom considered punishing him, or at least letting him sweat it out for a while
longer. However, he wasn’t actually angry or insulted—after all, he really
ought to get used to such reactions, given that he did look like a sixteen year
old and not at all like a Dark Lord. There would be plenty of opportunities to
punish people for making that mistake in the future, he was sure, but he
doubted anything good would come of torturing his hosts’ only child.
Still, there could be no harm in scaring him just a little….
He reached out and allowed the long fingers of one hand to curl over Draco’s
soft hair. The boy trembled under the touch, and his grandfather looked as if
he wanted nothing more than to reach out and snatch the boy out of his master’s
grasp. Of course he wouldn’t dare. Tom tilted Draco’s head back until he met
the swimming gray eyes and allowed his hand to travel down until his fingers
were half wrapped around Draco’s throat. He could feel the elevated pulse and
the convulsive swallows, and he allowed a smile to play across his lips.
“Leave us, child,” Tom ordered as he let go and sank back into his chair. He
was secretly amused at calling someone a child given his own appearance and the
fact that he still felt sixteen rather than sixty-six, but he didn’t allow his
amusement to show in his expression.
Draco stumbled to his feet and headed unsteadily for the door. He glanced back
over his shoulder and, instead of looking at Abraxas as Tom would have
expected, he looked right at Tom. As soon as their eyes met, Draco’s widened
and he looked away, rushing the rest of the way out of the library.
Tom fought the urge to smile. He hadn’t been so amused in quite a long time.
He turned to his oldest follower, twirling Potter’s wand around his fingers.
“Now, Abraxas, you and I need to have a little chat about this oversight.”
***** Thin Air *****
Chapter Summary
     Tom feels the pressure of pretending to be Lord Voldemort, and
     someone disappears.
Chapter Notes
     I'm not sure I'll be able to keep up this pace as exam season looms,
     but I'm currently inspired.
     There are various explanatory notes at the end.
See the end of the chapter for more notes
"Show me your Mark."
Lucius startled, his blond head whipping up to catch sight of Tom standing in
the doorway to his study.
"My Lord?" he asked, but he began rolling up his sleeve all the same.
Tom had been taking a risk; he'd really had no idea whether his other self had
actually gone through with Marking his followers. It had just been the
beginning of an idea before Tom had been put into the diary. If Lucius had
ended up having no idea what he was talking about, he would have had to
Obliviate him.
He might still have to Obliviate him, actually, if he became too suspicious.
"It occurs to me that I have not investigated the effects my resurrection has
had on this," he said by way of explanation as he took Lucius's outstretched
arm into his hands. The truth was that he needed to investigate the nature of
the Mark in the first place so that he could use it. He had started planning
how to bring some of his other followers back into the fold, but he could not
do that until he understood how their Marks worked. If he could not even
utilize the very brand he'd placed on them, it would be a dead giveaway that he
wasn't really Lord Voldemort.
Lucius winced uncomfortably when Tom prodded at the brand with his finger. "It
is still faded, My Lord. I had thought that it must be an effect of you having
obtained a new body rather than the one that originally created the Mark."
"Hmm…" Tom mused, only half paying attention to what the other man was saying.
"Yes, probably."
This wasn't the Mark he had envisioned for his followers. Then again, he had
never planned for his group to be called the Death Eaters either. The skull and
serpent was eminently suitable for a group called the Death Eaters, he had to
admit, but he rather doubted that he would have branded the Knights of
Walpurgis with any such thing.
He sighed. I will have to find a way to examine Abraxas's Mark.
Still, he had more information now than he had before: He knew without a doubt,
after having examined it, that it was a variant on the Protean Charm. He had
not worked out exactly how to modify the charm to suit his purposes before he'd
been sent into the diary, but at least now he knew that his other self had kept
that idea instead of finding something else entirely. It was a place to start.
There was a knock on the door then, and he dropped Lucius's arm to face that
direction.
"Father?"
Lucius paused in rolling his sleeve back down, shooting a vaguely horrified
glance between Tom and the heavy oak panels. "I can tell him to come back
later, My Lord. No doubt he just wants to ask me for some toy or another."
Tom smiled coldly and pointedly took a seat in one of the comfortable chairs in
front of Lucius's desk. "No, Lucius, invite him in. I need to speak with him."
There was no arguing with such an edict, but Tom knew that Lucius desperately
wanted to disobey him. He had not made a move to harm a hair on the Draco's
head in the days since their rather unorthodox introduction, but all three of
the older Malfoys had been quite on edge, as if he might change his mind at any
moment and strike the boy down where he stood. No doubt he hadn't put them at
ease by torturing Abraxas and Lucius for failing to have informed Draco
immediately of his identity. He had enjoyed Draco and been thoroughly amused by
him, but he had just needed to torture somethingand had found the boy's actions
to be the perfect excuse to Cruciate his sires. He would have used any excuse
at that point, and he didn't regret having done it.
Draco himself was still terrified to be around him, which was apparent from the
way he trembled when he noticed Tom in his father's study. He bowed
immediately, if stiffly, and murmured, "My Lord."
Lucius had come around his desk to stand protectively behind his son, for
whatever good that would do, and seeing them together struck Tom anew with how
close the resemblance was between them. When he had gone to kill his own father
fifty years ago, it had been like looking through time at what he would look
like in twenty or thirty years—well, more like in fifty or sixty years, given
that wizards aged slower than Muggles. He had wondered then what it would have
been like if the man had taken responsibility for him as he ought to have done,
instead of abandoning his pregnant wife and unborn child.
The younger Malfoy always looked up at his father with undisguised love and a
bit of worship shining in his eyes, and Lucius looked scarcely any more
dignified when he looked down at his son.
Tom supposed that Draco Malfoy would never murder his own father.
Mentally shaking himself from those thoughts, Tom gestured towards the chair
nearest his. "Come, Draco, sit by me."
Draco was obviously nervous at such a request, but to his credit he didn't look
to his father for support before he did as he was told. Once he was settled,
Tom offered him a kind look, one that appeared genuine.
"You are very important to my plans, Draco," he said softly, being as
unintimidating as he could manage. "No one else has the information you do. I
need you to tell me everything you know about Harry Potter."
"P—Potter?" Draco asked uncertainly. Then his eyes widened and he quickly
added, "My Lord."
Tom honestly did not have much patience for this sort of thing. He had hated
children even when he was a child himself, and that opinion had certainly not
improved as he grew older. However, his observations over the past several days
had shown him that, no matter what Draco's father thought, there was more of
Narcissa than Lucius in the boy's personality, even if his appearance was every
bit his father. Unlike Abraxas and Lucius, Draco was sensitive and appeared to
have no taste for true violence. He would not respond well to being treated
harshly, but Tom suspected that if he handled the boy with a soft hand then he
would be able to coax just as much loyalty from him as from either of the older
Malfoys. And soldiers were not the only followers Lord Voldemort would need.
So he leaned back casually in his chair and consciously softened the usually
harsh lines of face. "Yes. I need to know his strengths and weaknesses: who his
friends are, which subjects he does well in and which poorly, which professors
are his favorite. That sort of thing."
Draco blinked up at him through long, pale lashes, seemingly still unsure about
this turn of events. Tom supposed the boy might just think it was some sort of
trap and that he was going to be Cruciated as soon as he said the wrong thing.
Then he released his lower lip from between his teeth and said, "He—he is
treated favorably by the headmaster, My Lord, and by his head of house,
Professor McGonagall. In first year he should have been expelled because he was
caught on his broomstick after Madam Hooch had told us not to fly until she
came back, but when McGonagall saw him she gave him a place on the Quidditch
team—as a first year!—instead of expelling him or even taking points."
Tom raised his eyebrows. Potter must be extremely talented on a broom. "And
Dumbledore?"
Here Draco scowled in clear irritation. "At the end of first year everybody
knew that Potter and his friends had to have broken at least a hundred school
rules, the rumors were so incredible—something about a Cerberus and the
Sorcerer's Stone. But then, at the end of year feast after Slytherin had
already won the House Cup and the whole Great Hall was decorated in our colors,
Dumbledore awarded them all fifty points each and took them from dead last all
the way to first! Right there in the middle of the feast, after we had won fair
and square!"
He had never cared for such things himself, but Tom well understood the
motivation that the little House Cup competition provided for most students. He
had even played along and done more than his share of helping Slytherin win,
although it had been done in service of his being recognized for his brilliance
and talent and not actually as a quest to earn house points.
"Oh!" Draco exclaimed, the color in his cheeks rising even more. "Hagrid, the
nasty half-breed groundskeeper, seems to have a soft spot for Potter. I know
that Potter helped him hide a baby dragon last year, and I got detention from
McGonagall for reporting it!"
Tom actually laughed at that, just a single chuckle that escaped his mouth
before he could check himself.
"A baby dragon? Well, I suppose I am not surprised that Hagrid still has a
penchant for dangerous creatures that he has no business keeping as pets."
Draco and Lucius were both staring at him now, and he realized that he had been
mistaken to say that aloud. He wondered if he would ever get used to putting
his thoughts through the The Lord Voldemort They Know Would Never Say That
filter he had been attempting to construct in his mind.
"The acromantula, My Lord?" Lucius asked finally.
Tom realized that of course it made perfect sense for Lucius to have already
known, since he was the chairman of the school board during the most recent
Chamber incident. Surely Hagrid would have been the first suspect, since he had
been expelled as the culprit fifty years ago.
He ignored the question and turned back to Draco. "And his friends?"
"He's friendly enough with all of his housemates, but he's only close to Ron
Weasley and Hermione Granger, sir," he was quick to reply. "Did you kill the
Weasel? Only I couldn't think how Potter could have gotten into the Chamber if
he wasn't the Heir of Slytherin, and he did speak Parseltongue. I thought—I
mean, until I learned of your return, My Lord—I thought that maybe Potter
really had run mad and done it all himself, and Dumbledore was just covering
for him."
If he hadn't had so much practice controlling his reactions, Tom might have
reared back in genuine surprise. There was so much information to shift through
there, but he settled for asking, "Potter really could speak it then?"
"Oh, yes, My Lord. He spoke it right there in front of everybody when I was
paired with him in Dueling Club."
Draco seemed like he would say more, no doubt to regale Tom with a heavily
edited version of the duel that made him look the best, but Tom held up his
hand to forestall it. He had a lot to think about—Why had Potter lost the
ability to speak it, or had he been telling the truth in the bathroom and
merely had difficulty unless he had a real snake to talk to?—but there were
more pressing matters to attend to at the moment.
"Tell me about this Granger, then. A Mudblood?"
Lucius cleared his throat and Draco looked extremely uncomfortable.
"Yes, My Lord. She's very smart, though, at least with books. I'm sure she's
the brains behind everything Potter's done; Potter and Weasley can't even
manage to catch the Hogwarts Express on time."
He guessed from their reactions that this girl must be smart enough to have
challenged Draco academically, which he knew Lucius would not be happy about.
"Potter is close to his friends?"
"Yes, My Lord. He's always with them. They do everything together, as far as I
can tell, including whatever stunts Potter pulls. He wasn't himself at all when
he came back from the hospital."
Well, at least there was some good news! The Malfoys had shrunk back from him
as much as they could without moving, and Tom realized that he had started
twirling Potter's wand between his fingers without thinking about it. He often
did that when he was thinking of something particularly violent. Although in
this case it wasn't aimed at the Malfoys, they obviously had no way of knowing
that.
He smiled and kept twirling the wand, which did very little to alleviate his
hosts' fears. "Tell me, Draco, do you think Potter would be just as affected by
the loss of his Mudblood as he was by the loss of Weasley?"
Draco blinked at him several times in surprise. "I—I suppose so, My Lord. He
spent every second with her after he came back to school."
Tom rose suddenly from his chair, causing Draco to scramble up after him to
copy his father's bow. He reached out and ran the tips of his fingers along the
boy's cheek as he passed by them on his way out the door, enjoying the shudder
it drew. "You have done very well, Draco."
===============================================================================
It turned out that it was a bit more difficult to track down a Mudblood than
Tom had originally thought. Abraxas had been a bit surprised by his anger over
the time it was taking him to complete the task.
"My Lord," he had placated, spreading his hands in front of himself to show his
submission, "you know that these things take finesse to accomplish, and, as a
result, a certain amount of time. It would be easier if we could use Lucius,
but of course we can't blow his—"
Tom had snarled at him quite viciously, and he had abruptly stopped talking.
Perhaps his other self had known that, but he hadn't known any such thing.
Every time he found something else he didn't know that he should have, he got
more and more angry.
"I don't care whose arse you have to lick, Malfoy! I want the information by
the end of the week!"
Whether Malfoy really had put himself out to get the information sooner or
whether he would have had the information by the end of the week anyway, Tom
had no idea. But he had the information in hand that Friday afternoon, so he
was quite content either way.
The next obstacle had come when Lucius had become quite horrified at Tom's plan
to carry out the kidnapping himself.
"But, My Lord, surely you should not lower yourself to this!"
Tom might have been amused by this earlier, but by that point he had been quite
annoyed with the whole exercise. "Who will do it in my place, Malfoy? You? You
would stand out in a Muggle neighborhood as much as a troll would, even if you
changed your appearance."
And really, the icing on the cake had been that clearly Lucius had wanted to
ask quite a lot of questions about why Tom himself would have more success
blending into a Muggle neighborhood.
"Tell me, Malfoy," Tom had said by way of diversion, "have you any idea how to
mask your magic so that the Ministry does not immediately know that magic has
been performed in the vicinity of the Mudblood?"
"I—No, My Lord."
Tom let his wand out to twirl around his fingers. "And are you confident in
your ability to either escape or, upon capture, talk your way out of it if
Dumbledore or the Ministry is having the house watched as a precaution?"
"No, My Lord." Lucius had looked quite put out to have to admit that.
Tom had held him under the Cruciatus Curse for longer than was strictly
necessary for the offense of questioning his lord's plans.
And so on Saturday nearly two weeks after he had learned of the girl from
Draco, Tom found himself standing on her street. It was in an affluent London
suburb, the kind of place where Tom had always imagined that he would someday
live, before he'd discovered that he was a wizard. A church dominated the
center of the neighborhood, and four streets spread out around it like a cross.
He selected the street directly in front of the church door and set off down it
at a casual pace, smiling and nodding to the residents who took note of him. He
looked like he belonged there, he knew, and aside from the neighbors not
recognizing him as a resident he should have no trouble. He would probably be
thought of as the school friend of one of the neighborhood kids.
The Grangers had their name on their mailbox, so Tom had no trouble at all
finding the house. It was a typical middle-class home, two stories and an attic
made of brown brick with large white windows. The front garden was planted
heavily with trees and shrubs of all sorts so that only the narrow stone
walkway up to the door was clear. Tom kept up his leisurely pace as he made his
way up the walk and rang the bell.
The door was opened by a rather tall woman with dark hair pulled back into a
loose bun. She seemed quite bemused by the strange boy standing on her stoop
clutching a book to his front with anxious fingers. "Can I help you, dear?"
"Mrs. Granger?" asked Tom in a soft, nervous voice. At her affirmation, he went
on, "I'm Dean; I go to Hog—erm, to school with Hermione. I was hoping to visit
her, you see. But only if she isn't busy—and also you aren't busy, I mean! I
wouldn't want to—to intrude."
The woman looked as if she had to resist the urge to coo at him and pat his
cheek, which was just what Tom had hoped. "Is Hermione expecting you, dear?"
"No. I rather wanted it to be a surprise to cheer her up. She had such a hard
year last year, and I know that she was so—so upset by what happened to—well,
you know…." He trailed off uncomfortably, and Mrs. Granger's eyes darkened and
crinkled in understanding. "Only I know—that is, I've noticed—that she loves to
read, and I thought that she might enjoy this book"—here he indicated the book
that he had deliberately been keeping in a white-knuckled grip—"and that maybe
she wouldn't mind if I visited her instead of just owling it."
"Oh, of course. That's so thoughtful!" Mrs. Granger moved aside to allow Tom
into the house. "Where are you from, dear? Do your parents expect you home for
dinner?"
Tom crossed the threshold triumphantly, but he maintained his pathetically
nervous façade. "I haven't any parents; I live in an orphanage in Lambeth."
She looked at once pitying and uncomfortable, as Tom had known she would. All
adults reacted the exact same way to hearing of his childhood circumstances. On
the other hand, in his experience all children reacted with either curiosity or
ridicule, but never kindness.
"Oh dear! Well, you shall certainly have to stay for dinner, if you've come all
this way. Here, you go wait in the sitting room and I'll call Hermione
downstairs."
Tom found himself deposited into a room where another man was already occupying
the only sofa. He was watching the television, and Tom had never seen one as
large or colorful as that. In fact, he had only ever seen the large boxes with
small, black-and-white screens that were displayed in some of the most
expensive Muggle stores in London during his childhood. It was really
fascinating that the technology had come so far, and he wondered what else was
different about the Muggle world so many years later…. But he had work to do,
so he shoved the thought aside for later consideration.
Mr. Granger didn't seem particularly pleased that a young man had come to his
house looking for his daughter. They exchanged only the most cursory of
greetings under Mrs. Granger's watchful eye, but then they sat in silence when
she left to call up the stairs for Hermione. It was only after the girl could
be heard coming down the stairs that the man ventured to speak.
"So, do you have an, erm… interest in our Hermione?"
Tom looked away from the television to meet the man's gaze and allowed a cold,
high laugh. "An interest? You could say that."
Mr. Granger's face had colored and he looked as if he was about to speak when
his daughter stepped through the door and gasped loud enough to draw everyone's
attention. She staggered backwards right into her mother, who was a couple of
steps behind her.
"Hermione, dear, whatever is the matter?"
But Hermione paid her mother no mind. She was staring wide-eyed at their guest
and had begun frantically patting at her pockets. "You!"
"Yes, me," Tom agreed, rising from his armchair with a grace that belied the
nervous suitor act he'd been performing before. "I should have known that you
would have managed to find a picture of me somewhere in the Hogwarts library."
"Hermione…?" her mother tried again, even as her father exclaimed, "What is
going on here?"
She put her arms out and tried to herd her mother backwards out of the room.
"It's him! Voldemort—the man who killed Ron and Ginny!"
There was a general explosion of chaos at that point, with Mrs. Granger
screaming and trying to switch positions with her daughter, who was having none
of it, and Mr. Granger rising from the couch with a great shout to rush towards
Tom. The man was soon face-first on the floor, and Tom trained his wand
steadily at the women.
"Tsk, tsk, little Mudblood. No wand? A true witch would never be caught without
it."
Hermione stood defiant next to her mother, who had frozen and was staring
unblinking at her husband's unmoving form. "I wouldn't have been able to fight
you even if I'd had my wand."
Tom laughed again, the sound causing Mrs. Granger to flinch. "True enough, but
it's the principle of the thing, you understand…. Now, you can come quietly or
not."
With a great flurry of movement, Hermione shoved her mother towards the door
once more, but the cry for the woman to run had hardly left her mouth before
her mother had dropped to the floor, screaming in agony.
"That will be 'not,' then? I admit that I had hoped you would say that; it's
much more fun this way."
Hermione had knelt down next to her mother, but there was of course nothing she
could do to help the effects of the Cruciatus Curse. She only received a hard
knock across the face from one of the woman's flailing arms, which knocked her
backwards onto her ass. She glared up at Tom through a mass of wild curls,
sprawled out on the floor in front of him like an offering.
"What do you want?"
He smirked. "You. Did I not make that clear?"
Mrs. Granger continued to scream and thrash.
"I'll go!" Hermione cried. She was watching her mother with wide, teary eyes.
She had snot trailing down her face from her crying, and blood from where her
mother's arm had split her lip. "I'll go! Please, take it off!"
Tom was a bit disappointed that she had capitulated so quickly, and he held the
curse for a few seconds longer just because he was enjoying himself. But he
lifted it eventually. Mrs. Granger continued to lie on the floor sobbing, of
course, and not moving, but the screams stopped. He levitated the woman next to
her husband and conjured a magical chain that he quickly set about manacling
around their ankles.
"You—you're bringing them with us?" the girl asked weakly.
Tom dragged her up by the hair and shoved her in the direction of her parents.
She stumbled and landed in a heap across their prone forms.
"Of course I'm bringing them, you stupid Mudblood. I can't believe I've been
told that you are sensible."
He had no desire to explain it to her further if she couldn't figure it out for
herself, but it was quite obvious to him. First, even the Ministry was not so
incompetent that they would fail to notice a Hogwarts student and friend of
Harry Potter being kidnapped when her parents were left behind. Either her
parents would raise the alarm or, if they were Obliviated or given false
memories, their memory lapses would be a sure sign that there was magical foul
play involved. If they all came with him, he was counting on the Ministry's
denial of his existence to lead them to believe that the Grangers had all
disappeared in some sort of Muggle incident. After all, there would be
absolutely no sign that anything magical had occurred, as he had been very
careful to only use magic on the Grangers themselves and not on any doors or
other objects that would leave behind a magical signature, and the lack of a
Dark Mark or any other signature would have them refusing to attach the name
Lord Voldemort to the disappearances. Surely the Dark Lord would sign his work
if he was behind the disappearance of the best friend of the Boy Who Lived?
Honestly, why else had she thought that Lord Voldemort had used subterfuge to
gain access to her home instead of blasting his way inside?
Second, Hermione had proven much easier to control if he had her parents under
his power. He wouldn't mind torturing information out of her or forcing truth
serum down her throat, but with a prisoner as important as this he preferred
not to burn his bridges that way unless absolutely necessary.
With another roll of his eyes to signify his disgust at her idiocy, he tapped
the chain he had conjured to turn it into a Portkey, and the Grangers spun away
in a swirl of magic.
After a sweep through the house to make sure there was nothing out of place
that would immediately indicate that something strange had happened—no
television left on, no kettle still on the burner—he Apparated into the front
drawing room of Malfoy Manor. Narcissa was waiting for him, but Abraxas and
Lucius had gone about their days as usual (Abraxas attending a schmoozing
business lunch and Lucius a Quidditch match of the professional team he owned)
in order to stave off any suspicions that might happen to arise from the
Grangers' disappearance.
"My Lord," she greeted him coolly, "our… guests have arrived safely in the
cellar."
Tom smirked, half in amusement at her attitude and half in pleasure for a
mission well done. "Excellent. I imagine that you'll sort out the details of
their stay."
She did not look pleased, but nonetheless she agreed and bowed as he strolled
out of the room.
He would have to deal with her later.
Tom intended to leave the Granger girl to stew for a while before he
interrogated her, so he made his way to the library to continue his research.
He had made some headway on the Marks, but he still did not feel confident
enough to use them without giving away his ignorance. There was also the matter
of what to do about his other self. He had determined by this point that he
needed to bring him back. Tom was already running out of time before everybody
learned what he really was, and he simply did not have time to gain decades of
knowledge and experience before he was found out. If he wanted to take over and
change things, as he had always planned, then he needed his other self.
Exactly how to go about bringing him back was an entirely different matter, and
one that Tom had no clear answer for. Yet.
Chapter End Notes
     I base my assertion that wizards age slower than Muggles on the fact
     that Dumbledore in his seventies or so (in the flashbacks during CoS)
     still has auburn hair, and McGonagall in her sixties or seventies
     still has black hair. And they were all quite spry and didn't seem to
     be at all affected by age when dueling, including Voldemort, who was
     seventy-one when he died. I assume they don't dye their hair or have
     hip replacements, but rather wizards just age slower than Muggles.
      
     The Grangers' home and streetin DH Part 1 is in Hampstead Gardens;
     for my own convenience I've envisioned that street and house in this
     story. As for Tom's orphanage, we don't really know where it is, but
     in CS the back of the diary has a stamp from a bookshop on Vauxhall
     Road. That isn't a real road in London, but Vauxhall is a real enough
     place; I have decided that Tom would probably have been from Lambeth,
     which is a community in the same borough as Vauxhall, because during
     the 1920s (and beyond) it would have been a poorer area than
     Vauxhall. There was even a workhouse there in the eighteenth and
     nineteenth centuries.
     Their neighborhoods are about eight miles apart, which even today
     would be about an hour trip using public transportation. So if Tom's
     story had been true, he really would have had to have quite the crush
     on Hermione.
***** Secrets and Lies *****
Chapter Summary
     Some secrets and lies are revealed, and more are created.
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
It seemed that the library was also Draco's usual refuge. Since he had been
home he had disturbed Tom more than once at odd hours, opening the library door
just a crack and then squeaking out a terrified "Forgive me, My Lord!" before
closing it again and scurrying off. Tom hadn't had an opportunity to question
the boy about it since he only ever saw him in the company of the adults. They
had only just started to relax, as if they had finally accepted that Tom wasn't
going to kill the child at any moment, and he had no desire to put them back on
edge by questioning him in front of them.
Their fear had been fun while it lasted, but fear was only a useful thing when
it served a specific purpose. In this case it was quite counterproductive.
He was waiting for Draco the next time he cracked open the library door in the
wee hours of the morning.
"Come in, Draco."
The boy paused, and Tom felt as if he could almost hear the hammering heartbeat
from all the way across the cavernous room. Then he pushed the door the rest of
the way open and entered warily, presenting Tom with a face that was
desperately trying to appear confident and wide eyes that gave away his fears.
Draco came to kneel in front of him without having to be told to do so. He
lowered his head so that Tom was presented with a view of his blond hair and
the back of his neck. "Forgive me, My Lord."
"Why should I forgive you?"
"Please, I—I didn't mean to disturb you, My Lord," replied Draco, his cultured
voice wavering.
Tom reached out to run his hand along the rumpled platinum locks as if he were
petting a dog. He so enjoyed any human touch at all, these days. "Then why do
you keep doing it?"
He could feel that Draco's body was as tense as a bowstring now, but to his
credit he didn't stammer when he explained, "I had hoped that you had already
retired, My Lord. I had finished with my books and wanted to select others, and
I tried to wait until I wouldn't be intruding."
But Tom, who had no need to sleep, had taken to staying in the library all
through the night when there was no chance of being disturbed by either of the
elder Malfoys. The boy's behavior made much more sense to him now.
"Ah, Draco," he said softly, absentmindedly using his long fingers to
straighten the tangles in the child's hair, "you need only have asked. Did you
think that I would deny you the chance to learn?"
Draco trembled under the attention, but he replied, "I didn't think you would
want to be bothered, My Lord."
"You are not as bold as your father. He would have already asked and been
granted his request."
The littlest Malfoy audibly sucked in a breath. "I don't—I'm not… My father is
your trusted servant, My Lord, and I'm… well—"
"A child?" filled in Tom. Swirling thoughts had begun to form something solid
in his mind. "Yes, you are at that. But you want to be like your father; you
are disappointed that I said you are not like him."
It hadn't been a question, but Draco answered anyway. "Yes. He has earned his
place, and I want that."
Tom smiled and pulled his hand away from Draco's head. The boy was only telling
half of the truth, he knew, and had chosen the most flattering part to tell.
Tom had no doubt that Draco expected that earning his place was a foregone
conclusion and would require little more than his last name and the strength of
his father and grandfather behind him.
The real truth, that which Tom knew even Draco himself did not yet know, was
that he would never be like his father. There was too much of his mother in
him, and even from their brief acquaintance Tom already sincerely doubted that
he would ever be able to torture or kill with impunity, for no reason and with
no regrets, like his father and grandfather. The child was lucky that it was
Tom he needed to follow now and not Tom's other self, because he had gathered
that Lord Voldemort had little mercy and no need for followers who had
consciences.
Draco Malfoy would either prove himself worthy of being one of Tom's, or he
would most likely be killed trying to prove himself as one of Lord Voldemort's.
"You may use the library, Draco," Tom informed him. "You may even sit in here
with me, if you are able to remain quiet and stay out of the way."
The blond head came up to reveal eyes wide now with awe instead of terror. "Oh,
yes, My Lord! I swear I can! I'm one of Madam Pince's favorite students, you
know."
Tom laughed, his normal laugh as opposed to the high, piercing noise he made to
unnerve others. "Is that old bat still at Hogwarts? Just you keep in mind,
Draco, that my punishments are far worse than a bit of shrieking and a
detention."
Draco nodded. "I promise, My Lord!"
"Go to bed now," ordered Tom. "You're no use to anyone at this time of night,
least of all to yourself. You may come back tomorrow…. Oh, and Draco, wizards
do not swear unless they are willing to be bound by the most unyielding of
magics. I ought not to have to remind you of this."
Draco did come back the next day, and the day after that. He remained quiet and
unobtrusive unless Tom directly addressed him, which he did with increasing
regularity as the days passed. He was pleased to discover that the boy had a
keen mind and impressive magical acumen. He was not exceptional—really, who was
exceptional compared to Tom?—but he was talented. And he was growing
increasingly comfortable in Tom's presence; he was even occasionally willing to
ask Tom to explain things from his readings, if Tom had indicated that he was
allowed to speak.
He was sitting in his customary chair in the far corner of the library when his
sires burst through the library doors a couple of weeks after Tom had kidnapped
the Grangers. Lucius rushed to speak before Tom could even begin to express his
anger at such an intrusion.
"My Lord, I have received information that the Ministry knows about the
Muggles!"
Tom was immediately on his feet, the ancient, priceless tome he'd been holding
in his lap falling to the floor in a heap. "What?"
Lucius spoke so quickly that Tom could barely make out his meaning. "My contact
in the DMLE warned me that Dumbledore has contacted the Aurors claiming that
the Muggles have been abducted and are being held in our cellars."
Where Lucius looked furious, Abraxas appeared merely put out by the
inconvenience. He reached out and placed a hand on his son's shoulder to
forestall the tirade.
"There is apparently a disagreement in the upper ranks of the Department, My
Lord," explained Abraxas more calmly than Lucius could have. "Scrimgeour and
many of his Aurors want to conduct an immediate raid on the manor, but Bones
has put her foot down pending a hearing to review the evidence."
"Bones's unfailing sense of fairness is quite annoying at times," said Lucius,
"but it is undeniably useful in this sort of situation. After all of their
attempts last year failed to turn up any evidence of our dealing in the Dark
Arts, she became quite strict about the Aurors being able to justify such raids
before they are carried out."
Tom paced back and forth between the Malfoys and the cluster of chairs where
he'd been sitting. "How much time do we have?"
"The hearing is scheduled for tomorrow morning, My Lord," Lucius informed him,
adding a little sniff of disgust to the end.
Tom immediately felt a good measure of the tension leave his body. If there was
no threat of Aurors knocking down the doors at any moment, then they had plenty
of time to handle the problem. If they hadn't obviously had more pressing
matters to deal with, he would have punished Lucius for his alarmist attitude.
He made sure to keep his wand firmly up his sleeve lest he give into the
temptation anyway.
"How could Dumbledore have gotten his information?"
Both Malfoys shared a glance, and it was Abraxas who spoke. "Should we not
first devise a plan to allay suspicions, My Lord, and, perhaps, to get the
Grangers out of the manor?"
"No, you fool." It had been a solid bit of foresight to keep his wand up his
sleeve. "Dumbledore's information is too specific, too accurate, to be mere
guesswork. If someone here has shared what they know, then they must be dealt
with before we decide our next steps. It would do no good to plan evasive
maneuvers if Dumbledore, and through him the Aurors, are just going to be
informed about them."
Abraxas's spine stiffened. "No one here would have shared anything with
Dumbledore, My Lord."
"I would be more inclined to believe you if the Aurors weren't on the verge of
finding my prisoners."
Tom turned a steely glare on them so intimidating that they both fell to their
knees with no further prompting.
"Look at me," he demanded, to which they both immediately complied. He locked
eyes with Abraxas first. "Do you have any idea how this betrayal happened?"
The older man's thoughts were racing so quickly that Tom could not catch the
details of all of them. However, two thoughts stood out above the rest: a
desperate denial of any knowledge and an utter terror that his son would be
found guilty. Tom released him with a sneer and turned to Lucius, who, his
thoughts revealed, had no knowledge of the betrayal but was terrified that his
wife had committed the deed.
Tom was not sure if these suspicious thoughts were the result of sheer love and
fear of loss, or if they portended a more serious problem he needed to deal
with.
His sneer deepened. "Well, it's clear that it was neither of you."
"Please, My Lord, none of us would have—all of us here are loyal to—" began
Lucius, but Tom cut him off with a vicious hand tangling through his smooth
blond locks.
"Silence, you fool. Do you forget that I can read your wife's thoughts as
clearly as your own?" Tom used Lucius's long hair to pull his head back even
further. "Your wife is not loyal to me. She is loyal to your son first and
foremost, and I daresay she would leap in front of a Killing Curse out of love
for you"—he spat the word love as if he were speaking of the vilest thing
imaginable—"not that you would deserve it. But she despises me."
Abraxas prostrated himself even further at Tom's feet. "My Lord, all of the
communications in and out of the manor are monitored."
He undoubtedly had more to say, but he did not get the chance before his
muscles contracted all at once and sent him flat to the floor with a keening
moan. It was not the Cruciatus Curse but one that Tom had invented and
perfected long before he'd known that what he was doing was magic, back when he
had been dealing with cruel children at the orphanage. As it turned out,
keeping his wand put away was no guarantee that he would keep his magic to
himself.
Tom did not seriously think that Narcissa Malfoy had betrayed him, if only
because she would have rather died herself than to put her son's or husband's
lives in danger by angering the Dark Lord. No, his anger was because if she
hadn't done it, then he didn't know who could have.
He knew that neither of the Malfoys were stupid enough to try to speak to him
again when he was like this, no matter how much they might want to. Therefore
he was shocked enough at the small voice that he reflexively tugged even harder
on Lucius's hair.
"My Lord… Please, My Lord, the house-elves…"
Even through his whimper of pain, Lucius breathed out, "Draco…"
Tom pried his fingers out of the long blond hair and released Abraxas from the
spell so that he could turn his full attention to the littlest Malfoy. Draco
was standing beside the chair that Tom had abandoned, shifting his weight
nervously from foot to foot. Tom tilted his head to consider him. "What was
that?"
"You—you have to find someone who could have known everything and left the
manor without anyone knowing." He visibly swallowed and tried to keep his gaze
from straying to his suffering father and grandfather. "Mother couldn't have
left or sent any messages without Grandfather knowing, but the house-elves
could have."
The rest of them could only stare at Draco in various degrees of shock.
Tom's mind raced with everything he knew about house-elves, which he had to
admit was not a whole hell of a lot. He had known that they were responsible
for the cooking and cleaning at Hogwarts, but after a cursory bit of research
he had dismissed them as otherwise useless creatures and thought no more about
it.
Lucius staggered to his feet and began making his way to his son, as if his
mere presence might have an impact on whatever Tom decided to do to the boy.
"Draco, cease this at once!" he ordered, his voice tense with terror. "You know
that the house-elves cannot leave this manor or give away information without
permission."
His son looked defiant and opened his mouth to speak, but Tom broke in with,
"Have you given them all direct orders to that effect?"
Lucius looked at once confused and stymied, and he turned to his father.
Abraxas, who had only just managed to pick himself up off the floor and back
onto his knees, shook his head in denial. "There is no need; it is in the
nature of house-elves to be bound in loyalty to their masters. None of them
could have left the grounds without direct permission."
"That's not true!" began his grandson, but Lucius clapped him hard on the
shoulder.
"DRACO!"
Tom held up his hand for silence, and all of them immediately stilled. He held
out his hand towards the youngest of them. "Come here, child."
The elder Malfoys both looked stricken at the command, but Draco walked over
with a wary confidence born of his time spent alone with the Dark Lord. He
knelt in front of Tom and looked up to shyly meet his eyes instead of bowing
his head.
"Tell me," Tom commanded calmly.
"My personal elf, Knobby, visits me at Hogwarts sometimes," explained Draco,
keeping his eyes on Tom's instead of looking at his father or grandfather when
they both made noises of surprise. "I never asked him to the first time, and I
don't think anyone else told him he was allowed. He just did it, because he
missed me."
Tom saw in Draco's thoughts that this house-elf had been his constant companion
as a young child, as it had been tasked with minding him as a nanny of sorts.
It was probably not uncommon, Tom supposed, for families with such means to
assign a house-elf to see to feeding and cleaning a young child instead of the
parents. He lifted his eyes to look at Lucius, who looked as if he wanted to
allow his jaw to drop in surprise and was only resisting due to years of
training.
"I… No, I never gave it permission," he croaked.
From behind himself, Tom could hear Abraxas say, "Neither did I."
"Call them all here," was the immediate command. Then Tom turned his attention
back to Draco. "You have done very well. Take your book and go for now."
By the time Draco had gathered his things and left the library, Lucius had
helped his father to his feet and they had assembled a small army of rag-
covered house-elves in a haphazard line in front of their master. Tom had no
desire to speak to the little beasts himself, so he turned and gave his
directive to Abraxas, who still looked a bit green around the edges from his
ordeal.
"All of you," he addressed the ragtag group with a strong voice that belied his
appearance, "are ordered to follow this man's orders as if he were one of your
masters." Then he turned to receive Tom's next instruction before turning back
to his house-elves. "I order whichever of you has given any information you
have learned in this house to any other person who does not live in this house
to step forward immediately."
All of the house-elves looked absolutely horrified, including the bat-like one
who stepped forward, his enormous green eyes shimmering with fear and tears.
Tom supposed that this one was horrified for an entirely different reason than
all the rest of them. He recognized it at Lucius's personal house-elf.
"DOBBY!" roared Lucius, and he raised his heavy walking stick to deliver what
would surely be a death blow if he put any measure of magic at all behind it.
Tom stilled his follower's hand with an almost bored tone. "Don't be stupid,
Lucius. The little wretch is of far more use to us alive."
===============================================================================
That Friday night, Malfoy Manor was to fill up with Ministry officials from
every conceivable department, although they had obviously been a bit heavy
handed with invitations to the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. Neither
Abraxas nor Lucius had been able to get any definitive information about the
evidentiary hearing before Madam Bones, but as Aurors had yet to descend on the
manor, it was safe to assume that she had not been impressed with the
information Dumbledore had been able to give the Aurors.
It was no surprise, really, given that all of the headmaster's information had
come secondhand from Harry Potter by way of a traitorous house-elf who had only
been able to offer him veiled hints and warnings.
Still, they had considered it far too risky to keep the prisoners at Malfoy
Manor. Just as it was far too risky for Tom Riddle to stay in the house when it
was to be full of Aurors who had been invited to a dinner party thrown for the
sole purpose of making it seem like the Malfoys had nothing to hide and, in
fact, had no idea that they had been under suspicion at all.
Tom Apparated out of the manor just as the magical carriages began carrying the
first guests from the gates to the front door. He landed with barely a sound on
the soft, long grass in front of a small, single-story cottage that had been
left to Draco by his paternal great-grandmother.
"She always hated me and my son after me," Abraxas had explained, while Lucius
had muttered something that sounded suspiciously like an insult under his
breath, "but for some reason she grew attached to Draco and left all of her
possessions and fortune directly to him, even though he was barely three when
she died. I doubt that the Ministry knows anything about it, since my great-
grandfather built it and warded it himself for his wife's pleasure, and it has
never been connected to the Floo Network."
He had only been inspired enough to come up with such a solution after Tom had
held him under the Cruciatus Curse for a solid five minutes for daring to
suggest that Tom might consider his filthy Muggle father's house in Little
Hangleton.
When Tom opened the door to the small, windowless walk-in closet that had been
converted to hold the prisoners, the smell of human waste and unwashed flesh
assaulted his sensitive nose. He fought valiantly to control his natural
reaction and succeeded in merely sneering in distaste instead of recoiling.
Three pairs of eyes glared out at him from the darkness, and he reached out
with his magic to forcibly haul the Mudblood to her feet.
"Come, Granger. It's time to see what you can offer me."
It was the work of a moment to secure her in one of the kitchen chairs. She
squeezed her eyes shut at the magical candlelight that illuminated the cottage
and bent her head forward so that her mass of hair shielded her face. Tom
thought that her hair was so matted that it was probably beyond repair and
would need to be shaved off and started anew (not that he was planning on
giving her the opportunity to do so).
He flicked his wrist and, with a cry of surprise and pain from his prisoner,
her head flew back to expose her face to him.
"You have two choices, Mudblood: You can tell me what I want to know and earn
yourself and your filthy parents some better living conditions, or you can deny
me and I can make your lives now look like heaven in comparison to what I will
do to you."
Even through her filth and her pain, her brown eyes glared at him defiantly.
"If you wanted me to cooperate, maybe you should have started out treating us a
bit more humanely."
Tom had read about such bravery in many of the Muggle stories he had consumed
as a child, and he had heard that such valor earned the respect of many.
Personally, he could only feel revulsion at such utter stupidity.
He allowed his childhood torture spell to wrack her weakened body until tears
and snot cleared trails down her dirty face.
"Next time it will be the Cruciatus Curse. Oh, yes," he added at her surprised
look, "what you just experienced was not the Unforgivable. That was a little
thing I invented years before I got my Hogwarts letter or my wand. And, of
course, if you find the Cruciatus Curse to be insufficient motivation, I will
have to use your filthy mother to demonstrate the effects of prolonged
exposure—it's anatomically impossible to make one's brain actually fall out the
ears, you know, but I can turn it to mush quite easily."
He knew he had defeated her when her lower lip began to tremble, and he
congratulated himself on having the foresight to bring her parents along. He
was certain that she would have rather been tortured than betray her friend,
but she could not willingly sentence her parents to such a fate.
"Okay," she whimpered. "I'll tell you whatever you want to know, if I can."
Tom rewarded her with a cold smile that he knew perverted his exceedingly
handsome features and made him look quite demented. "I knew you are a smart
girl, Granger. I want to know how Harry Potter survived in the Chamber of
Secrets."
Her eyes went wide. "I—I don't know that. No one does!"
"No one?" he asked. "Not even Dumbledore?"
She shook her head quite vehemently. "If Dumbledore knows then he didn't tell
Harry. He told Harry that it had something to do with his mother, that she had
left behind her protection on the night you tried to k—kill him. It's the
s—same thing he said after you attacked Harry before."
Tom had always been something of a natural Legilimens. He had always been able
to get a general impression of someone's state of mind, to tell what their main
emotion was at a given moment or, more importantly, to tell if they were lying.
He had learned more during his time at Hogwarts, and he could have invaded
Granger's mind for more information. However, he could tell that she was not
lying, and he was not yet so skilled in the art that he would leave her mind
completely intact should she try to resist him. He decided that this early in
their acquaintance any additional details he might have been able to pick up
through invasive Legilimency were not worth the risk of ruining her.
Instead, he tried a different approach. "Tell me how Potter was affected by our
little adventure."
===============================================================================
Hours later, he was no closer to answers than he had been before he'd
interrogated the filthy little Mudblood. She had only been able to tell him
things that he had either already known, such as that Potter had lost his
ability to speak Parseltongue, or could have guessed for himself, such as that
Potter was emotionally traumatized by the loss of the two Weasley brats.
He had half a mind to refuse to improve their living conditions as he had said
he would, since she hadn't told him anything remotely useful, but in the end he
decided that she needed to be able to trust his word. And, in any case, if he
told the house-elves to clean the closet at least once every few days, then he
wouldn't have to experience such a horrible odor the next time he saw her.
Abraxas found him brooding in the library surrounded by stacks of mostly
illegal books. He gingerly took the seat across from him without waiting to be
invited.
"Tom…"
Tom had already raised his head to acknowledge the address before it occurred
to him that he really ought to have cursed the man to the deepest level of
Tartarus and back for using that name.
"I know," said Abraxas before Tom could react. "I know that you aren't
really—that you're you and not him."
He might have to either Obliviate or outright kill the man for that, but Tom
figured that he owed him at least the courtesy of being able to say what he had
come to say. His tone was wry when he said, "You took a risk calling me that."
Abraxas's face was serious, and when he nodded the dim lamplight played across
his dark eyes and pale hair in a way that made him look quite ghoulish. "I
know. It was a calculated risk, just like mentioning your fa—well, you know
which place—was a calculated risk."
"If I had been him I would have killed you on the spot for either offense,"
guessed Tom.
"You would have killed me on the spot for calling you 'Tom,'" agreed Malfoy.
"But he has lost so much of his humanity that I am not sure he still feels
enough to have wanted to kill me for mentioning that place. I wanted to see how
much you feel."
Tom leaned back in his seat and folded his long fingers in his lap. "I hope the
results were worth the punishment you received for mentioning that place to
me." Abraxas was still moving as if he were twice his actual age due to the
effects of the prolonged torture, and Tom smirked when he winced at the
reminder. "What convinced you so thoroughly that you were willing to risk
yourself to confirm the truth?"
"Many things, Tom. I admit that I was never entirely at ease with your physical
appearance or the circumstances surrounding the diary, but that," he emphasized
with a little flourish of his hand, "would have been nothing if not for your
reactions that backed up my suspicions. He would have likely killed Draco on
the spot for speaking to him the way my grandson did to you, and he certainly
would not have allowed the boy to share the library with him afterwards. He
would have been able to read every thought in my mind from all the way across
the room without eye contact, but you had me stare into your eyes. But I knew
for certain after you used that torture spell on me; he had stopped using it
entirely by the time he had left Hogwarts."
Tom smiled ruefully at his oldest follower. He might have been able to pull it
off for longer with nearly anyone else, but it seemed that Abraxas was far too
familiar with the differences between him and his other self.
"You must have some plan for this information, Malfoy. You would have kept
silent otherwise."
Abraxas leaned forward, although the movement caused him to let out a little
breath full of discomfort. "No, I don't have a plan. But you do, and I can help
you. I can fill in all of the information you lack, and with my help you can
move forward. You are going to bring him back, are you not?"
Ah, so that's it, thought Tom. Malfoy wants to be able to tell Lord Voldemort
that he had a hand in his return, no doubt to make up for these ten years of
doing nothing.
He allowed a full smile to grace his face. "I am."
It was only when Abraxas was leaving the library a few minutes later that Tom
pulled out his wand.
"Oh, and Malfoy," he called, causing the older man to turn back to face him, "I
find that I much prefer being addressed as 'My Lord.' Crucio."
Chapter End Notes
     Rufus Scrimgeour was Head of the Auror Office in the early 90s,
     before he was promoted to Minister of Magic after Fudge left office.
     Until she was killed by Voldemort in 1996, Amelia Bones was Head of
     the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, of which the Auror Office
     is a subdivision, so she would have been Scrimgeour's boss.
      
     In case there is any confusion on the subject: Since Harry was in the
     hospital wing directly after the Chamber incident, and indeed he
     didn't have the diary with him in any case, he didn't free Dobby as
     he did in canon.
***** The Knights of Walpurgis *****
Chapter Summary
     Tom meets with old friends and discovers a new part of himself.
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
Tom landed in front of a high iron gate that rose into spikes at least five
feet above his head. Abraxas walked towards the gate and, with a shimmer of
familiar Dark magic that Tom recognized as his own, passed directly through it.
Tom followed him up a narrow walkway, peering through the unnatural Darkness on
either side that stopped him from actually seeing more than a few feet away
from the path. It was clearly malevolent. And clearly his own magic.
The house, at least what he could see of it, appeared to be an abandoned manor
house built at least a century before. Abraxas had told him that the Muggle
owners had been killed, but the entrance hall was still filled with unmoving
Muggle portraits of the family that appeared to date back at least six or seven
generations.
Abraxas breezed past them without looking and stopped in front of a pair of
large double doors.
"Ah, Malfoy," came the hiss from inside, an odd mix of English with a
Parseltongue accent.
He apparently took that as permission to enter and slipped through the doors,
but Tom lingered outside, suddenly nervous about what he would find inside.
"My Lord, Edgar Bones is dead, along with his wife and children for good
measure."
"Good, I am glad to hear it." Voldemort's voice was high and cold, and even Tom
couldn't tell whether he was actually glad or just saying empty words. "Is this
your doing?"
Tom didn't hear Abraxas's reply, because he had stepped through the door and
was staring in horror at the mutilated face of his other self. The skin was as
pale as snow and appeared stretched over features that seemed somehow blurred,
as if someone had tried to erase a chalkboard but only succeeded in making a
mess. The gleaming red eyes drew him in, and he felt like he was sinking deeper
and deeper under black water.
He pulled himself out of the Pensieve so hard that he slammed himself against
the back of his seat.
"That…" he began, then trailed off, utterly unable to keep the shock and
disgust out of his voice. He looked up at Malfoy, who was watching him
nervously from a chair across from him. "How did that happen?"
"I don't know for sure, My Lord. In hindsight he began to change even when we
were still in school." Here he glanced at Tom, who knew they were both thinking
that it had probably started with his own creation. "It came on so gradually at
first that those of us who spent time with him every day didn't notice any
change. Then he left on his travels, and when I saw him later it was… shocking,
My Lord. And he only got worse as the years went on. I can't even imagine the
things he must have done to himself."
Tom could well imagine some of the things his other self had done. He had begun
planning many things before he'd been put into the diary. What he couldn't
imagine was why his other self hadn't stopped at the first sign of such
horrible side effects.
"And his mental state?"
Abraxas looked pained for a moment, as if he were reluctant to answer
truthfully lest Tom Cruciate him for it. "Similar to his physical state."
Was all of that just because of the Horcruxes? Or was he affected by other
rituals or experiments, too? wondered Tom. If it had been just the Horcruxes,
then he really had to wonder whether creating six of them was really such a
great idea. Surely any benefits derived from having a seven-part soul couldn't
possibly outweigh those consequences.
He let out a breath that was the only outward expression of his thoughts he
would allow himself.
He needed the other Horcruxes before he went after his other self. He needed to
study them, and, more importantly, if his other self was as affected mentally
as he was physically, then he needed control of the other Horcruxes so that
Voldemort wouldn't think he was expendable. Tom knew that if he were confronted
with another version of himself popping up out of the woodwork, he would
probably view it as a threat. He could only imagine how someone who had fallen
as low as his other self would react. So an insurance policy was definitely
needed.
Tom really didn't want to have to dodge Fiendfyre from Lord Voldemort.
"I need other followers. My Knights."
He didn't really want to involve anyone else, and he had been undecided about
doing it until he'd seen Abraxas's memory. Now he knew that he couldn't do it
without them, no matter how much it absolutely galled him to have to admit it,
even in the privacy of his own thoughts. The time in the diary must have made
him more circumspect, because he couldn't imagine thinking any such thing
before.
Still, he would only use—and only reluctantly—those he knew personally.
Abraxas explained, "Rosier's dead. Broken heart, I think; he was a shell of a
man after his only child was killed by Aurors. Avery died in a magical accident
a couple of years ago. Dolohov is in Azkaban. Only Lestrange, Nott, and
Mulciber are alive and free, excepting myself."
"Mulciber already knows, or at least suspects. He seemed hopeful at the idea of
my return," Tom mused aloud.
"His son was caught near the end of the first war and put into Azkaban, and
Mulciber lost his position at the Ministry as a result. It only made him more
determined to follow you."
"What about Lestrange and Nott?"
"My Lord, you know that Lestrange would do anything you asked of him,
especially with you looking like this." A smirk had appeared on his face, but
at Tom's cold stare it quickly slipped back off. He cleared his throat. "He is
loyal, My Lord. He has two sons who were sent to Azkaban for torturing Aurors
in your name, and he gave up his post as a Hit Wizard rather than publically
denounce their actions and therefore you. He's lucky he was able to escape and
abscond to France before they could toss him into a cell next to his children."
If Tom recalled correctly, it had been Lestrange's ambition to become a Hit
Wizard since before even coming to Hogwarts. If he was really willing to give
it all up rather than denounce his lord, then he was indeed much more loyal
than all of the others who had scrambled to convince the Ministry that they had
never been his followers. (The Malfoys included, he thought bitterly.)
"And Nott?"
The corners of Abraxas's mouth tightened. "He was never suspected in the first
war and has gone to great lengths to avoid those of us who were, or even those
of us who have family members who were accused or convicted. He has a son
Draco's age, but the boy has never been allowed to be friendly with Draco."
"That is a disappointment," said Tom, his voice cold and high.
"Yes, My Lord, but may I suggest—that is, you may not have considered, given
that you only have memories up to a certain point, but many of the other
Knights also had sons who were among your most trusted Death Eaters. Avery, for
example—"
Tom pinned him with a calculating stare, and he immediately stopped talking.
"I have considered it." Tom offered no more explanation than that, but Abraxas
bowed his head in deference and thought it best to remain silent.
===============================================================================
The Muggles' prison was much more tolerable the next time Tom visited. Granted
their physical states were worse—Granger's hair looked as if vermin had taken
to living in it—but at least their closet was clean.
"You see that I have kept my word," Tom said to the girl. "I will likewise keep
my word to make things much worse for you if you give me a reason. Will you
cooperate now?"
She rose shakily from the bare floor, using the wall to support herself, and
mutely followed him out of the closet. She looked longingly at the bed as they
passed it, and she sighed as they passed the open bathroom door, but she kept
her peace. She hesitated briefly when she caught sight of the same chair where
he'd restrained her the last time, still sitting in the middle of the kitchen
floor, but at his pointed stare she gingerly lowered herself into it.
He saw no need for restraints at this point. He appeared to be gaining some
modicum of her trust—or at least her reluctant faith that he would keep his
word—and he had enough experience with weak children to know that he could get
more out of her through mind games than through physical ones.
Still, he took out his wand. She flinched as he pointed it at her, then a glint
of recognition lit up her dull brown eyes.
"Recognize it, do you? It's still his, you know. I didn't win it from him, but
rather he carelessly threw it away in his haste to see about poor little dying
Ginny. He's quite stupid, your friend; almost as stupid as you, the Mudblood
who didn't have her wand on her when Lord Voldemort invaded her home."
She drew in an indignant breath but mercifully didn't speak. Tom smirked.
"Ah, good, you're learning. There might be hope for you yet." He pressed the
tip of the wand to her temple and she drew in another breath, this time a gasp
of fear. "It doesn't really matter that the wand isn't mine. It isn't as
comfortable as my own wand, but I am extraordinary and can perform magic you
can only dream of, Mudblood, even with my enemy's wand. For instance"—he
pressed the wand harder into her skin—"I could invade your mind and take every
thought, every memory, away from you. I could find out your worst nightmares
and make you believe that you're living them until you go mad."
Granger shuddered but remained defiant.
Tom prodded her with the wand until she tilted her head back and met his eyes.
"I can also take away everything that makes you who you are: your personality,
your intelligence…. Imagine your poor parents' reactions when I return them a
daughter who thinks she's a teapot, with the intelligence to match," he said
casually, as if he were speaking to a friend over tea. "I think I'll let you
keep your memories, though, so that you'll remember what you've lost."
He wasn't really good enough yet to do exactly what he'd said—certainly he
could scramble her brains, but he didn't have the finesse he'd described—but he
would be soon after he convinced his other self to teach him. And in any case,
the Mudblood had no reason to doubt him.
Her eyes had gone wide now and she stared at him in horror, her gaze darting
back and forth between each of his eyes as if trying to determine if he was
telling the truth. He gave her a cold smile.
"Which is more important to you, Hermione Granger: your mind or your silly
delusions about courage?"
He really ought to have phrased it as herself or her friend Harry Potter, but
he figured that she would be more likely to succumb this way. He was correct,
of course; she dropped her gaze to her lap and drew a shuddering breath.
"What do you want me to do?"
"Do?" he echoed, a hint of amusement in his tone. "That's an interesting turn
of phrase, but I confess you'll have to give me time to think of things for you
to do for me. For now I want the same as before: information."
She had stiffened again. "Please, I was telling the truth before. I—I really
don't know anything else about the Chamber."
Tom stepped away from her, feeling no need to be in such close proximity now
that she was cooperating.
"Indeed, I would have known immediately had you been lying. What I'm interested
in is something else you mentioned: the previous time Harry Potter and I
encountered one another."
She blinked up at him owlishly. "Th—the Philsopher's Stone, you mean? Do you
need it for immortality even though you've already got another body?"
"It is not for you to question me, Mudblood!" he snapped. Internally, his
thoughts were racing. The Philosopher's Stone… Of course! My other self is in
need of a body. Could Potter have defeated him another time? With barely any
external pause, he continued, "You will tell me about our little adventure from
Potter's perspective."
She bit her lower lip at his outburst but, after a short pause to collect
herself, explained, "We found the Cerberus in the beginning of the year and I
noticed that it was guarding a trapdoor, although we didn't learn until later
what was down there. We thought all year that it was Professor Snape who was
trying to steal whatever Fluffy was guarding, and that he was the one who let
the troll into the dungeons as a distraction and cursed Harry's broom. I went
for help while Harry faced you, so I didn't know until he told me afterwards
that it was you—that you had possessed Professor Quirrel."
Tom narrowed his eyes at her. Possession, of course… He must be too weak to do
much else without his own body.
"And how did Harry Potter defeat my—me?" he asked, almost slipping and saying
"my other self."
Granger swallowed nervously. "It's like I said last time: Professor Dumbledore
told Harry that Professor Quirrel couldn't stand his touch because you couldn't
stand his touch, because his mother left him with protection on the night you
killed her…. I—I'm sure that Professor Quirrel's body was only being kept alive
through the possession because of the unicorn blood, so he was probably
particularly susceptible to—"
"Yes, that's quite enough speculation from you, Mudblood," cut in Tom, even
though he figured that she was probably entirely correct. He just didn't want
to hear anymore.
Unicorn blood. Merlin and Morgana, what had his other self gotten himself into?
He wondered if now he'd have to deal with some mystical unicorn curse on top of
the already formidable obstacles associated with getting an at-least-half-mad
Dark Lord a functioning body. It had better all be worth it—his other self
better have retained his knowledge and experience—or else Tom was going to be
severely put out by the whole thing.
===============================================================================
Lucius was standing stiffly in the front drawing room when Tom Apparated back
to the manor. He executed a formal bow that did nothing to hide his
displeasure.
"My Lord, both Lestrange and Mulciber are waiting for you in Father's study."
Poor Lucius was taking it quite badly that Tom had called in other followers.
Apparently he did not like to share.
"Time does tend to get away from me when I'm having fun," replied Tom.
He really had lost track of time, but truthfully he hadn't found his discussion
with the Mudblood the least bit fun after she'd started her story. Now he found
himself in the unenviable position of not being in control of the situation,
and he mentally cursed himself and the Granger girl quite soundly as he walked
towards Abraxas's study half a step behind Lucius.
Lucius stopped at the door and reached out to open it for Tom, but Tom smiled
grimly and pressed his wand into the man's side. "After you."
Malfoy's eyes widened in surprise and a little fear, but he stepped through the
door willingly.
Tom smirked a bit at his own paranoia about entering the room first or leaving
Malfoy at his back, but all the same he kept his wand in his hand by his side
as Lucius stepped aside and Tom stepped into the doorway. He knew that they
couldn't really harm him short of using Fiendfyre or basilisk venom or
something equally as destructive, but old habits died hard when he felt out of
control.
Mulciber was staring at him with his mouth hanging open, and Lestrange's blue
eyes were comically wide and his face pale as a sheet.
"Ah, My Lord, welcome back," greeted Abraxas, the corner of his mouth quirking
upwards and a hint of humor in his voice. "As you can see, Richard and Rastaban
had not quite accepted the idea that you could be back."
Lestrange stayed glued to his seat, his gaze likewise glued to Tom's face, but
Mulciber flew out of his chair and onto his knees.
"My Lord, I had hoped for this since I heard the Potter boy speak about the
diary!"
Tom allowed himself a brief smile, just a slight upturn at the corners of his
lips that everyone except Lestrange probably wasn't paying enough attention to
catch. "Yes, I saw as much in Lucius's memory."
Lestrange startled out of his frozen stupor, apparently brought back to reality
by the sound of Tom's voice. One moment he was in his chair and the next he had
all but knocked Mulciber over in his haste to kneel before his lord. He didn't
bow his head but stared up into Tom's eyes with a searching gaze.
"Master," he said on an exhale that seemed to have been torn from his throat.
"Please believe that I never doubted your ability to return. I was only afraid
that what Malfoy said was too good to be true!"
He seemed unable to say more but looked up at Tom imploringly.
Tom examined the lines around the man's eyes and mouth, which certainly had not
been there the last time he'd seen Rastaban Lestrange. He wasn't sure that he
would ever get entirely used to seeing the teenagers from his memories as
middle-aged wizards fifty years later. By now Mulciber had righted himself and
given Lestrange a little shove in retaliation that the man hardly seemed to
notice. Tom did notice, and he curled his tongue against the roof of his mouth
even as he gestured for the two to remove themselves from the floor.
"I wonder, with all of this dedication so freely offered to me now, why none of
you"—here he looked up at the Malfoys to include them in his
indictment—"bothered to try to find my other self in the intervening decade."
Mulciber and the Malfoys all flinched and opened their mouths to try to excuse
themselves, but it was Rastaban who spoke first, as earnestly as Tom had ever
heard anyone speak.
"I did try to find you—him! My sons were doing my bidding when they were
caught, and after I fled the country to escape their fate, I followed every
lead I was able to get from my contacts back in Britain. I swear it!"
"I well believe it coming from you," allowed Tom. Rastaban looked as if Tom had
presented him with the grandest prize he could imagine. "Still, I doubt that
Lord Voldemort will be particularly appeased by your hopes and dreams, given
that they amounted to nothing."
Lestrange deflated all at once, looking as pained as if Tom had kicked him
right in the bollocks. Tom did not soften his glare at all, but after a few
moments he turned it on the other three occupants of the study.
"As for the rest of you, who never tried to find him at all, I imagine that he
will be angry beyond all description. Yes," he added to preempt the words that
were clearly on the tip of Lucius's tongue, "even at you, Lucius. Do you truly
imagine that Lord Voldemort is going to be pleased that you released me into
the world? Do you imagine that he will see me as anything other than a usurper
that you unleashed by disobeying his explicit instructions to keep me hidden?"
Lucius looked ill, as did his father, who was clearly worried for his son's
life.
"However…" he drew out until they were all hanging on his words, "if you help
to bring him back now, then he might be more forgiving of your previous
failures than otherwise. And, gentlemen, I will be pleased with your efforts
should we succeed."
He did not feel the need to add that he would punish any of them who failed
him. They all knew it; he was not as insane as Voldemort, but three of them
well remembered his temper even at school, and Lucius had experienced enough of
it in the past weeks since his return. Silence reigned as they all mulled over
his words, until finally Lucius, by far the boldest of the group, ventured the
question Tom knew they all wanted to ask.
"My Lord… Forgive me, I mean no offense and certainly no treason by asking, but
I admit to being curious…. I wonder why—and please know that a word from you
will silence me forever on the subject—you want to bring him back at all, if he
will view you as a threat."
Tom laughed the high laugh that was utterly at odds with his appearance, and
all four of them shuddered at the sound, more so Lestrange and Mulciber, who
were as yet unused to hearing the sound again outside of their memories.
"Do you think that he will never find a way to return? He came close to
succeeding a year ago and was only stopped through unforeseen circumstances
beyond his control." Tom thought it best not to mention Lily Potter's apparent
protection, or Potter's involvement at all. He allowed his cold gaze to take in
all of their reactions. "I see that none of you had any inkling of this,
although you certainly should have known that he cannot truly die and would
have come back eventually."
He swept across the room and took a seat in one of the regal chairs across from
Abraxas's desk. Mulciber and Lestrange, who had both been standing, immediately
lowered themselves to their knees so as not to be higher than their lord.
Lucius followed suit a second later, and Tom thought to himself that having his
other Knights around was going to have a profoundly positive influence on the
man.
"My friends, it is better that we take the dragon by the horns and control the
circumstances of his return, than that we wait for that inevitable time when he
manages it himself. This way you can earn some of his forgiveness, perhaps even
his favor, and I can show him that I have no wish to be a threat to him."
Their expressions and a quick mental scan of their surface emotions told Tom
that they were all on board with his plan and agreed that it was necessary and
perhaps even the best course of action. He was glad that it had been so easy to
gain their support by feeding into their fears and their hopes for Lord
Voldemort's favor, because he could never have admitted the entire to truth to
anybody.
That is, Tom was not going to get very far very quickly without his other
self's expertise, and unbeknownst to them, his followers were going to help him
gain the means to control Lord Voldemort.
===============================================================================
Tom was absolutely incensed and not a little disbelieving. He had nearly cursed
Lestrange for a presumptuous liar when he'd come forward with the information,
but in the end he supposed that his other self probably was mad enough to have
done it. And Lestrange had been nothing but earnest when he'd explained that
the Dark Lord had given him one of his precious objects to keep in his
Gringotts vault and had said enough to him that he believed one other was
hidden in Tom's mother's house.
Little Hangleton. It left a bitter trail through his mind when he mentally
spoke the name. In one part of his mind it seemed like it had been only weeks
since he'd come here, and in another part of his mind he fully felt the span of
five decades between then and now.
Did he absolutely lose his fucking mind?
The welcoming wave of familiar Dark magic that washed over him as he approached
the horrible little hut was answer enough, and he actually allowed a hiss to
escape.
"Absolutely bloody barking!" he exclaimed in Parseltongue, addressing his other
self as if he was actually there to hear Tom's rant. "Albus fucking Dumbledore
knows our middle name, you utter idiot, and it isn't as if there's a surplus of
Marvolos who speak Salazar's language forming a queue to get into Hogwarts! As
if your bloody loose-lipped pillow talk with Lestrange wasn't bad enough!"
The door to the Gaunt shack was clearly heavily magically reinforced, and a
brief examination revealed that it would take a blood sacrifice and a password
to enter.
"Because Dumbledore couldn't at all manage to get past your little wards after
you've left them here without any maintenance for who knows how long!" he
continued to hiss aloud. "Open!"
The door opened for him without the sacrifice, and Tom hoped that it was only
because it recognized his magic and not because the protections had
deteriorated so much that they would have let anybody in without it.
He was still muttering to himself as he bent to fit through the low doorway,
which is no doubt why it didn't immediately occur to him that the voice that
greeted him was also in Parseltongue.
"Master?" it asked, sounding a bit torn about it. "You feel like him and speak
like him, but you don't smell the same…."
Tom blinked and increased the intensity of his light to illuminate the entire
room, which wasn't difficult given how cramped it was. There was a snake of
unidentifiable species rearing up a body length away from him. The part of its
body that was off the ground was almost as tall as he was, and the rest of its
length was situated in large coils.
Oh, well, at least he thought to protect it using more than just a bloody door!
He almost rolled his eyes, but cursing his absent other self out in
Parseltongue was quite enough childishness for one day.
Clearly the serpent was of magical origins, and although he couldn't identify
it he assumed—hoped—that controlling it was much the same as controlling the
basilisk.
He allowed his voice to fill with his magic. "I am your master. I have come to
remove the ring from your care; it is no longer safe here. You will not hinder
me."
The snake gave no response and made no move as he edged towards the corner of
the little room that seemed to almost pulse with Dark magic, so he assumed that
it had worked. Even if it hadn't and the snake decided to attack him suddenly,
what were the chances that his other self had bred some new species of magical
serpent with venom that worked like that of the basilisk?
Actually, now that he'd thought about it, Tom thought the chances were pretty
high.
He kept one eye on the snake as he crept towards the small, elaborately
decorated chest. Something inside pulsated in time with his own heart, and it
was difficult to keep his attention trained on anything other than the feeling.
His pulse hammered throughout his entire body and blood pounded in his ears,
and his magic thrummed along with it in perfect sync with the Dark magic
bleeding out of the chest.
He forgot entirely about the very real snake looming over him as he knelt down
and ran his fingers reverently along the top of the lid. The carved snakes
decorating the chest came to life and slithered toward his hand, hissing warm
greetings and seeming to bask in the warmth of his magic.
With a last touch, he hissed, "Open, my love."
Whether the chest worked on the same Parseltongue password as the Chamber's
entrance and the shack's door, or whether the Horcrux inside really had
answered his call, Tom neither knew nor cared. The lid had clicked open and
that was all that mattered. His uncle's ring gleamed up at him, its own
inherent Darkness seeming somehow to have overtaken everything surrounding it.
He reached out and caressed it, and it seemed to flood his body with itself and
return the touch from the inside out.
Tom moaned from low in his throat, a completely involuntary action on his part.
The other Horcrux seemed to pulse with reciprocated feeling.
He slipped the ring onto his finger, and all was right in the world for a few
blissful seconds.
Then the pain shot through his finger and up his arm, and he hissed out several
colorful phrases and ripped it back off his hand. The curse seemed to struggle
to gain hold of his body, and he involuntarily shook his shriveled hand in a
vain attempt to alleviate the pain, until finally the magic seemed to wear
itself out. With nothing to latch onto, the curse dissipated, and Tom watched
through narrowed eyes as his hand returned to normal, much more slowly than
when he'd cut or burned himself but still quickly enough that he wasn't
worried.
He opened his other hand to look at the ring resting innocently in his palm. It
pulsed through him again, and Tom wasn't sure if he was imagining it or if it
was laughing at him.
"Go ahead and have your laugh," he told it in their magical language. "You just
wait and see whether I take the time to remove that curse."
This time Tom was quite sure that his fellow Horcrux pulsed in protest.
 
Chapter End Notes
     Edgar Bones was Madam Amelia Bones's brother. He was killed in the
     first war along with his entire family (as we find out from Susan
     Bones and Moody in OotP), and if you'll recall, Amelia Bones was
     killed in the summer of HBP, some think by Voldemort himself.
     (According to JKR's interviews, Edgar and Amelia's parents were also
     killed in the first war, but no one says this in the canon.)
      
     As in my other story, I've used my little head canon here regarding
     Lestrange Sr's name. Rabastan is JKR's bastardization of the star's
     actual name, which is Rastaban (meaning "head of the serpent,"
     actually in the constellation Draco), and it bugged me enough that I
     had to think of why the characters would have changed it. So in my
     head canon the brothers' mother dislikes her husband's given name and
     Sr. didn't win the battle to have his first son named after him,
     hence Rodolphus, but by the time the second son was born he'd managed
     to get his wife to accept the bastardized version, Rabastan.
***** Magic Makes Might *****
Chapter Summary
     Tom engages in a bit of curse breaking and picks up a present for
     himself.
Chapter Notes
     There is violence and non-consensual sexual activity in this chapter.
     Tom is an evil, sadistic little blighter. I have changed the rating
     to Explicit, but the lower (R) rated version is available at
     Fanfiction.net or Fiction Alley if you prefer (links on my profile
     page).
“My Lord, the risk of Lestrange going into Diagon Alley as himself is far too
high! He will be arrested on sight if any Auror or Hit Wizard recognizes him!”
“It’s a risk that I have to take, My Lord! The goblins will never allow me to
access my vault if I’m under the influence of any sort of potion or spell to
conceal my identity!”
They had been discussing the subject of Lestrange safely accessing his
Gringotts vault for the better part of an evening, and at this point the
argument had gone around in circles. Tom had been lounging sideways across an
overstuffed armchair, half of his attention on the ring he was idly weighing in
his hand and the rest on his followers’ disagreement. It was always interesting
to watch people on two sides of a debate bellow ineffectively at each other
without realizing any common ground, and for Tom it was a nice opportunity to
gauge the interactions between the four. It seemed that Lestrange had a special
dislike of the Malfoys, and Mulciber was attempting to hedge his bets with both
of them.
Finally, the noise became too grating on his nerves. Tom waved his hand lazily
in the air, and the silence was immediate.
“Lestrange, you will travel to Gringotts under Polyjuice Potion. Your
willingness to put yourself at risk for my benefit is admirable, but
sacrificing yourself to Azkaban would not do either of us any good.” He turned
his eyes to the Malfoys, who were looking quite smug that he had agreed with
them. “In fact, he will go as one of you, and the other will accompany him. I
expect that you will be in contact with the goblins beforehand to smooth the
way.”
It was not an impossible task, especially when vaults the size of the Malfoys’
and Lestranges’ were involved, but dealing with the goblins was never easy.
Abraxas and Lucius shared a glance full of trepidation.
===============================================================================
The month it took Polyjuice Potion to simmer seemed interminable to Tom. Lucius
had strongly favored the idea of simply obtaining the premade potion from his
usual dealer, but under no circumstances would Tom leave such an important
mission up to the reliability of a potion maker he didn’t know (and hadn’t
threatened into compliance himself). No, for something as important as the
retrieval of a Horcrux, he had to brew the potion himself.
The only problem was that it was boring. Certainly he didn’t mind the exact
science of cutting and measuring and stirring, but thinking about keeping an
eye on the potion as it simmered for hours and days at a time made even him who
didn’t need sleep want to doze off from sheer boredom.
Unfortunately, Lestrange had always been absolutely dreadful at potions, and
his remaining followers all had other things to work on, both for Tom and in
their professional lives, and could not dedicate their full time to watching a
cauldron simmer. However, Lucius had been quite happy to put forward his son,
much to Abraxas’s anxiety and Tom’s amusement.
“You want me to accept a second-year student as suitable for this task?” he had
asked, equal parts critical and curious.
“Third year!” Draco had butted in. Then he’d shrunk back against his father in
horror and added, “My Lord.”
Tom had rewarded him with a baleful glare. “Third year, then.”
Lucius had flushed in embarrassment, but persuaded Tom quite admirably. “My son
is particularly gifted in Potions, My Lord, and he does not have any other
assignments or concerns to take his attention off of the potion, as the rest of
us do. I am certain that he is more than capable of keeping an eye on it and
ensuring that you stay on the brewing schedule.”
“There is merit in the idea,” Tom had allowed.
“I will take full responsibility for my son, My Lord. Although I am confident
that it will be unnecessary.”
Tom had given them both a genuine smile filled with the full measure of his
sadistic amusement. “Lucius, if your son fails, I will hold you both equally
and fully responsible and make you each watch the other’s punishment. “
On the one hand Tom was pleased that the boy seemed particularly competent for
the job after all, because it meant that they would successfully brew it with
no mishaps. After the first awkward encounter, Draco had grown more confident
in ordering Tom to the potions lab to perform some task or other. In turn,
after critically evaluating Draco’s work the first few times, Tom had grown
more confident in allowing him to do some of the menial slicing and dicing.
They had forged a relatively smooth working relationship that was marred only
by Draco’s lingering terror that he and his father would be tortured at the
slightest mistake, which was, of course, completely true.
On the other hand, Tom was disappointed, because he had gotten his hopes up a
bit that he’d get to act out all of the fantasies he’d been nursing about
torturing father and son together. No doubt his other self would have invented
a reason to act on his thoughts, if he even bothered with a pretext at all, but
Tom was unfortunately not quite that mad yet.
The bright side was that his relationship with the youngest Malfoy continued to
grow, and Tom was fairly certain that he would be able to turn Draco’s loyalty
to himself in due time. Since spending more time in Draco’s presence, he had
witnessed enough tiffs between Lucius and his son to allow him to conclude that
Draco’s hero worship of his father was that of a child who had never had any
occasion to think that his father might be fallible or that there might be
someone smarter or stronger. Now that the boy was thirteen, the time seemed
ripe for Tom to disabuse him of that notion.
Thus, whereas he usually all but completely tuned out the familial interactions
of his hosts, on one morning near the end of the Polyjuice’s brewing cycle, Tom
paid attention to the disagreement between Lucius and Draco at the breakfast
table.
“But I’m thirteen years old! I think I’m old enough to handle it!” cried Draco
with the attitude of a boy who had not yet realized that if he had to repeat
his age as proof of his maturity, then it was not really proof of his maturity
at all.
“I said no, Draco. Your continued entreaties will not change my decision.”
Draco glowered at his father. “Do you expect me to go back to school with
nothing more than Basic Hexes for the Busy and Vexedunder my belt? When do you
expect that I’ll be old enough to crack open a useful book?”
“When I say so,” drawled Lucius from behind his newspaper, completely
unbothered, “and not a moment before.”
That afternoon in the library, his son was still visibly sullen, though it had
hardly affected his work earlier in the potions lab. After all, he was
undoubtedly too terrified of Tom to allow their potion to suffer.
Finally, after several hours of putting up with it, Tom finished adding
information from his current book to his already mountainous stack of notes and
turned his attention to Draco.
“Which book has caused all of this trouble?”
Draco started in surprise, as he usually did when Tom unexpectedly broke the
silence between them, and looked up at him with wide eyes.
“A Theory of Modern Dark Arts,” he answered, a little scowl on his lips.
Hardly modern anymore. It was already twenty years old when I read it. Still,
thought Tom, picturing the pages in his mind, it has its uses.
Lucius was not wrong that his son was too young for it, although Tom was sure
that simply explaining why to Draco could have avoided all of this intolerable
sulking. The title was appealing for anyone who was looking for a place to
begin an in-depth study of the Dark Arts, but in reality following the text
required quite a thorough knowledge of Arithmancy and Ancient Runes. Tom had
bullied one of the older Slytherins into getting it for him out of the
restricted section during his first year, before any of the professors had
begun agreeing to write him passes of his own, and barely thirty seconds after
he’d opened it he’d been demanding that his fellow Slytherin let him borrow his
Arithmancy and Ancient Runes textbooks as well.
Although Tom had taught himself the basics of those two subjects during his
first term at Hogwarts, he doubted that Draco would be able to appreciate A
Theory of the Modern Dark Arts before at least the end of the upcoming school
year.
He Summoned it from one of the upper shelves of the Malfoy library and sent it
flying towards Draco, who stared in surprise between Tom and the book hovering
in front of him. Then he hesitantly reached for it and, when a few seconds
passed without Tom punishing him (or his father popping out of the woodwork to
berate him), he opened to the first page.
It took less time than Tom had predicted before Draco, a look of mild disgust
passing over his features, said, “Honestly! ‘This book will attempt to explain
how the complex relationship between the runic bases of the oldest Dark magic
and the modern Latin usage can be simplified using the new and exciting
breakthroughs in our understanding of arithmantical principles in order to
seamlessly bring the most ancient of the Dark Arts into a new era,’ really?”
“Abrams isn’t the most concise of authors,” allowed Tom, although he knew that
wasn’t what Draco meant.
“Not that!” cried Draco, apparently forgetting to be absolutely petrified of
Tom. “Why didn’t Father just tell me that this is what the book is about?”
Tom shrugged carelessly. “I do not pretend to understand why adults feel the
need to assert their own dominance as if it’s actually an answer to anything,
rather than simply explain things to children.”
Draco laughed. Tom magically took the heavy book from Draco’s lap and sent it
back to its place.
“Abrams’ argument is incorrect, in any case,” Tom explained as he shuffled
through his many notes. “However, it has been accepted as true by the majority
of practitioners, and that is why so many Dark wizards have trouble learning
even the basics, much less creating anything new.”
He thought privately to himself that this was probably how the elder Avery had
managed to kill himself in a magical accident. Avery had always been
brilliantly creative but without the requisite skill in Arithmancy to safely
conduct the experiments he dreamed up.
“Perhaps if you can ever work out for yourself what Abrams got wrong,” he
continued, “then I will think about sharing some of what I know with you. No
cheating, mind you; I’ll know immediately if you’ve asked your father or
grandfather to help you.”
Malfoy’s eyes lit up in pride and pleasure. “Oh, thank you, My Lord! I’ll
figure it out, I promise! Arithmancy and Ancient Runes might be boring
subjects, but I’ll put all of my effort into learning them if you will be my
reward!”
The ghost of a smile flitted across Tom’s lips at Draco’s innocence in
proclaiming Tom as his reward. Undoubtedly the boy had no idea at the sexual
suggestion in his words and had only meant that his reward would be his lord’s
time and knowledge.
“It’s boring to learn them at first, that’s true. It’s rote memorization, just
like when you were memorizing your multiplication tables. However,” he added,
the tone of his voice taking on an excitement that had Draco leaning forward in
his chair, “once you have learned the basics, an entire world of magical
knowledge is at your fingertips. You can understand how and why spells work and
potions ingredients interact in certain ways. It’s like how after you learn
multiplication, suddenly the world of division and algebra and more advanced
mathematics is open to you.”
Draco looked so enraptured by what he was saying that he had the rashest idea
he’d had in a while. He carefully put his notes back in order after he’d
removed the bit of parchment he needed. Then he glanced up and allowed his eyes
to meet Draco’s.
“Come here and I will give you a demonstration.”
The boy came without hesitation, as if he fully trusted Tom. Even though that
was what Tom wanted, he still found himself disapproving of the willingness to
trust that Draco, like most children with loving and protecting parents, tended
to display so easily. For all he knew, Tom was planning on experimenting on
him!
Draco came to a stop in front of his chair, and Tom motioned for him to stand
at his side instead. With Draco looking over his shoulder, he levitated the
Gaunt ring in front of himself and spread his notes out across his lap and the
arms of the chair. He waved his wand at the ring until a black shadow was
visible swirling around and through it, like ink slowly seeping into parchment
and spreading its stain across the page.
“It’s cursed, you see?” he asked, and he sensed rather than saw Draco’s
affirmation. “I could analyze the effects of the curse using various methods
learned across the fields of Defense, Ancient Runes, and Arithmancy.”
Draco’s arm appeared suddenly in front of him, and he felt the boy lean close
against his back in order to reach over his shoulder and point at the uppermost
corner of his notes.
“That’s what you’ve written here?”
Tom found, to his own great amusement, that he didn’t much mind the littlest
Malfoy being so presumptuous with his person. Or at least he didn’t mind enough
to curse him for it. He had been encouraging the familiarity, had he not?
“Yes.” He ran a long finger down the parchment, pointing out the various runic
notations one by one. “This one is for death. This one wilting. Strength.
Proliferation. Preservation. Pain….” He pointed to the next section of his
notes. “Then I could translate the runes into their arithmantical
equivalencies.”
The body behind him was almost bouncing up and down in excitement, and Draco’s
voice was hardly any more measured. “Oh, and then you could use the Arithmancy
formulas to figure out how it would all work together!”
Tom’s calculations went on for almost a full eighteen inches of his small,
spidery script. It had been vastly complex, and most of his efforts over the
past month had been in teaching himself various advanced topics in Arithmancy
that he had never learned before going into the diary.
It had been made even more complicated by the fact that his other self had
apparently figured out a way to modify the usual magic using Parseltongue, and
Tom had found himself having to isolate the changes and use them to try to
reconstruct the Parseltongue runic alphabet that Voldemort had apparently
created.
Really, he was exceptionally good, but if he’d had a smaller sample size and
hadn’t happened to more or less share a mind with the creator, he would never
have been able to suss out even half it. Even another Parseltongue wouldn’t
have been able to recreate Voldemort’s work, and someone who couldn’t speak the
language had absolutely no chance of countering the curse.
It was absolutely brilliant, and he wanted to kick himself for not having
thought of casting spells in Parseltongue before.
He allowed his finger to skim over the rest of his calculations and onto his
second piece of parchment. “Indeed. The next step is to use the same process,
only backwards, to figure out how to produce a counter-curse, much like how one
would produce an antidote in Potions. I was planning to try it now, if you
would back up.”
Draco leapt backwards immediately, and Tom didn’t need to look over his
shoulder to know that the boy’s face was probably mottled with a mixture of
embarrassment and terror. He spared a small smirk of sadistic pleasure, but his
focus almost immediately turned to the task at hand.
It would be horrifically embarrassing if his attempt failed in front of Draco.
He raised Potter’s wand and squared his shoulders, then hissed out the
incantation in the serpents’ language.
The effect was immediate, like a clap of thunder rolling through Tom and
Draco’s bodies and rattling the bookcases and all the ancient portraits hanging
on the walls. The ring clattered to the floor, but the malevolent magic of the
curse hovered in the air for a few seconds even after it had gone. Then it
darted towards them with a seemingly sentient purpose.
Tom felt like he was greeting an old friend, but even as the magic crashed into
him like a great wave he still had enough presence of mind to quickly erect a
Shield Charm in front of Draco.
Then he was lost in the feeling.
Great Merlin, the power. The sheer power. It was beautiful.
He felt like he had cast some sort of sex spell on himself, and he felt his
eyes roll back into his head as the waves of pleasure and glorious pain rolled
through his entire body
When he came to, he found that he had managed to leave his chair and end up
sprawled on the library floor surrounded by parchment. He had an almost painful
erection.
Draco was leaning over him with eyes the size of Galleons and a mouth that had
dropped open almost as wide. He reached out as if he thought to offer some kind
of aid to his master, but then he hesitated and left his hands hovering in
midair between them.
“You were…” He trailed off and swallowed uncomfortably, his gaze darting down
to Tom’s lap and then up to his half-closed eyes, then back down to the tented
fabric at the front of his trousers and finally away to anything that wasn’t
Tom. “You were, erm… screaming.”
A nearly hysterical laugh escaped Tom’s throat. “Was I?”
The library doors crashed open and hit the walls on either side with a bang,
and Tom turned his head in time to see all three of the older Malfoys pushing
past each other trying to be the first through the opening. With a strength he
hadn’t known she possessed, Narcissa Malfoy shoved her much larger husband out
of her way and nearly sprinted across the enormous room to gather her son up
into her arms.
“Oh, my baby! You’re all right!” she cried, dragging his head against her
breast as if he were an infant who needed his mother’s comfort. “I was so
worried! There was that awful banging and the screaming…!”
Draco Malfoy apparently respected his mother’s supposed feminine delicacy far
too much to shove her away from him, no matter how much he appeared to want to.
No doubt this was a result of his father treating his mother as if she were a
priceless porcelain doll.
Lucius wrapped his arms around his wife and son, seemingly having no desire
whatsoever to offer Draco any assistance in the matter.
“I’m fine,” he insisted irritably. “It wasn’t even me who was screaming,
anyway. Ask the Dark Lord, he’ll tell you.”
“My Lord?” asked Abraxas, who had come to stand beside his family and place a
supportive hand on his son’s shoulder. His voice was as full of confusion as
Lucius’s expression.
Tom levered himself up onto his elbows and shifted to try to conceal his
erection, although there was hardly any chance of that.
“Just a bit of curse breaking gone, uh… wrong.” He reached for the ring, which
had landed on the floor just beside him. “I’m curious, though. Exactly what was
your plan when you came crashing in here, if I hadbeen torturing the boy?”
None of the Malfoys looked like they were prepared to answer, although Narcissa
shuddered and clutched her son even tighter to her breast, which produced an
indignant sound from him, muffled though it was by her robes.
“I see,” said Tom, although he supposed that it wasn’t nearly as threatening as
it ought to have been what with his voice still full of sex and a despicable
dreaminess. The ring was practically vibrating with excitement in his hand, and
he offered it a dreamy “Hello to you, too!” before slipping it onto his finger
at long last.
Abraxas and Lucius were staring at him as if he had lost his mind. He probably
had, of course.
He grinned and clambered to his feet, holding out his hand until his wand flew
from wherever he’d lost it and connected with his palm. It sparked violently
when he closed his fingers around it.
He had so much energy, so much power, flowing through him.
He wanted—no, needed—to kill something. And then to come. Not necessarily in
that order. He wasn’t feeling particularly picky.
Tom wordlessly left the Malfoys standing together in the library staring after
him as he headed towards the front drawing room.
===============================================================================
Tom appeared… Well, he wasn’t entirely sure where he’d appeared. His mind was
flitting between various thought so rapidly that he was lucky he hadn’t
splinched himself.
He snorted; as if Tom Riddle had or ever would splinch himself!
He appeared to be in a Muggle neighborhood in the city. It was dusk, and the
street was nearly deserted, although lights were on in most of the buildings on
either side of the street. He could see Muggles engaged in various activities
within, and he wondered that they didn’t feel like they were part of a zoo
exhibit, being on display like that to anyone who looked into the windows.
He reached down absently to adjust his still half-hard member into a more
comfortable position and started off towards the street corner. He nearly
missed a step when he saw the signs proclaiming the name of the two
intersecting streets, then spun around to face the direction from which he’d
come.
The building at the end of the street appeared to be an office building with,
from what he could make out of the signs from so far away, a dentist’s office
and various other businesses.
There was no orphanage.
Why had he been thinking of this place, of all the places in the world?
Tom gave himself a firm shake, not that it did much to clear the foggy quality
of his thoughts. The ring was vibrating around his finger, and the power of the
curse was still flowing through his veins. Oh well, he thought, and with a
shrug he set off again down the street to see if the park where the orphans
used to play was still there. It turned out that although nearly everything
else had changed, the park was where it had always been, although its landscape
had been altered over the years.
It appeared to be deserted this late in the evening, except, as Tom had half
expected, for a pair of Muggle teenagers who were snogging quite vigorously on
a picnic table.
The ring thrummed so hard that Tom’s arm vibrated, and he reached down with his
other hand to adjust it on his finger.
“My thoughts exactly.”
The girl noticed him first, and she reared back from her partner with a little
gasp of surprise. She was quite pretty, and even though Tom’s interests didn’t
primarily lay with girls, even he had to admit that the lacy pink contraption
encasing her large breasts looked very alluring. The girls he’d been with fifty
years ago hadn’t worn anything like that.
Her boyfriend spun around to face him, and Tom was quite pleased that he was
also a very nice specimen. If it had to be Muggles, at least it was attractive
ones. And it really did have to be Muggles, unfortunately, given that he wasn’t
at Hogwarts anymore and couldn’t exactly go around doing this in wizarding
villages without drawing attention to himself. Oh well, he could make do.
“Who’re you?” demanded the boy angrily. “What do you think you’re doing? Can’t
you see that we’re busy?”
Tom allowed his gaze to travel over the pair. “I can see that, yes.”
In the next second, the boy had collapsed on the ground in agony, his screams
echoing off the trees and making lovely music in Tom’s ears and bringing his
erection back in full force.
“WHAT DID YOU DO!” screeched the girl. “STOP IT! MAKE IT STOP!”
“But he screams so prettily,” declared Tom. “You, on the other hand, do not.”
It was even easier than usual for him to cast another spell while maintaining
the power on his first one. The girl stopped screeching and began undressing
herself under the effects of the Imperius Curse even as her boyfriend continued
to writhe and scream in the grass. She had small, dusky nipples, a trim waist,
and a neat patch of dark hair at the junction between her shapely thighs. Tom
took it all in as she walked calmly over to him and knelt on the ground before
him. He undid his trousers, and his ring seemed to be dancing on his finger.
He released the male but immediately petrified him instead, using his magic to
forcefully turn the boy’s head so that he had to watch through his unblinking
eyes.
Then he released the girl from the curse.
She gasped and would have flung herself backwards away from him if Tom hadn’t
violently curled his hand—the one with the ring—into her long brown hair. She
couldn’t even turn her face away from his erection.
“I want you to suck it,” he informed her just as casually as if he were talking
about the weather. “And if you use your teeth, I will remove them from your
pretty mouth one by one. Do you understand?”
She attempted to nod in the affirmative and winced in pain as the movement
ripped at the hair he was gripping. Satisfied, he released his hold. She
hesitated and allowed her eyes to dart over to her unmoving boyfriend, but when
Tom’s hand came back up towards her head, she flinched and quickly closed the
distance between them. Her mouth was warm and wet, of course, but she wasn’t
putting any effort into it at all, just holding him there.
Tom sighed in exasperation and used his hand on the back of her head to force
his cock down her throat. She choked, which thankfully, finally, felt
absolutely fantastic.
He tightened his fingers through her hair again. “You had better make this
enjoyable or else I’ll use your cunt instead.”
Her eyes were wild and frightened, but she seemed to make the right decision.
She brought her tongue up to delicately caress him and applied enough suction
to make him moan in appreciation.
Tom wouldn’t allow her to move far enough back that he completely left her
throat, but she moved back as far as she could. He was okay with it, since the
great sobs that were wrenching her body and her continued gagging make her
throat convulse quite pleasantly around the head of his dick.
Still, in short order he became bored with the apparently limited number of
tricks she seemed to know how to perform with her mouth. He held her head in
place and thrust his hips against her face. She made sounds of distress, and
from the convulsions he could tell that she was choking quite violently, but he
didn’t care.
He spilled down her throat with a groan.
As soon as he released her, she threw herself to the side and got sick into the
grass.
“Disgusting,” sneered Tom. “You do know how to ruin a moment. Avada Kedavra.”
Her body fell forward into her own vomit. He stepped around her gingerly, as if
his shoes might become contaminated just from getting too close, and headed
towards the boy. He was obviously still where Tom had left him, but there were
tears streaming out of his open eyes and down his frozen cheek onto the ground
below him.
“I was going to let her live, you know, so that you could watch each other with
me,” he explained calmly, infusing his voice with pity he didn’t really feel.
“However, it’s probably for the best that I didn’t. I imagine that you would
have continued to put up a fight on her behalf if you knew she still lived.
Hopefully after what you’ve witnessed you’ll be smarter than to keep resisting
me.”
Eyes glared up at him in defiant hatred, although the Muggle wasn’t able to
move a muscle.
Tom laughed, high and cold. “I see that I’m mistaken! No matter. It will make
it all that much sweeter for me to have to break your spirit through more
physical means.”
He levitated his prisoner up so that he could grab onto one of his beefy arms,
then Disapparated them away from the park and into the Malfoys’ front drawing
room.
Abraxas and Lucius were apparently waiting for him. They sat together on one of
the green velvet sofas, staring in various degrees of surprise at the spectacle
he made with his disheveled clothing and floating victim.
“Oh, don’t mind me,” Tom told them jovially. “I just picked myself up a little
present.”
***** The Webs We Weave *****
Chapter Summary
     Tom begins constructing his framework in earnest.
Chapter Notes
     Sorry this has taken much longer than usual. I'm in the middle of
     exams; in fact, I had a four-hour tax exam today. It was as horrible
     as it sounds. (I've alleviated the pain somewhat by including a tax
     joke in this chapter, but it probably isn't recognizable or funny to
     anyone but me.) The exam period extends until the end of next week,
     but after that I should be back on a normal schedule.
See the end of the chapter for more notes
When Tom became aware of his surroundings, he was in a graveyard standing in
front of a larger than life statue of the Angel of Death. The full moon
illuminated its skeletal face and enormous scythe, and Tom only had to lean
forward slightly to make out the names etched into the elaborate display.
Thomas Riddle. Mary Riddle.
He blinked once, but the names didn't change.
"What the hell?"
"It's terribly dreary, isn't it?" came the response from directly behind him.
"Only imagine not being able to meaningfully experience anything other than
this for years untold."
For a split second, Tom was convinced that he was imagining things, but then he
realized exactly what was happening. He turned slowly, his movements deliberate
and in no way giving away his surprise or anxiety. His own face stared back at
him from a couple of a feet away, an intensity in his expression that made Tom
understand from an outside perspective why people were so terrified of him.
"But of course you know how it is, even though you've managed to escape
somehow," the Horcrux continued, his eyes roaming over Tom's face. "Although I
imagine that being stuck at Hogwarts is immeasurably better than being stuck in
this bloody Muggle graveyard."
Tom had already opened his mouth to say that actually he'd been quite able to
imagine himself to any number of other locales, before he realized that this
Horcrux obviously had not had that experience. That had to be important
somehow, but it probably would not be a good idea to point out the difference
to someone who had been stuck looking at his filthy Muggle family's graves with
no real way to measure time.
Instead he filed away that information for later thought and said, "It's been
fifty years, assuming that you were created soon after I was. Not quite years
untold, but I know exactly what you mean."
The Horcrux's nostrils flared, and he took a step closer so that they were mere
inches apart, almost touching.
"Fifty years," he hissed. "It seems longer… and shorter."
Tom felt the corner of his mouth quirk up involuntarily. "I know."
His other self brought his hand up as if to touch Tom, then stopped just short
of actual contact. Their eyes met, and Tom was sure that he saw hope and
desperation and madness in that gaze. He could understand that; he still felt
it all himself.
He reached out with his own hand so that they met in the middle. As soon as
their palms touched, the Horcrux gasped and closed his fingers hard around
Tom's, as if he was afraid that Tom would pull away. Of course he had no
intention of that, and likewise he didn't resist when the Horcrux closed the
distance between them and all but pressed their bodies together.
"My God…" the Horcrux moaned somewhere in the vicinity of Tom's ear. "My God…"
Tom had consciously exchanged his Muggle expressions for wizard ones as soon as
he had entered the magical world at age eleven. He hadn't referenced any god in
years, so he knew that the Horcrux must be absolutely overwrought to have
forgotten himself so thoroughly that he reverted to that terminology.
He—and Tom really must think of something to call him other than "the Horcrux,"
he thought—held fast to Tom's hand, but he ran his free hand over Tom's form in
the same way Tom had seen concerned parents check small children over for
injuries. The touch felt solid, but he was ice cold to the touch and his chest
did not rise and fall with breath. Tom imagined that it must be like embracing
a corpse, and it took all he had not to shiver. Only the knowledge that he had
been exactly the same until he'd regained a body, and that he would have done
anything or killed anyone to feel someone's touch, stopped him from pulling
away.
"You're real," the Horcrux told him. "I'm real…. I had begun to doubt…."
"I know," repeated Tom. He brought his free hand up to clasp the Horcrux's
bicep.
The Horcrux shuddered against him.
"I can feel what you do… I can feel it!" A laugh erupted from his throat,
crazed and uncontrolled. "Will you let me see?"
Tom could well understand his desire to actually experience things, even
secondhand. Of course he knew himself, and therefore he knew that he couldn't
trust this version of himself. He wasn't entirely sure that the Horcrux would
actually be able to mount any sort of assault on his mind, given that he was a
Horcrux himself and not an actual human being, but Tom had no doubt that he
would try. All of the various variables flashed through his mind in seconds,
and in the end he decided that the need to gain the Horcrux's cooperation and
keep his own doubts hidden as much as possible outweighed any risks, especially
since he was sure the Horcrux would want to gather information and wouldn't
simply attack him the first time he was allowed into Tom's mind. He would first
want to know how Tom had escaped, at the very least.
"Any preferences?"
He could feel the Horcrux's glee in his own consciousness.
"Anything."
Then they were spinning through darkness interspersed with flashes of memories,
some shared between them and some new ones Tom had made for himself. The
Horcrux had moved to stand beside him, but their hands remained clasped. He
squeezed Tom's fingers when the memory of torturing Abraxas and Lucius in the
library flashed by, and Tom focused on the scene.
It was like viewing himself in a Pensieve, and the Horcrux went to stand beside
Memory Tom as the apparition threaded his hand violently through Lucius's hair.
It was actually quite interesting to view the events from a third-person
perspective. In the moment he hadn't been able to focus on the results of his
actions, but now he stood beside the Horcrux looking down at the expression of
agony that twisted Abraxas's face under the effects of Tom's childhood torture
curse. His eyes were screwed shut and his jaw was clenched so as not to scream,
while his hands were tensed into claws and his arms and legs were curling
towards his body. Tom knew that it was the perfect result of the muscle
contractions built into his curse, and the Horcrux seemed to appreciate it as
much as he did.
When the torture ended, Tom guided them out of his mind and back into the
graveyard. They landed on top of their father's grave, which was somehow
fitting, and the Horcrux smiled.
Then Tom was blinking up at the dark green canopy of his bed in Malfoy Manor.
It took him a few seconds to realize that he must have been asleep—or at least
unconscious and, instead, inside the Horcrux's consciousness.
The movement that had woken him up drew his attention again. Something was in
the bed with him. Tom shot up into a sitting position and immediately regretted
it. He felt lightheaded and weighted down all at once, and he was only glad
that he wasn't an actual human being or else he felt like he might have been
sick all down his front.
Tom had never been one for drinking—his earliest experiences with alcohol had
been with gin, which was prescribed by the matron of the orphanage to cure all
sorts of ills. It made him associate the distinctive burn of alcohol with
medicine, which rather ruined the whole effect for him. At Hogwarts he had the
opportunity to indulge through the widespread black market in the Slytherin
dorms, but at first he had thought that he had much better ways to spend the
few Sickles and Knuts he managed to save from his scholarship allotment each
year, and later, after watching his dorm mates imbibe, he had determined that
being drunk would make him weak and vulnerable.
But what he was experiencing now felt like everything he had ever heard about
hangovers, multiplied several times.
The Horcrux was flooding his consciousness with its fury and fear at being left
alone again, which made things worse.
When he felt more in control of his body again, he turned his head and took in
the form of the rather large young man who was bound face-down with his arms
stretching out before him and attached to the headboard with heavy magical
chains. Images of the night before flashed in his mind, brief snatches of
motion and speech that flitted away before he could firmly grasp any of them.
He could well fill in the blanks, however, by observing the dried blood and
semen and other conspicuous materials covering the Muggle's body, particularly
his lower half.
The Muggle had stopped struggling against his bonds (the movement that Tom
assumed had woken him up), but he was glaring at Tom as best he could in his
position. The effect was lessened by his puffy, red-rimmed eyes and the fact
that he'd been magically gagged… not that his glare would have had any effect
on Tom under any circumstances, of course.
Tom cast a quick glance over the magical bonds to satisfy himself that he'd
managed to actually secure them in whatever state he'd been in last night, then
he rolled out of bed and squished the thick carpet between his toes on his way
to the palatial bathroom. He winced a bit at his tender groin when he stepped
up into the shower, but the steaming water pouring across his body quickly
soothed any ills, and he thought that he might even be up for another go soon.
He thought that the next time he visited the Horcrux, perhaps he would like to
experience the basic luxuries of a hot shower and a warm body underneath him.
===============================================================================
The end of the week found Tom in the library chewing on the end of his quill.
He had worked through every book in the Malfoys' library that could possibly be
relevant to his situation, and he hadn't really found any answers. It was to be
expected, he supposed, given that no one had created multiple Horcruxes before,
and no Horcrux that he was aware of had ever obtained its own body.
How could anyone be expected to write anything helpful about something no one
except him had ever imagined in their darkest dreams?
He had thoroughly investigated Draco's memory of the curse breaking. It was
probably the oddest thing he'd ever seen to witness himself thrashing around
and screaming in practically orgasmic bliss and then acting like a drunken fool
afterwards. But at least he had been able to conclude that his other self's
magic affected him like some sort of intoxicating aphrodisiac.
It was most tempting to seek out more of it.
At the same time, Tom felt like he should do everything in his power to avoid
it.
If that were the only thing he had to worry about, he might have been okay.
However, the question of his own abilities and limitations as a Horcrux was
extremely pressing now that he was in contact with another one, and on top of
that he had about a dozen more questions after learning that the Horcrux in the
ring hadn't been able to escape the graveyard.
The Malfoys' reactions to the entire episode were also quite troublesome. Tom
would have had to be a fool to trust the men who had swindled the Ministry into
believing that they'd never willingly associated with Lord Voldemort, and he
was no fool. Now he was doubly suspicious.
As the littlest Malfoy wandered into the library, Tom decided that he would
deal with that problem quite neatly. His plans for Draco and his plans for the
Granger girl were both entirely within his own control, and acting on things
within his own control soothed him in a way that nothing else could. His pet
Muggle could testify to that.
"Ah, Draco," he said in a suitably pleased tone, "your timing is impeccable. I
want to speak with you, if you have time to spare."
Ever since the incident, Draco seemed to vacillate more than ever between being
comfortable around him and being terrified of him. Today he was apparently
feeling the former, because at Tom's words his entire face brightened and he
came to sit on the floor at Tom's feet without waiting for further invitation.
"My Lord, I always have time for you," Draco informed him in a voice full of so
much earnest feeling that it made Tom's teeth ache.
Of course he knew that, both because no one around him would ever dare deny him
and also because he had been diligently making strides in his Legilimency. He
had only phrased the order as if it were a request to put his prey at ease by
portraying himself in a kind light.
When he patted the boy's head as if he were one of Lucius's wolfhounds, Draco
preened under the attention.
"Tell me, how far have you read in the books I recommended to you?"
Draco was an eager pupil, but he was not the most brilliant student Tom had
ever met (even excluding himself, since it was unfair to compare anyone's
intelligence to his own). Draco was naturally very good in Potions and Defense,
but he was only average or perhaps a bit above in Charms and Transfiguration
and had to work quite hard to master those kinds of spells. This made teaching
him the Dark Arts something of a challenge, but Tom had persisted in order to
gain his loyalty over that towards his father, who had refused to teach him
much more than the basics that every child from a Dark family learned.
Tom suspected that Lucius had hoped his son wouldn't follow in his footsteps,
and refusing to teach him Dark magic had been some sort of vain effort towards
that goal. But now he appeared to view Tom as the lesser of two evils and to
hope that he would be able to offer Draco some protection when Lord Voldemort
returned.
"I finished them yesterday morning, My Lord," answered Draco. Then, knowing
that Tom would want to hear his interpretation of what he'd learned, he added,
"It's important to learn how to do magic wordlessly and, as much as possible,
wandlessly, because safely performing the Dark Arts requires a lot more control
over one's magic than most wizards have."
He was clearly expecting some sort of praise, but Tom was unimpressed. He
raised one suspicious eyebrow. "And how much of it have you been able to
apply?"
"Oh, well…" Draco blushed and looked down at his hands. "I can do some basic
spells wordlessly, but I haven't been able to manage any offensive or defensive
spells yet."
Over their weeks working together, Tom had managed to get Draco to move past
his habit of grossly exaggerating to make himself look better. Nothing had been
more effective than Tom purposefully taking Draco at his word and hexing the
stuffing out of him with the expectation that he'd be able to shield himself as
he'd bragged he could. Draco obviously still hated to be embarrassed by
admitting that he hadn't been able to do something, but that was infinitely
preferable to being hexed to bits by Tom.
Tom let out a breath of frustrated acceptance. He really wasn't suited at all
to being a teacher, as he barely had even as much patience as an angry mother
dragon, and he especially didn't have much patience to try to figure out ways
to explain things he'd simply known intuitively since before even going to
Hogwarts. He reminded himself quite firmly that it was in his own best
interest—and that it was his own plan!—to claim Draco Malfoy as one of his own,
not only because he would need his own followers separate from his other self's
but also because if he controlled the child then he controlled the parents, no
matter who they'd actually sworn loyalty to.
He turned a steely gaze back to his student and tried to decide how to
articulate the feeling of being one with his magic in a way that Draco would
understand.
===============================================================================
Draco would have probably been absolutely horrified, Tom reflected the next
day, to know that Tom was actually looking rather more forward to dealing with
the Mudblood than to spending more time with him. Being charming had always
been a particularly exhausting form of hell for him, no matter how good at it
he'd been (and he'd been the best). On the other hand, playing mind games was
his bread and butter. He had been anticipating the Grangers girl's reaction to
his offer for days, gleefully planning how he'd handle every minute variation.
He was nearly grinning when he entered the little cottage, but he managed to
school his face into his usual impassively handsome mask before he opened the
closet. The Grangers peered out at him from the darkness, and Tom leaned
casually against the doorjamb and crossed his arms over his chest.
"I have been told that you are intelligent, Mudblood," he told her, enjoying
the way she jerked at his words. "Although I have not seen much evidence of it
firsthand, it has occurred to me that I could put you to some use."
His Legilimency allowed him to read her defiant emotions before she even
declared, "I won't help you."
Mrs. Granger flinched as if she knew exactly how stupid that was of her
daughter, and Tom turned his eyes onto the older woman just for the
satisfaction of seeing her cower backwards into her corner.
Tom twisted his mouth into a patronizing smile. "You already have, Mudblood. Do
you not remember the information you gave me in exchange for your own well-
being? If you have changed your mind, I can always—" But she had frozen at the
sight of his wand, which he'd produced seemingly from thin air. His smile
widened. "Ah, I see that we still understand one another."
She clambered to her feet without another word and with a decided droop to her
shoulders.
Tom smirked to himself as he led her through the bedroom; her reactions were
just what he had predicted.
"Now, I suspect you might even enjoy this task," he said as he entered the
kitchen ahead of her, "and then you'll have quite a bit of egg on your face for
that abysmal behavior earlier."
He stepped aside to reveal that the kitchen table was covered with stacks of
books and unused parchment. Her eyes, which were already a bit less defiant and
a bit more defeated, lit up with interest that she tried and failed to hide.
He'd been more than correct that the way to Hermione Granger's heart was
through books.
He waved his arm to indicate that she could approach the treasure trove. "They
range from the ancient to the beginning of this century, and none of them have
such luxuries as tables of contents or indexes. You're to synthesize the
information in each book."
Tom really did want them indexed and catalogued for his own use, and he really
didn't have the time or patience to do it himself. But having Hermione Granger
do it was little more than an exercise in manipulation and fact finding. The
task would make her happy and was the perfect opportunity to slowly introduce
her to the world of magic beyond the levitation charms and button-to-beetle
transfigurations she'd learned at Hogwarts… to introduce her to real magic. Of
course he'd actually already read all of the books he'd given her for this
first go around, but he wouldn't tell her that. He wanted to judge the true
extent of her intelligence, and to do that he had to know the subject matter at
hand so he could evaluate her work.
She eyed the tomes hungrily. He knew then that he already had her, but he still
had to make sure that the entire state of affairs was laid out on the table. He
stepped between her and the books and fixed her with a serious gaze.
"I will allow you to remain outside of the closet even when you are not
working, as long as you meet my standards."
It was unnecessary to mention that if she failed then her situation would be
worse than it had ever been before. Indeed, mentioning it would have been
counter to what Tom was trying to accomplish with her.
Granger bit her lip and tore her gaze from the books to bravely meet his eyes.
With a defiant little tilt to her chin, she asked, "What about my parents?"
"What about them?" Tom shrugged in the truly careless manner of one who
honestly had no feelings on the subject.
"I can't sit out here reading while my parents are stuck in that closet!" she
exclaimed.
Tom outwardly frowned, but inwardly he was congratulating himself on having
predicted her reactions so well.
"If you exceed my expectations then I might consider allowing them to join you
in the bedroom, although Salazar only knows how you'll manage the sleeping
arrangements with one bed." Undoubtedly they would not only manage sharing one
bed but would actually welcome it, given their current living conditions.
However, his apparent obliviousness to their situation made Granger visibly
bite her tongue to keep from speaking, which is exactly the amusing reaction
Tom had been hoping for. "However, if it turns out that your intelligence is
not up to my standards, there will be no need for you to worry about them
anymore."
Her eyes lit up with not a little anger and a determination to prove how wrong
he was to doubt her, but she smartly kept her comments to herself. It seemed
she had learned by now that her words would mean nothing to him, but he would
keep his word if her actions pleased him.
Tom watched her with an impassive mask fixed firmly on his face as she watched
him weave his wand in a complex pattern by the door. Now that she was free from
the closet, he had doubled the wards, just in case. Not that he thought she
truly had a chance of escaping, since even if she managed to get out of the
building she would still be out in the middle of nowhere without a wand. He
just would prefer that she not die trying before his plans had come to
fruition.
Finally, when he was done, he stepped through the door and, without bothering
to look back at her, said, "Until later, Mudblood."
===============================================================================
The Horcrux was lounging across their grandfather's sarcophagus when Tom
appeared in the graveyard the second time. He looked up unhurriedly, as if he
couldn't be bothered with Tom's appearance, and Tom decided not to call him out
on the blatant untruth of it. If acting disinterested made the Horcrux feel
more in control of the situation, then that could only work in Tom's favor.
"I wasn't sure you'd come back," declared the Horcrux.
Tom kept his face neutral. "I don't know why you're complaining. It's only been
a day."
The Horcrux leaned back on his elbows and let his long legs sprawl out across
the stone, one of his feet dangling over the edge and kicking at their
grandfather's name. He scowled. "Well, I guess a day is nothing to you, since
you have a body."
Tom only controlled his expression through sheer force of will. It was the best
reply he could have hoped for—the information contained in it, that is, not the
reply itself. Clearly the Horcrux did not have access to his mind or to any
real sense of Tom's physical surroundings, or else he would have known that it
had been a week since Tom's last visit. Tom had assumed that the Horcrux's
sense of time was just as nonexistent as his had been while inside the diary,
or probably even worse since he hadn't been able to directly communicate with
the outside world like Tom had, but it was fantastic to have it confirmed.
His mind was his own, and that was the most important thing.
Finally allowing a slight smile to pass over his features, Tom said, "I have a
present for you, but I want something from you."
"It isn't much of a gift then, is it?" asked the Horcrux. "It hardly stems from
detached and disinterested generosity."
"Name one time we have done something out of generosity of any kind."
The Horcrux laughed, and Tom was struck anew with two completely relevant
realizations: First, it was incredibly strange to watch someone who was as
close to identical to you as it was possible to be. Even identical twins had
enough differences that most people who knew them for more than a couple of
days could tell them apart! Smaller eyes, facial symmetry that was slightly
off, freckles in different patterns… the Horcrux and he had none of those minor
differences. Second, he was truly an intimidating individual. Even his laughter
was off-putting because of the hints of instability and coldness behind it.
"Fair point," replied the Horcrux as he slipped gracefully off the sarcophagus.
"What's the present, and what do you want?"
Tom raised his eyebrows just the barest amount. "I want to know everything you
know about the other Horcruxes. And I promise you'll love it; trust me."
His other self took in an unneeded breath and let it out harshly, his nostrils
flaring. "I don't know much more than you do. I was created less than a year
later."
"I don't mean the mechanics or properties of it," answered Tom. "I mean what
they are and where they're hidden. Did you still plan to use objects from the
Founders? Were you able to find any objects that fit the bill?"
"I had determined that Ravenclaw's diadem was a real object, just before I was
made. I was close to tracking it down, I think. Did you know that the Gray Lady
is Rowena Ravenclaw's daughter? Sorry, of course you didn't…." he answered his
own question a second later. After an awkward pause, he added, "In any event, I
think she's the key to finding the diadem."
"You hadn't pinned down any other possibilities?"
The Horcrux narrowed his eyes as if he were trying to decide whether that was
an accusation. "Not anything more concrete than what you already know."
"I see…. And had you given any more thought to where they would be hidden?"
Chapter End Notes
     I've been trying to strike a balance between showing conversations
     and avoiding giving massive info dumps about things we already know
     that would probably be boring to read about in any detail (e.g. what
     the Horcruxes are). Please let me know what you think about that or
     about anything else in the story, if you have a few seconds.
***** Standby *****
Chapter Summary
     Tom spends a Saturday on standby.
Chapter Notes
     All exams, papers, and holidays are officially finished for me, and I
     have a bit of a break now so for a while I should be able to focus on
     writing this and my other story, The Other Side. I hope you all had a
     good holiday season and that the wait wasn't too long for this
     chapter!
See the end of the chapter for more notes
The last official meeting before they carried out the plot at Gringotts was a
tense affair for everybody involved. Lestrange clearly had a reason to be
nervous, as he was the one really risking his neck, but in reality his nerves
were more because of his intense fear of displeasing Tom than any worry for
himself. Tom attributed Abraxas's nerves to worry over whether the goblins
would keep their end of the deal, which was never a sure bet. Lucius was right
to be worried, since his neck was on the line on two separate fronts, the
goblins and the Polyjuice Potion.
No doubt Mulciber, who didn't actually have any personal stake in this
operation, was so jumpy just because it was obvious that Tom himself was
operating with a hair trigger.
Tom turned his head abruptly to meet Mulciber's frightened eyes, and the man
flinched and was unable to hold his stare for more than a few seconds before he
dropped his gaze to his lap.
"But you must feel left out of these proceedings, Mulciber, since you've
nothing to contribute," said Tom in his own imitation of the low, sibulant
voice his other self had used in Abraxas's memory. "Why don't you tell us if
you have anything useful to add?"
Tom was half hoping that Mulciber wouldn't have anything interesting to say,
because he was itching to torture something. This usually turned out to be the
case, because Mulciber's somewhat low administrative position at Saint Mungo's
(after having lost his position in the Ministry when his son was caught as a
Death Eater) didn't afford him much access to information that Tom would find
useful. This time, however, the man perked up at the opportunity, and Tom
suspected that he wouldn't be able to torture him after all.
"My Lord, paperwork came across my desk only this afternoon indicating that
Molly Weasley is a serious case for one of the Mind Healers."
It took Tom several seconds to piece together why exactly he should care about
the state of this Molly Weasley's mind, but then he determined that she must be
the mother of the Weasley brats he'd disposed of. Little Ginny had only ever
referred to her mother as "Mum," but why else would Mulciber bring it up? The
whole thing brought a cruel smirk to his lips as he recalled thinking in the
Chamber that he would never spare another thought for little Ginny after she
was out of his sight. It seemed he had proven himself correct, at least until
someone else brought her up.
His followers had all sat back further in their seats at the twist of lips, as
if to get as far away from him as possible, which only made Tom's smirk deepen.
"The Healer is petitioning the hospital to be allowed to treat her free of
charge for the indefinite future," Mulciber rushed on, eager to tell all of his
news before Tom could decide how to react. "The hospital takes on such charity
cases in serious circumstances. The Healer's professional opinion is that Mrs.
Weasley might present a danger to herself or others without proper treatment,
but the Weasleys have exhausted their ability to pay."
Lucius couldn't suppress a snicker. "Now that you mention it, I had heard from
my friends in the DMLE that Weasley returned from bereavement leave as soon as
the period of paid leave expired, even though Bones told him that he was free
to take as much additional time as he needed. No doubt he couldn't take any
unpaid time off without his remaining children starving to death."
His colleagues joined in on his laughter.
"It's very amusing news," Tom broke in, and all of them immediately quieted
down as if they had never been laughing at all, "but what use is it to me?"
It was rather a rhetorical question only intended to make them refocus on what
was important. In fact, Tom's mind had begun spinning with possibilities as
soon as he'd heard the news.
However, Lucius apparently took it as a genuine inquiry, because he, always
eager to make life harder for Arthur Weasley, immediately said, "My Lord, if I
may, I suggest that we could achieve several objectives at once here. If
everyone were to think that you are actively targeting the Weasleys…"
Tom had been thinking the same thing. A malicious smile curved over the
handsome lines of his face. "Yes, that would certainly distract Dumbledore and
send Potter into a tailspin. And it seems that such a threat might send Molly
Weasley into a complete mental breakdown, if she isn't there yet."
"I will find out the details of her condition," added Mulciber. "I should be
able to get my hands on all of the Healer's records on Monday."
Tom nodded. "Good. Lucius, you will give your house-elf very clear instructions
about what to tell—and not tell—Potter."
===============================================================================
The next day, Saturday, was absolute hell for Tom. Yesterday he'd been able to
distract himself with the final preparations for today, but now all that was
left was the waiting. He absolutely despised waiting for other people to carry
out his plans, both because he hated waiting itself and because he hated not
being in control.
And he couldn't distract himself by waiting around. Tom's mind refused to focus
on anything besides what the Horcrux had told him about the hiding places.
Places that represent something important about his past, he'd said. Places
that represent something important about his place in the magical world.
Tom leaned back into his thick down pillows and closed his eyes to better
recall the Horcrux's exact words about its own creation.
"What better place to create me than here, on our father's grave? There's
something incredibly poetic about it all," he'd said, eyes gleaming with pride
and more madness than even Tom was entirely comfortable seeing. "You were
created in the same place where your soul was split to make your creation
possible, although it wasn't planned that way for you, of course. I decided to
carry it on after you were created."
Tom had arranged his expression into one of interest. "And since you were going
to use our father's death to create the next Horcrux, you had to do it here.
Why here, though, and not up at the house?"
The Horcrux grinned. "It was also about what this place means…. Hogwarts was
our first home in the magical world, the place where we began our education,
and the place where we made our first kill. The other locations have to be just
as significant. I might have killed our father up at the house, but the house
itself has no significance. This village is what's important: the house, this
graveyard, the hovel where our mother grew up. This is the final resting place
of the last Tom Riddle, the place where his legacy ends…. And I just liked
dancing on his grave."
Tom opened his eyes and stared up at the canopy, having been able to reach no
conclusion other than the one he'd already made.
It was all madness. Horcruxes were meant to be hidden—protected!—where nobody
could find them!
Of course Tom understood the need for grand gestures—Lord Voldemort's Horcruxes
could be nothing short of exceptional, just like he was—but that's why he had
chosen the Founders' artifacts as his remaining containers. The diary had a
purpose, and furthermore it represented his mind and thoughts. The ring was a
representation of his heritage, his ancient, pure bloodline dating back to
Salazar himself. The remaining four were grand symbols of the wizarding world,
representations of Tom's rightful place and his eventual dominion over magical
society.
But hiding Horcruxes in places intrinsically connected to himself was just
sheer stupidity!
It was a good thing he came along when he did, or else surely his other self
would have been defeated eventually because of his utter madness. Tom was
considering now whether it was even worth it to bring the man back, if he was
that insane. He would definitely have to take things even more carefully than
he'd been planning to before. Perhaps if he could just use the Horcruxes'
knowledge instead… but no, he would have to deal with his other self somehow,
since his continued existence meant that his other self could never be disposed
of….
First he needed to find the rest of the Horcruxes. His own placement was
irrelevant because he'd had a purpose the later Horcruxes hadn't, so the ring's
placement in the Gaunt shack and the cup's placement in Gringotts were the only
clues he had. Little Hangleton was significant because it was everything about
his heritage, the good and the bad, all rolled into one otherwise insignificant
speck on the map. There were any number of things about Gringotts that might
have seemed important to his other self, but he couldn't guess which one or
more of them had actually been important in Voldemort's insane mind.
The Horcrux in the ring hadn't known much about it, as he had only had the
beginnings of plans when he was created. Tom would have to wait until he had
the cup in order to know more.
Tom hated waiting!
He rolled off his bed and crossed the room to the unobtrusive door nearly
hidden in the wall paneling. It led to a relatively large room, though much
smaller than his bedroom, that had originally been intended as a dressing room
when his suite had been built anticipating a royal visit, before the Statute of
Secrecy had passed. There was enough room for a large bed and plenty of toys.
His Muggle was huddled on the floor, which was amusing for Tom. He had an
exceptionally comfortable bed, but apparently he refused to go anywhere near it
unless Tom forced him to.
"Up," he ordered.
The Muggle flinched and pressed his naked, trembling body further into his
corner, but there was still fire in his eyes when Tom forced him up. That was
good; Tom smiled, showing the boy his white teeth.
"You know, darling, you seem unhappy," Tom said, his voice a smooth mixture of
intimacy and mockery. His prick stirred with interest at the flash of disgust
and anger in the Muggle's eyes. "Perhaps I ought to have taken your wishes into
consideration. I'll tell you what: You can choose which spells I use today."
The Muggle finally turned his eyes upwards to stare at Tom with the horror of
one who had comprehended that he was looking at a monster. Tom smiled back.
"Don't be shy about telling me what you like best. The Cruciatus Curse? The
Blood Boiling Curse?" He leaned in so that his lips brushed against the
Muggle's ear and his breath ruffled the curly hair. "How about my curse, do you
like that one?"
The boy slammed himself sideways then, and Tom registered the feel of soft hair
against his skin just before the pain. He stumbled backwards, his hand
automatically coming up to cradle his nose, and watched the Muggle scramble for
the door.
He couldn't get out, of course, with the locking spells on the door. Still, Tom
let his magic lash out violently. The boy's cry of surprise and pain was cut
off abruptly, his breath knocked out of his lungs as he was slammed up against
the wood. Tom half considered either letting the magic crush him against the
solid oak or allowing him to crumple into a heap on the floor, but he settled
for a happy medium. As Tom straightened himself out and took an unsteady step
towards the Muggle, the boy kicked his feet wildly in midair as he searched for
purchase against the smooth door, and he clutched desperately at his throat as
if he could somehow release the collar of magic that was supporting his entire
body.
"You filthy Muggle," hissed Tom, his voice an unpleasant mixture between
English and Parseltongue, "you dare to strike me?"
His prisoner's eyes were wide open and rolling frantically in panic as he
failed to draw breath. Tom watched in satisfaction as his nails tore gashes in
his own throat in his attempts to free himself. Finally, he turned wild,
pleading eyes to Tom's.
Tom brought up an elegant hand to collect the trickle of blood that had leaked
out of his tender nose. He examined the blood with glowing eyes, then turned
his fingers for the boy's inspection. "You expect me to help you now, after you
have drawn my blood? My blood?"
The tears that streamed down the Muggle's face did nothing to persuade his
captor, but Tom was interested in something else. He stepped closer, trailing
his wand down the side of his prisoner's face and across his jawline.
"Will you submit to me willingly, if I let you live? Will you submit to
whatever I want, no matter what it is?"
The Muggle hesitated for the barest second, but then he nodded. His face was
beginning to turn a horrendous shade of burgundy by then, so Tom had expected
that response. The real test would come when he was actually faced with Tom's
demands when his life wasn't about to be snuffed out. The thought made Tom
smile in anticipation.
He dropped the boy with a mere thought, allowing him to fall to the ground in a
heap. He wheezed and gasped, but Tom was uninterested in his struggles. He
undid the fastenings of his trousers in one smooth movement and moved back to
the center of the small space so that the boy would have to come to him.
"Prove yourself, Muggle," demanded Tom, with a lewd gesture towards his exposed
privates. There was no need to add that he meant now, as the tone of his voice
brooked no opposition. Indeed, the Muggle half shuffled and half crawled
towards him even as he continued to gasp for breath, and with only the briefest
grimace of disgust he brought his mouth to Tom's member.
Tom hadn't ever allowed him to do this before, as he hadn't trusted that the
boy wasn't stupid enough to bite at the first opportunity. Now he judged that a
true brush with death would have tamed that spark of defiance and idiocy just
enough to make this safe, at least for the rest of the day.
As the Muggle gagged and choked around him, Tom let his head fall back and
thought about everything else he wanted to do. Images of blood and sweat and
cum danced through his mind, and he wondered how far his little pet's resolve
would let him push.
In any event, he would be well and truly distracted from all the waiting.
Abruptly, he used his long fingers twisted in the Muggle's hair to pull him off
his cock and drag him upwards until he was standing awkwardly before Tom,
wincing in pain. Tom shoved him face down onto the bed, and before the Muggle
could react, he'd hit him with a Cruciatus Curse. The writhing and screaming
did a bit to dissipate Tom's anger and boredom, but not a lot.
He ended the curse just as suddenly as he'd started it, leaving his toy crying
and shaking on the bed.
"I suggest that you stay still," Tom told him as he dragged the tip of his wand
down the boy's flank and across his trembling buttocks, "because I'm not going
to stop if you move. It'll just make it worse."
He gave the shaking boy a moment to process that, not out of kindness but
rather to allow him to imagine the worst. Then he brought his wand up to the
soft skin of the boy's side and silently cast a cutting charm.
===============================================================================
It was taking too long. The hot shower that was usually a relief to him hadn't
done any good at all. Well, except for actually cleaning him, which it did
quite well, as evidenced by all of the blood that had swirled around the marble
and down the drain. Torturing his Muggle had been fun for a while, but nothing
could fix the fact that Malfoy and Lestrange should have been back hours ago.
He was just stepping out of the shower when Abraxas burst into his bedroom, a
clearly panicked Lucius right on his heels. Tom only had to take one look at
them through the open bathroom door before he had brought them to their knees
with the sheer force of his rage.
"What happened?"
"Please, My Lo—" began Lucius, but a glare from Tom, even completely nude and
dripping as he was, stopped his plea short.
His father, who actually had the answers, quickly filled the silence. "My Lord,
the Aurors… Lestrange…"
He seemed unable to articulate his thoughts into anymore coherence than that,
but Tom could well fill in the blanks. Both Malfoys cried out as his fury
washed painfully over them.
"How?" he hissed.
"The—the potion, My Lord!" gasped Abraxas. "It had to be that! I was speaking
to the goblin when I heard the commotion, and when I looked back Lestrange was
himself again. I've spent the rest of the day at the Ministry, but I managed to
convince them that Lestrange had blackmailed me and I had been planning to ask
for their help as soon as my family was safe."
A deadly calm settled over Tom's mind, and his followers both cried out with
relief as his magic uncurled itself from their bodies. He sucked in a deep
breath full of hot steam and took his time putting on a thick robe he Summoned
from his wardrobe. By the time he had completed the task, he had settled his
thoughts enough to deal intelligently with the situation.
Tom turned steely gaze on the elder Malfoy. "So I made a mistake with the
potion?"
Abraxas bowed his head. "No, My Lord, I'm sure that you could never have made a
mistake. I suppose that I must admit, to my shame, that it was my grandson's
error."
Lucius let out a low moan of distress, and Tom turned cold eyes and an even
colder smile on him. "It seems, Lucius, that you never shared the details of
our arrangement with your father."
"Master, I beg you! Please, please take me instead! I will take his punishment
on top of my own!" he pleaded, bowing so low that his forehead touched the damp
floor and his hair fell from its normally neat tie and spread out around him.
Tom watched impassively as Lucius prostrated himself and his father seemed to
realize that the situation was more serious than he had originally considered.
Tom supposed that Abraxas had known that blaming Draco would earn the boy a
punishment—would earn all of them a punishment—but he had thought it would be
manageable. Indeed, it was more than clear now that he had utterly
underestimated Tom in more ways than one.
"What was it that I said when I agreed to take Draco on, Lucius?" asked Tom
coolly. "Ah, yes, I remember! That I would hold you both fully and equally
responsible and force you each to watch as I torture the other."
Lucius moaned again, and Abraxas stared between them in growing terror. If Tom
hadn't been so focused on his goal, he undoubtedly would have taken a full
measure of sadistic pleasure in watching the eldest Malfoy realize his error.
A snap of his fingers produced a house-elf. "Bring Draco to me."
The order had the expected result on both of the Malfoys, but Tom ignored their
begging as he brushed past them and, finally, into the bedroom. His temper was
hanging on a thread, and if he allowed himself to react then he would
obliterate Abraxas Malfoy on the spot.
When Draco appeared in the doorway, he looked around the room in shock and not
a little fear. Tom was sure they made quite a sight, him in a dressing robe
with the elder Malfoys practically licking the floor at his feet. He held out
his hand, and Draco warily but readily came to him, allowing Tom to wrap his
wand arm around his shoulders with such trust that surely his father and
grandfather would have been horrified by it even under the best of
circumstances. Tom allowed his wand to hang casually down across Draco's chest,
where it would surely cause him some harm if Tom lost his temper and his magic
sparked. This was not lost on either of the elder Malfoys, though Draco himself
seemed not to think anything of it.
"It seems that our potion failed," he told the boy, a hard edge to his voice
that didn't quite allow it to be as casual as he'd hoped. "Your grandfather has
been quick to blame you for the mistake."
Draco's jaw dropped open. "What? No!"
Tom smirked at Lucius and Abraxas from over Draco's head. "No? So you're saying
it was my mistake, then?"
"No!" cried Draco. "I'm saying that there was no mistake! It was perfect!
You know that!"
"Really?" he asked coldly. "Tell me, Draco, if the potion was perfect, then why
was Lestrange exposed in the middle of the Gringotts lobby, before the
Polyjuice ought to have worn off?"
Draco's mouth worked for a few moments before he found his voice. "It—it must
have been… tampered with."
He was so upset that he had forgotten to add his customary "My Lord" to his
declarations, but Tom didn't mind. The boy had reacted exactly as he'd hoped,
and his father and grandfather had, in turn, reacted to Draco's words exactly
as he'd anticipated. Lucius appeared caught between hope and horror, and
Abraxas's carefully constructed mental walls shifted in his fear and regret.
The shift was just the minutest amount, but it was enough for Tom to attack the
weak point and work his mental fingers into the resulting crack.
He couldn't make out Malfoy's exact thoughts, not unless he had direct access
and was willing to destroy the man's mind, but he had advanced enough to be
able to make out the generalities.
Tom bit back a curse and subtly pointed the tip of his wand away from Draco's
chest, just in case.
"Indeed, that is what I think as well," he finally said, turning his flashing
eyes to Abraxas. "The real question is who would have dared to tamper with it."
Abraxas's face remained completely impassive, which was probably more of a
giveaway than if he'd tried to act offended at the accusation. Honestly, Tom
had to wonder sometimes about peoples' inability to lie believably. He'd
learned very quickly as a child that there was a fine balance between acting
unworried and acting offended, and too much on either side would advertise
guilt. With the exception of a few panicked, fearful reactions that he hadn't
yet learned to control as a child (His first meeting with Dumbledore came
immediately to mind, which did not improve his mood at all.), he had always
carefully tailored his reactions to what people expected, to great effect.
On the other hand, Lucius was staring at his father with his mouth agape,
utterly unable to control his reaction.
"Father…" he began, then trailed off, his voice a rather tragic mixture of
disbelief and anger.
Tom felt Draco shake his head in denial from where the boy was resting against
his side, and he looked down in time to meet wide gray eyes. "No, Grandfather
wouldn't… He wouldn't!"
"Oh, but he would. He thinks that loyalty to my other self means that he must
thwart my plans, and by tampering with the potion he could simultaneously ruin
my chances of retrieving what I need from the Lestrange vault and get rid of
someone more loyal to me than to my other self."
Most of it had been an educated guess, but he could tell by the spark of steely
defiance in Abraxas's eyes that he was right on the money. They glared at each
other with pure hatred until Lucius broke in, his voice shattered.
"No… But why would you—" He cut himself off with a nervous glance in Tom's
direction, then apparently decided that asking his question was worth the risk
of drawing his master's ire. "Why would you risk Draco? My son…" He was on his
feet suddenly, glaring down at his father with as much fury as Tom had ever
seen him direct towards anyone. "He's my son! How dare you use him in your mad
scheme! How dare you!"
Abraxas looked contrite. "Lucius… I did not know. I thought that we would all
be punished but nothing more than we could endure, than what we have endured
before—"
"DRACO HAS NEVER ENDURED IT!" roared Lucius, cutting off wherever Abraxas had
been heading with his explanation.
His father pinned him with a glare that had undoubtedly been used to cow his
son since infancy. "You are the one who offered your son to Tom Riddle, not me.
You are the one who agreed to the terms, not me."
"You're the one who sabotaged his work!" retorted Lucius. "The issue of
punishment would not even be on the table if you hadn't done that! The scale of
punishment is irrelevant—I can't believe that you willingly set him up
for any punishment!"
Abraxas pursed his lips into a harsh line, the so familiar pure-blood hauteur
coming over his face. "He will have to endure torture sooner or later. If he
had to suffer sooner—if we all had to suffer—in order to remain loyal to our
lord, I judged it well worth the price."
Tom had heard more than enough to learn all he wanted to know. Abraxas, unaware
of the terrible scope of the threat Tom had put over Lucius and Draco's heads
when he had accepted the boy's help, had acted to sabotage him out of loyalty
to his other self. And he had acted alone, no doubt because he knew that his
son would never have agreed to go through with anything that would have put his
own son directly in harm's way. Whether Lucius would have agreed to sabotage
him if Draco hadn't been in the picture, Tom didn't know.
As he felt Draco tremble against his side, he judged that it was irrelevant at
this point—Draco was his now, and it was far too late for his father to do
anything to change that.
"Did you really think I would accept that our work was faulty? That I wouldn't
figure it out?" he asked somewhat incredulously. "Apparently you are so blinded
by the insanity of Lord Voldemort that you have underestimated my intelligence.
I would kill you for that insult even if I weren't going to kill you for your
betrayal."
Draco gasped and wrenched himself from underneath Tom's arm, going instead to
his father's embrace. It was the most physical affection Tom had ever seen the
littlest Malfoy willingly display; apparently the situation was enough to
override his teenage independence. Lucius closed his eyes tightly for a few
long moments before he turned a pleading gaze on Tom.
"Please, My Lord, if you would… Please spare my son from having to see his
grandfather…" He trailed off with a choked sound, apparently unable to finish
the sentence aloud, no matter what his father had done or how angry he was
about it.
He would normally be furious at any request coming from someone with so little
bargaining power in the situation, but in this case Tom had to acknowledge, if
only to himself, that murdering Abraxas Malfoy in front of his grandson would
probably damage the relationship he was building with the boy. Fortunately he
wasn't planning on murdering Abraxas just yet anyway, so he was spared having
to balance those varying concerns.
"Tell me, Lucius, do you need your father's approval to maintain your various
interests, so long as he lives?"
Lucius stared at him in confusion for long enough that Tom had to say his name
sharply. Then he seemed to snap out of his stupor. He explained, "Er, no, My
Lord. He turned over most of the day-to-day operations to me years ago. His
approval is only needed for major decisions."
"Fantastic," said Tom, although the tone of his voice didn't sound excited at
all. He spoke to Lucius as if Abraxas wasn't even in the room. "Your father
will be imprisoned here until further notice. If he wants so badly to help Lord
Voldemort, then he will be glad to know that his body and soul will be donated
to that cause when the time is right. In the meantime, he is already dead to
you and your family. Am I understood?"
Lucius stroked his hand through his son's hair, pulling Draco further against
him. He let out a shaky breath and determinedly refused to look down at his
father.
"Yes, My Lord."
It was the work of a moment to bind Abraxas and toss him into the room with
Tom's pet Muggle. Tom smirked a bit at how furious the man would be about that,
but he'd brought his expression under control by the time he'd turned back
around to face Lucius and Draco.
"Malfoy, find out everything you can about what your father has said to the
Ministry, and what has happened to Lestrange. Draco, I want your report about
what he did to the Polyjuice Potion by the end of the week. And someone tell
Mulciber that I want answers on Monday and not a day later, or he'll find
himself hogtied with Abraxas."
He spun away and opened his wardrobe. The Malfoys recognized the clear
dismissal for what it was and quickly left him alone. Tom finally let out the
breath he'd seemed to be holding in along with his rage, but he quickly reined
it all back in as well as he could. There was absolutely no room for
impulsivity, especially not now that he was short one Horcrux and two
followers. He dressed quickly, intent on going to the library to continue
working towards figuring out where else Voldemort would have put Horcruxes.
Chapter End Notes
     I hope it was worth the wait. I appreciate all of the comments,
     kudos, and bookmarks more than I can say.
***** The Dementor's Kiss *****
Chapter Summary
     Soul-sucking comes in many forms.
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
Granger did an awful job of hiding her dismay. She was all wringing hands and
worried eyes, and when Tom entered the little cabin she spoke up immediately.
"The book is wrong; I only recorded what it said."
Tom paused for a fraction of a second. It was the first time she had ever
addressed him willingly, without him first having to threaten her in some way
to gain her cooperation. Then his eyes traveled curiously past his frazzled
archivist and to the table behind her. She had reorganized his deliberately
haphazard stacks, somewhat surprisingly in more or less the same way he would
have done it himself had he not been tricking her into believing he had no idea
what they were about. He could tell even from across the room which category of
books she'd been working on.
"You ca—" began Granger, then cut herself off abruptly before she said that he
couldn't do something. After a moment's hesitation, she continued, "You'll read
the books yourself before assuming that I did a poor job, won't you? It isn't
my fault if the authors are wrong."
He had pondered how Granger would react to her views—rather, the Hogwarts
curriculum—being challenged, but this was more than even he had anticipated.
Tom had always been skeptical of what he was told and had never accepted his
textbooks and professors at their words. He had always considered it the single
positive attribute he'd brought with him from the Muggle orphanage, because he
had quickly learned that children who had been raised in the wizarding world
tended to accept conventional wisdom and lists of magical rules at face value
without question.
Tom had expected Granger to be more like him, since she had been raised by
Muggles. He had certainly not expected such blind faith in authority.
The only change in his expression was a flicker that passed through his eyes so
quickly that Granger was left wondering if she'd seen it at all. He reached out
to smoothly pluck her notes from midair where he'd Summoned them and made a
show of scanning the rows of her small, neat handwriting, then he turned to her
with a perfectly arched brow.
"What makes you think the author is incorrect?"
She spluttered for a moment, and when she finally spoke her already-annoying
voice rose higher with each word. "The first exception to Gamp's Law of
Elemental Transfiguration clearly states —"
"I asked for your thoughts, not for you to regurgitate Gamp's Law at me," he
cut her off, quite enjoying the way she gaped at him in astonishment and not a
little anger.
"What else can I do except state the facts?" she asked, and Tom was genuinely
disappointed in her unimaginativeness. "If it were possible to conjure food
from thin air, then someone would have done it and it wouldn't be one of the
exceptions!"
Tom allowed an amused smile to flit across his face. "Are the exceptions laws
describing the limits of magic itself, or are they statements describing the
limits of wizards' minds?"
Granger gaped at him quite unattractively. "They're laws about the limits of
magic, of course! You can't honestly believe that if a wizard were simply more
intelligent he could create food from nothing!"
"Most transfigurations are accomplished by pure magic guided by sheer force of
will. The average wizard doesn't seriously consider the molecular properties of
wood versus metal when he transfigures a match into a needle, as the author
suggests," he began with a shrug. "That is why most transfigurations are rarely
as good as the real thing and often can't stand up for very long to any real
attempt to use the objects. But if one did know the exact molecular properties
and concentrated on transfiguring the match on a molecular level instead of
just imagining the superficial idea of a needle…"
He trailed off with a challenging look in her direction, while she stared at
him in a mixture of astonishment and a clear determination to prove her point.
"No," she insisted rather forcefully. "If it were that simple, then food
wouldn't be considered the first principle exception to Gamp's Law. This—this
book"—she said the word as if it caused her great pain to grant the text such a
label—"would be required reading, if it were true. It would be a revolutionary
breakthrough!"
Tom laughed grimly. "There probably isn't even one wizard in a thousand who
could define the term 'molecule,' much less who has any idea about the
different chemical structures of things. The fact that there hasn't been a
wizard with both the scientific knowledge and magical capability to actually
accomplish it doesn't mean it can't be done."
"Then you're just arguing hypotheticals! You don't seriously claim to have done
it yourself!"
He shrugged one shoulder lazily. "I'll get around to experimenting with food
eventually, when I have the time. Taking over the world is a full-time job, you
know, and hardly leaves time for studying anything else." He also rather
suspected that his few years of scientific education, which had been quite
lacking even compared to his more fortunate Muggle contemporaries, was woefully
outdated these fifty years later. "But I've no reason to think the exception is
actually a limitation of magic itself, since I have already broken the fourth
exception."
"You can't have!" she exclaimed. "I tried duplicating money myself and—"
Tom's sharp eyes cut to her at that, and she immediately stopped talking.
"You are calling me a liar because your meager attempts failed?" he demanded,
caught somewhere between anger and amusement.
She stared at him with wide brown eyes, clearly having realized only at that
moment how much she had been pushing him, how much freedom he had been allowing
her to challenge him before she'd crossed that line. Tom shook off the remnants
of his anger with a deep breath and a flex of his fingers so that he might more
clearly feel the Horcrux's energy mingling with his own. Then he schooled his
face back into handsome impassivity and stared at her coolly.
"I suggest, Mudblood, that you attempt to apply your not inconsiderable mind to
having a bit more imagination. I've no use for someone who is incapable of
thinking for herself."
Indeed, if there were but one good thing Tom could say about Draco, it would be
that he was an imaginative little prat. Sometimes too imaginative, truth be
told, but Tom was convinced that by the time the boy was old enough to be of
any real use he would have managed to mold his little Malfoy mind into
something worthwhile. He had left Granger standing there with an impossibly
hurt look on her Mudblood face only to be met with Draco's eager face almost as
soon as he'd set foot back in the manor.
"My Lord, I think I figured it out!" he exclaimed from the top of the grand
staircase as Tom was walking across the entrance hall from the front drawing
room. He took the steps down two at a time, triumphantly holding aloft a bundle
of parchment almost as thick as his own forearm.
Tom stood half ready to cast a Levitation Charm should the boy fall headlong
down the marble steps. As soon as Draco was close enough that Tom could be
heard without yelling across the entrance hall, he asked, "Did you have a
house-elf waiting to inform you as soon as I returned?"
"What?" replied Draco, clearly startled at having his train of thought
interrupted. Then, "Yes, of course, but look!"
There were suddenly several long pieces of parchment floating open in front of
his face, and Draco stood beside him pointing at the last line of a series of
complicated equations and chattering away. Tom thought that perhaps it was time
to redraw the line for the acceptable level of familiarity for Draco to have
with him. On the other hand, Malfoy was such a sensitive, spoiled little git
that he doubted he'd get anywhere near the level of productivity out of the boy
were he to be harsh and cold towards him.
"This is almost correct," Tom finally said, forestalling Draco's longwinded
explanation. "You're right that he added additional boomslang skin after we had
left the potion to simmer after the first step of the second part of the
brewing cycle, but you've miscalculated the amount."
Draco stared at him. "How did you check my work so quic—You already knew the
answer!"
Tom flicked his fingers vaguely in Draco's direction to silence him. "Of course
I did. Look here where you've assigned a value of nine to the boomslang skin.
It should really be somewhere around seven point three, but I suspect that you
were unable to find the correct value listed anywhere and tried to derive it
yourself using some known value." He mentally reversed the calculation Draco
would have used to derive the value, and a few seconds later corrected himself,
"From the value of Ashwinder skin. Of course, with your limited knowledge, you
could not properly account for all of the differences between the two."
"You aren't mad that it's not correct?" ventured Draco.
"Actually, I did not expect you to get this far. I had anticipated that you
would stop after you determined that the culprit was boomslang skin and pinned
down the timing."
It occurred to Tom after he'd stopped speaking that perhaps Draco would desire
some more explicit praise than that, perhaps something more along the lines of
being told that he had done very well and gotten surprisingly close to the
correct answer for someone who hadn't even begun the relevant classes at
Hogwarts yet. But Draco had clearly read that implication into what he'd
already said, because he was smiling widely. Tom reached out a tendril of magic
to scan Draco's thoughts and quickly learned that his young follower had been
teaching himself Ancient Runes and Arithmancy since their discussion in the
library all those weeks ago, so eager was he to impress Tom.
"Can I ask you something, My Lord?"
Tom was amused that Draco would think to ask permission now after he'd taken so
many liberties earlier, but he waved him on without commenting on it.
Draco carefully rolled up his parchments, eyeing his work much more closely
than necessary and avoiding looking at Tom. "Why did you assign me this task if
you were going to do it yourself anyway?"
"I wanted to see if you could do it." The answer really was that simple. He
added, "But I hardly went through the whole process myself. I simply looked in
your grandfather's mind for the answer."
In fact, he had invaded Abraxas's mind for more information than that, and that
process had been quite painful for Malfoy. He had cooperated somewhat after Tom
had assured him that his mental wellbeing wasn't at all necessary for what Tom
had planned for him, of course.
Draco had already bowed his head low and turned to go back up the stairs when
Tom called him back.
"As it happens, I did do the calculations for the precise amounts of boomslang
skin myself." He wasn't yet a good enough Legilimens to have ferreted out such
precise information, even when he'd had direct eye contact and no concerns
about breaking Malfoy's mind. "You can find them on my customary table in the
library. Top row of parchment, second stack from the right. Do replace my
original back where you find it."
It was both a reward and another test. From the way Malfoy's eyes lit up and he
smiled brilliantly at Tom before rushing back down the stairs towards the
library, Tom knew that the boy really was thrilled at the opportunity. He could
appreciate that thirst for knowledge. And the next time he was in the library,
he would know whether Malfoy had the gall to look at his other papers.
===============================================================================
The second meeting after the failed attempt on Gringotts wasn't any less
terrifying for Lucius and Mulciber than the first had been. Tom knew that he
was significantly less likely now that he'd had another week to calm down to
hold Mulciber under the Cruciatus Curse for five minutes straight merely
because his information was boring, or to blow up Lucius's glass while he was
holding it because he looked too much like his father when he tilted his head a
certain way, but neither Mulciber nor Malfoy knew that.
They were still holding meetings in Abraxas's study, except now it was Tom's
study. Lucius had been visibly put out at that—no doubt he'd been waiting
literally years to move into the room—but Tom had decided quite abruptly that
he was no longer a schoolboy to be skulking about in the library. He was Lord
Voldemort, more or less, and if he wanted the master's study he would take it.
"Lestrange is extremely lucky at your timing, My Lord," Lucius was saying. "If
he'd been caught now instead of last week, he'd almost certainly have been
Kissed."
Tom could not but agree. He looked up from the Daily Prophet he'd spread across
Abraxas's desk, although he could still see the moving photograph and the
headline screaming up at him as he looked at his remaining followers—ESCAPE
FROM AZAKABAN!
"Indeed, this Fudge seems like he wouldn't be capable of reacting within reason
if he actually tried."
Lucius nodded once in acknowledge. "Yes, My Lord, he is little more than a
fool. He is understandably eager for any news that could distract the public
from the Ministry's catastrophic failure here, and he is sure that publicly
disposing of one recently captured Death Eater would make up in some way for
them having lost another one. If the Head of the Department were anyone less
formidable and popular than Bones, Fudge would likely have had Lestrange Kissed
in the middle of the Ministry atrium today, notwithstanding the fact that he's
already been legally sentenced to Azkaban."
"The apprentice Healer I have under the Imperius Curse told me that Molly
Weasley had an emergency appointment this morning," added Mulciber. "She is
convinced that the information Malfoy's house-elf passed on about you going
after her remaining children is directly related to Black's escape. She insists
that her children will not be allowed to go back to Hogwarts this year, and she
nearly took Arthur's head off when he intervened in the argument that caused
between her and one of her sons. Apparently she has one of those magical clocks
that shows you were where family members are instead of telling time, and she's
taken to carting it around with her everywhere, even out in public."
Lucius snorted. "I wonder if she would feel any more secure if she knew that
there will be Dementors stationed at the school. I had no choice but to agree
with Fudge or he undoubtedly would have done everything in his power to replace
me as head governor with someone more willing, but I admit that I am
considering keeping Draco out of Hogwarts."
"Draco will be going to Hogwarts," stated Tom.
His tone was mild, but his eyes were hard, and Lucius could clearly see that
arguing would not do any good. He visibly swallowed and lowered his eyes in
acceptance.
"Yes, My Lord."
Feeling no need to acknowledge the subject further, Tom began on the various
questions he had regarding Black. "From what you two know of him, what is Black
likely to do? I would like to intercept him as soon as possible so that I can
either bring him into the fold or, if his mind proves unsalvageable, put him
down before he becomes even more of a liability."
Malfoy and Mulciber looked at each other uncomfortably. Tom was getting quite
impatient with their silent conversation by the time they seemed to reach an
agreement and Mulciber turned back towards him to speak.
"My Lord, I beg you will forgive us, but we truly have no information about
Black. As far as we know, you… He… is the only person who ever knew who his spy
in the Order was."
Tom raised his eyebrows. "Spy?"
Despite having tried to pass the buck to Mulciber, Lucius was unable to keep
his mouth shut. He rolled his eyes in exasperation at his fellow's inadequate
explanation. "Black was the first of his family sorted into Gryffindor, and
before he'd finished Hogwarts he'd alienated his family and managed to get
himself disowned. Nobody had anything to do with him for years. He was
certainly never openly a Death Eater. We all knew that He had a spy inside the
Order, but I was shocked, as was my wife, when Black was arrested."
"I see," said Tom. "That presents a problem, but if Black was that successful
at spying, then that on top of his obvious competence in escaping from Azkaban
makes him too valuable to pass up. You will pool your resources and come up
with any helpful information you can about him by our next meeting."
He dismissed them with a wave of his hand, and Mulciber bowed and all but ran
out the door as quickly as possible without making himself look as frightened
as he was. Malfoy, on the other hand, lingered in the study. Tom looked up from
his various parchments to glare dangerously at him.
"My Lord, forgive me. It's just that I wonder if you might be willing to…
reconsider your position on Draco attending Hogwarts. He would be much safer at
Durmstrang, and he would receive a much better education there as well. In
fact, I had always planned to send him there, but Narcissa—"
"No," interrupted Tom, and Malfoy choked on whatever utterly uninteresting bit
of family drama he had been about to share with him. "I need eyes at Hogwarts,
and Draco has proven himself capable of meeting my expectations."
Lucius's eyes widened, and Tom imagined that he could almost see his hammering
heartbeat in his neck.
"My Lord… with all due respect, isn't Draco too young to take on the
responsibilities of a Death Eater? I had been planning on allowing my son to
join at sixteen, the customary minimum age, but—"
"Your son?" Tom echoed, a cold smile twisting his lips. "Draco might be your
son, but he is my follower. When he joins formally and what responsibilities he
has in the meantime is entirely my decision, not yours. You lost that right, if
indeed I would ever have considered letting you have it in the first place,
when your family betrayed me."
Malfoy held onto the back of his chair as if he might fall over without it. "My
Lord, I had nothing to do with my father's plot. I swear, I am your most
loyal—!"
Tom took more pleasure than he probably should have in cutting the man off yet
again. "You are certainly loyal to someone, but it isn't to me." He held up a
hand to forestall Lucius's next protest. "I know that you had nothing to do
with your father's betrayal, but I also know that the only reason he didn't
want to involve you is that you never would have allowed him to plot against
your son. It had nothing to do with your loyalty to me."
"That might have been his reasoning, My Lord, and of course it's true that I
never would have gone along with any plan that put Draco in danger, but I would
not have betrayed you even if Draco had not been involved."
Tom's smile grew wider. "I have seen your mind. You support me because you see
me as the lesser evil and hope to protect your son from Lord Voldemort. If you
thought tomorrow that my other self would offer a better deal, you would betray
me in an instant."
His growing skills in the art made it easier than ever to pick up the rather
loud half-thought that flitted across Lucius's mind before he could push it
away. If He offered Draco's freedom…
The smile turned into a laugh. "Draco will never be free. Allow me to be
perfectly clear so that we understand one another: He. Is. Mine. In fact, the
only reason I am allowing you to live is that Draco is too young to take over
the Malfoy estate and your various positions if I were to kill you like I am
going to kill your father."
When Lucius Malfoy stumbled out of his father's study, anyone who saw him would
have known immediately that something life-altering and horrible had happened
to him. Tom knew that only he would ever know the reason, because Malfoy was
certainly not stupid enough to mention their conversation to anyone else,
especially not his wife. And especially not Draco himself.
===============================================================================
As was common for him nowadays, Tom's good mood didn't last very long at all.
Almost as soon as he was left alone to his own thoughts, the weight of his
failure and his to-do list pressed in around him as if he were on the bottom of
the ocean. The Horcrux's excited pulses of energy at sensing his general
elation brought his mind almost immediately back to the matter that had been at
the forefront of his mind over the past week: He couldn't keep putting off his
plans and experiments until he had another Horcrux.
His attachment to the ring Horcrux, as ill-advised as it had always been, was
now something he absolutely could not afford. The cup was beyond his reach, and
as yet he'd had no luck trying to track down further Horcruxes.
Removing the ring from his finger felt almost as if he were removing his arm
from his body, but he gritted his teeth and did it anyway. Perhaps he stared at
it for too long without acting, but there was no one there to judge him for it
except for the portrait of Sirius Black, which was leaning around the ring Tom
had placed on top of it in order to continue screaming up at him.
With a sudden movement born of the thought that he had to either give up the
idea completely or just do it, Tom pointed his wand at one of his desk drawers
and began moving it in a complicated pattern as he hissed the password. From
inside the drawer he pulled out a lockbox that had been warded as impenetrably
as he knew how to make it, and from there (after several minutes of delicate
wand work and chants in Parseltongue) he carefully levitated out a clear vial
no bigger than his pinky.
He refused to physically touch it. He was uncomfortable enough just touching it
with his magic.
Hell, he was uncomfortable enough just being in the same room with it. He could
sense its presence, in the same way he might sense someone looking at him
except that it was a much stronger, more tangible feeling of danger.
With a lead heart, he carefully manipulated the vial until a single drop was
teetering on the edge of the rim. He watched it grow until finally it dripped
off the vial, and although he wanted desperately to stop it even in that split
second it was in midair, a single drop of basilisk venom landed next to the
ring, just shy of actually touching it.
He could feel the Horcrux going absolutely insane, but otherwise nothing
happened.
A series of spells later had the venom removed completely from the desk and the
vial resealed in its lockbox inside the desk. Then Tom picked up the riotous
Horcrux and placed it back on his finger, allowing himself to be swept into the
Horcrux's mindscape.
He had barely had time to reorient himself before he was engulfed by frigid
arms and found himself face to face with the wide, terrified eyes of the other
Tom.
"What happened?" demanded the Horcrux, either not bothering to or unable to
mask the fear in his voice.
Tom had been more than reasonably certain that the Horcrux had no idea what was
actually going on in the real world beyond some vague impressions of Tom's
strong emotions when they were in close proximity, but if he'd ever had any
lingering doubts they were swept away by this. There was no way that the
Horcrux could have faked such a reaction, much less that he could have hidden
his anger if he'd had any idea that Tom himself had been the one to put him in
danger.
"There was an attack," he said, filling his voice with all the stress he'd
actually felt, even if the words were a lie. "Basilisk venom…"
He trailed off by design and wrapped his arms around the Horcrux in return,
allowing his body to shudder as if at the memory. The Horcrux moaned as if it
were in distress and squeezed him tighter, crushing them together in a kind of
embrace that Tom had never experienced before. It was odd, being held and
holding someone for purposes other than domination or pure sexual
gratification. It was stranger still given the fact that the Horcrux had not
touched him since their first encounter, but he accepted it with all the grace
he could.
After a while, the Horcrux spoke into his ear, voice barely above a whisper. "I
didn't know what was happening, but I felt like I was going to die. There was
this feeling of foreboding, and then suddenly there was this… terror. All I
could do was scream and struggle. And then it was gone, and I was myself again,
here in this graveyard. I've never—the feelings—I don't—"
"I know."
And he did. It was the same thing he had felt when Potter had come within
inches of plunging a basilisk fang into his diary. He had never felt any
emotion that strongly before, and he had never felt anything close since.
Overwhelming seemed a bit too underwhelming a word to adequately describe the
experience.
He'd needed to know whether his feelings were entirely the result of watching
Potter and knowing what would happen, or if it was also at least partially the
result of the connection and sensory awareness of a Horcrux that he had known
existed since he'd been interacting with the ring. He'd needed to know whether
a Horcrux's sensory perception extended in that way to its surroundings.
Now that he had verified all of those things, he could leave the Horcrux's mind
and run the test again on the diary, just to be absolutely, one hundred percent
sure that it was no longer in any way connected to him. If it was still
connected to him, he was sure that he would experience the same thing he had
felt in the Chamber before his body had fully formed, the same thing that the
other Tom had just experienced. If it was no longer connected to him then he
was sure that he would feel no more discomfort than what he'd felt handling
basilisk venom in general.
He had devised plenty of other tests, but none of them could provide him with
absolute certainty. And he needed absolute certainty on this issue.
At the moment, though, he was more concerned with the way that the other Tom's
lips kept brushing against his ear and then his jaw. He had thought it was
accidental at first, but at a certain point he had to accept that it was not.
That point came sometime between a brush against his jaw and the lightest touch
of lips against lips. He wasn't sure exactly what his first reaction was, as
all of his possible reactions seemed to come to mind all at once. It was only
after he realized that he was more put off by the Horcrux's lack of body heat
than by the kissing itself that his mind settled on opportunism.
Tom had known since the first time he'd found himself in the Horcrux's mind,
even before the first time it had asked to be invited into his own mind, that
it was looking for a way to take over. That it either wanted to force him to
reveal the exact details of how he had created his body so that it could
replicate it, or, if that avenue failed, to take over his body as its own.
It was exactly what he would have done in the Horcrux's position, and in fact
it was little better than what he had done to Ginny Weasley.
If this was how the Horcrux wanted to play the game of trust and manipulation
between them, then Tom would play along, as unconventional and unexpected as it
was. He would even let himself enjoy it; after all, what was it if not the
ultimate form of self-pleasure? If this form of self-pleasure came wrapped in a
game that, if he lost, would result in him losing control of his own body and
soul, then that just made it more exciting.
When the Horcrux brought their lips together again, he pressed back to deepen
the kiss.
Chapter End Notes
     Tom has so many balls in the air that it isn't the easiest task for
     me to juggle them (especially not within the general world limit I've
     given myself for chapters in this story), but I think I've got it
     worked out in this chapter. Please comment if you have any thoughts,
     and thank you again to those who reviewed the last chapter!
***** Feet and Inches *****
Chapter Summary
     Tom's plans move forward with varying degrees of success.
Chapter Notes
     There is a slightly tamer version on FFN.
See the end of the chapter for more notes
It was fascinating that Tom's entire world had fit inside an eight by five inch
space. It had seemed much larger to him, of course, since he'd had the rein of
his own mind. Still, the fact that he had existed in such a small object was
endlessly amazing to him.
The diary wasn't even an inch thick. How had it held him? How had he fit inside
it?
If he were the kind of person who had… feelings… then it would undoubtedly also
be endlessly uncomfortable or terrifying to think of it. As it was, he was
simply fascinated. He couldn't wrap his mind around it, which was really saying
something.
Tom ran his fingers over the cover. He'd thought it was so high quality when
he'd bought it, but that had just been the ignorance of an orphan who'd had
secondhand clothes and whatever supplies he'd been able to scrounge up. Since
living in Malfoy Manor he'd been surrounded by only the best. The leather
covering the diary was rough against his fingertips; the smooth leather of the
blotter on Abraxas's desk was probably ten times better quality and a hundred
times more expensive than anything Tom had ever owned.
The pages were still pristinely white despite everything the diary had been
through, until Tom meticulously wrote the date in the top corner of the first
page. He understood from Ginny's descriptions, when they'd first met, that
whatever she had written had sunk into the diary, and whatever he'd replied had
appeared in its place.
The ink stained the paper, 5 August 1993in his spidery script.
It neither disappeared from the page nor appeared in his consciousness like
Ginny's words had. Tom leaned back in his chair and stared at the ink as if it
would reveal all the answers he wanted.
Of course it didn't, and neither did the tiny sliver he ripped off the corner
of the page. He didn't feel any of it.
Still, he felt his chest tighten in anticipation when he carefully tipped the
small vial of basilisk venom over the diary. It had taken him days to get up
the courage to finally do this, but it turned out that watching the drop fall
had no great effect on him. There was no great increase in heartrate or
perspiration or heavy breathing like he'd experienced the last time the venom
had been about to come into contact with his diary. When he finally upended the
entire contents of the vial onto the pages, he felt nothing as the paper began
to wilt under the venom's corrosive powers.
Tom had thought he'd feel elation, or at least contentment, or something, when
he was finally able to say conclusively that he was himself, by himself. The
reality was far less dramatic. He felt, as usual, next to nothing.
===============================================================================
The trouble with holding the master of the manor captive was that his house-
elves ultimately obeyed him. Tom had found it necessary to keep Abraxas knocked
out in a magical coma to stop him from simply having his house-elves free him,
which was extremely inconvenient when Tom wanted to question him about all
sorts of things. The trouble with house-elves was that no one seemed to know
enough about them for Tom to even begin to construct a magical barrier that
would keep them out of a certain area no matter whether their master called
them there.
Tom found it exceedingly distasteful to have to experiment on house-elves. Not
because of any humane considerations, of course, but rather because they were
annoying, foul little creatures that were better kept in the background away
from wizards. By the third day of his series of experiments, his mood was
really beginning to deteriorate.
Draco didn't seem to mind being around the servants nearly as much, and he also
seemed to be developing a reckless sort of immunity to Tom's moods.
As the house-elf they were using that afternoon Apparated through Tom's magical
barrier with seemingly more ease than ever before, Tom cursed aloud and
followed it up with a magical curse for good measure.
Draco halfheartedly kicked the squealing, flailing creature further away from
himself and diligently recorded the results in the ever-expanding ledger they'd
procured for that purpose.
Tom pinched the bridge of his nose. "Let's add species-dependent barriers to
the list of noes. I think we've exhausted all of the possibilities for it."
"We have," Draco confirmed after flipping back through his notes for a few
seconds.
"All right, I'm finished with this today," admitted Tom, although his voice
didn't betray the depth of his annoyance.
Draco nodded and scribbled a few more notes before snapping the ledger closed.
Tom knew that he would have an updated report of all the combinations they'd
tried on his desk by lunch the next day. (It was, he had to admit, much easier
to conduct experiments when he had an assistant.)
"Er… My Lord…" began Draco before Tom could turn to leave the room. "I was
wondering if I might… ask you something."
Tom turned back around to face him, one elegant eyebrow raised in inquiry.
Draco swallowed nervously. "It's just that I've been wondering about something
I heard, you know, that day… about Tom Riddle."
If he'd been in the habit of external signs of his thoughts, Tom would have
huffed in frustration. He shouldn't have been surprised, of course, that Draco
had remembered his grandfather mentioning that name, or that he'd finally
mustered up enough courage to ask about it. That didn't mean he couldn't be
annoyed, however.
"That is my given name," he finally decided on confirming. There was no point
in trying to hide it, since there was absolutely nothing he could do to stop
the curious boy from looking him up in the Hogwarts library. If the Granger
girl had found a picture of him, then Draco would undoubtedly accomplish the
same. "Lord Voldemort is my chosen name."
Draco looked unsurprised, but he still bit his lower lip nervously, so Tom knew
that he was not yet satisfied. In short order, he ventured, "But Riddle isn't…
I mean, it isn't…"
"A wizarding name?" supplied Tom. "Yes, I am aware. Why do you suppose I chose
to give up my name for another?"
Draco gaped at him, opening and closing his lips several times as if he meant
to say something and then changed his mind.
Tom offered a weak smile and saved him the trouble of vocalizing his thoughts.
"You're wondering why I think pure blood is so important, and why pure-bloods
have been so eager to follow me if I am not pure myself. I have come to learn
that purity of blood does not have anything to do with magical power, but it
does have quite a lot to do with how connected to one's magic someone is. And
obviously Mudbloods pollute the wizarding world with their pointless Muggle
ideas, like the worst kind of poison eroding away our traditions and values
and, most importantly, knowledge."
He stepped further into the room, nearer to Draco, who stared at him with wide
gray eyes.
"Pure-bloods have followed me either because they do not know or, if they do
know, they recognize my power as greater than theirs…. So much greater than
theirs that it would be foolhardy to cross me, Draco. Do you understand?"
"Yes," he squeaked, then he cleared his throat and tried again. "I mean, yes,
My Lord."
Tom smiled more genuinely now. "That's good, Draco. Very good. I trust that you
do not have any more questions about this?"
"No, My Lord."
"And I will never hear that name from your lips again?"
"Of course, My Lord!"
"Undoubtedly you will look me up as soon as you step foot back in Hogwarts,"
Tom mused. "Perhaps I will answer your questions then, so long as you abide by
our understanding."
The conversation now clearly over, Draco hopped down from the lab table he'd
been perched on and followed Tom out of the large laboratory they'd claimed as
their own.
Lucius was waiting for Tom outside of Abraxas's study. When he saw them coming
down the corridor together, his pale face took on the same pained look as it
normally did when he saw his son anywhere near Tom. Draco chirped a greeting to
his father but didn't break his stride towards the library, and Tom shot an
amused look at Lucius behind his son's back before gesturing for him to enter
the study.
He wondered if watching Lucius watch him sit at Abraxas's desk would ever cease
to amuse him. He hoped not.
"My Lord, I do not wish to raise your hopes unnecessarily," began Lucius, "but
there may be an opportunity to find Potter." Tom, who had always found it
beyond infuriating that Dumbledore had hidden Potter so well, perked up and
waved his hand for more. "The Accidental Magical Reversal Squad was deployed to
Potter's house last night—he blew up his aunt and then ran away, apparently—and
Fudge tracked him down to the Leaky Cauldron this morning."
"He's at the Leaky Cauldron?"
Tom was ready to leap from his chair immediately, although what exactly he'd do
was as yet beyond him, but Malfoy's apologetic look stopped him.
"Not anymore, My Lord. Arthur Weasley's department is always aware of these
incidents; they have to quickly determine the nature of the magical event and
coordinate which department handles it, of course. The Order spirited Potter
away before I had time to even get there."
Tom levelled a cold glare at Malfoy.
"I know, My Lord, but at least Potter is away from his usual summer home. We
have no way of finding that, but at least we have a chance of figuring out
where the Order has holed him up now."
"Oh good," replied Tom. "I'll just deploy my army to search every known
member's house. We should hear back in a couple of days."
Malfoy looked torn between fear and exasperation. When he spoke, his words were
obviously measured so as to get his point across with the least likelihood of
being flayed alive. "I know that the situation is not entirely helpful, My
Lord, and I did consider waiting until after I had a chance to get any
additional information before I informed you. However, I thought you would want
to know as soon as possible, before I risked my position to get information
that you might not even want to use. I do not know your plans for Potter in
order to coordinate my own responses accordingly."
Indeed, although a large part of Tom wanted to kill Potter at the first
opportunity and hex Malfoy for good measure, the rational part was quick to
remind him of all the downfalls. Sending Malfoy to get information on Potter's
whereabouts was likely to make people suspicious of the man, even people who
hadn't been suspicious up to this point (notably, Fudge himself). Even if he
were successful, killing Potter would cause its own problems. It would
immediately put the rest of the wizarding world on high alert, for one thing,
even if many of them were not willing to admit that Lord Voldemort had
returned. And Tom was having such fun tearing down the Ministry's and the
populace's confidence in Dumbledore and Potter, specifically by actually
driving Potter as mad as he sounded….
"I was thinking, though, that if Black were to hear that Potter is on the
move…" Malfoy's voice broke through the silence.
Tom curled his tongue up against the roof of his mouth for a moment as he
tapped the tip of Potter's wand against his desk. Neither Mulciber nor Malfoy
(even with the help of his wife) had been able to gain any more useful
information about their escaped fugitive, and when Tom weighed the pros and
cons of Black being at large he found himself uncomfortable with the possible
consequences.
"Your thoughts have merit," he finally allowed. "I will rely on you to make
sure that this information is front-page news. If Black makes a mistake, either
we will get to him first, or he will be arrested and the Ministry will be able
to determine conclusively that he acted alone."
Lucius looked relieved for the first time since he'd seen his son and Tom
together. "Yes, My Lord. Either way we will come out ahead."
Tom's lips twitched in amusement, even though he was not unaware of the
difficult position Malfoy was in. The man had no choice but to ingratiate
himself to Tom, but because of the brand on his arm he would never be able to
give Tom his full loyalty, even if that were what he wanted. Unfortunately for
Malfoy, Tom knew that.
It was exceedingly amusing, but as Tom watched the back of Malfoy's blond head
disappear out his office door, it occurred to him that it was also exceedingly
inspiring when he considered how to handle his own followers, currently a party
of one.
===============================================================================
It turned out that the Granger girl was actually quite good at the task he'd
given her. With the exception of the biased tone he could detect when she
disagreed with something, her work was nearly professional quality. She had yet
to work on anything severely above the level of a normal third year, though, so
he was eager to review her work on the more difficult texts he'd brought with
him on his trip. It was the second round of testing he planned to perform, and
if she succeeded he would begin to give her books he had not yet actually read
for himself (with, of course, a book or two he had actually read randomly
delivered for continued quality assurance purposes).
He thought that her constant stares and lip biting were because she was
expecting some sort of verbal indication that he thought she'd done a good job,
but when she finally spoke it turned out to be on the subject they'd discussed
during his last visit.
"I've been thinking about the first exception to Gamp's Law," she began
hesitantly. When he looked at her impassively but offered no objection to the
topic, she cleared her throat and started again. "I thought that it has to be
impossible that no one has ever tested the theory, especially after that book
was published, but of course I don't have access to a library or any book shops
so I had to think theoretically about why the tests would have failed instead
of just looking it up. My thoughts are only general, of course, because I
couldn't look up any of the specifics, and I might be incorrect, of course,
because I can't verify anything…."
She trailed off and looked at Tom expectantly, but he offered her no
reassurance. She cleared her throat again.
"It's just that from what I understand about chemistry—You're right, of course,
that magical children are horribly deficient in basic knowledge like that. I
cannot believe that it has never occurred to me before to miss all of the
things I would have learned had I continued in the Muggle education system!
Science and mathematics and even history are so important that—!"
At Tom's raised eyebrows, she stopped speaking abruptly and a flush rose up on
her cheeks, a marked contrast to her too-white complexion. She had only just
begun to regain color in the weeks she'd been exposed to sunlight through the
magically barred windows.
"Right, well, that is to say… From the limited knowledge of chemistry at my
disposal, I think it must be impossible to recreate the exact chemical makeup
of a food. It's so complex that I don't think it would be possible for someone
to think about all of the factors that go into it, such as how two molecules
can be structurally almost identical yet be so different. We can duplicate food
we already have, or maybe we could modify food if we knew exactly what we were
doing, but I don't think that we could possibly take into account all of the
factors in transforming some non-food item into good, nutritious food."
Although she had presented her case in a strong voice, she looked at him
nervously now, clearly frightened at his reaction to being told that he was
wrong. To her obvious surprise, Tom allowed himself a small smile.
"Good, Granger. I am pleased."
"You're—you…" she spluttered. "You're pleased?"
Tom leaned back regally in his chair. "Yes. I only wanted you to think for
yourself instead of spouting off a list of citations. It seems that not being
able to look up answers in a book has done you a world of good."
If Hermione Granger had hated him before, he was sure from the expression on
her face that she hated him doubly as much now.
"You mean that you knew what you were saying was wrong, but you—you argued it
anyway?"
"I was playing devil's advocate, yes." He grinned at his own choice of words,
this time genuinely. "It is terribly appropriate that I would be the devil's
advocate, is it not?"
If she saw any humor in it at all, it was not apparent from her reaction. "I
can't believe that I spent days agonizing over what you said when I was right
all along!"
Tom leaned forward suddenly, and she abruptly stopped talking. He regarded her
through narrowed eyes, finally saying, "I challenged you because you were
utterly incapable of explaining why or how or anything else remotely useful.
There is a difference between knowing an answer—understandingit—and simply
repeating what other people have said verbatim without being able to explain
why. As I told you before, I have absolutely no use for you if all you can do
is the latter."
Her brown eyes were wide and her face still flushed with embarrassment and fear
when she ventured, in a small voice, "So you were telling the truth about
making money? They are wrong about that, even though they aren't wrong about
food?"
"Yes, very good, Granger," he said mockingly. "You have learned today that
sometimes what other people say is right and sometimes it is wrong, and the
only way to tell the difference is to think for yourself."
She swallowed convulsively and asked, "Will you… explain it to me?"
It was clearly difficult for her to ask that of him, and internally Tom cheered
at his success in pushing her to this point, as he had planned. She might end
up being a useful asset in the end after all, or perhaps he would still end up
determining that she was useless beyond the fact that her disappearance hurt
Potter. Only time would tell. But at least now the door had been cracked open
and she had a chance to push it open further and maybe to one day walk through
it, to come to his side willingly.
Outwardly he allowed himself to deflate all at once, as if the anger he had
been projecting had suddenly left him. He ran a hand through his thick hair,
messing it up as if he had forgotten himself, and she noticeably relaxed.
"How about you tell me, Granger?" he asked, allowing his voice to lose its
normally hard edge. "What is it about these particular lumps of metal that
makes wizards unable to create them, and how might one get around that
limitation?"
When he left the cabin this time, the Mudblood was staring after him with a
look born of determined curiosity. As soon as his face was hidden from view,
Tom allowed himself a smirk.
===============================================================================
"Why do you want to find the others?" the Horcrux finally asked one day as he
was nibbling down the side of Tom's neck.
Tom had been thinking about his answer since before he'd asked about the others
the first time, and especially since they'd started their physical
relationship. He had been waiting for days for the Horcrux to finally ask the
question, to open the door to that discussion.
He massaged his fingers against the Horcrux's scalp and pulled him harder
against his neck. "It's an insurance policy for when he—Voldemort—finds out
about me."
The Horcrux released the suction on his skin with a smack and pulled back to
stare at his face, eyes roaming over his features as if he might be able to
discern all of the answers just from looking.
"You know he won't be happy that I have a body," clarified Tom. He tugged on
the Horcrux's head to pull him back down, but at the resistance he sighed and
let himself fall back against the grass with an irritable glare. "Fine," he
said on another sigh. "He'll probably think destroying me is a better idea than
allowing me to have a body, but if I have his other Horcruxes under my control
or hidden where he can't find them then he won't think I'm expendable."
Of course he hadn't told the Horcrux about Voldemort's demise or about all of
the research he had planned for his fellow Horcruxes, and he didn't plan on it
either. He thought that he was more likely to get cooperation using only the
self-preservation story.
The Horcrux stared at him through narrowed eyes as Tom busied himself running
his hands over his partner's arms and shoulders as if he were too nervous to
lie still.
"So you plan to, what, hide me away in another dark hole somewhere?"
"That would probably be safer for you," he said hesitantly, his fingers digging
hard into the Horcrux's shoulders, "but I have grown rather… attached to you. I
was thinking you might want to risk staying on my finger, even though Voldemort
might be so angry that he fries us both."
They stared hard at one another for several long seconds, until Tom craned his
neck up to press a kiss to the Horcrux's jaw, which was the furthest he could
reach in this position. Then he found himself aggressively pressed into the
ground as their mouths mashed together, and the Horcrux tugged insistently at
the soft flannel pajama bottoms he was wearing.
Tom had always known where his game with the Horcrux would inevitably lead him.
Their kisses had grown bolder every time he'd entered the graveyard, and he had
come to look forward to the Horcrux's cold hands against his skin. He had
steeled his mind for more, carefully thinking through what he would have to do
and preparing himself to act.
He just hadn't expected it to come so quickly.
Still, his hands were steady as they undressed one another, and in response to
the Horcrux's silent challenge, Tom smiled and leaned in to suck hard on a
patch of skin on the underside of his jaw. Then he allowed his hand to be
guided lower and his fingers to be wrapped around the Horcrux's erection. It
was odd; Tom had hardly ever done this, as he usually wasn't concerned with his
partners' sexual gratification and wanted to skip right to the fun parts—fun
for himself, that is. However, in this case he was not ready to go that far, as
he would undoubtedly have to allow himself to be the submissive partner, so he
threw himself into making the experience as good for the Horcrux as he was
able.
A few moments later, a cold hand closed around his own warm member, and that
made it almost all worth it.
The Horcrux's cold breath brushed his skin when he moaned, and Tom fisted his
hand through his partner's hair until he forced their mouths together in a
violent clash of lips and tongues and teeth. Then it was all hot hands against
cold skin, and cold hands against hot skin, and their hot and cold breath
mingling whenever they groaned or whispered filthy words to one another.
It was the singularly most intimate experience Tom had ever had, which he found
unaccountably hilarious since they hadn't gone further than tugging each other
off.
The Horcrux’s fingers had warmed up enough now that Tom was left with only the
feeling of slick fingers and a broad palm along his shaft. He let out an
involuntary grunt and pressed his hips further up towards his partner after the
Horcrux rather roughly ran his thumbnail along the slit, gathering up the fluid
there and using it to further lubricate his movements.
He was pushed firmly back down into the ground, for which he retaliated by
mimicking the same movements on the cock in his hand. For good measure, he
reached up with his free hand and pinched one of the Horcrux’s nipples. That
earned him a breathless sort of half-chuckle against his mouth before his
counterpart nipped harshly at his lower lip.
It seemed to be over too soon. Tom had only just begun to really appreciate the
feel of soft skin on the Horcrux’s hard shaft, and to feel brave enough to
begin experimenting with different grips and movements, when suddenly he
realized that he was on the verge of finishing.
When they had finally sated themselves, Tom's hot cum cooling against their
stomachs and the Horcrux's cold cum warming, they lay motionless on their
father's grave. The Horcrux was lying atop him, Tom's legs parted to
accommodate him with the weight, heavier than expected, pressing him into the
soft grass. The Horcrux was undoubtedly setting the tone of their encounters,
making his point very clear that he was the dominant partner between them. Tom
found that he didn't mind quite as much as he had at the beginning. Nor did he
particularly care anymore that, now that he wasn't moaning or whispering
against Tom's skin, the Horcrux had stopped going through the motions of
breathing and felt almost like a corpse above him.
"Do you swear it?" the Horcrux eventually broke the silence. At Tom's hum of
inquiry, he clarified, "That you only want the other Horcruxes so you can hide
them. That you'll keep me with you."
"I swear," replied Tom, without any outward hesitation at all even though he
had an internal aversion to swearing anything.
The Horcrux laid his head against Tom's shoulder and pressed his nose against
the soft skin of Tom's throat.
"Before I was created, I had been thinking about the cave."
There was no need for him to elaborate on exactly which cave. And really, Tom
felt like sort of an idiot that it had never occurred to him before—or as much
as it was possible for him to feel that way about himself, which wasn't really
much.
"I had not actually solidified any plans or put anything there," cautioned the
Horcrux, "but it's the best I can do for you."
Tom turned his head to kiss the Horcrux, but, finding that he couldn't reach,
he settled for nuzzling his cheek against the Horcrux's hair instead. "Thank
you."
The Horcrux let out an exhalation of cold breath against Tom's neck and then
pulled back.
"Where are you going?" asked Tom.
"I thought you'd want to go off Horcrux hunting," answered his counterpart.
Tom knew that there was undoubtedly an opportunity here to garner even more
trust in the Horcrux's eyes. If not trust of him personally, then at least
trust in the idea that he highly prioritized his relationship with the Horcrux.
As much as he wanted to rush off to the cave immediately, he wanted even more
to milk this relationship for all it was worth. Accordingly, he reached up to
wrap his hand around the back of the Horcrux's head, running his fingers
through the soft hairs at the base of his neck.
"Of course I do, but it can wait a while longer," he said truthfully, pulling
the Horcrux down for a quick kiss. "At the moment I want this even more."
===============================================================================
Later, Tom grinned maniacally up at dark green canopy of his bed at Malfoy
Manor. He felt loose and satisfied due to his pleasant exertions with the
Horcrux, although his lips and skin were as pristine as ever, without any hint
of bruising or swelling. His body felt like he would after any normal wet
dream, even though mentally he had the benefit of his memories as if they had
happened in the real, physical world.
It seemed that the consequences of his actions with the Horcrux would be
limited to his memories and whatever pertinent information he was able to
gather. Including, at this very moment, the very likely location of another
Horcrux.
Chapter End Notes
     Thank you again to everyone who reviewed; I think I managed to reply
     to everybody personally. Please everyone do let me know what you
     think!
***** Victory and Defeat *****
Chapter Summary
     Tom experiences the highs and lows of being Lord Voldemort.
Chapter Notes
     There is violence, including blood play and rape, in this chapter.
See the end of the chapter for more notes
As far as hiding places went, Tom had to admit that, all other things being
equal, the cave wasn’t a half bad one. It was on the coast a good half mile
away from the nearest strip of accessible beach, and one had to clamber over
sharp, slippery rocks, some of them as tall as a man, to access the narrow
opening in the sheer rock face. He’d had to use a weak, self-invented
compulsion spell and various other forms of magic to take the boy and girl he’d
led there during childhood—he couldn’t quite seem to grasp their names from the
edges of his memories—from the narrow beach to the cave.
However, all things were not equal. Albus Mudblood-fucking Dumbledore was aware
of his unfortunate beginnings at Wool’s Orphanage, and there was absolutely no
guarantee that he hadn’t found out about even this place, especially if he’d
gone digging for information after finding out about Tom’s diary.
It seemed that Voldemort had been thinking even less clearly when he’d hidden a
Horcrux here than he had been when he’d hidden one in the shack in Little
Hangleton, if the complete absence of any discernable Parseltongue spells was
anything to go by. Tom could easily detect the presence of his own magic
(especially easily now thanks to his prolonged exposure to the ring Horcrux)
along one rough stone wall along the back of the entrance chamber, and a very
brief examination revealed that it was a relatively simple curse calling for a
blood sacrifice.
Honestly, blood magic was all well and good, but why not pair it with the need
for a Parseltongue password?
Tom was even less impressed by the submerged boat and the lake full of Inferi.
If this were all that Voldemort had managed for the protection of a piece of
his soul, then Tom hoped that this was one of the last ones he’d hidden, lest
all the others turn out to be all but unprotected. An army of Inferi was a nice
touch, he had to admit, but surely any wizard who’d completed his OWLs knew
that all one needed to hold them off long enough to escape was a bit of fire?
He did have to hand it to his other self that the potion, held in an un-
spillable basin and doled out by an un-spillable shell, was a rather ingenious
piece of work. The first sip was terribly unpleasant, burning down his
esophagus and into his stomach and churning there for a few horrifying moments
as if it might actually take hold. Then, presumably because the potion was only
intended to work on living creatures with actual bodies made out of something
other than Dark magic and the essence of a pitiful little girl, it dissipated
almost as soon as it had begun. Tom would have forced Abraxas or Lucius to come
drink the rest of it had his experimental sip gone wrong, but he decided that
he would rather endure the brief flashes of discomfort himself than bring
either one of the Malfoys along to witness the cave.
All of the various defensive measures felt rather more like a fantastical
production than real protection, and Tom concluded that Voldemort’s good sense
must have long since been taken over by his flair for the dramatic.
Tom knew that something was terribly wrong when he picked up the locket for the
first time. It didn’t call to him like the ring had from the moment he’d
stepped inside the Gaunt shack, and when he finally touched it there was
absolutely no spark of magic at all.
It seemed… like a completely normal locket.
He was tempted to give it a good shake and hold it up to his ear to see if he
could hear anything inside, but instead he fumbled with the mechanism that made
even his long, elegant fingers seem clumsy. It briefly crossed his mind as he
finally managed to wedge one thumbnail between the two sides of the locket that
perhaps he might find himself cursed like he had with the ring, but by then
he’d pried it open.
===============================================================================
The very foundations of Malfoy Manor seemed to shake with his fury when he
landed in the front drawing room. His body, made of his magic as it was, seemed
to act as a conduit for his rage in the same way his wand would surely spark if
he were to hold it in his hand just then. He watched with satisfaction as the
rug and sofa nearest him smoldered from the contact with his magic.
When a house-elf offered to take his cloak, he spun around and chucked the
useless locket at the poor creature, as if he were still a sixteen-year-old boy
in mind as well as appearance. The fit of childish pique made him feel better
for a few seconds.
He needed something stronger, much stronger.
His first instinct was to track down Malfoy and demand information, but in the
deepest recesses of his mind where he still had some semblance of sense, he
acknowledged that he would probably end up killing the man. His imagination was
running rampant with panicked screams and tangled limbs and Malfoy’s long pale
hair spattered with blood. No doubt Tom would find a dead Malfoy very
inconvenient after he’d regained control of himself.
Fortunately, he did have a pet Muggle whose only purpose in life was to fulfill
Tom’s needs.
The boy had become somewhat resigned to his fate of late and had taken to
submitting peacefully, even if Tom could see silent tears tracking down his
once-tan face and could read in his mind that he wanted to fight back. This
time, however, when he caught sight of Tom he reared backwards as if to avoid
being caught and threw his arm out as if to fend off Tom’s hand. Tom could see
himself through the Muggle’s mind: wild, blood-red eyes glowing out of a paper-
white face with a monstrous expression, the malevolent shadow of magic
surrounding his body moving to fill up the entire small room.
The Muggle’s terror provoked his anger even further. It made him want to
destroy the boy. It made him hard.
He struck like a snake, darting around the Muggle’s defenses and wrapping his
fingers in long, tangled hair. He used it to yank the boy up, reveling in the
resulting yelp of pain and fear, and dragged his prisoner to the bed. The
expanse of pale, smooth skin on offer offended Tom on some primal level he
couldn’t immediately identify. He always took great care to heal the boy of
whatever wounds he inflicted, as he had always enjoyed keeping his toys in
pristine condition. No doubt it was some remnant from his years in the
orphanage, when he’d only possessed a few small, stolen treasures and had no
easy way of getting anything new. Now, though, he wanted to break something
apart.
The first cut started at the Muggle’s shoulder and went diagonally down his
back and across one pert ass cheek until it curved around the side of his hip.
Tom couldn’t have said what spell he’d used, or if he’d even used one at all.
It didn’t matter; the next cut crisscrossed in the opposite direction just as
smoothly, and the one after that sliced through skin and muscle like a hot
knife through butter.
The boy choked on a scream and twisted his fingers into the sheets on either
side of his head. “Please, Master…”
It was a mistake. The sound of his pleas, of his weakness, disgusted Tom and
only fueled the flames of his fury. He felt like his entire body was burning,
and he thought that surely if his body were made of flesh and bone then this
wild, uncontrolled magic would have consumed him by now. Normally being so out
of control of himself would be a bit worrying to him, but in his present state
of mind all he could think about was the blood that flowed from the Muggle’s
back onto the once pristine sheets.
He breathed in deeply, taking in the scent of sweat and fear and blood, and as
he exhaled he cut another deep line across the soft canvass laid out before
him.
Then again. And again. Until he felt some semblance of his control return.
The Muggle was screaming continuously now, not just each time he was cut, but
his struggles were in vain. The wiggling and bucking only served to make Tom’s
slashes less precise, until on one vicious down stroke blood splattered across
his face and into his mouth. Tom swallowed and paused mid-strike, running his
tongue across his lips to gather the coppery fluid that had landed there. It
tasted like life and death together, and he wondered suddenly if he’d be able
to taste magic in a wizard’s blood. It was all supposed to be about the blood,
wasn’t it?
It was really quite amusing how such thoughts came to him at the strangest
times. He grinned to himself, a bit more of the blood dripping down his face
and into his mouth at the movement, and crawled forward onto the bed until his
hips were pressing against the Muggle’s backside.
The Muggle usually spread his legs haphazardly to accommodate his master, which
was something of an automatic response that had been beaten into him after so
many long weeks under Tom’s attention, but this time he didn’t move. Tom
frowned and brought his palm down harshly across the deepest of the gashes on
the Muggle’s back. The vicious crack of skin against skin rang clearly across
the silent room and the boy’s body jerked once with the impact, but there was
no further reaction.
Tom frowned even deeper and prodded the Muggle again, absentmindedly flicking
his tongue out to catch a drop of blood he could feel tickling his skin as it
ran down the side of his nose. He finally got a reaction. It was only a slight
moan, but it was sufficient to convince Tom that his toy wasn’t going to expire
at any given moment.
He forcefully spread his toy’s legs and dragged the prone body back towards
him. His hands slipped against the blood-slicked skin, but it only excited Tom
even more. He dipped his fingers into the blood and dragged it along the
Muggle’s back and down between the generous globes of his ass. The boy was well
used by now and his body relatively pliant, but it was apparently still painful
with only blood for lubrication. When Tom forced two of his fingers inside, the
Muggle actually moaned and flinched, although he did not have enough energy to
try to move away.
Although causing the Muggle pain was quite intoxicating, Tom had absolutely no
desire to hurt himself by using only blood for lubricant. He cast a minimal
lubrication charm on himself before roughly lining himself up. He was a bit
annoyed when the Muggle didn’t really react, so he grabbed hold of the boy’s
hips and dug his fingers hard into the deep gashes there. Only when his victim
whimpered in pain did he shove himself inside.
It was warm and wet and tight, but not nearly so satisfying as he’d hoped. His
mind was too active, his fury too great, his body too tense. He dug his fingers
deeper into the cuts and threw his head back as he snapped his hips harder and
faster. His body responded to the pleasurable sensations and to the red tangle
of pain and fear in the Muggle’s mind, but his own mind was still racing and it
did nothing for his anger.
Recognizing that it was a waste of time and that his interest was flagging, he
allowed himself to finish more quickly than usual and, with a final squeeze of
the Muggle’s tortured hips, pulled himself free.
He clambered off the bed and retrieved his wand, then set to putting himself to
rights. The long, boiling shower did little more to relieve his thoughts and
tensions than had the sex, but he forced himself to return to the Muggle’s room
to heal the worst of the damage before it was too late.
The boy was in the exact same position Tom had left him in. Tom dug his fingers
into the Muggle’s shoulder and flipped him over, uncaring of the way it made
the cuts on his back split even further open. Tom knew—Of course he
knew!—before he saw, but there was confirmation in the cold, unseeing eyes and
the permanent grimace plastered across the pale face. His toy had gone and died
on him.
It was most inconvenient. And without his permission, too!
Tom scowled and roughly shoved the body back down on the red-stained sheets.
His body was still humming with magic, but his disappointment at this turn of
events seemed to have disrupted the head of steam he’d been building up. His
wand hand twitched and a storm of sparks shot out of the end, but he didn’t
have enough motivation anymore to go out and seek havoc to wreak.
His fury was a fleeting thing, as were all of his feelings, and once it
abandoned him he was left as empty as always.
Tom Riddle never forgot, and he never forgave, but once the cloud of emotion
cleared from his mind he was able to put his grudges and his resentments to
good use. Productive use. As he stared in the mirror at his eyes, which had
returned to their normal deep brown, he acknowledged that the truth was that
his cold, unfeeling calculations were ten times more dangerous than his blind,
emotional rages.
Then he smiled at the thought that victims of his anger, such as his dearly
departed pet, would probably disagree with own self-assessment.
===============================================================================
                                        
Tom was as in control of himself as he’d ever been by the next day, but by then
his exploits had become known to everybody in the manor. Breakfast was an
exceedingly uncomfortable affair for the Malfoys, although Tom enjoyed himself
quite well. Lucius had become even more stiffly formal in his presence than
usual, and Tom could see in his thoughts that he had come to think of Tom as
closer in personality and proclivities to Lord Voldemort. He could see in
Narcissa’s mind that she was rather more furious about the mess he had made in
her manor than she was actually upset about what he’d done to the Muggle, but
she was also clearly very worried about the continually growing influence Tom
had on her son.
As for Draco, almost as soon as Tom had settled into his chair, he wasted
almost no time asking, “Did you know that you scared Great-Great-Great-Aunt
Marcella so badly that Mother still can’t find her?”
Tom could feel his eyebrows rising on his forehead quite without his say-so.
“Who?”
“Well, her portrait, of course, not the actual woman,” replied Draco, waving
his hand in a dismissive way that might have provoked Tom to Cruciate him if he
hadn’t known that it was an unconscious mannerism. Tom thought that Lucius
might fall out of his chair with worry, but Draco didn’t seem to notice. “She’s
kept in the entrance hall, but she ran out of her frame last night and hasn’t
been seen since.”
Normally Tom wouldn’t hesitate to inform his little assistant that he really
didn’t care about Great-Aunt Whoever, and that he really ought to remember to
tack on a “My Lord” or two to the end of his sentences, but this morning Tom
was enjoying the elder Malfoys’ discomfort far too much. He offered a toothy
smile that he could tell, from reading their thoughts, set the elder Malfoys on
edge even as Draco grinned back at him.
“Is that so?”
“Yes,” said Draco. He twirled his fork around in his fingers absentmindedly, as
if it were his wand, and finally seemed to pluck up the courage to continue.
“You must have been really angry….”
Ah, Tom thought to himself when Draco’s thoughts finally revealed his
motivations, I have no idea how people who aren’t Legilimens can function. It
seemed that Draco was aware that something dreadful had happened the night
before, but his parents had been tightlipped about the details. He was, quite
rebelliously, hoping that Tom would fill in the details for him, and
furthermore he thought rather bitterly that perhaps his parents would see that
the Dark Lord didn’t treat him like a child.
“Draco, darling,” interjected Narcissa, unable to maintain her silence any
longer, “I am sure the Dark Lord would like to enjoy his breakfast in peace.”
Tom turned a sharp, unblinking gaze on the woman, although he addressed her
son. “Yes, I was very angry. Someone dared to defy me, to steal from me. Do you
know what happens to those who stand between Lord Voldemort and what belongs to
him, Draco?”
Narcissa’s rapidly whitening face showed that she clearly understood his double
meaning. Although Tom did not turn his gaze to her husband, he could clearly
read in the deep, sick panic in Lucius’s mind that he also understood.
Oblivious to the tension around him, Draco replied, “I imagine they’re killed,
My Lord. Like my grandfather will be.”
“Killed, yes, but punished first. Tortured.”
Narcissa Malfoy looked like she was ready to leap over the table and drag her
son to safety, if she hadn’t known that she’d be obliterated before her ass
fully left her chair. Her eyes darted over to her husband, and Tom finally
followed her gaze to see that Lucius was shooting her a quelling look, though
he looked as if he were barely maintaining his usual haughty mask. Cold clarity
settled over Tom’s mind and the pieces of several scattered plans came together
all at once as he looked at their faces and read their fears.
He allowed his smile to stretch further across his white teeth and rose
gracefully from the table. “Come, Draco. We have a lot to accomplish before you
leave for Hogwarts tomorrow.”
Draco looked longingly at the remains of his breakfast, but he dutifully left
the table and made to follow Tom out of the breakfast room. Tom was amused to
note that he didn’t even look to his parents for permission or glance back at
them as he walked towards the door. When he’d first moved into Malfoy Manor,
Draco hadn’t seemed able to do anything without his parents’—particularly his
father’s—approval. Tom pushed the door open with one hand and used his other
hand to usher Draco through as he passed by, locking eyes with Narcissa as he
pressed his hand into her son’s back. Then, with one last wicked smirk for her
benefit, he followed the youngest Malfoy out the door.
The entire episode had made him feel much better than he had even earlier that
morning. And, he thought as he eyed the blond head in front of him, he would
feel even better when his plans came to fruition.
“I thought about our calibration problem,” he began without preamble as soon as
they’d shut themselves into their laboratory. He had laid awake the entire
night and allowed his mind to mull over the complicated puzzle of house-elf
magic in order to keep his thoughts off of the stolen Horcrux. “I think I’ve
figured it out.”
They had managed to create a barrier through which house-elves couldn’t travel,
but then their tests had revealed that it didn’t work across long distances.
Even Tom had been completely confused about the mechanics behind such a thing,
and he’d had to send Lucius out for several advanced books on wards that even
Malfoy Manor’s library hadn’t held.
Draco paused as he was shifting to get comfortable perched on his usual table.
“Oh. Are you leaving, then?”
The last time they’d tested distance, Tom had Apparated several hundred miles
away, first to the cottage where he kept the Mudblood and then to a small
village in Scotland that he remembered from a visit to one of his fellow
Slytherins fifty years before.
“No. You’re leaving for Hogwarts, though.” Draco looked truly deflated at the
thought, and Tom knew that as much as he wanted to return to school, he didn’t
want to give up the education he was getting at the Dark Lord’s hands. A smirk
flitted across Tom’s mouth. “I have been considering all the things you can do
for me at the school. I am used to being in the castle myself, but I believe
that your eyes and ears might do just as well.”
That was a lie, but Draco seemed to take the praise at face value, if the way
he lit up like a Christmas tree was any indication. “What can I do, My Lord?”
There were many things Tom could do and experiments he could run using the
unique blend of wards and residual magic around Hogwarts Castle, but Draco was
not at all qualified to do them—at least not yet, although Tom did hold out
hope that he could eventually shape the potential he saw in the boy into
something he could use. In truth, the most important thing at this point was to
tie Draco to him forever so that Draco’s parents would likewise be tied to him
forever, regardless of Lucius’s existing ties to Voldemort. Whatever use he
happened to be able to get out of such a young, inexperienced follower was just
a bonus.
But he couldn’t let Draco know that, so he said, “Beyond testing our house-elf
ward, you will be able to keep an eye on Potter and Dumbledore, and, of course,
to let me know if anything else interesting happens. Right now I would not want
to give you duties that might interfere with your schoolwork, because it is
important that you develop your skills for the future.”
“Oh, yes, My Lord, I understand.” Draco was still beaming at him. “I want to be
powerful enough that I can…”
He trailed off, a flush creeping up his cheeks, but he ought not to have
bothered since Tom didn’t even need to read his thoughts to know what he was
thinking.
“Be like your father?” he supplied. “We have had this conversation before,
Draco, and I maintain that you are not like your father. You ought to focus on
fully developing your own strengths rather than poorly imitating your father’s
strengths.” Draco looked as if he would argue if anyone had said that to him
besides the Dark Lord, and his thoughts were much the same. Tom raised an
eyebrow and pinned him with a severe look, probably the most severe look he’d
given Malfoy in weeks. “Your father has failed me on numerous occasions and
only narrowly avoided the same fate as your grandfather.”
He was pushing his luck, he knew. Although Draco had slowly but surely begun to
start viewing his father as a flawed human being and not as a god, he still
held more real affection for the man in his little finger than Tom had ever
held for anybody or anything in his entire life. Therefore, before Draco could
think too long about it, Tom got to the point.
“Still, you once said to me that you want to earn your place among my
followers, and at least you have succeeded there. I want to mark you before you
leave.”
Draco’s mouth dropped open. “Wha—what?”
“As you may have noticed, I do not have a surplus of people I want to work with
at the moment. I want to reward you for your hard work and dedication.” He had
found that flattery always worked better on Draco than anything. “You will be
the first, you know, since my return.”
He still seemed to be in shock, but Draco managed to stutter, “I—I’m honored,
My Lord.”
Tom allowed a true smile to peak through his mask at Draco’s racing thoughts.
It was true that he felt honored, as well as more than a little scared, but it
was the other thoughts that made Tom laugh.
“Indeed, the Dark Mark is ugly as hell. Fortunately for you, I have created a
new Mark, one far less likely to immediately identify you as my follower should
someone see it.”
Of course there was another, far more immediately practical reason he had
developed his own mark: He couldn’t replicate the Dark Mark, which was tied to
Voldemort’s magic, and anyway he wanted his followers to be tied to him, not to
his other self. But it was also true that he thought it was a bit impractical
to have such a conspicuous mark right on his followers’ forearms. He had come
to the conclusion that his other self must have lost his mind almost completely
after very few Horcruxes.
His mark was the Slytherin house crest, which was admittedly not the most
creative choice. Still, if anyone were to see it they would mostly likely
assume that his followers had simply gotten tattoos celebrating their Hogwarts
house, and it could easily be adapted for followers from other houses whenever
he began recruiting in earnest. And he would allow them to put it anywhere they
would like, so that there wouldn’t be dozens of people walking around so
conspicuously with the same tattoo on the same place on their bodies.
Draco chose to have his on his side under his arm, as they both agreed that
nobody would believe that Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy had allowed their son to
get and then keep a tattoo at age thirteen, and it was too big a risk that
someone would see it on his arm. He removed his shirt and laid on his side on
the table. He was shivering more from fear than from the cold, but he didn’t
flinch when Tom pressed the tip of his wand against his skin. He cried out when
Tom cast the spell, but after the initial jolt he merely whimpered occasionally
as the magic swirled into his skin and formed the silver serpent on its green
background.
When it was over, Tom did him the courtesy of casting a cooling spell on the
burning Mark. When Draco sat up, Tom could see that his face had gone pale with
pain, but his eyes were dry and he managed a pleased smile.
“Will it—” he started, then stopped as the movement of his muscles caused him
to wince a bit. He let out a breath and started again. “Will it hurt like this
when you call me? My grandfather told me that it did.”
Tom raised an eyebrow almost involuntarily. It would seem that Lord Voldemort
did not favor Abraxas as much as Tom Riddle had. Or perhaps he had so lost
control of his sadistic tendencies that he couldn’t pass up the opportunity to
hurt someone.
“No. Not unless I want it to hurt. See.”
He drew on the magical connection between them and watched as Draco jumped
slightly in surprise. He had only given a slight tug, and Draco grinned wider
in response.
“That’s not so bad! Do you have a Mark, too?”
Tom did not, in fact. He had quickly learned from studying Abraxas’s and
Lucius’s Marks that they had to be tied to some physical, controlling object in
order to be used. He could only assume that his older self had Marked himself,
but Tom had also quickly realized that he was actually a magical object
himself. He had been slightly unnerved for a fraction of a second to consider
himself an object instead of a person, but then he’d gotten over it when he’d
realized the benefits. Such as the fact that he could use himself as a magical
object when necessary, like when he needed to tie his followers’ Marks to a
physical object and his magical body wouldn’t actually accept a Mark.
He had other factors to test, of course, such as whether he could be recognized
by spells that depended on one’s humanity, such as the Human Revealingspell,
Age Lines, and wards, but he rather suspected that he couldn’t.
“No,” he answered.
Almost before he’d managed to get the word out, Draco asked, “Does my father
know that you’ve allowed me to join?”
Tom tried his best to mask the maliciousness in his smile, and luckily Draco
didn’t seem to recognize it. “I thought that I would allow you the pleasure of
informing him of your accomplishment yourself.”
In short order, he’d sent Draco trotting off to find his parents. As soon as
the door closed behind him, Tom allowed himself to laugh long and hard.
===============================================================================
Lucius rushed into his father’s—now Tom’s—study with only a few seconds to
spare before the time Tom had instructed him to arrive. Mulciber looked up from
the reports he was arranging on a small table beside his chair and immediately
looked taken aback at the wan, pinched look on his compatriot’s face. Tom only
stared impassively as Lucius offered a perfunctory bow of his head and took his
seat, although inside he was still laughing.
“Well?” he asked, his voice high and dangerous.
Lucius glanced up long enough to meet his eyes, then looked back down at his
knees. “I saw Potter get on the train, My Lord.”
“Well, Malfoy, it seems that your grand plans to capture Potter have not worked
out, after all,” replied Tom, and Mulciber snorted in amusement. “Not to worry,
Lucius; your son will keep an eye on Potter for me.”
Lucius did not look up from his lap, and his voice was barely above a whisper.
“Yes, My Lord.”
The look on Mulciber’s face could only be described as sheer confusion. Tom
turned his harsh gaze on him. “Well, Mulciber, do you have any better news for
me?”
“Yes, My Lord. The most recent reports from the Healer indicate that Molly
Weasley is truly losing it. Her fear over her remaining children returning to
Hogwarts has led to almost daily sessions with her Mind Healer, and her
relationship with her oldest school-age son—Percy, I believe—has deteriorated
almost to the point that he won’t speak to her. What might interest you more,
My Lord, is that the family encountered Potter in Diagon Alley, and Molly
Weasley caused such a scene that her husband Apparated her straight to Saint
Mungo’s. It’s all here in these copies of the reports.”
Tom accepted the neat stacks of parchment, although he would not read them
until later. “And Potter?”
“I’m sorry to say that the Healer did not make many notes about Potter, but the
scant information we have indicates that he appeared very hurt by her reaction
to him.”
“He did look out of spirits, My Lord,” inserted Malfoy, “and at least we know
that Potter can’t stay with the Weasleys, for future reference.”
Completely unable to resist such an opening, Tom said, “I will inform Draco to
watch out for any interesting behavior from Potter or the remaining Weasley
brats.” Malfoy deflated even more, and Tom had to really work to keep his
impassive mask firmly on his face. After several loaded seconds, he continued.
“Now, somebody tell me about R.A.B." 
Chapter End Notes
     I know that in GoF Voldemort asks Wormtail for his arm so that he can
     call the other Death Eaters. I always thought it was extremely
     impractical if he couldn't call his followers without needing one of
     them present, and anyway it doesn't make sense that his followers
     could call him by pressing on their own Marks but he couldn't call
     them in return. So I usually use one of two ways to explain it to
     myself: 1) He could have actually called them without Wormtail's help
     in GoF, but he just wanted to torture Wormtail a bit more. 2) He
     needed a master Mark on himself, but when he lost his body he lost
     his own Mark and had to recreate it after the graveyard. I obviously
     chose the second version here.
     A HUGE thank you to everybody who reviewed over the long weeks
     between chapters. It really made me want to write more, even when I
     was at my most stressed.
***** Chicanery *****
Chapter Summary
     The art of deception is taken to new heights.
Chapter Notes
     Chicanery: noun, actions or statements that trick people into
     believing something that is not true; deception by artful subterfuge
     or sophistry. The use of such trickery to achieve a purpose. (Adapted
     from Merriam-Webster, Google definitions, and YourDictionary).
See the end of the chapter for more notes
The day after Draco left for Hogwarts, Lucius had dinner with the Minister of
Magic and several other high-ranking men who liked to make deals and discuss
political gossip over Firewhisky and magical cigars in the middle of the day.
Even with her husband and son gone, Narcissa apparently still planned to serve
a formal noontime meal as usual, as Tom received a ridiculously formal
invitation from her personal house-elf. He declined (if cursing the house-elf
out of the room and ignoring the invitation entirely could be called
declining), as he had no need either to eat or to sit across a table from
Narcissa Malfoy, and anyway he was ears-deep in a complicated treatise on
ritualistic soul sacrifices.
Shortly after the ostentatious clock in Abraxas's study chimed one, the woman
herself appeared in the doorway. Tom would have cursed her out of the room too,
except that the flurry of thoughts flitting across her mind signified a
determination that made him quite curious.
"My Lord," she began, as stiff as the lace at her collar, "I would like to
offer you information in exchange for my son's freedom."
Tom could barely contain his amusement long enough to pin her with the severe
glare she deserved.
"I am afraid that Draco is not for sale."
She froze from head to toe for long seconds, although he could see the tempest
behind her eyes. Finally she gathered herself enough to say, "His safety, then.
Your vow that you will not harm him, and that he will come out the other side
of this mess alive and whole."
"I am also afraid that my vows are not for sale." Tom's amusement was quickly
fading into indignation and anger that this bitch dared to think she could
bargain with the Dark Lord. Before she could make another offer, he asked,
"What makes you think that I won't simply rip the information from your mind
and then harm Draco to spite you?"
"You like him," she replied immediately, desperately. She sunk into the nearest
chair gracelessly, as if she would have collapsed onto the floor if she hadn't
sat down. "You did not punish him for his mistake at the beginning of the
summer, or like you said you would if the potion failed. You might punish me,
but—"
But he could clearly see in her mind the images that she was so fiercely afraid
of, the ones that made her so terribly ill that she had concocted this mad
scheme to protect her son.
He nearly cackled in malevolent delight at such a perfect opportunity to hurt
her.
"I like him enough that when I fuck him, I'll make sure he learns to enjoy it,
to beg me for it—eventually."
Her blue eyes shot wide for a few seconds before she slammed them shut and
bowed her head for good measure.
"Don't bother with that, you stupid woman," he continued in the same sadistic
tone. "I can read your thoughts just as clearly whether I have eye contact or
no. Except, curiously, for the information you claim you have to trade with
me…. Ah, yes, I see. A secrecy charm, very cleverly applied."
Narcissa was visible trembling. "Please, My Lord—"
"You would make a great follower if you weren't so hung up on this idea of
getting Draco away from me," he went on as if he hadn't heard her. "My dear
woman, if and very probably when I decide to sodomize your son, there is
nothing you or anybody else can do to stop me."
Dear Salazar, watching her face crumple in hopelessness and impotent rage was
the most hilarious thing Tom had experienced in ages! Who had she thought she
was dealing with? He wasn't even sure that he was managing to keep his
expression of sadistic glee off his face. He discreetly checked his features in
the shiny, reflective surface of Abraxas's desk.
"Now then, let's discuss the terms of this deal you want to make. You will tell
me every last detail of whatever you know, or I will suddenly find myself so
overcome with desire that I just won't be able to help myself the next time I
see pretty Draco."
A shudder ran the length of Narcissa's body, but she looked up and met his eyes
bravely. Her gaze was filled with such hatred that Tom almost thought it was
cute.
"Regulus Arcturus Black," she said clearly, withdrawing a familiar locket from
her pocket and setting it on the edge of the desk with very determined control.
"R.A.B. I recognized his handwriting immediately when the house-elf you hit
with this brought it to me."
Tom sat back in his enormous high-backed chair and considered her over the
steeple of his long fingers. "Your cousin."
"Yes. You—He used my cousin's house-elf for some sort of secret purpose about
two years before the end of the war, and Regulus disappeared a few days later.
The family all assumed that you—He had killed him, except for my sister, who
would never have believed ill of her lord."
He probed her mind viciously, but he could tell that it was still not entirely
open to him.
"Crucio," he hissed, and her body immediately contorted as she screamed and
flopped out of her chair and onto the floor. He counted to ten and released the
curse. "You are still hiding something."
"My—my sister!" she sobbed and did not get up. The front part of her hair had
escaped its chignon to fall over her wet face in a blonde cascade. "She told
me—years ago she told me, just weeks before she was arrested—that Sirius had
never been a Death Eater, that it was his friend Peter Pettigrew who had been
the spy!"
Tom, who had come around the desk to stand over her prone form, gave her a
swift kick in the stomach that made her heave and sent her splayed out across
the floor. He reached down to grab the silky locks of freed hair and used them
to violently wrench her head up so that her terrorized eyes met his.
"How would she know that?" he hissed. He yanked her hair again when she didn't
immediately reply, only to realize belatedly that he had asked in Parseltongue.
He repeated the question in English, but not before giving her another shake
for good measure.
Her hands frantically sought purchase on any surface she could reach. "Please!
She was one of the Dark Lord's most favored followers; she said that she was
one of the Death Eaters He sent to—to convince Pettigrew to become a spy!"
Tom released her and she collapsed face-first onto the priceless rug, as if all
of her muscles had failed her.
"You would dare keep this from me even when I sent your husband specifically to
ask you?" he asked, so filled with rage that he couldn't even tell whether he
was speaking in Parseltongue or English. "You would dare keep anythingfrom me?
Crucio!"
He held the curse for interminable minutes as he rolled his neck in an attempt
to relieve his tension and pondered what he would do about the new information.
He would need to exhaustively examine all of the possibilities of the Regulus
Black lead. After all, it was entirely possible—he hoped—that the man hadn't
managed to destroy the Horcrux, or that he was still alive somewhere waiting to
use it to his advantage. He had no idea what he would do about Peter Pettigrew
and Sirius Black, and at this point he couldn't bring Lucius in on it. He would
never bring any of the older Malfoys in on anything ever again; for that
matter, he was becoming quite iffy about even Draco.
Well, except that, even if he hadn't ever seriously given any thought to the
issue before, now Tom was absolutely decided that he would take the boy to bed
just to spite his lying, conniving mother, if for no other reason. Not
immediately, of course, because although he had no moral qualms about shagging
such a young boy (or any moral qualms at all, for that matter), he was not a
pedophile. And he wanted to be able to rub it in her face that Draco had
offered his body to Tom willingly, which would take some time.
He realized suddenly that she'd stopped screaming, and with a loud expletive he
released her from the Cruciatus Curse. It wouldn't do to turn her into a
vegetable before she could see the fruits of his labor.
Merlin, he would be severely annoyed with himself if he managed to accidentally
break two playthings within a week.
A cursory examination showed him that she hadn't lost her mind yet, so he was
satisfied to leave her as a whimpering mess on the rug for her husband to see
when he returned home. He walked back around to the other side of the desk and
retook his seat, picking up his quill and unconsciously sticking the end in his
mouth as he further considered his plans.
His thoughts were interrupted by a house-elf carrying an official-looking
letter. It stared frozenly at the heap that was its mistress, until Tom
demanded, "Give it to me."
He had only intended to take the letter in order to use the most expedient way
to make the house-elf go away, but then he noticed the handwriting on the
outside and, uncaring of the Malfoys' privacy, opened it immediately.
     Father,
     I was attacked by a mad hippogriff in Care of Magical Creatures. What
     was Dumbledore thinking letting that oaf Hagrid be a professor? My
     arm was split open almost to the bone! The school matron assures me
     that she has healed it completely, but it still hurts and what does
     she know anyway? She's just a school nurse. What if it scars?!
     They haven't let me see Snape, and those idiots McGonagall and
     Pomfrey assured me that there was no need for them to contact you for
     a "minor injury"! I had to get Pansy to sneak this up to the owlery!
     Come soon.
     Draco
Tom blinked for a few moments before he finally smiled. Clearly the boy wasn't
severely injured at all if he found the wherewithal to be such a prissy git.
"What if it scars," indeed. Nonetheless, Tom could see that this was the
opportunity he and Lucius had been looking for.
He might not be willing to trust Lucius Malfoy with any sensitive assignments,
but he knew that he could trust the man's political dealings on the issue of
Hogwarts and Albus Dumbledore, as they were of the same mind there.
"Get up," he ordered Narcissa, casting several waking spells and nudging her
rather harshly with the toe of his shoe. "Your son is coming home; you had
better look in perfect order when he gets here and not give one tiny indication
that anything is wrong."
There was no need to state the "or else."
===============================================================================
As it turned out, Lucius had several world-renowned Healers in his pocket due
to the family's patronage of St. Mungo's. Although there was nothing
technically wrong with the job Madam Pomfrey had done on Draco's arm, a
specialist in cosmetic healing had been able to save him even the miniscule,
barely noticeable scarring he would have had otherwise. More importantly, the
Healers had been willing to sign off on reports stating that Draco's injuries
had been extensive and that without proper medical attention he might have had
impaired function in his arm.
They got new equipment for the Creature-Induced Injuries Ward and a newly
endowed program for cosmetic healing; Tom got a Ministry investigation into the
incident that had almost maimed Lucius Malfoy's son.
Mulciber had personally convinced the other members of the board of governors
to report the incident to the Department for the Regulation and Control of
Magical Creatures, as they hadn't wanted any appearance of Lucius using his
influence for his son's benefit. However, Lucius had stepped in behind the
scenes to somehow ensure that his friends in the department—Death Eaters and
Death Eaters' children, he told Tom—were assigned to the case.
Two days after the attack, it was the top story in the Daily Prophet, under the
headline HOGWARTS THIRD YEAR MAIMED IN CARE OF MAGICAL CREATURES.
The lead Healer and the head of the Ministry inquiry both provided statements
about the seriousness of Draco's injuries and the ongoing investigation, but
what most pleased Tom was the statement Mulciber had made on behalf of the
school board.
"It is utterly unacceptable that third-year students would have been exposed to
such dangerous creatures as hippogriffs," he had said. "They are classified by
the Ministry as an XXX magical creature, which means that competent wizards
should be able to cope with them. I think we can all agree that students in
their first year of class—their first day, in fact—cannot be considered
competent wizards expected to be able to handle hippogriffs. Furthermore, as
the board of governors expressed to Headmaster Dumbledore when he first
appointed Rubeus Hagrid as professor of this dangerous subject, we are
concerned that a gamekeeper who never completed Hogwarts cannot be considered a
competent wizard himself. Rest assured that the board is thoroughly
investigating this incident."
Lucius had added, after expressing sufficient concern for Draco and titillating
readers with hints of a grueling and bloody recovery process, "I have no doubt
that Mr. Hagrid, as a half-giant, is perfectly capable of taking care of
himself in his own unique way. I doubt is his ability to teach our children how
to properly deal with such creatures, and also, as my son's injuries
illustrate, his ability to properly protect them while doing so. Furthermore,
Mr. Hagrid did not complete his education because he was expelled from Hogwarts
for harboring an Acromantula inside the school, which injured several students
and killed one during the 1942 to 1943 school year. The Hogwarts by-laws
currently state that the headmaster has full autonomy to make staffing
decisions, but it is clearer than ever to me and to my colleagues on the board
of governors and in the Ministry that it is too easy for the headmaster to
abuse that power to appoint incompetent, unqualified, and even dangerous people
to position at Hogwarts."
The three of them had spent half an hour in Tom's study constructing the
statements so as to give the most damning information possible against
Dumbledore. Even the fact that Hagrid was explicitly outed as a half-giant
would fuel public outrage against the headmaster, although surely anyone who
had ever gone to Hogwarts had to have at least suspected it before. Now
Mulciber and Lucius would push for governor-controlled staffing decisions and,
more immediately gratifying for Tom, the removal of the current headmaster.
Draco spent most of morning giggling over the article while making full use of
his completely uninjured arm, until Tom directed him to his studies. After all,
although they were planning to keep him home for a full week, he still had to
keep up with his schoolwork.
It was a second article in the paper, on the third page and much smaller than
the first, that had most piqued Tom's interest that morning. He left for the
cottage almost as soon as he'd noticed it.
The Mudblood had chopped her hair off at her shoulders, no doubt because it had
become such a rat's nest that she hadn't been able to salvage most of it. She
kept reaching up to shove it back behind her ear every few seconds as it
escaped to fall into her face. She was so engaged in the book she was bent over
that she didn't seem to notice that she was doing it, and she hadn't even
noticed him come in. It was quite pathetic, Tom thought, because when he had
allowed himself through the wards and into the cottage the shift in magic alone
should have alerted her to his presence. Either she was not at all powerful, or
she was so disconnected from the magic around her that there was probably
little hope of rectifying the situation.
Her constant battle with her disorderly hair annoyed him so much that he'd cast
a spell at her head almost before he'd thought it all the way through. Her
short curls immediately flew out of her face and behind her ear, and she
squeaked in surprise as her hands flew up to her head.
If she was frightened to turn and find the Dark Lord pointing his wand at her
head, she did a much better job of hiding it than she had in the past. Tom was
pleased; he had made more progress with the Mudblood in the past few weeks than
he could have hoped for.
He sneered. "With all that studying you did at Hogwarts, I'm surprised you
never bothered to look up any practical spells so you wouldn't have to do
things the Muggle way."
Her thoughts were a stranger mixture between disappointment that he was
disappointed in her (which almost made him smile) and anger at that specific
accusation.
Finally, she seemed to settle on stubborn anger. She raised her little nose in
the air and, as though she were a famous lecturer addressing an audience,
informed him, "There is nothing wrong with doing things the Muggle way. There
is no need to be dependent on magic for every little thing."
"Are you a witch or are you a Muggle?" retorted Tom, his sneer deepening and
his voice filling with derision.
"I'm a witch!" she exclaimed, clearly before she had thought it through.
It cost Tom no more than a tilt of his head to make her eyes go wide as she
realized the tone she'd taken with him. He remained silent for a few moments
longer to allow her to worry. Then, adopting a mocking version of her imperious
tone, he declared, "Then you ought to fully embrace being a witch. You will
gain no points from anyone by clinging to inefficient Muggle habits. Do you
think that anyone important in our world would respect someone who stands out
so obviously as a filthy Mudblood?"
Granger's lip began to tremble as soon as he used that word and her eyes
watered, but she did not cry.
Tom held her expressive, hurt gaze with his own cold, fathomless eyes. "If you
are so determined to live with one foot still in the Muggle world, then there
is no excuse for you not to have figured out how I replicated money."
That clearly confused her, and she opened her mouth as if to demand that he
explain, although she thought better of it before the words actually came out.
"What is it about Galleons and Knuts that keeps wizards from copying them,
Granger?" he pressed, although he had no intention of waiting around for her to
answer. His patience would not last anywhere near long enough for that, he
knew. Therefore, he answered himself, "There are a number of enchantments the
goblins place on their coins that make it nearly impossible to duplicate them
or to create authentic-seeming counterfeits. But of course the magical world,
goblin and wizard alike, is so wrapped up in itself that it overlooks one
important thing: Muggles."
Her face lit up suddenly with the glow of comprehension. "You copied Muggle
money and then you—you exchanged it for wizard money!"
"Of course not, Granger; I am not as sloppy as that. I copied Muggle currency
and then exchanged my counterfeits in the Muggle world for another form of
Muggle currency in order to ensure its legitimacy, and then I exchanged that
for wizard currency."
The Mudblood studied his face closely, as if she might be able to glean the
answers to her questions in the contours of his nose or the angle of his jaw.
Finally, although it clearly pained her to do so, she admitted, "I don't
understand what that has to do with whether the exception to Gamp's Law is
accurate."
"It is a matter of creative problem solving, Granger. The main goal of
duplicating money is to have more money. Most wizards and witches realize that
they cannot successfully copy the Galleons in their pockets and conclude that
it is an impossible goal. But it is not an impossible goal at all if one is
willing to look outside the wizarding world's limited box in order to solve the
problem. As with most so-called rules in the magical world, they only apply to
the accepted parameters wizards have built for themselves and not to anything
outside of that."
"And you don't think it's a bit hyp—" She paused for a few seconds and
considered him thoroughly, as if she were debating whether to risk saying it,
then marched on bravely as if she'd never paused at all. "—hypocritical to say
that I shouldn't keep any Muggle habits, even though you use Muggles to get
your own way?"
He smiled and allowed a laugh to escape, genuinely amused at her question.
(Although he acknowledged that she was just as likely to have caught him in a
mood where he would have eviscerated her for saying it, and therefore it was
incredibly stupid of her). Her sharp intake of breath drew his attention back
to her, only for him to find that she was studying his face with a peculiar
furrow in her brow that he had never seen on her before. He unabashedly dipped
into her thoughts.
"—a grip, Hermione. You know that he's a devil, even if he smiles like an
angel."
Another laugh escaped his throat. He realized that it must have been the first
time he had ever genuinely smiled in her presence, as opposed to the mocking,
cold smiles he sometimes gave people he wanted to intimidate.
"Just think what he's done to your—" She abruptly derailed her entire train of
thought and tore her attention away from his lips to meet his gaze in wide-eyed
horror. "Oh God! He caught me looking! Oh God, he's laughing! Does he know what
I'm thinking? How could he know?"
Tom did not laugh again, but it was a near thing. Instead he allowed his full
lips to curve even further over his straight teeth.
"It's called Legilimency, Mudblood. It is an obscure branch of magic, very
difficult to master and mostly illegal to use, so I am not surprised you have
never read about it in your Hogwarts-approved textbooks."
Her face was red with mortification and not a little righteous indignation at
his intrusion on her privacy, but she managed to ask, "Is that how you would…
do those things you said?"
"Yes," he replied immediately, knowing that she was referring to his threats to
make her live out her worst nightmares or to strip her of her intelligence.
He offered another smile, this one a cruel mockery of the one she had so
admired, and she looked down at her lap, her cheeks flaming.
"As for your question, it is not hypocritical at all. I despise Mudbloods who
hold onto the most useless parts of their prior lives while flailing around the
magical world without any true connection to magic itself. I equally despise
those who are raised in the magical world and never question anything around
them, holding on so single-mindedly to the notion that nothing exists outside
of the narrow box they've built for themselves. Each side ought to embrace
every part of the magic and knowledge available to us—and, of course, use every
advantage we have—and dispose of the useless habits and ideas that hold us
back."
He could see that she was mulling over his words just as intensely as he had
hoped. He was glad; he did not care about her immediate reactions but rather
wanted her to seriously consider what he had said. Tom was sure that it would
only bring her further into his web. Hermione Granger might like to think of
herself as a Gryffindor Goody Two-Shoes, but he had forced enough tales of
broken rules and illegal potions (and stolen ingredients) out of her to know
that her mind and morals bent just as far as she was able to justify things to
herself.
And she would bend to his will, or else he would send her frizzy head to Potter
via owl post.
With a smirk that he knew she could not see with her head bowed so low, he
said, "However, none of that is why I came here today. Were you aware that
today is September fifth?"
She looked up with enormous brown eyes and a chin quivering with the knowledge
that she had been his prisoner for the entire summer and was now missing
school. "Oh."
"Indeed," replied Tom. "They have noticed you are missing."
He could see the light of fierce determination and hope come on again in her
eyes. He hadn't seen the likes of that since her first few weeks as his
prisoner. He smiled, a cruel and mocking smile this time instead of the genuine
one that apparently made him look like an angel.
"I knew you would think that they'll come for you," he told her in a pleasant
tone that was completely at odds with the promise of pain in his expression.
"That's why I wanted to share the article in the Daily Prophet with you."
It was a short article that took up less than one-sixth of a page of the
newspaper and was wedged between an article about parchment thickness and an
advertisement for Sleakeazy's Hair Potion and Scalp Treatment.
     Headmaster Albus Dumbledore has reported to the Department of Magical
     Law Enforcement that a third-year student, Hermione Granger, is
     missing. Miss Granger, a Muggle-born Gryffindor and reportedly the
     best friend of Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, neither returned to
     Hogwarts on September first nor withdrew from the school. The
     headmaster has urged the Ministry to investigate her apparent
     disappearance.
     In response to the headmaster's concerns, Gerald Savage, a senior
     officer in the Auror's Investigation Department, explained to this
     reporter that, "Truancy is not a concern of the DMLE. If you ask me,
     either Miss Granger decided that she was happier with her own kind in
     the Muggle world, or there was some sort of Muggle accident over the
     summer, maybe one of those dangerous airplanes or guns. Either way,
     it isn't our concern."
     An airplane is a long metal tube Muggles stuff themselves inside to
     try to fly without magic. A gun is a kind of metal wand that Muggles
     use to kill each other.
When she read the article, Hermione, who had not cried at all up to that point,
finally allowed a few tears to leak from her eyes. Tom was inordinately pleased
with this result.
"You see how much the wizarding world cares about Mudbloods," he told her quite
casually, as if he were discussing the merits of the article on parchment
thickness. "There's no mention of your accomplishments, or of anything about
you except that you're a Muggle and were friends with the Boy Who Lived. The
Ministry doesn't care that you and your parents have been missing for months,
and neither does anybody else judging by the size and placement of the article.
Although you'll notice that a pure-blood student's injury takes up almost the
entire front page…."
A sob escaped her throat at that point, and she brought her hands up to cover
her eyes.
"Please stop," she begged.
"Perhaps you ought to put some of that original thinking we've been talking
about to use and consider why you care so much about protecting a bunch of
narrow-minded fools who don't know anything about magic beyond what the
Ministry tells them they can know and who don't even care about protecting you
in return," he told her seriously.
Then, with a cruel smile tugging at the corners of his mouth, he gracefully
swept out of the cottage and sealed the wards behind him. He had no illusions
that the article would make her convert to his way of thinking, but he was
quite pleased to be laying the various pieces of groundwork that he hoped would
lead to the results he wanted in a few months. Now he only needed his other
self to return and play his part in the production, and he was sure that
Hermione Granger would eventually fall at his feet.
Chapter End Notes
     Citation: The line about what a gun is was taken from the article
     about Sirius that Stan Shunpike shows Harry in Prisoner of Azkaban,
     Chapter Three, "The Knight Bus."
      
     Author's Notes: We're finally getting into how Tom's presence and the
     things he's done are changing the events and plots of canon. I'm very
     excited to get to this stage of the story.
     Thank you for any reviews, favorites, and follows. I particularly
     appreciate the reviews, and if you have favorited and followed then I
     would love to know why.
***** Bending. Breaking. *****
Chapter Summary
     Plans begin to take on more solid shape, and Tom experiences a loss
     of control.
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
“This is it?” Tom eyed the dim row house and didn’t bother to mask the disdain
in his voice. Just based on Walburga Black’s attitude when he’d known the older
girl at Hogwarts, he had supposed her to live in a grand mansion with golden
columns and gilded statues.
Narcissa’s pale cheeks flushed a bit in indignation and embarrassment. She
opened her mouth as if to respond, but as soon as she met Tom’s gaze she
snapped her lips closed and looked down again. Although she still showed
occasional sparks of defiance, her visit to Tom’s office seemed to have scared
some actual sense into her. She had only recently been able to control the
lingering tremors from his prolonged use of the Cruciatus Curse, and apparently
the memory of it was enough to make her think twice about provoking him
further.
He was happy to follow her up the front steps in silence. Tom had never
understood the need most people seemed to have to fill a silence—he was as
annoyed now by purposeless talking as he had been by the chatter of the other
children at the orphanage when he was boy. And he had no desire at all to talk
to Narcissa Malfoy about anything. He wouldn’t have even brought her along at
all, if she hadn’t assured him that only a Black could enter the house.
Tom was sure that he could have broken into the house himself, eventually, but
there was no reason to put in the time and effort necessary to break ancient
wards when he had a Black available, even one he could hardly stand to be
around.
Other than the thick cloud of dust that enveloped them when they stepped into
the narrow entrance hall, which sent them both into an undignified coughing
fit, and a hideous umbrella stand that appeared to have been made from a
troll’s lower leg, there was nothing of particular note on the ground floor
besides a hideous portrait of an older woman. Tom barely credited it as what
the previously-beautiful Walburga Black might have looked like if the
intervening fifty years since their shared youth hadn’t been kind to her at
all.
“WHO’S THERE?” shrieked the painted woman, her eyes rolling in her head as if
she might be able to see sideways beyond the borders of her frame.
The caterwauling stopped almost immediately when Narcissa stepped into the
portrait’s line of sight. “Hello, Aunt Walburga.”
“Cissy,” replied the portrait, clearly warring with itself between relief and
annoyance, “how long has it been since you visited me?”
“I’m sorry, Aunt Walbur—” began her niece, but Tom did not have the patience
for any such nonsense.
“It’s a portrait, not your aunt,” he interrupted harshly as he mounted the last
few stairs himself. Narcissa moved out of his way immediately, and the woman in
the frame looked as if she was ready to begin shrieking again until she
recognized him suddenly and froze with her mouth half opened and a look of
horror in her painted black eyes.
“Riddle?” she finally asked.
Tom stared back impassively, as he had resigned himself to people who used to
know him reacting in exactly that way. “Do you know anything about a locket
your traitor son stole from me?”
Walburga’s portrait reared backwards, as far away from him as her painted
surroundings would allow her to go, but she didn’t answer. Tom could feel a
sharp tingling thrumming through his being and knew that a fellow Horcrux was
close by, and it was making him even more impatient than usual. He raised his
wand up to the canvas, not quite touching, and cast a spell to keep the woman
from leaving the frame. Of course he didn’t need to use his wand for such
things, but he had found that most magical people were so inept at wandless
magic that only the actual sight of a wand could properly frighten them.
Managing to keep his outward veneer of calm, he asked again, “What do you
know?”
“It was you! You—you are Him!” she cried instead. “You killed my Regulus! YOU
KILLED MY SON!”
The tip of his wand sizzled with magic, and the oil paint mere centimeters from
Walburga Black’s face began to melt. She shrieked, more in terror than in rage,
when she realized that she couldn’t leave the portrait and escape the flames.
“What. Do. You. Know?” he repeated, letting his irritation show through and
barking every word. Salazar, how he hated repeating himself!
She cowered against her frame as her portrait disintegrated, eyes rolling in
fear as canvas began to burn right next to her.
“KREACHER!” she finally yelled out, and for a moment Tom thought that she was
calling him a creature and was disappointed at her lack of inventiveness. Then
a house-elf Apparated into existence next to him and, after taking in the sight
of Tom attacking the portrait, started screeching too, increasing the volume in
the cramped stairwell by double at least as Walburga shouted over him,
“KREACHER KNOWS SOMETHING! I KNOW HE DOES!”
Tom tilted his head to consider the distraught house-elf and raised his wand
just out of reach of the canvas, and Walburga sagged in relief against the edge
of her portrait. The house-elf’s bloodshot eyes looked between the portrait and
Tom in absolute terror, finally focusing in on Tom’s blood-red eyes and the
magical energy barely controlled beneath his false skin.
“Oh, no, no, no, no,” it cried pitifully, collapsing to its knees on a rickety
step. “It’s Him! Oh, poor Master Regulus!”
“What about Regulus?” demanded Tom in a high voice, turning his full attention
and his wand on the pathetic little creature. “What do you know?”
The elf’s ears flattened back against its head in agitation, little tufts of
white hair sticking up at odd angles at the movement. “Kreacher knows nothing!”
“He does!” protested Walburga, eyes still darting warily between the scorched
and melted parts of her portrait and the tip of Tom’s wand. “He would never
tell me what secret my son swore him to keep, but I knew! A mother knows!”
Kreacher keened in pain and bent over so low that his nose pressed into the
moldy carpet. “Kreacher knows nothing!”
“We don’t have any authority to force it out of him,” reminded Narcissa, her
lips pressed together in extreme disapproval at Tom’s actions. “My cousin
Sirius is his rightful owner.”
Oh, for Salazar’s sake, thought Tom, and he could barely suppress the desire to
roll his eyes heavenward. Then, without warning, he struck.
He’d never been inside a house-elf’s mind before, and he definitely did not
want to repeat the experience if he could help it. It resembled the mind of
somebody who had been placed under the Imperius Curse, except that instead of
the compulsion of the curse creating a sort of fog over the true mind, the
house-elf’s compulsion was a part of its mind, weaved inextricably in
amongst its thoughts and synapses. Still, there was nothing stopping Tom from
accessing what he wanted to see, even if it was clear from the inky Dark magic
suffusing the memories that the house-elf was under orders not to willingly
reveal them.
A handsome face smiling down at him, full of pride… The paper-thin skin
covering Lord Voldemort’s skull stretching grotesquely as he grinned, forcing
another mouthful of potion down Tom’s throat… Burning! Oh, the horrible,
excruciating burning that worked its way down his esophagus and to the tips of
his fingers and toes… Regulus Black’s handsome face sick with panic and regret…
Tom’s crippling grief as he watched his poor young master struggle against dead
arms, knowing there was nothing he could do as Regulus disappeared beneath the
opaque black surface of the lake… Home. He had to go home… Master Orion wasting
away from grief, and his dear mistress’s tears as she too succumbed… A heavy
gold locket that oozed the same terrible magic that had stolen Master Regulus’s
life…
Tom staggered down a step as he wrenched himself out of the filthy mess of the
house-elf’s mind. He felt the fear and pain and grief lingering in his own body
like an inky black tar he couldn’t wash off his skin. It was absolutely
disgusting. He hadn’t even realized that he’d raised his wand until the
brilliant flash of green light lit up the dark stairwell and the house-elf
crumpled at his feet and slid down a few steps until coming to rest just
underneath its mistress’s portrait.
Narcissa and Walburga both looked at him in censure and not a little surprise.
In Narcissa’s case, his still-open mind easily picked up that her surprise was
not due to his having killed the despicable thing but rather was because he’d
cast the Killing Curse completely nonverbally. He obviously couldn’t read a
portrait’s mind, but from the pinched looked on Walburga’s painted face he
assumed that she was just upset he’d killed her only constant companion.
He dismissed both women’s feelings as utterly unimportant and began to climb
the stairs as soon as he’d regained his equilibrium. Grimmauld Place was so
diffuse with Dark magic that it had seeped into the very structure of the walls
themselves. Even with his innate connection to the other Horcrux, he would have
had a hard time pinpointing its location in such a mess, and he was happy to
confirm that, impatient or not, his decision to invade the house-elf’s mind had
been the right one. He knew just which drawer in which cabinet in the first-
floor drawing room to look in for his locket—well, Voldemort’s locket, as he’d
stolen it after Tom had been made, but it was Tom’s locket now.
It was an ugly thing, truly, all bulk and no elegance at all. But he could feel
his own familiar essence combined with his own Dark magic seeping into every
molecule of gold, and he felt somehow more whole when he put the locket around
his neck. The ring went a bit insane when he did it, and he thought that the
Horcrux in the graveyard was probably throwing a tantrum and destroying
everything around him (never mind that it didn’t stay destroyed so there was no
point). He would have to deal with that later.
Grimmauld Place proved to be full of other interesting Dark artifacts as well,
and Tom was perfectly happen to entertain the thought of them now that he had
another precious piece of his soul secured on his person. He selected a few of
the most interesting-looking texts that he knew the Malfoy library didn’t
contain and stowed a couple of particularly rare items in his robes under the
disapproving eye of Narcissa Malfoy, but in truth he was far too eager to
interact with the locket to begin any sort of meticulous investigation into the
ancient houses’s nooks and crannies, so they returned to Malfoy Manor soon
after recovering his Horcrux.
He didn’t bother explaining himself to Narcissa or Lucius, who had been
anxiously waiting for them to return with a stack of papers obviously meant for
Tom’s eyes, before making his way to his bedroom. Lord Voldemort did not need
to explain himself to anybody, and whatever Lucius needed to bring to his
attention could wait until after he’d done what he needed to do.
He slid the ring off first, which caused it to erupt into such a riotous
display of aggressive energy that Tom’s lips quirked up into a rare genuine
smile. It landed with a heavy clink against the fine, polished ebony of his
bedside table. Then it was the work of but a moment to allow himself to slide
into the dizzying maze of his own mind and emerge through the oppressive
darkness into the Horcrux’s.
The first thing he noticed was that he was back in the cave where the locket
ought to have been safely hidden. The next thing he noticed was the soul
fragment itself staring at him with wide, red eyes in a bone-white face.
“You were made here?” he asked somewhat incredulously.
Because honestly, he had never considered the cave anywhere near that
important, and he was having a hard time understanding exactly what had
happened in the span of four or five years to make his other self’s way of
thinking so drastically different from his own. Was it just due to the creation
of Hocruxes in itself?
“Yes,” replied the Horcrux, and it was difficult for Tom to look at it, because
its face looked so much like his own and yet not, especially when it moved.
“Which one are you?”
“The first,” informed Tom with some inexplicable well of pride and a handsome
grin that his nineteen-year-old self had obviously lost.
Then he exerted the will of his own mind over the Horcrux’s, because he did not
have time to cultivate a relationship with yet another version of himself and
thought it was probably the case that it was weaker than the ring and wouldn’t
be able to defend itself against him anyway, and he was almost never mistaken
about anything. Not even when he desperately hoped he was wrong.
===============================================================================
When he eventually met with Lucius and Mulciber later that evening, Tom had to
expend a significant amount of focus in order to care about what they had to
say. It wasn’t that the information they had to share was not worth his
while—indeed, it was all very good information!—but rather it was that Tom was
distracted by the confirmation of what he had long since suspected about his
other self’s mental deterioration. He had been able to take everything he’d
wanted from the locket Horcrux’s mind without much in the way of meaningful
resistance.
“The other governors are embarrassed,” Mulciber was informing him, and,
marshalling his unrivaled self-control, he tried to pay better attention. “This
whole mess with the half-breed has exposed exactly how little power the
governors can actually exert over Hogwarts, and the public is questioning what
good they actually do.”
Lucius nodded his assent. “Unfortunately, I think it will do little good to
attempt to give the board of governors more control or to oust Dumbledore so
long as he is still the presiding member of the Wizengamot and has so much
popular sway. In the past, he has been allowed to remain and make his own
arguments whenever school board issues have been brought before the Wizengamot,
and when Dumbledore speaks he has the ability to make people who had thought
something was unreasonable suddenly see things his way.”
Tom didn’t bother to hide his scowl. When Tom had been a student, Headmaster
Dippet had been easy enough for him to influence, but Dumbledore had often been
able to change his mind again even after Tom had thought he’d gotten what he
wanted.
“If you will allow me, My Lord,” continued Lucius, “I would suggest that we
need to plan a specific series of attacks to systematically dismantle
Dumbledore’s power.”
Tom liked to hear anything that had to do with stripping Dumbledore of power.
The stories surrounding the attack on Draco in Care of Magical Creatures had
caused an uproar in wizarding Britain, and Tom could feel that they were on the
cusp of being able to mold the events into something great. They were so close
to Dumbledore’s throat that he could almost taste the old warlock’s blood.
“What would you suggest?” he asked easily, because he was nothing if not
perfectly aware of his own strengths and those of his followers. He mostly had
strengths and no weaknesses of his own, of course, but even he had to admit
that his extraordinary brilliance and power lent themselves better to ruling by
force than to ruling by diplomacy, and that his captivating charisma was better
suited to drawing followers into his web than to navigating the intricacies of
Ministry politics.
On the other hand, Lucius Malfoy was a master at political intrigues and
Ministry bureaucracy, which was one reason why Tom hadn’t disposed of him in a
fit of rage yet. And undoubtedly it was how he had managed to crawl his way
into Voldemort’s good graces in the first place.
“We should push forward the hearing to determine the hippogriff’s fate; it
isn’t scheduled until the beginning of next month, but I think I can persuade
them to have it as early as next week. Once we have a legal determination that
it is in fact danger to people, I will pursue a personal injury lawsuit on
behalf of my son against the giant, the headmaster, and Hogwarts itself,
because as long as Dumbledore is a party to my lawsuit before the Wizengamot,
he will not be allowed to participate in any related matters. It is the only
way I can think of to force him not to participate in the Wizengamot hearings."
Muciber sat forward eagerly in his leather chair. “With him out of the way,
I’ll persuade the other governors to submit new legislation to the Wizengamot
giving the board of governors ultimate power over hiring decisions.”
“I will also convince Fudge to enact some Ministerial decrees on the subject,”
added Lucius. “They likely would not be upheld if challenged, but that isn’t
the point—the point is just to apply as much pressure as we can from as many
different fronts as possible.”
Tom sat back in his enormous chair and allowed his wand, which had been
spinning slowly atop one of his fingers, to fall neatly back into his palm.
“You have been discussing this without me,” he declared quietly. Malfoy and
Mulciber’s eyes were both riveted to his wand, and he could almost hear their
hearts thumping in their chests. “Why are you so worried? Surely you know that
Lord Voldemort rewards followers who take the initiative to further his plans.
That is why you have been making plans, is it not?”
Mulciber swallowed visibly and nodded his head, but he did not seem able to
speak.
Although Tom could see Malfoy’s knuckles whitening as he clutched the arms of
his chair, he managed to say in a level tone, “Of course, My Lord. We thought
only of how we could use our expertise in this area to achieve your goals.”
“Yes, I thought so,” Tom replied in the same tone. To belay his deliberate
calmness, he began to twirl his wand in his customary manner when contemplating
whether he ought to use it. “I know that neither of you would conspire to
betray me.”
He could read in their thoughts, of course, that neither of them had been
acting to betray him when they’d met to discuss how to handle the Dumbledore
situation. In fact, they had both been extremely eager to be able to present
him with a solid plan. That is why he thought it best to outwardly praise their
efforts while still implicitly encouraging their terror at the idea of what he
would do to them if he thought they’d been planning anything against him. Or
what he would do to them if it turned out that the advice they’d given him went
awry.
After he was satisfied with the sick fear permeating both of their minds, Tom
broke the deathly silence that had fallen around the room. “Richard, you must
find time to thoroughly examine and catalogue the contents of Grimmauld Place.
Mrs. Malfoy will have to accompany you, due to the protections on the house,
but I trust that you will not allow her to interfere.”
“Yes, My Lord,” assured Mulciber immediately, although he spared a brief
sideways glance in Malfoy’s direction, clearly wondering why Narcissa couldn’t
handle it herself since he was already so busy with various other tasks.
“Good. Just remember that you must work quickly, in case Sirius Black decides
to make use of the place and tightens the protections. Additionally,” he
addressed to both of them, “it is time for you to gather any rumors or other
information regarding my other self’s location.”
With that, and with a careless flick of his hand, Tom dismissed the other man,
who immediately executed a perfect bow and turned to leave the room despite his
tremendous curiosity. As soon as he’d gone, Tom turned his attention to Malfoy.
He had considered humiliating Lucius in front of his fellow Death Eater, but
ultimately he had concluded that Lucius would not be anywhere near as effective
at his job if he wasn’t respected by his fellows, and furthermore a humiliated
Lucius was likely not a productive Lucius. Just like a frightened Draco was not
a productive Draco. These Malfoys really were a horribly sensitive lot.
“Of course I do not trust you to work with your wife, Lucius,” he told the
blond man mockingly. “I barely trust that the two of you aren’t conspiring to
betray me when you’re alone here at the manor, even when I know that the only
thing on your mind is to fuck her.”
Lucius flushed in mingled embarrassment and anger, but he smartly did not
protest what Tom had said. Although it clearly cost him dearly, he managed to
mutter, “I understand, My Lord.”
“Of course you do,” said Tom, who somehow managed to keep his expression
neutral and straight. “Now, I find that I need you to ensure that Draco will be
able to leave the school for a visit, and the sooner the better.”
“Draco, My Lord?”
Tom began to idly twirl his wand again. “Yes. The reason for the visit is
irrelevant—to go over his testimony with the barrister, for a final check of
his wounds by his Healers, or whatever else you come up with, it matters not to
me—but I need to see him as soon as possible.”
Lucius, clearly displeased, pursed his lips together and nonetheless attempted
a neutral tone. “May I ask why, My Lord? Draco has already missed more school
than he ought to have.”
“You may not,” Tom informed him harshly. “Have the visit take place on a
weekend for all I care, Lucius, but I will see him.”
The apprehension and discomfort that cloaked Malfoy like a death shroud went a
long way towards lightening Tom’s mood. For that reason alone, he had
absolutely no intention of informing Lucius that the only reason he needed to
see Draco was so that the boy could deliver a package to him. Not that he would
have informed Lucius of his purpose in the absence of such entertainment value,
given that the last time the older Malfoys had been directly involved in his
plan to obtain one of the Horcruxes, it had been spectacularly thwarted.
===============================================================================
As Tom removed the locket from around his neck and replaced the ring on his
finger, he steeled himself for a confrontation the likes of which he had never
experienced before. He could feel the malevolent rage pouring off of the ring
as if it were a tangible thing in his bedroom with him, and he knew that it did
not bode well for his meeting with the Horcrux.
Indeed, almost as soon as his bare feet came into contact with the long, cool
grass of the Little Hangleton graveyard, the Horcrux dug his fingers into Tom’s
upper arms with such force that he was sure he would have been severely bruised
if it had happened outside of their minds. And if his body were more than a
magical construction for no other purpose than to house his soul.
“Did you enjoy your meeting without me?” demanded the Horcrux harshly. “I
suppose he’s more to your liking, since he knows more about Lord Voldemort’s
plans than I do.”
Tom reached up and began to straighten the Horcrux’s clothes as if nothing at
all were the matter.
“The locket?” he asked nonchalantly. “Of course not. He treated me like a
child.”
That seemed to stymie the Horcrux, and he exhaled a surprised breath, although
he didn’t release his death grip on Tom’s arms.
Tom allowed an exasperated expression to cross briefly over his face. “I just
thought it would be better if he didn’t suddenly have two of us interrogating
him. Honestly, stop being so paranoid.”
“Paranoid?” echoed the Horcrux, clearly offended. He took a step closer until
their noses were a hairsbreadth from pressing together. “You. Are. Mine. You
are not to be without me again.”
Internally, Tom wanted to shove his other self away and inform him that if
anybody owned anyone else, then clearly he owned the Horcrux. After all, he
wore the Horcrux like an ornament on his finger, not the other way around.
Externally, he kept his expression the same and curled his arms around the
Horcrux’s waist, leaning forward the short distance between them to press a
somewhat less-than-chaste kiss to the other boy’s pursed lips.
“I don’t want to be without you, Tom.”
It was the first time he had ever called the Horcrux by name, and it apparently
had a profound effect. The Horcrux smashed their lips together violently and
released his arms only long enough to tangle one hand in Tom's hair and wrap
the other around his hips to grab a handful of his ass. Tom allowed a moan to
escape from somewhere deep inside him and opened his mouth willingly to the
invasion. He had long since known what he would have to do to complete this
ruse, and he had suspected even before putting the ring back on his finger that
now would be the time it was expected of him. After all, the Horcrux’s anger
and feelings of possession could only have led them to one result.
Their clothes were removed in a flurry of ripping fabric and dangerously
imprecise Vanishing Charms, and Tom did his best to lose himself in the moment
and not let his reluctance become obvious as the Horcrux’s cold hands explored
his bare skin. Only after the Horcrux had released Tom’s nipple from between
his teeth and forcefully shoved Tom over onto his stomach did Tom allow his
mask of lust to slip off his face. He crossed his arms underneath his head and
buried himself face down in them so that the Horcrux couldn’t see his
expression, but he allowed his body to be manipulated further and did his best
to stay relaxed and seemingly willing.
He didn’t flinch at the whisper of magic against that one part of his body that
had never been touched. Not even when the Horcrux’s icy fingers pressed inside
of him more roughly than he would have liked—if he’d admitted to any preference
at all regarding such matters—did he allow himself to tense or struggle against
the intrusion. He had long since prepared himself mentally, and what good was
his body if not to submit to his own ironclad will?
If his will was that he submit his body physically to the Horcrux, well then,
he would just have to hold it together until a more appropriate time to rebel.
It felt strange to have cold, long fingers forced inside of him, although the
lubrication spell the Horcrux had been kind enough to provide eased the way. It
couldn't protect him from the uncomfortable pain when the Horcrux added another
finger and spread them apart, forcing Tom's tight muscles to stretch and give
way.
"You heal almost as soon as I can stretch your ass open," informed the Horcrux,
his dirty words matched only by his filthy tone. "I'm sure this will hurt you
more than I'd thought, but I can't say I'm not glad--you'll have the
tightest hole I've ever fucked."
He punctuated his words with a rough jab of all three fingers inside at once,
and they made a horrible squelching noise as he removed them and thrust them
inside again. Tom couldn't blame him for being aroused by the whole thing, as
he had found such things incredibly arousing when he had taken Rastaban
Lestrange and his other male lovers, but he felt very differently about it when
he was the one being subjected to such treatment. He could feel the Horcrux's
hard cock brushing against the back of one of his thighs, and he had to fight
not to tense up.
Then one of the Horcrux’s hands gripped his hip roughly, and the other ghosted
up his spine, leaving a trail of lubrication that had been heated by Tom's own
body in its wake, until the fingers spread, large and cool, between his
shoulder blades and shoved his upper body more firmly into the ground. Despite
his valiant efforts, Tom couldn’t stay completely still, and he unfolded one of
his arms and reached back blindly until he came into contact with the smooth
skin and soft hair of the Horcrux’s thigh. The muscles flexed underneath his
fingers as Tom felt the large, blunt head of the Horcrux’s cock get situated
tightly against the cleft of his ass, not yet breaching him but pressing firmly
against the natural resistance of his body. He breathed in deeply through his
nose, concentrating on the sweet scent of earth and magic and death, and the
feeling of the long grass tickling his nostrils and upper lip.
But he kept his eyes open. He was not weak, and he would not scrunch his eyes
closed like he had seen Rastaban and his few other conquests do.
When the Horcrux finally pushed inside him, the large head popping inside and
making them both groan for different reasons, it was without much fuss and with
less pain than Tom had anticipated. Of course, he had experienced the
excruciating, soul-wrenching, seemingly never-ending pain of being torn away
from the rest of his soul and magically encapsulated in a diary, and he had
purposefully burned and cut and maimed himself in the name of research, so he
really ought not to have been surprised that the pain of having a dick shoved
roughly up his ass was nothing he couldn’t handle.
His reluctance was all psychological, nothing more.
“Mmm, yes, it is,” the Horcrux said hoarsely as he sharply adjusted his hips,
and Tom realized that he had allowed his mental barriers to fall enough that
his surface thoughts were clearly readable. He slammed the gates of his mind as
tightly closed as he could manage, glad that he’d realized it before the
Horcrux had been able to read anything deeper and much more dangerous.
It was difficult, though, to keep his mind closed when his body burned with the
dull ache of his constantly-healing muscles being stretched almost anew every
time the Horcrux withdrew and slammed back in violently, or when he began to
feel a frisson of pleasure from someplace inside him whenever the Horcrux
roughly rubbed against it with every thrust.
Almost unconsciously, he shifted his hips to seek out more of that feeling, and
a ragged moan escaped unbidden from his throat when on the next inward thrust
the Horcrux seemed to connect with some magical center of pleasure that he’d
never quite believed existed even when Rastaban had begged him to fuck that one
spot harder, faster, more please.
The Horcrux laughed, and without being able to see his expression, Tom couldn’t
tell if it was more out of delight or cruelty.
“Shut up!” demanded Tom, and the Horcrux laughed again.
But Tom didn’t have the mental wherewithal to protest again as the Horcrux let
his magic radiate off of his body, and the exquisite mixture of pain and
pleasure was too much for Tom to handle. Merlin, the magic… It felt like the
addictive bliss he had experienced when Voldemort’s curse on the ring had
interacted with his own magic, except that now the magic was physically inside
of him and battering against every shred of resistance he had as the Horcrux
rhythmically pounded away at his tender body.
“Yes, yesssss…” he hissed, slipping into Parseltongue quite without his own say
so.
He released his own magic, partly because he wanted to and partly because he
couldn’t hold it in anymore, and felt the crackle of it over his body like
electricity. The Horcrux nearly screamed and came to a halt halfway inside of
Tom, his entire body shivering and sparking with magic as he collapsed against
Tom’s back. Tom felt the heavy cock inside of him twitch and the tight muscles
of the Horcrux's thigh contract and release in an uncontrollable spasm.
Tom hissed again and pressed back against the Horcrux until the globes of his
ass were pressed tightly against the Horcrux's sharp hip bones and he'd taken
as much of the Horcrux's dick inside of himself as possible. Merlin, the magic
felt amazing that deep in his body, and he couldn't even bring himself to feel
ashamed of the way he was rutting when it felt so good. Using his hand, still
wrapped around the Horcrux’s thigh, he tried to spur him on.
“Don’t stop, you idiot!”
The Horcrux groaned again and choked out, also in Parseltongue, “I won’t.”
Tom would have had something more to say, except that their mutual moans and
sighs as their magic mingled over and through them was more than enough to
express how he thought it felt. It hurt, but in such an exquisite way, like
shocks of magical electricity stimulating his body from both the outside and
within, and he couldn’t have maintained control now any more than he’d been
able to maintain control when he had been writhing on the floor of the library
in Malfoy Manor. The Horcrux was seemingly experiencing the same thing, because
his formerly controlled movements, calculated to hurt and humiliate and possess
Tom, were now erratic and calculated to do nothing more than ensure his own
pleasure. Which fortunately also insured Tom’s, so he wasn’t complaining, even
though under any other circumstances he probably would have felt humiliated by
the way the Horcrux’s cold, clammy skin slid erotically against his own slick,
hot back and the Horcrux’s balls slapped noisily against his own every time he
slammed harshly inside.
In the part of his mind that could still process anything beyond their mingled
pleasure and pain, he was actually horrified by the freezing cold spurt of cum
deep inside of him and the Horcrux’s groan of possessive satisfaction against
his ear. But then the Horcrux gripped Tom’s cock roughly with magic-sparked
fingers, and he was able to fully lose himself in the combination of the cool
touch and powerful energy. He allowed himself to find his own
release, completely losing any semblance of control in the overload of
sensations his entire body was experiencing.
He was never able to come back down to earth, as it were, before his mind was
viciously invaded and he felt, for the second time in his life, the beginnings
of his soul being torn away from his body.
Chapter End Notes
     Uh oh.
     As always, I deeply appreciate your comments, bookmarks, and kudos.
     They make me feel very guilty for not being able to post a new
     chapter every single day, but they also make me work on this story
     even when I don't really have the time.
***** Clarity *****
Chapter Summary
     Secrets are revealed and information is exchanged.
"You must learn to forgive yourself, my lady," Tom told the young woman,
carefully crafting his voice to reflect the perfect amount of sympathy and
knowing.
"Forgive myself?" she demanded in a hard voice that was at least an octave
higher than usual. "How could I forgive myself, after what has happened?"
Tom took a step closer and raised his hands as if he were going to hold hers.
He paused within inches of touching her, of course, and under her sharp gaze he
allowed his cheeks to color and a small, sad smile to pass over his handsome
lips. When he spoke, his voice was full of longing and regret. "You mustn't
conflate the two events. Yes, you were wrong to take what was not yours, but
your desires were perfectly understandable. Your mother understood, and she
forgave you. None of that makes your death your fault."
Her full lips quivered under her strong, long nose, and Tom wondered if ghosts
could actually cry. She brought her spectral hands up to caress his, which were
still hovering uselessly where he had made a show of trying to comfort her
earlier, and he resisted the urge to shiver at the feeling. It felt like he'd
dunked his hands into the frozen lake outside.
At last, in a small voice, she asked, "Do you really think it was
understandable?"
"It is to me, at least," he asserted at once. "Other people—people without
natural talents like yours, my lady—would not understand. They would likely
call it selfish, but that is only because their minds can't grasp the
possibilities that motivated you."
"And you can," she said, a statement and not a question. She pulled her hands
away, and for a dreadful moment Tom thought that he had gone too far. Then she
smiled, just a small one that was still full of grief and regret, but all the
same was the first one he had ever managed to coax out of her in the long weeks
he'd been visiting her. "I always wondered why you wanted to find my mother's
diadem. I have heard about you around the school, you know, and I know that you
do not need the diadem to enhance your wisdom."
This time, the color rose unbidden to Tom's cheeks. He replied, "I cannot lie
to you and say that I am not curious about wearing it, but that is not why I
wanted to find it. I want to bring all of the Founders' creations back together
again, where they belong, and where they can benefit Hogwarts and everybody who
passes through these halls. Forgive me, my lady, I know that it is painful for
you, but surely you agree that they never should have been taken away from
here?"
It was only a half-truth, of course. Tom did want to bring all of the Founders'
objects back together again, but he wanted to do so for his own benefit and not
to reunite them at Hogwarts.
"It is painful, yes, but perhaps you are right that I ought to learn to start
forgiving myself," mused the ghost. "I think that having my mother's diadem
returned to Hogwarts would be a good first step."
"Helena, maybe I was wrong to ask. You don't have to—" Tom began to protest,
because he knew that she would respect him all the more if he did.
She interrupted him by placing her ice-cold hand on his cheek, although of
course it mostly went through him and made his face feel frostbitten. "No, you
were right to ask. My mother would have wanted her diadem returned to the
school that she worked so hard to build."
She paused for a moment, floating a few paces away. Once she had gathered
herself, Helena Ravenclaw looked at Tom Riddle with trust in her eyes and told
him what he wanted to know.
"The place I fled, with the magical, untamed forests that you so enjoyed in my
stories, was in southeastern Albania…."
===============================================================================
Tom pulled himself free of the memory with a deep inhalation of breath and
rolled his neck until it cracked and released the tension held there. The
locket Horcrux's mental faculties, including his memories, had been far too
corrupted for Tom to have gotten more than some brief glimpses, but the ring
Horcrux's mind had been more than well enough intact to fill in many of the
blanks. He exhaled the breath and opened his eyes. The Horcrux was sprawled
naked on top of their father's grave, where Tom had left him, and he was
staring up at Tom in a mixture of horror and incredible anger.
"Ah, Tom," he addressed the other boy mockingly, allowing a cruel smirk to curl
his lips, "I should have known that you would never have told me the whole
truth."
The Horcrux glared up at him in hatred. "You risked your body just to get
information out of me?"
"Of course not," Tom replied condescendingly. "I had to know whether you could
possess my body, because if you could then Lord Voldemort certainly could. In
that case it wouldn't have mattered whether you did it now or he did it later,
so I had nothing to lose. Although I was confident that I'm the stronger
between the two of us and could fight you off, even if it had turned out to be
possible in theory for you to possess me."
"So you've been planning this since the beginning." The Horcrux looked even
more furious than before. Tom knew that he was not taking it very well that he
had been played so perfectly.
Tom laughed, a true laugh from the center of his belly that echoed off all of
the headstones in the dark graveyard.
"Yes, of course," he said when he'd finished. "I realized right away that you
had no sense of the outside world, of what I was doing or of time or of
anything else, and so I used it to my advantage and all the while allowed you
to think that you were the one playing me."
The Horcrux exhaled sharply. "So there was never any attack, with the basilisk
venom?"
"No. I was just experimenting on you."
They stared at one another, Tom's grin stretching further across his face and
the anger in the Horcrux's eyes attempting to burn its way through him.
When he'd tired of the staring contest, Tom informed the Horcrux, "The only
thing left to decide now is whether I want to keep you for myself or give you
to Voldemort."
The Horcrux leapt to his feet, and Tom admired his body even as the Horcrux
stalked towards him. It was the height of vanity, he knew, but he couldn't get
over how well the Horcrux looked. Besides, there was absolutely nothing
threatening about a naked man with his bits dangling in the air. Or at least
there was nothing threatening about it to him, although he well remembered
Lucius Malfoy licking the floor at his feet when he'd been standing completely
nude in his room at Malfoy Manor.
The Horcrux stopped directly in front of Tom, trying to use his barely-there
height advantage to be more intimidating. "You said that you wanted to find the
Horcruxes so that you could hide them from Voldemort. Was that a lie, too?"
"No, that wasn't a lie," replied Tom, quite easily, "but I never said I wanted
to hide them, necessarily. And the more I've learned about my own reaction to
other Horcruxes, the more I think that I ought to just wear you all on my
person when I go to meet him. That way he can't destroy me without destroying
all of his Horcruxes at once."
Tom thought the way that the Horcrux's jaw clenched just the slightest amount
was very attractive. Perhaps he ought to stand in front of a mirror and
practice looking at his own facial expressions, as he'd done when he'd been a
boy and trying desperately to copy the emotions that were so important in
interacting with adults.
"What do you mean? What have you learned?"
Tom smiled cruelly. "Only that Voldemort lost more of his sanity and even more
of his appearance the more Horcruxes he made. Ifeel better—clearer,
stronger—when I have you and now the locket with me, so hopefully Voldemort's
mind will return to him at least partially due to being in close proximity with
me and the rest of you, and I can convince him that he ought not make any more
Horcruxes."
"You wouldn't honestly give one of us to him," the Horcrux declared, tilting
his head to consider Tom as if he were trying to work out a complex problem.
"It wouldn't be much of an insurance policy if you just handed one of us over."
Tom shrugged carelessly and pushed his hair out of his eyes. "I might hand over
one, if it helped him regain some of his sanity. I had thought I'd hand over
one of the later ones so that I could keep you for myself, since you're such
better company, but I'm not sure about that anymore."
"Surely they're better company, since they can offer you more information than
I can." The Horcrux sneered in displeasure. "You've already taken everything
you can from me."
"Interestingly enough his Horcruxes are a reflection of his decay. Take you,
for example." He paused long enough to see that the Horcrux's nostrils were
flaring, despite the fact that he didn't actually need to breathe. "You are
almost entirely normal in regards to your intelligence and, Merlin knows, your
looks. But your magic and your mental control just isn't at all there. I never
told you that when I was inside the diary, I could control my environment with
great precision. I wasn't stuck in the Chamber of Secrets at all, despite
having been created there, unlike how you are stuck in this filthy graveyard."
"You're lying" insisted the Horcrux, though Tom could tell that he didn't
really think so.
"No, not at all," he answered calmly. "Take the locket for another example. I
didn't even have to let himopen himself up by trying to invade my mind before I
was able to break through his mental shields and take everything I wanted from
him. Unfortunately he was quite insane and his memories weren't as clear as
yours. So yes, you're better company."
The Horcrux's sneer deepened, and Tom made a mental note, for future reference,
that his face really did not look either attractive or intimidating when he did
that. "So you didn't have to let him fuck you either?"
"I guess that means you don't want to continue our relationship. That's too
bad; since we're going to be stuck with each other anyway, you really ought to
get over this little incident and learn to take some pleasure in your
situation, Tommy."
The Horcrux's angry shouts were still ringing in his head when Tom collapsed
back against his bed in Malfoy Manor, laughing so hard that he nearly brought
himself to tears.
===============================================================================
The hearing of the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical
Creatures to determine the status of the hippogriff was nothing more than a
formality by the time it rolled around. Lucius had worked his magic so well
that he had actually managed to have the case heard directly by the Committee
for the Disposal of Dangerous Creatures instead of having to go through all of
the red tape, so their decision to dispose of the hippogriff was really just an
exercise in rubberstamping a foregone conclusion.
Still, Lucius reported that Hagrid had been a blubbering mess throughout the
proceedings, and the committee had been so hostile towards Dumbledore that the
man had actually appeared a bit taken aback.
"Even Amos Diggory was visibly angry about the situation," Lucius informed him
excitedly. He was quite a bit more animated than Tom had seen him in recent
months. "If even Diggory is this upset, then Dumbledore's image is more
tarnished than even I had dared to hope!"
Tom eyed him with slight annoyance. "Who is this Diggory?"
Lucius sat down heavily in his customary wingback chair across from Tom's. "I
apologize, My Lord. Diggory is a Light wizard who is fairly high in the
department. I believe that he will be the next head, and he would need to be
replaced if we were ever to take over the Ministry."
Tom let it slide that the nature of his comment had been in the hypothetical,
instead of saying when they took over the Ministry, but only because the news
Lucius had brought was so good and Mulciber chose that moment to join them in
the library. The older wizard had a wide grin on his face that made him look
somehow closer to the teenager Tom remembered than to the wizard in his sixties
that he truly was. He was wearing emerald green robes instead of his customary
black, with a vibrant silver waistcoat underneath that shimmered whenever it
caught the sunlight pouring in through the floor-to-ceiling windows along the
far wall of the Malfoy library.
"I hoped to find you both here," he said jovially as soon as he was close
enough that he didn't have to shout. "I've just come from lunch with several
members of the school board, and I thought it was time to celebrate."
He produced a bottle of Blishen's Firewhisky from thin air and presented it to
Lucius, who only spent a few seconds inspecting the label before he nodded in
approval and conjured three tumblers.
"None for our lord, Lucius!" exclaimed Mulciber, and although it was perfectly
true that Tom had never enjoyed alcohol, he wasn't entirely sure whether he
ought to appreciate Mulciber's interference or be insulted by it. Then Mulciber
produced a glass bottle with a cork and no label. Tom could see the
condensation forming on the outside of the glass, indicating that the contents
were being kept cold. Mulciber bowed to him completely properly, although he
still had a smile covering his face. "I know you always hated how the other
boys would tease you about it, but I hope you take this gift in the spirit I
intend it, My Lord. It's just as you like: only one teaspoon of syrup for every
pint of soda, no ice and only slightly chilled."
Tom took the bottle with delicate fingers and stared at it in shocked silence
for only a few seconds, but certainly long enough that his lack of reaction was
making Mulciber uncomfortable.
"You went to the Three Broomsticks for this?" he asked softly.
Mulciber looked at him hopefully. "Of course, My Lord. Rastaban was planning to
give you some to celebrate his success at Gringotts. Since he, er… couldn't
fulfil that desire, I thought that I would do it now."
"Thank you, Mulciber," Tom finally replied, although he made sure to keep his
voice harsh and immediately followed it up with an order. "Pour it for me."
He reflected that there were some definite benefits to working with men who had
known him when he had still been the schoolboy Tom Riddle who had a not-so-
secret addiction to the Three Broomsticks' cherry soda. Men like Lestrange and
Mulciber remembered what had made him great before his other self had eroded
his mind and body beyond recognition, and he knew that they were excited for
another chance to wipe the slate clean and begin anew from the beginning.
(Well, at least that's how Rastaban had felt before he'd been carted off to
Azkaban. Hopefully he would still feel the same when Tom managed to free him.)
Mulciber's thoughts were so optimistic, in fact, that Tom thought he was
probably more confident than Tom himself in his ability to work together with
Lord Voldemort and forge something new and even stronger than before.
Tom sipped his slightly chilled cherry soda as he watched Richard and Lucius
toast to a job well done.
"What did the other governors have to say?" he asked once his followers had sat
back to enjoy their whisky.
Mulciber grinned again. "Those who were already on our side have become even
surer in their belief that Dumbledore must be removed from the school, but it
is our success with the former Dumbledore apologists that we really ought to
celebrate. Hagrid's incompetent testimony and Dumbledore's weak non-
justifications of his half-giant have been enough to convince them that they've
been defending a headmaster who doesn't deserve it."
"I will officially file the personal injury lawsuit first thing tomorrow
morning," Lucius informed them, a pleased smirk covering his face. "I will work
closely with my barrister to ensure that we can bring all of Dumbledore's sins
out into the open during the testimony. We must be careful, of course, that he
isn't able to do anything to point the finger at me for last year's events."
"It would look bad for us if he were to round up all of the former board
members to testify that you'd blackmailed them, Malfoy," pointed out Mulciber
as he poured himself another glassful of whisky.
"Discredit the ones you can now, ahead of time," ordered Tom easily. "Kill the
rest."
Lucius ran his finger along the lip of his glass. "That will be our only
option, I fear. We must act before Dumbledore is able to gather any of their
testimony or list any of them as witnesses. Belby ought to be easy enough to
control; it would just take the slightest slip of the tongue for the Ministry
to realize that he doesn't always deal his potions and regulated ingredients
strictly within the law. Some of the potions he sells come with automatic
minimum sentences in Azkaban, which ought to be enough to motivate him to see
things our way."
Mulciber offered a hard smile to show his approval of that suggestion.
"Indeed," he assented. "And I'm sure Bertie Higgs would be shattered if his
good friend Rufus Scrimgeour were forced to arrest his father Healer Higgs for
performing illegal abortions."
"Really?" asked Lucius, turning fully in his chair to face the older wizard,
and Tom could suddenly see a very strong resemblance to Draco. "How do you know
that?"
Mulciber shrugged. "I had an indiscretion with an unmarried witch once, before
I got so old. I don't know if he still performs them, but sixty years ago he
was more than happy to take my Galleons and get rid of the problem. Even if we
couldn't prove it, the damage to his reputation alone would ruin the family, so
I'm sure his son can be convinced not to testify on Dumbledore's behalf."
Lucius blinked a few times as if trying to take that in. Tom was amused that he
didn't blink at all when being asked to torture or even murder someone, but he
was apparently scandalized at the idea of illegal abortions.
"We will kill the rest and make it look like accidents," he decided. "The
others will surely know what's going on and will likely decide on their own not
to testify, but if not they can also be dealt with. I will handle it
personally."
He was looking forward to it, in fact. Malfoy and Mulciber had been such good
little servants lately that he hadn't had an opportunity to torture or kill
anyone as often as he'd have liked, and with Draco away at Hogwarts he couldn't
even play the psychological mind games he so enjoyed playing with the boy's
parents. The last person he'd tortured had been Narcissa Malfoy, but even she
had begun acting well enough around him that he couldn't strictly justify
torturing her. His wand hand tingled in anticipation.
===============================================================================
Draco had only been back to school for a couple of weeks when his personal
house-elf returned from Hogwarts to deliver his first missive to Tom. They had
decided that it was safer to correspond through the house-elf rather than
through owl, because there was currently not any way for Hogwarts to intercept
Draco's house-elf, or even to know about it.
     My Lord,
     The past few weeks have probably been the best I've ever had at this
     wretched school. Potter has been moping around and not even trying in
     classes, and I'm surprised every morning he shows up to breakfast
     that he hasn't just gotten it all over with and tossed himself off
     Gryffindor Tower the night before. Wouldn't that be grand? It isn't
     as if he ever eats anyway, so I don't know why he bothers coming to
     the Great Hall. I think that Longbottom has tried to be his friend,
     but Potter isn't very responsive from what I can tell.
     Today in Potions, Professor Snape yelled at him for not paying
     attention in class and melting his cauldron so badly that we had to
     evacuate the classroom. Longbottom, who was sitting next to him,
     actually passed out from the fumes and had to be dragged out of the
     room by those other two Gryffindor idiots, whatever their names are.
     I don't know why they couldn't have just levitated him—honestly,
     that's Muggle influence for you! Professor Snape had barely given him
     a detention and told him that he had to start paying attention before
     Potter started screaming at him like a raving lunatic.
     I think maybe he is a raving lunatic. It'd be great except that it
     isn't any fun to rile him up anymore. Come to think of it, the only
     thing I miss about Weasel and the Mudblood is how easy it was to rile
     them up.
     The last time the Dementors got close to him, he fainted dead away. I
     think I forgot to tell you about that after the hippogriff incident.
     Father told me that it's going to be executed and that I'm to come
     home soon to meet with the attorney about a personal lawsuit. That
     oaf Hagrid has been inconsolable; he's barely even teaching his
     classes anymore, not that he was ever competent at teaching them in
     the first place. I hope that you and Father get him sacked sooner
     rather than later. I don't need an Owl in Care of Magical Creatures,
     but it would be quite embarrassing if I weren't able to get one.
     With the Mudblood gone, I'm the top in all of my classes now. I just
     wish that I'd been able to prove that I'm better than her instead of
     her just disappearing. Anybody can repeat what they've read in a
     book, but I am certain that she would have started to fall behind now
     that we're older and expected to do more practical spell work. I can
     already do basic non-verbal magic! What could that stupid Mudblood do
     besides recite lines?
     I have to go to detention now, because Professor McGonagall caught me
     making fun of Potter for not being able to complete his homework
     without his Mudblood's help. Stupid bitch. I hope you remove her just
     like you're going to remove Dumbledore.
     Draco
After Tom sorted through the nonsense to get to the meat of what Draco was
telling him, he was very pleased with the report. So Potter wasn't eating,
wasn't doing his work, and wasn't speaking to his fellow Gryffindors? He was
happy to hear that the boy was handling things so poorly. He sounded quite
depressed, which is of course just what Tom would want to for him, if he had to
be alive. He did hope that Potter didn't fling himself from any towers, though,
if only because Tom wanted to kill him personally.
He would have to instruct Lucius to investigate Draco's claims that Hagrid was
doing his job even more poorly than before. If they could have the oaf removed
for cause even before the upcoming trial, then that would make Dumbledore's
decision to hire him in the first place, and not to decide himself to remove
him from his teaching post, look even worse for the old goat.
Tom would have really loved to have told the Granger girl all about Draco's
letter, but he was too far along in his plan for her to do something like that
now. It would only turn her away from him.
Today she was hunched over the kitchen table scribbling notes about a book that
was at least twice as thick as her own arm. Tom was sure to make enough noise
when he entered the cabin that she took note of his presence, since she still
hadn't shown any greater talent at magic than before. She looked towards the
door, as if anybody else would have been entering the cabin and she had to
check, but she blushed when she caught sight of him and turned quickly back to
her work.
"Working hard, I see," he said levelly, neither raising his voice nor speaking
too softly. "I hope that this time you will try to report what you read without
inserting your own commentary. I have no need for your opinion."
"Of course." She didn't turn to look at him, but she had stopped writing. "I'm
sorry."
Tom didn't grace her with another comment but instead left the kitchen through
the small door leading towards the bedroom area. The bed was unmade, and he was
somewhat surprised that Granger wasn't a habitual bed maker, but not enough to
think on it for more than a fleeting second as he passed through the bedroom
and towards the walk-in closet that still housed her filthy Muggle parents.
She crashed through the doorway after him, her growing curls flying around her
face and partially obscuring her panicked brown eyes. "What are you doing?"
Tom paused and cocked his head to consider her, arranging his face into a
quizzical mask. "Did I not promise that I would allow your parents out of their
little closet if you proved that you could perform your task to my
satisfaction? If you have changed your mind—"
"NO!" she cried at once, and when he lowered his hand from the doorknob and
frowned in disapproval at her interruption, she sucked in a breath and tried
again. "I mean, no, please, My… My L—lord."
Tom allowed a pleased smirk to wind its way onto his lips.
"Good girl," he said as if speaking to a particularly troublesome, mentally
challenged dog. "You would make a wonderful follower, Granger, if you could
learn to embrace the things I can teach you instead of fighting them."
He could read in her thoughts that it was on the tip of her tongue to say that
she would never follow him even if her life depended on it, but the words never
passed her lips as she eyed his proximity to the closet door and realized that
it wasn't her life that depended on it but her parents' lives. Instead she
boldly looked him in the eyes and said, quite respectfully compared to her
racing thoughts, "I'm a Muggle-born."
"Really?" he asked wryly, his mouth curving into the grin that he knew she
liked so much.
She swallowed and studiously looked at his eyes and not his mouth. "I mean that
I thought you only let pure-bloods join you."
"Oh, that's not true at all," he informed her matter-of-factly. "Half-bloods
are welcome to join me, particularly those who have been raised in the magical
world and know how to appreciate it. I can make exceptions for particularly
exceptional Mudbloods. Take Potter's mother, for example, or you."
He could see that she was caught somewhere between shock at his revelation and
pride that he thought her exceptional, even though she was still quite
disgusted at the idea of becoming a Death Eater. Tom knew that she likely
wanted to sit him down in a chair somewhere and interrogate him about his
rules, his cause, and what he had meant by referencing Lily Potter, but he
thought that it would do her some good to stew in her questions for a while.
Accordingly, before she could get another word in edgewise, he pointed one long
finger at her and said, "If the Muggles interfere with the quality or quantity
of your work, I will lock them right back up and you will have no guarantee
that I'll ever let them back out again."
She nodded once to show that she understood, but he stood silently staring at
her and made no move towards the door. Finally, after so long that Tom thought
maybe she was stupid after all, she finally realized what he wanted.
In a small, defeated voice, she said, "Yes, My Lord."
He turned back towards the door and opened it wandlessly, because he knew how
fascinated she was by his control of wandless magic, which she had read in one
of her useless Hogwarts textbooks was impossible to control with any precision.
Tom thought that if he continued to play his cards right, he might yet be able
to steal her away from Potter completely and irrevocably.
***** The Hard Way *****
Chapter Summary
     Tom has to teach some people the hard way.
The little things about being alive (or close enough) pleased Tom the most. He
chose not to cast an Impervius Charm on himself as a light rain began to fall,
because he enjoyed the splatter of cool raindrops against his skin. The sound
of his shoes against the paving stones leading up to the nondescript two-story
house also sent a ripple of pleasure through his dark mind. Memories in diaries
couldn't click-clack against anything, or make any other noise at all for that
matter.
In the end it turned out that it was probably a good choice not to repel the
water from his body, because he could see in Helen Higgs's mind as the woman
peered through her peephole that the wet hair sticking to his forehead made him
look even younger and less threatening than usual. She opened the door without
much more thought than that, and Tom smiled shyly to perfect his vulnerable
look.
"Good evening, madam. Is Mr. Albert Higgs home? I've a delivery for his hands
only."
Whether it was simply a common request or Tom just looked pathetic enough not
to qualify as a danger, he wasn't quite sure, but Mrs. Higgs smiled graciously.
"Oh, yes. You just come inside out of the rain, dear, and I'll fetch Mr. Higgs
for you."
She stood to the side, gesturing into her front hall with a hand that appeared
to be covered in flour. Tom stepped inside with a shy smile.
The Higgs home seemed rather typically middle-class to Tom's eyes, not that he
had much experience in homes outside of the orphanage, Malfoy Manor, and the
Slytherin dormitory, none of which were middle-class in the least. There was a
coat rack and an umbrella stand crowding into one corner of the cheery yellow
hallway, and several wizarding pictures of the Higgs family were displayed on
the walls. He could see a sitting room with an uncomfortable looking sofa off
to his left, and straight ahead he could just see into what appeared to be a
small dining room stuffed with a large table.
For a man who had significant political clout and many influential friends,
Bertie Higgs's home was completely unremarkable.
He heard Higgs stepping on a creaky floorboard before the man appeared around a
corner at the far end of the hall. He appeared to be of average height and
weight, with average features and plain brown hair. He was rather as
nondescript as his home.
Tom wondered briefly if the appearance of utter normalcy was somehow beneficial
in climbing the political ladder. Well, for other people anyway. Tom would just
take over by manipulation and sheer force, because he was incapable of
appearing normal for very long.
"Yes, what can I do for you?" asked Higgs.
He was using that strictly polite tone most people reserved for servers and
shop girls and other undesirable but unavoidable parts of life. Tom had grown
used to that tone being directed at him when he'd been nothing more than a
skinny orphan dressed in threadbare clothes.
He pushed his damp hair out of his face and stared at his victim with
unmistakable red eyes. "Oh, you can do a great many things for me, Bertie
Higgs."
Higgs let out an indistinct exclamation of shock and reached for his wand, but
Tom's silent, wandless spell upended him and sent him flying ass over head into
the wall behind him. Tom wouldn't have viewed the man as any sort of real
threat even if he hadn't been a Horcrux and virtually indestructible, so he
felt no compunction about turning his back on Higgs in order to open the front
door. He couldn't see anything, but he could hear his companions' thoughts
quite clearly, one filled with glee and the other with impatience.
He stared coolly at the empty space. "Come in."
Wet footsteps appeared on the hardwood floor moments before the door swung shut
again and Mulciber's head appeared floating in thin air, covered in his white
Death Eater mask.
"Thank you, My Lord," he said, eyeing the groaning man sprawled against the far
wall with a kind of sick pleasure.
Tom watched indifferently as he began to untangle himself from the Invisibility
Cloak.
"Next time remember to charm the bottom of your shoes as well," he admonished,
gesturing to the wet shoeprints leading from the door to where Mulciber was
standing. Tom couldn't see his reaction through the mask, so he quickly lost
interest and turned sharply to look at Lucius Malfoy, who was hanging his own
Invisibility Cloak neatly on the coat rack as if he planned to stay for tea.
"Bring the woman."
Malfoy paused almost imperceptibly; probably even Tom wouldn't have noticed it
if he hadn't been watching so closely and if he hadn't been able to read in
Malfoy's mind that he didn't appreciate being relegated to such a menial task.
But it was over nearly before it had begun, and Lucius turned to make his way
down the hallway.
"Don't use magic on anything except the woman," Tom reminded him before he
disappeared through the narrow doorway leading in the direction Mrs. Higgs had
disappeared. "Any magic you use on the house or an object will leave a trace."
Some sort of fire spell streaked towards Tom suddenly, and his attention turned
to Bertie as quickly as a striking snake. Mulciber cried out a too-late warning
from behind him, but Tom didn't bother to step out of the way. The spell burned
through his robes and scorched his skin, but with barely a flick of Tom's hand
it dissipated. He could feel his own anger mixing with the emotions of the
others in the room: Higgs's terror and Mulciber's anxious confusion.
Tom inhaled a deep breath that he didn't need and then released it, using the
expansion of his lungs and the relief of a long exhalation to calm his mind and
refocus solely on his objective.
"Ah, Bertie, this isn't the time for foolish bravery."
He watched without any flicker of an expression on his face as Higgs gaped in
horror at his healing skin. He gave his body a cursory glance as he reached out
to catch Higgs's wand and deposited it into his outer pocket. He could sense
Mulciber's surprise and confusion but didn't turn around to acknowledge him.
"In fact, you could have avoided all of this if you hadn't decided to be brave
in the first place."
The poor man seemed utterly unable to form either a coherent thought or a
coherent sentence. "You—I—I didn't think—"
"That is very clear, Bertie," interrupted Tom. "What sort of person would
respond to my offer by allowing his family's reputation to be ruined and his
father to be tossed into Azkaban? I heard that he's already died in prison,
Bertie. Not surprising at his age, I suppose."
"P—p—p—please…"
"Were you a Gryffindor, Bertie?" Tom went on, his tone light and
conversational. "I hate Gryffindors. What they call bravery, I call stupidity."
Higgs's eyes were glued to where Tom was reverently tracing the contours of
Potter's wand with his long fingers. "I—I—I didn't kn—know it was y—y—you."
"It's too late for excuses, Bertie. I've already roused myself and made the
trip, you see."
Lucius appeared then with Mrs. Higgs held at wand point in front of him. Her
entire front was covered with flour now, and judging from the white-speckled
state of Lucius's robes it seemed like she had put up something of a fight. Tom
could sense Mulciber's amusement at Lucius's appearance, but to the veteran
Death Eater's credit, he didn't make a single sound.
"Bring her to me," Tom said, his voice now calm but as cold and hard as ice.
He reveled in the way her eyes rolled wildly in their sockets, so dilated with
adrenaline that he could barely see the blue of her irises. Malfoy shoved her
to her knees at Tom's feet, just far enough out of reach that she couldn't
actually touch him. This is what he'd been missing: a human reduced to the
abject, mindless terror of a caged animal. His mind briefly flashed to an image
of another woman—a Muggle woman, slightly older than Helen Higgs but better
looking, staring up at him with wild eyes as she begged the grandson she'd
never known to forgive the sins of her family—but Mrs. Higgs's quite different
voice brought him back to the present.
"Please, whatever you want!" she pleaded. Her voice was much stronger than her
husband's, although her thoughts weren't any more coherent. "Whatever you want!
Please!"
Tom tilted his head in a way that he could see in her thoughts made him
strongly resemble a cobra staring down an enemy. He let his blood-red eyes bore
into her. "I was always going to take what I want."
"Please! Please!"
Tom Silenced her with a flick of his wrist, and she collapsed in despair,
falling back against Lucius's legs. He stepped back and briskly shook out his
robes as if he could remove her touch that way. Tom couldn't see his expression
through the ornate mask he was wearing, but he assumed that Malfoy was
scowling. Mrs. Higgs toppled the rest of the way onto the hardwood floor, but
she didn't seem to notice.
"Now, Bertie, do you see what your actions are costing your wife?" demanded
Tom, fighting to keep his tone the same despite his amusement at Lucius's
expense.
Higgs shifted as if to stand, although what he thought he could do to protect
his wife against two Death Eaters and the Dark Lord himself, Tom couldn't have
said.
Tom gestured to Mulciber, who was still standing behind him. "Hold him. Make
sure he watches."
Mulciber crossed the length of the hallway before Higgs managed to stand, but
the man still tried to throw his weight against Mulciber in some sort of feeble
tackle. It was all he had left, Tom supposed, since he didn't have a wand.
Richard's mind flickered with delight as he brought his heavy hand down hard on
Higg's shoulder, slamming him back into the wall with a sickening crunch. Higgs
moaned in pain both at the impact and at Mulciber's further manhandling. He was
soon facing Tom and his wife with one of Mulciber's hands wrapped tightly
around his throat and a wand pointed at his eyes so he couldn't close them or
direct his gaze away.
"At first I just wanted your cooperation on the simple matter of not testifying
on Dumbledore's behalf. It is such a simple thing, Bertie, that I cannot
understand your reaction," Tom explained as soon as he was happy with Higgs's
position. "I could just kill you for your lack of cooperation and have you
replaced, but I think I might like having a servant so close to Scrimgeour.
First, though, we must deal with your punishment for daring to raise your wand
against Lord Voldemort."
Tom brought up his own wand to force Mrs. Higgs to her knees in front of him.
She had tears and snot streaming down her face in equal measure, mixing with
the flour and creating a disgusting mess. Tom was certain that Lucius would
burn his robes later.
Higgs's voice was choked and strained due to Mulciber's grip on his throat, but
he managed to gasp out, "Please…"
"Which is your wand hand, Bertie?" continued Tom as if he hadn't heard. "It was
the right hand, wasn't it, that you raised against me?"
Helen Higgs's right arm extended out towards Tom, palm up, and the long sleeve
of her blouse magically rolled up to expose a lightly freckled forearm. She
stared up at him with bulging, fear-filled eyes and struggled to pull away. Of
course, all of her efforts were futile in the face of Tom's overwhelming magic.
"No! NO!" screamed Bertie, his voice escalating with every successive shriek.
"NONONONO!"
Tom Silenced him before he'd even fully turned to look at the man.
"Since you have proven that you care nothing for yourself or your own
reputation, I will have to punish dear Helen instead. You do care about your
wife, don't you?"
Higgs was screaming without making a sound and thrashing in Mulciber's grip,
until the Death Eater had to use magic to subdue him much like Tom had done to
the woman. Then Higgs could only sit silent and immobile as his wide, panicked
eyes were forced to fixate on the grisly spectacle at the other end of his
front hallway.
Tom smiled cruelly. "Ah, I see that you do care about her."
He unsilenced Mrs. Higgs before he began, because he wanted her husband to get
the complete experience of her being tortured for his mistakes. She began
shrieking immediately, not producing any discernible words but only long,
frightened screams that were muffled by the fact that she couldn't open her
mouth any wider than the half-formed word on which Tom had frozen her in place.
Still, somehow she managed to scream even louder when Tom made the first cut on
her arm.
He sliced just through her skin, avoiding the muscle and bone. He could have
just lopped the whole thing off in one go, of course, but he wanted to take the
process slowly so that her pain would be as great as possible and the sights
and sounds would have their greatest effect on her husband. There was a
delicate balance, though, between taking it so slowly that she could feel each
individual pain and going so slowly that she went into shock or otherwise
became somewhat numb to the full sensations.
Her blood flowed freely down her arm, thick and rich, and pooled onto the floor
between them as Tom cut through each layer of muscle and sinew and bone and
skin with surgical precision.
Mulciber's sadistic arousal as he watched permeated Tom's thoughts and almost
caused him to give into his own arousal. However, a Dark Lord simply did not
spring an erection while trying to maintain a serious demeanor and torture
middle-age witches, even if said Dark Lord was physically a teenager, so he
valiantly stamped down his reaction. Instead he concentrated on the feeling of
Dark magic surging through his body and out his fingertips into his wand, and
on the now hoarse screams of Helen Higgs.
Finally, just when his victim's voice was beginning to give out and Tom was
sure that she would have collapsed from shock and blood loss had she not been
held upright by his magic, he cast the final curse and watched as her forearm
fell to the floor between them with a horrid plop of finality. It landed in the
blood, which splashed outwards and splattered Mrs. Higg's whole front and the
bottoms of Tom's green robes and his black shoes.
Lucius, who had long since moved further away, leapt even further backwards to
make sure that he avoided the mess. Tom distantly reminded himself to have a
talk with the man about proper Death Eater decorum.
Tom turned to look at him with an unforgiving expression. "Make sure that she
doesn't bleed out."
He could sense Lucius's utmost reluctance to get anywhere near such a mess, but
the man stepped forward immediately and produced his wand from somewhere within
his voluminous robes. It wasn't his snakehead cane, of course, because that
would have been immediately identifiable, but rather it was his boyhood wand.
Tom only watched for a few moments as Malfoy examined the stump several inches
below Mrs. Higg's right elbow and then cast some sort of spell that made the
woman shriek briefly and then dissolve into inarticulate moans. A cauterizing
spell, Tom assumed. Tom's focus turned instead to Mr. Higgs, who was still
frozen in place by Mulciber's magic.
He traversed the hallway at a deliberately leisurely pace, allowing Higgs to
watch him coming and to take note of the trail of Mrs. Higgs's blood left in
his wake. Finally, when he was close enough to see the whites of the man's
bloodshot eyes, he demanded in a glacial tone, "His arm."
Mulciber didn't react for a handful of seconds, but soon enough he realized
what Tom meant and manipulated his spell so that Higgs's right arm was extended
in the same way his wife's had been before Tom had separated it from her body.
Higgs's eyes widened desperately, but he couldn't otherwise move or make a
sound.
"Now, now, Bertie, there's no need to fear," reassured Tom, although nobody
could have actually been reassured by his voice. "I told you that your wife was
taking the punishment in your stead. That's all done now, you see, so we can
move past such unpleasantness."
Higgs's mind was such a jumble of horror, disgust, and guilt that Tom could
barely make it all out, but nonetheless he could clearly feel the shocked anger
produced by that comment. He very nearly laughed under the combined weight of
his own and Mulciber's amusement.
"I could place you under the Imperius Curse, but I judge the risk too great
since your best friend is the Head of the Auror Office. You can do my bidding
without being placed under the curse, can't you, Bertie?"
Higgs couldn't move or speak, but his expressive eyes attempted to convey his
willingness to cooperate now that he was faced with Lord Voldemort himself.
"Crucio," Tom said calmly, as if he were saying hello. He held it for only a
few seconds before releasing it, and when he next spoke his voice was full of
mocking anger. "Of course you can't! I cut off your wife's arm, for Merlin's
sake! You mustn't lie to me, Bertie, because I can see everything in your mind,
and you only make me have to punish you."
Bertie stared up at him, silent and frozen.
Tom pressed Potter's wand harshly into the tanned flesh of the man's forearm.
"Fortunately, I know how to control you without resorting to the Imperius
Curse."
Bertie would have screamed, Tom was sure, if he'd been able. He had been sure
to push every bit of malevolence and Darkness into the magic that he could, so
he knew that it was at least as painful as the Cruciatus Curse. The man would
have screamed even without the pain, if his horror-filled eyes were any
indication of his reaction as he watched the terrible skull appear on his once-
pristine skin, quickly followed by the miniature likeness of the basilisk
slithering in and around it.
"My Death Eaters are quite upset that I gave you such an honor, Bertie. But
they understand your purpose. What would Auror Scrimgeour say, I wonder, if he
saw his best friend Bertie Higgs with a Dark Mark on his arm?"
It was not an actual Dark Mark, of course, because Tom was not Voldemort and
could not reproduce the Dark Mark. However, it was the very image of one except
tied to Tom instead of to his other self.
Tom let his lips stretch into a half-amused grin over his white teeth as he
read Bertie's thoughts. The man was still the consummate Gryffindor even after
the horrors he'd endured.
"Oh, Bertie, did you really think that I would leave your memory perfectly
intact for you to show your friend? You and dear Helen will remember every
second of tonight, but anyone else who looks will see only what I want them to
see. Namely, you coming to me willingly, and you inflicting that injury on your
wife with your own hands when she refused to do the same."
He motioned for Mulciber to release the man, and Higgs promptly sank to the
floor in defeat and misery.
"Good. I can see that we understand one another. You will carry out my orders
without question. If you make a mistake, then your wife will be punished on
your behalf. If you kill yourself or allow yourself to be captured, then I'm
sure I have at least one Death Eater who would love to torture and rape her
every day of the rest of her life. If she should die before I'm satisfied, then
your grandchildren will take her place. They're lovely children, from what I
can see in your family portraits."
"Y—you wouldn't—"
"Me? Oh, no, not personally. They're a bit young for my tastes." Tom turned his
head to look at Mulciber, and Higgs whipped around to stare at the unknown
Death Eater who had been his jailor throughout the entire ordeal. "But you like
to fuck helpless little girls, don't you?"
He knew that Mulciber was smiling behind his mask, although he couldn't see it.
"Until they can't squeal anymore, My Lord."
Tom smiled in return, presenting a gruesome parody of happiness.
"And when he's done with them, I will have them turned into werewolves before
returning them to your family."
He knew that he had ensured Bertie Higgs's cooperation long before his and
Mulciber's little game, but the utter adoration rolling off of Mulciber in
waves was well worth the diversion. Besides, one could never make too many
threats.
===============================================================================
Several weeks later, the preparations for Malfoy's lawsuit were well underway
and going as well as could be expected. The hippogriff was scheduled to be
executed in two weeks' time; apparently nobody had told Hagrid that he could
file an appeal, so there wasn't anything clogging up the works on that front.
Furthermore, there had turned out not to be any need for Lucius to investigate
Draco's claims about Hagrid's devolving classes, because one of the other
governors had already been told about it by her granddaughter, a sixth-year
Ravenclaw. That was the best outcome for Tom's plans, of course, because the
less Lucius and Mulciber were directly involved in things, the fewer suspicions
could arise.
Malfoy's barrister was happily surprised when he received the list of potential
witnesses from Dumbledore's barrister and saw how incredibly short it was. He
was a former Voldemort-sympathizer who had not quite attained the honor of the
Dark Mark before Voldemort's fall, and he had worked closely with the Malfoys
for several decades, so he was sure that Lucius had some nefarious hand in the
situation but was wise enough to pretend otherwise.
Tom could not think of the situation with Dumbledore's witnesses without
thinking of Mrs. Higgs's screams, the satisfying squelch of her severed arm as
it landed in the pool of her blood, and Mr. Higgs's stricken, bloodshot eyes.
And of the various other forays he'd made into the world of blackmail and
intimidation in the name of removing Dumbledore from power, none of which had
been anywhere near as satisfying as the Higgs incident.
Now, with the civil trial scheduled for less than a month away, the barrister
had arranged for Draco to come home for a weekend so that he and Dumbledore's
lawyer could take the boy's testimony. Given the circumstances and the fact
that Lucius presented his son as a traumatized minor, it was deemed unnecessary
for Draco to actually miss class to attend the trial.
Tom was only happy that Draco would finally deliver the package he'd been
waiting for months to get his hands on. In fact, he was barely able to contain
himself while Lucius and Narcissa greeted their son and held him in the parlor
talking after his arrival. Contain himself he had, though, because he hadn't
wanted the Malfoys to have any idea exactly what he had enlisted Draco to do.
Honestly, with the way Narcissa carried on, one would think that Draco had been
off at war for several years instead of at school for a few weeks. The more Tom
saw of how actual parents behaved, the happier he became that he hadn't had any
parents after all.
Finally, later that night after everybody else had gone to bed, he heard
Draco's distinctive footfalls against the stone floors outside the library
door. He nearly leapt from his chair and rushed the boy, but he managed to stay
seated and make a passable attempt at nonchalance as Draco crossed the room
towards him. He had a plain wooden box in his hands, which looked far too
ordinary for what Tom knew it contained.
Draco dropped to his knees beside Tom's long, outstretched legs. "Everything
went according to plan, My Lord."
Tom all but snatched the box out of his little follower's hands and threw open
the lid so violently that he was sure he had broken the hinge. There, nestled
in a dark green cushion that had clearly been transfigured out of one of
Draco's silk shirts, lay Ravenclaw's diadem. The intricate curves of the gold
pieces and the sheen of the sapphires were just as Tom had always imagined they
would be when he had looked at the painting of Rowena Ravenclaw that hung at
Hogwarts. The Dark magic and evil energy that were absolutely leaking out of
every surface of it were not exactly as he had imagined, but Tom had grown
quite used to it by now from handling so many Horcruxes.
He wondered vaguely if he had felt like that to others when he was in the
diary, or if he still felt like that now. Perhaps this was the aura he exuded
when he lost control of his anger and his magic, such as when he had realized
that the locket had been stolen?
Draco shifted beside him, his hand brushing softly against the outside of Tom's
thigh as the boy withdrew his now-empty arms, and Tom was pulled out of his
musings.
"You didn't try it on, Draco?"
"No, I—!" Draco began, but then he seemed to remember all at once that one
simply did not lie to the Dark Lord, and he bit his lip and looked down at his
own lap. "I mean, I did think about it. About what it would be like, I mean.
But you said not to, so I didn't really do it."
Tom inhaled sharply as he ran his finger along one sharp edge of the gold, and
the Dark magic curled around the digit and violently lashed out against him. So
this was Horcrux was not anywhere near as friendly as the ring, then.
"Yes, I know that you didn't wear it," he finally replied after what must have
seemed like forever to Draco. "If you had, you'd be cursed. Probably dead."
Draco's head shot up and his surprised eyes met Tom's. "You didn't tell me that
part!"
Tom narrowed his eyes, which was more than enough to reprimand Malfoy. The
blond ducked his head and mumbled a quiet but sincere apology.
"Should I have told you?" Tom asked, a slight challenge in his voice. "Was
there any real danger of you disobeying me?"
"Of course not!" insisted Draco, his earnest gray gaze rising again to flash at
Tom. Then his eyes widened and he immediately added, "My Lord."
Tom allowed himself to smirk. He would never admit it to anyone, but he had
come to miss Draco when he'd been away at school—just a bit, of course, and not
that it meant anything beyond that Tom was bored of constantly being around the
likes of Lucius and Richard.
He gestured to Draco's customary chair across from his. "Have a seat, Draco.
Tell me what you've been doing at Hogwarts. Is there anything you haven't been
able to put into your letters?"
As Draco rose from the rug and made his way to the large chair, Tom caught
glimpses in his mind of cruel pranks against Potter and nervous, nearly-chaste
first kisses with a girl Tom didn't recognize. But none of that was what Draco
chose to mention when his mind finally settled on a topic.
"I… Well, I…" Draco swallowed, and in the brief pause before he continued Tom
watched in his mind's eye as Draco ran his fingers over the spines of a row of
thin books in a particularly dusty stack in the Hogwarts library, clearly
looking for a particular volume. "I looked up your school records."
"I see," said Tom at once, because it was nearly an automatic response when he
didn't know quite what to say. "That is… interesting. What did you find?"
"Well, you were an exceptional student," replied Draco. "How did you have the
time to get twelve O.W.L.s? And eleven N.E.W.T.s! And all Outstandings!"
Tom, who actually didn't know any more about his school record after being put
into the diary than Draco had before looking him up, was quite gratified to
have that confirmed. He supposed that he really had dropped Muggle Studies at
the N.E.W.T. level, then, as he had been thinking about doing before being made
into a Horcrux.
"And you were the top student in all of your subjects, and there was a note
about your Award for Special Services to the School, although it didn't mention
what it was for, of course."
Tom grinned in genuine amusement. "No, of course not. There was no ceremony at
all, and I was told that I mustn't speak about it to anyone. Then my badge was
relegated to the furthest corner of the Trophy Room where probably nobody would
notice it. I wished more than once that they would have just given me the
badge; I would have had the gold melted down and made quite a bit of money from
it."
Draco laughed from deep within his belly.
"I—I—" he tried to say when he thought he'd controlled his laughter. He was
finally able to explain, "I moved it to the front of the trophy case, in front
of the badges Dumbledore had made up for Potter and the Weasel after last year.
The next time Potter has detention, he's sure to see it!"
Tom didn't think that it was anywhere near as amusing as Draco did—he doubted
that he had ever thought anything was as amusing as Draco did—but he was so
giddy about the retrieval of this last Horcrux and Draco's laughter was so
infectious that he allowed himself to smile.
***** Wheels in Motion *****
Chapter Summary
     No sooner does one plan show fruit than several more begin to sprout
     in Tom's mind.
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
Draco was scheduled to Floo back before classes on Monday morning. Narcissa had
insisted that he should stay home as long as possible ("They must not feed you
well enough at that school. You are much too thin!"), and Draco had been
perfectly willing to oblige. Tom suspected that his cooperative attitude had
more to do with Draco's luxurious private bedroom than with the quality of
Hogwarts' foodstuffs, which he personally remembered quite fondly. Still he was
surprised that Draco hadn't tried to get away from his overbearing mother
sooner.
Tom was sure that even if his mother had lived, he probably would have ended up
killing her eventually if she had been anything like Draco's mother.
Not that he was annoyed enough to give up the great fun he was having at
Narcissa's expense, of course.
He shot a humored smirk in her direction when Draco looked down at his plate,
but she barely had time to register his expression and begin to worry before
Tom said, "Draco, there will be no need for you to send me anymore letters this
year."
Draco's eyes, full of surprise and worry and quite a lot of hurt, shot up to
meet his across the wide expanse of the Malfoys' dining table.
"My Lord…" he began, with a notable hesitation, "were they not… helpful?"
"They were quite helpful." Tom kept his voice as bland as possible, but Draco
still lit up with pride, even mixed with confusion as it was. Tom took another
bite of sausage and chewed deliberately slowly. Draco managed not to blurt out
his questions while he waited, but Tom could tell that it was a close thing.
Finally, he said, "However, your mother has expressed some worry at you being
given assignments at your age. I find that I am inclined to listen to her and
keep you out of it until you're older."
Of course, Tom's pronouncement had nothing whatsoever to do with Narcissa
Malfoy's worries, which the woman knew, even if her son did not. After all, Tom
had very nearly killed her the last time she'd tried to keep her son away from
the Dark Lord. But even if she hadn't been able to figure out his end game in
lying yet, Draco's reaction made it immediately apparent.
"Mother!" hissed her son as he spun to glare at her. There was a look of such
undisguised fury on his face that even Tom was very slightly surprised.
For her part, Narcissa's expression was one of surprise and not a little anger.
She turned to look at Lucius, but of course her husband could no more offer
help against Tom than she could help herself. They both turned again to look at
their son. Tom knew that he had managed to both tie their hands and stir the
beginning of distrust and resentment in Draco's mind.
Finally, in a smooth, soothing tone, Lucius put in, "Now, my dear, I am sure
that Draco can handle writing a few letters. It does not put him in any danger
at all, I am sure."
Tom could see the ploy for what it was: Even if Draco no longer completely
trusted his mother, at least he might still trust Lucius if he seemed
supportive, and then at least one of them might still have some control over
their son's situation. Tom wasn't at all sure whether Narcissa would ever
forgive her husband for it, though.
Lucius shot a strained smiled at his wife and son from across the table.
"Surely we can allow him to perform this small service for our lord?"
Narcissa steadfastly avoided meeting either Tom's or Lucius's gaze, or even
looking in either of their directions at all. She smoothed her expression into
one of reconciliatory calm.
"Yes… Yes, I think that would be all right."
Before anyone else could respond, Lucius added, "There now, it is all settled.
But you cannot fault your mother for being worried about you, Draco. You are
our only child, and as much as you wish to grow up quickly, your mother and I
wish that you could stay young just a little longer."
Draco barely managed a nod in acknowledgement before he turned to look at Tom
with so much hope spread across his face that it would have been quite
sickening if it hadn't been exactly what Tom had been looking for. And it was
still a little sickening even then.
"Well, if your mother withdraws her objections," Tom said, twisting the knife
in Mrs. Malfoy's heart just once more, "then I expect your reports weekly, as
before."
"Yes, My Lord!"
Tom unfolded his long limbs gracefully from his chair and headed for the door.
Just before he exited the room, he turned back and saw the youngest Malfoy's
eyes still on him. He purposefully softened his expression just enough that
Draco was able to discern the change.
"Oh, yes . . ." he began thoughtfully, as if he hadn't planned it all along, "I
have some books that I would like you to study. You may come with me to the
library."
When Draco leapt up from the table and followed Tom out of the dining room
without a backwards glance at either of his parents, Tom and the Malfoys all
knew who was winning Draco's loyalty.
Later, after the littlest Malfoy had been packed off to school and Tom had
spent all day in the library, he paused outside of Lucius's study on his way
back towards his bedroom. The Malfoys were having an argument inside, and of
course he had no compunctions about listening at doors.
"What do you want me to do, Narcissa?" came Lucius's voice, raised and clearly
agitated.
"I want you to be a father to your son! For once!" she said not-at-all kindly.
His voice rose even further in response. "I am being a father to my son! I
cannot get rid the Dark Lord, not even this version of him! I am protecting
Draco the best I can under the circumstances!"
"It's your fault that this version of him even exists!" shrieked his wife. "You
released him into this world! You offered him your son's services!"
Tom was torn between barging into the room and Cruciating Narcissa Malfoy's
brain out of her nose, or staying where he was and listening further. He had
never allowed anyone to talk about him in that manner without punishment, and
he had no intention of starting now. However, in the end his curiosity won out
over his anger. He could dream up new ways to torture Narcissa later.
"I can't go back in time and change it!" defended Lucius, the edge in his voice
replaced now with defeat. "I would change what I did last year if I could—I
would go back and make it so that I never gave the Weasley girl that diary—but
I have to live in reality, Cissy. Even if Tom Riddle did not exist, You Know
Who still would. Draco cannot escape his father's fate, just like I could not
escape my father's fate. You knew that when you married me, and you knew that
when we conceived our son."
There was a pause, then Narcissa said coolly, "If I could go back and change
something, I would make it so that I'd never married a Death Eater or brought
an innocent baby into it."
She was so intent on storming out of her husband's study and on wiping away her
tears that she did not notice Tom standing a little ways down the corridor,
which was probably for the best. Tom would not have wanted to distract her from
such fresh misery.
===============================================================================
Lucius was still standoffish and sullen a week later when he led Mulciber into
Tom's study. Tom found it distantly amusing, but his patience was admittedly
beginning to wear a bit thin. Perhaps it wasn't exactly fair of him to
purposefully drive Malfoy to the edge of his tolerance and then get annoyed at
the results he'd caused, but what was the point of being a Dark Lord if he
couldn't be as capricious as he pleased?
"Mrs. Weasley's been committed!" crowed Mulciber almost as soon as he'd crossed
over the threshold, distracting Tom from his musings about Malfoy, who had now
gone from moping to barely able to contain himself.
"What?" exclaimed Lucius. "When did this happen? Why didn't someone tell me?"
Richard cast a glance at Tom, but when it became apparent that he wasn't going
to step in and curse either one of them for their disrespect, he turned back to
Malfoy with a cruel, elated grin. "I doubt that it's made the Ministry rounds
yet. It's all very hush-hush. I only heard so soon because the receptionists
were gossiping about it in front of me."
Lucius was nearly hysterical with laughter, and Tom figured that it had more to
do with him appreciating the opportunity to let loose and relieve some stress
than with him actually thinking it was that funny.
Of course, Tom himself couldn't really care any less about the Weasleys'
misfortune, except that it would surely hurt Potter to watch the woman reduced
so low because of Potter's own failure. He could tell that Potter was the type
to take everybody else's actions and misfortunes onto his own shoulders, even
when anybody else could objectively see that it wasn't his fault. Draco's
reports about the boy's apparent mental state only confirmed what he'd already
known.
"What about her clock?" he asked, the wheels turning in his mind. "I understand
that she carries it around with her constantly."
Mulciber pondered that train of thought for a moment and then shrugged. "She
must have it with her. I've never heard of her coming to the hospital without
it, not even for her hour-long sessions with the Mind Healer, so I can't
imagine that Weasley would have got her out of the house without it unless he
knocked her unconscious."
"She stills trusts it then? Unquestioningly?"
"Yes, My Lord," Richard replied, standing just a bit taller in anticipation for
whatever plan Tom was scheming.
Tom finally smiled.
"Excellent. Then I will need you to find out her precise location in the
hospital." He picked his wand up from the desk with deliberate movements.
"Unfortunately, neither of you has enough skill with charms for what I have in
mind, so I will have to go to St. Mungo's myself. Of course, neither of you can
be of any help with my other plan either. I find that you are both quite
useless to me of late."
He watched with barely contained amusement as they simultaneously reared
backwards in alarm as if the same puppet master controlled both their strings.
"My Lord, I am certain that I—we—can do whatever you require…."
Tom really hoped that Voldemort had never actually enjoyed such blatant ass-
kissing. Of course Tom wanted to be feared, but he'd prefer it if everybody's
reaction to terror was to keep their mouths shut, not to yammer away with empty
platitudes.
He shifted head ever so slightly and let his gaze fall directly on Malfoy. "As
reassuring as I am sure I find that, I need somebody slightly stupider than
either of you."
That didn't seem to reassure Malfoy at all, but Mulciber at least seemed to
recognize the glint of humor in his master's eyes. The tension in his shoulders
relaxed considerably, and he offered a small smile that was really nothing more
than a twitch at the sides of his mouth.
"Of course, My Lord."
Tom was honestly glad at times that he had someone around who remembered what
he had been like when he'd been human. Not that he would ever tell Mulciber any
such thing. He sat back in Abraxas's plush desk chair without acknowledging the
older man's words or expression.
"I know where Lord Voldemort is," he began, then paused long enough to watch
the mixed joy and surprise and fear that crossed over his followers' faces.
"Well, in any case, I know the general area where he is. What I need is someone
too stupid to figure out why I would send someone to Albania."
Lucius looked like he would have let his jaw fall open in horror and
astonishment if he hadn't endured a lifetime of training in proper pure-blood
comportment, and instead he had to settle for looking a bit like he'd sat on a
porcupine.
Mulciber was clearly torn between excitement and anxiety, but he managed to
recover himself first. He swallowed visibly and appeared to search for the
right words for a moment before asking, "My Lord… do you not want to… to find
him yourself?"
"I imagine that he would attack me on sight. That would not be very conducive
to the two of us forming any sort of working relationship." Tom had to consider
for a moment just what he wanted to share with the two Death Eaters, but his
thoughts were so rapid that he didn't pause long enough for either of them to
discern it. "He will possess the person who finds him, just as he did two years
ago, and he will pick apart every thought in his vessel's mind. His vessel will
simply have to know enough that Voldemort will be willing to form an alliance
instead of trying to kill me."
"And if he isn't?" blurted Malfoy.
He looked like he immediately regretted it, and Tom could hear Mulciber
thinking that he was curious of the answer but glad he hadn't been the one to
ask.
Tom frowned. "He will be. But if not, then you will just have to hope that I am
stronger than him."
In Malfoy's mind, images of Draco and the beginnings of dangerous thoughts
began to take shape.
"None of that, Lucius." The man's gray eyes shot up to meet Tom's red ones, and
Tom offered a smirk that contained more sadistic pleasure than anything else.
"Come now, do you really think that your son would be safer if Voldemort ended
me? I know you aren't that stupid. For that matter, neither would you—you
brought me back."
Really, if Lucius would just put the same creativity into being a good Death
Eater as he did into trying to get out of being one, then Tom doubted that he'd
really even need to try to get out of it.
"How about Goyle?" intervened Mulciber before Lucius could say or think
anything to provoke Tom even further. "He's an idiot; he wouldn't even question
why he'd been given the honor."
There was a pause before Lucius responded, but then he seemed to register what
Mulciber had said and broke his gaze away from Tom's to shoot an incredulous
glare at the older Death Eater. "Goyle? He probably wouldn't even understand
that he had been asked to do something."
"Crabbe then," said Mulciber.
It was settled quickly after that. Crabbe hadn't even been born when Tom had
last been alive, and Tom hadn't been in his presence for several seconds
altogether before he realized that he probably would have killed the man as a
teenager if he'd had to share so much as a common room with him. He could tell
solely from the man's thoughts that he was the absolute worst mix of pride and
stupidity. He was too big of an imbecile to be of much use at anything but had
an ego so large that he thought he could do pretty much everything.
And he clearly had no idea who Tom Riddle was.
He stomped into Abraxas's study behind Mulciber and, right after he mentally
calculated the worth of the whisky lined up on the sideboard, he wondered why
the hell there was a kid sitting behind Abraxas's desk.
Mulciber bowed sharply at the waist in deference, then straightened and turned
towards the enormous presence behind him. "This is Crabbe, My Lord."
Tom had been too overwhelmed by the events in the Chamber of Secrets and by all
of the sensations in his new body to have been able to fully appreciate
Lucius's reaction when he'd first figured out who Tom was. He didn't have that
problem with Crabbe. When the man's mind froze for several long seconds, Tom
smirked to himself in sick pleasure. When his mind started racing with a
mixture of disbelief and horror, Tom finally looked up from the notes he was
writing and let his eyes settle on the troll hulking in his doorway.
Tom would never get tired of the sheer terror he produced in others. Of course,
he wasn't stupid enough to think that he could rule or inspire loyalty by fear
alone, but it was good enough for dealing with Voldemort's followers.
"What is this?" Tom broke the silence, carefully measuring out the cadence of
his voice to imitate his older self. "Do you no longer respect your master
enough to bow?"
Crabbe stood gaping at him, frozen with shock and fear. Mulciber rolled his
eyes at the younger Death Eater but quickly stepped out of the line of fire,
crossing the study to sink down in his usual chair.
"When I learned that many of my Death Eaters, supposedly the most loyal and
dedicated of my followers, had claimed to be victims of the Imperius Curse
instead of proudly standing by me, I confess that I was . . . disappointed."
Crabbe made a sort of choking sound and was finally propelled into action. He
fell to his knees on the threshold and pressed his forehead very nearly to the
floor. "Master . . . Master, please . . ."
Tom cast a wandless Cruciatus Curse, and Crabbe's enormous body promptly
contracted and convulsed as he screamed.
Richard leaned over the arm of his chair to get a better look, while Lucius
flinched almost imperceptibly and tried to make the way he sat further back in
his seat look graceful. In large groups, Tom would have spoken the incantation
aloud; he had found that there was a powerful psychological effect when
onlookers actually heard an Unforgivable being cast. However, in such a small
setting, with only Malfoy and Mulciber as witnesses, he felt that it was better
to let Crabbe witness "Voldemort's" undiminished power. It was incredibly
difficult to cast Unforgivables even using the incantation, much less
nonverbally.
When the curse was finally lifted, Crabbe lay face down on the floor with his
legs sticking out into the hallway. Movement was obviously excruciating for
him, but he pulled his large arms under his body and hefted himself up with a
groan.
"My Lord . . . Master . . . Forgive me . . ."
"Forgive you?" echoed Tom, allowing a mocking incredulity to seep into his
voice. "Malfoy, do I forgive?"
Lucius jumped at being addressed. He jerked his head up to look at Tom,
steadily keeping his gaze off the large man on the floor of his absent father's
study. "No, My Lord."
"Should I make an exception for Crabbe, do you think?"
Malfoy swallowed, but his voice came out strong. "No, My Lord."
Tom turned back to Crabbe, who had managed to lift himself onto his haunches
but was visibly shivering from the curse.
"Well, you heard him. However, I do allow my followers to repay their debts.
Malfoy, for example, has given me his only son." Lucius jerked as if he'd been
struck, but he didn't make a sound, and Tom acted as if he hadn't seen. He
continued, "However, from what Draco tells me, your son would be a burden
rather than a boon."
If Crabbe had doubted even for a moment that the strikingly handsome young man
could be the Lord Voldemort he had known, all of his doubts were erased by
Tom's grandstanding and casual cruelty. Mulciber, Tom could tell, was highly
amused by the entire exchange, although he was doing his best to keep his face
straight. For his part, Tom was more impatient than amused, which made Crabbe's
next words all that much sweeter to him.
"Please, My Lord, I'll do anything!"
Tom allowed a monstrous smile to form on his full lips. "I do have something in
mind, something that will test your resolve and be of great use to me if you
succeed."
Crabbe's double chin quivered. "Anything, My Lord!"
"Very well," replied Tom, as if he'd had to seriously consider the matter. "I
left something that has great value to me in the depths of an Albanian forest.
The place is dangerous, corrupted by Dark magic that has likely attracted Dark
creatures, but if you can retrieve it for me then I will consider part of your
debt repaid."
Crabbe blinked slowly, and Tom fancied that he could almost see the wheels
attempting to turn among the cobwebs of the man's mind. "But . . . what is it?"
"A piece of myself, you could say," Tom told him. "I cannot tell you what form
it has taken or where it might be hidden exactly. Part of your task is to
identify it."
It was all bullshit, of course—Tom just needed Crabbe to get close enough for
Voldemort to possess him—but it seemed to satisfy Crabbe's curiosity. Or else
he was just too confused to come up with any more questions.
"This is very important, Crabbe. Pay very close attention so that you remember
what I've said exactly." Tom leaned forward in his chair and caught Crabbe's
dull brown eyes with his own glowing ones. "I do not want this . . . item to be
harmed. I want it here with me at Malfoy Manor. It is an integral component of
my future plans, and I will not be able to succeed without it. Your only job is
to get it here."
He wasn't sure that Crabbe took in the whole message, but it was undoubtedly
stored in his memory, and that was what was important. Voldemort would see it
and would hopefully be intrigued enough to come to Wiltshire peacefully, if
only to see what Tom had to say. And when he arrived . . . Tom would cross that
bridge when he came to it.
===============================================================================
The fact that Voldemort was likely to make an appearance at Malfoy Manor soon,
for good or ill, had Tom wearing the Horcruxes he could directly on his person.
If Voldemort did decide to attack him, he wouldn't be able to try to destroy
Tom without destroying three of his other Horcruxes as well. Tom was wearing
the locket around his neck and had the tiara tucked into the inside pocket of
his robes, but he had been putting off placing the ring back on his finger for
days.
He could protect himself from the Horcrux as long as he was in control of his
faculties, but he could not guarantee that he would always be in completely
control of his faculties. For example, Voldemort might try to possess him or
just attack him, and Tom did not want to find out how it would feel if the
Horcrux took the opportunity to attack him at the same time.
He knew that he could not be ripped out of his body—his vessel—by conventional
means, but certainly it was possible to do it by unconventional means. After
all, the diary had once been his vessel, and now it was not. The ring Horcrux
was pretty much mentally intact, so if it was possible for Tom to be ripped out
of his body then the ring was certainly capable of figuring out how. It wasn't
as if the Horcrux had anything else to do with his unlimited time.
On the other hand, the risk of not wearing the ring was even greater than the
risk of wearing it. Tom did not have Hufflepuff's Cup, so he was already down
one Horcrux. At the moment, he judged that the risk was much greater that
Voldemort would decide it was worth destroying three Horcruxes as long as he
had two (the ring and the cup) left, than that the ring would figure out a way
to harm him any time in the immediate future.
Tom still wasn't looking forward to facing the Horcrux, though. It wasn't that
he was afraid; he generally did not feel fear, with his near death in the
Chamber of Secrets being the only exception in his memory. It was just that he
didn't know what to expect, and he hated not being in control.
Finally, he decided that he couldn't justify waiting anymore, and after he had
settled himself into his luxurious bed he reached towards the ring on the
bedside table. He could feel the Horcrux's energy licking at his hand as he
drew closer to it, and when he finally ran one long finger over the cool metal,
magic sparked between them.
Sweet Salazar, Tom had forgotten how fantastic—orgasmic—the pain felt.
He allowed himself a groan and sunk bank into the pillows as he slid the
Horcrux onto his finger.
The Little Hangleton cemetery was the same as it had always been. The Angel of
Death guarded the elaborate graves of Tom's father and grandparents at the
highest point of the sloping graveyard. Below them on three sides were a maze
of other graves ranging from above-ground marble crypts to simple headstones
that had begun to sink into the ground. Up the hill and some distance away,
Riddle House loomed over the family's estate, which abutted the cemetery on one
side.
"You came back," said the Horcrux from behind Tom, where he seemed to have
appeared as if from thin air. "I thought you had taken what you wanted and
abandoned me back where you found me."
"Are those yew trees?" asked Tom.
He couldn't sense the Horcrux's surprise, as the other Tom had his senses as
closed as off as possible, but the long pause was a dead giveaway. Then, the
Horcrux only said, "What?"
"Those trees," Tom repeated, pointing at the small wooded area along the stone
wall at the graveyard's border, which he had only just noticed, "are they yew?
I can't tell from this distance."
The Horcrux seemed distinctly annoyed now.
"Yes, I think," he said more sharply than necessary. "What does that have to do
with anything?"
"Oh, nothing," Tom said easily. He finally turned to face this other version of
himself, meeting the dark eyes with his own, which he could not will to be red
while inside of the Horcrux's mindscape. "Yes, I came back. If Lord Voldemort
doesn't know that I exist and where I am now, then he will soon. I have to keep
you with me for added security."
The Horcrux nodded, but the look on his face was inscrutable. He took a step
backwards and hoisted himself up onto their grandfather's sarcophagus. Since he
hadn't been attacked yet and the Horcrux seemed as placid as Tom had ever seen
him, he figured that there wasn't any attack coming at the moment. He was sure
the Horcrux couldn't possibly be operating without some sort of plan, but he
would never figure out what it was if he resisted. The Horcrux would be wary
now and would not easily let himself be lulled into a false sense of security
again, but nonetheless the best option was to play along.
He followed suit and lifted himself onto the cool stone next to the Horcrux.
Their shoulders and knees bumped, but neither pulled away.
After several minutes of silence, the Horcrux said, "You don't have to come
here, even if you have to keep me on you. You could keep our minds entirely
separate if you wanted. You proved that last time."
"I could," acknowledged Tom, "but it takes a lot of effort and I would rather
you simply cooperated. I have much better things to focus on than you,
especially when you don't really have a choice, in the end, besides to accept
me, since nothing you can do will hurt me."
The last was a lie, of course. The Horcrux could certainly cause him pain, even
if he could not win their battles.
"I hate you," the Horcrux said flatly.
"I hate you, too," assured Tom.
The Horcrux snorted. "However, I do not want to be stuck here alone forever. I
thought you were never coming back, and it was worse than before because I know
now what it's like to have company."
They lapsed back into silence. Tom's eyes traveled back to the little copse of
trees at the property line. He measured the branches with his eyes and started
to firm up the plans that had begun to form in his mind, although he knew that
in the real world it was fifty years later and they had all grown out far
beyond what they were here in the Horcrux's memory.
Finally, the Horcrux asked, "So did you come to sit here or to fuck?"
A startled laugh escaped Tom's mouth before he could stop it. He knew that they
were never going to talk about their past or the current situation beyond what
had already been said. Tom—they—didn't work that way. If he had come here, he
supposed it could have been to fuck, even if he hadn't thought about it that
way when he'd made the decision to come. Certainly the Horcrux, if he was still
anything at all like Tom himself, might just be arrogant enough to believe that
Tom craved him enough to come back here for that.
And what the hell? If he had already sold his body once then he could do it
again. It wouldn't even be that difficult to fake desire, since it had felt
rather good in the end.
Instead of answering verbally, he leaned over and sealed his mouth against the
ice cold column of the Horcrux's neck.
Chapter End Notes
     Citation: Tom's conversation with Crabbe is inspired by his first
     conversation with the Death Eaters after he's resurrected, in GoF
     Chapter 33, "The Death Eaters."
      
     Author's Notes: I'm sorry for the major delay. Thank you to everybody
     who commented. I think that I replied to everybody, but I'm sorry if
     I missed anyone.
***** Means and Ends *****
Chapter Summary
     The means are just as important as the ends.
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
St. Mungo's had the same off-white walls and bland floor tiles as any other
hospital Tom had ever seen. He'd have thought that wizards would try to make it
a bit more inviting and bit less sterile.
It stirred up anger and helplessness in him that he'd thought were long since
forgotten. Tom had only been four, maybe five, the last time he'd been in a
Muggle hospital; he'd discovered shortly afterward that he could control his
magic, and he hadn't been vulnerable after that. He hadn't thought about it
since he was eleven and the Hogwarts nurse had fixed the bone that hadn't quite
healed properly under the substandard Muggle care the orphanage had been able
to afford him.
Now Tom could almost feel the ache in the wrist, like a phantom pain, and he
scowled for just a moment before wiping his expression blank again. He was here
to permanently drive Molly Weasley insane, not to relive moments of childhood
weakness.
He refocused on his surroundings. He didn't think that anybody would recognize
him, but there were bound to be a few Mediwizards or support staff members who
had known him as a student, so he couldn't be too careful. As a Horcrux, no
ordinary magic that was supposed to alter his vessel could take hold of
him—just like his diary had been protected from water damage when little Ginny
had thrown him into the toilet, his body now was protected from physical damage
as well. Unfortunately, Horcrux magic tended not to discriminate between things
like Burning Charms and Slicing Hexes, and things like Polyjuice Potion and
Transfigurations.
He was stuck doing things the Muggle way. He'd let his hair fall across his
forehead rather than arranging it properly, and he was wearing a Gryffindor-
scarlet sweater and keeping his face ducked down while he slouched his
shoulders. It was unlikely that anyone who had gone to school with hi would
recognize him, besides his own Knights, and anyone who did happen to notice him
would probably think, at most, that Tom Riddle must have somehow ended up with
a shy grandson after he'd fallen off the face of the earth fifty years ago.
And Draco had verified earlier that morning, during breakfast, that Dumbledore
had been at the school. It was unlikely that he would have left to visit St.
Mungo's since then.
All in all, Tom figured that his plan would go off without a hitch.
The wizarding world was even less equipped to deal with psychological maladies
than the Muggle world—that was probably why nobody had recognized anything odd
about Tom when he'd arrived from the orphanage, and why nobody had thought to
see to Harry Potter's mental wellbeing despite all he had experienced and his
frequent adventures that Tom could only assume were poorly executed suicide
attempts. As such, there was no wing or floor dedicated to psychiatric cases.
Mrs. Weasley had been placed on the fourth floor, in a double room next to the
Janice Thickey ward, which housed patients whose minds had been seriously
addled by spell damage. She had covered her side of the shared room in all
sorts of knitted things and homemade quilts, in case Tom needed another reason
to want to torture her and then kill her.
And hadn't she been from a good pureblood family before she'd married the blood
traitor? Tom had always striven to have better and more of everything, whether
he'd had to steal, cheat, lie, torture, or kill to get it. And Molly Prewett
had given up a relatively comfortable life and the chance to barter her pure
blood in marriage to someone who could have given her anything she wanted, just
so she could spend her life knitting tea cozies? It was unfathomable.
He could remember that poor Ginny had wanted more than her family had been able
to give her. She'd had the misfortune of dreaming about Harry Potter, of course
(not to mention the misfortune of trusting Tom), so she hadn't shown much
better judgment than her mother. Tom wondered whether any of her siblings had
similar aspirations of greatness and made a mental note to ask Draco about the
other Weasley children.
Molly was propped up in an uncomfortable looking chair just inside the door,
surrounded by yarn in various dull oranges and browns. He couldn't imagine
why—those colors did nothing for her hair or complexion, or anybody else's for
that matter. She took his sudden appearance in her room in stride, at least.
His deliberately boyish appearance did have that advantage. She tried to smile,
a pitiful thing that was brittle around the edges.
"Hello, dear. Are you here for poor Mrs. Nettles?" They both looked at the
woman in the bed on the far side of the room. Her head was lolling against her
pillow, and though her eyes were open she didn't seem to see anything. Molly
sighed and leaned forward to pat Tom's hand. "Well, I'm sure she would
appreciate it, dear, if she were in her right mind."
Tom thought that Molly Weasley had even less tact than Draco Malfoy, which was
rather sad given that she was actually trying to be comforting.
He struck like a snake, shooting his hand out to wrap his longer fingers around
her retreating wrist. She tried to gasp, but the breath seemed to get trapped
somewhere in her throat so that it came out as a sad, strangled kind of sound.
He leaned down so that he was level with her and caught her gaze in his.
"I'm here for you."
"For me?" she choked out.
Molly had once been a formidable woman; Tom had always gotten that impression
from Ginny's stories of her family, and he could see it now hidden somewhere in
the ruins of her half-broken mind. He was determined to trample on even the
ruins of anything she used to be.
He smiled.
"You see, Molly, you were the last thing your daughter thought about. She was
so sorry, and she wanted so badly for you to know that."
The woman made a strangled, wounded sound from the back of her throat. "Ginny?"
And then Tom was inside her mind, and everything that had happened with her
daughter was playing out with all the perfect detail of Tom's memory.
"Pansy Parkinson made fun of my secondhand robes today, and all the Slytherin
girls and even some of the Ravenclaws laughed. I was so ashamed, Tom!"
"No one's ever understood me like you, Tom."
A girl in a threadbare nightgown walked barefoot across the wet grass, the
moonlight catching the copper in her hair so that had somebody only looked they
would have seen her. But nobody saw her or heard her, and then her small hands
wrapped around the first rooster's throat and Tom knew he had complete control.
"Dear Tom, I think I'm losing my memory. There are rooster feathers all over my
robes and I don't know how they got there."
The Weasley girl had to lean up on her tiptoes and reach as high as she could
until her arms and stomach stretched uncomfortably with the effort, but she
managed to get the cat stuck up on the wall sconce above her head.
"There was another attack today and I don't know where I was. Tom, what am I
going to do? I think I'm going mad . . . I think I'm the one attacking
everyone, Tom!"
"It's you! It's always been you! What have you done to me?!"
"Why, Tom? Just stop, please… Tom, please. Why are you doing this to me?"
But even though she stopped writing in the diary—even though she wrapped it in
the old nightgown that had been covered in paint and shoved it down into the
deepest, darkest corner of her trunk and tried to forget about it—she couldn't
escape. She took the diary out of its hiding place and carried it with her,
holding it close to her chest with one arm while she used her other hand to
write the message of her own demise.
Her skeleton will lie in the Chamber forever.
"Wha—where—?" She looked around wildly, eyes growing wider with every passing
moment and every new stone she saw. She spun so quickly that she nearly lost
her balance, but she came up just short when she saw him. "Who are… Tom?"
Tom smiled for the first time in fifty years. Well, to be fair, it was the
first time he'd been corporeal at all for that long.
"Hello, Ginny."
She knew enough to be terrified but not enough to fear him as much as she
should. Or perhaps that was just her Gryffindor bravery. "Tom… why did you
bring me here? You have to let me go!"
"I can't do that," he replied evenly. He could feel her essence flowing slowly
but steadily into him from the connection he'd so carefully crafted between
them since over the long months. But it wasn't enough, not yet.
"Let me go! Please let me go! I won't tell anyone, I swear, just please let
me—"
"Oh, Gin," he said almost softly as he let his ghostly, partly corporeal
fingers grasp her shoulders, "I will never let you go."
She didn't have time to respond before he closed the distance between them and
pressed his icy mouth to her slack lips. He had not been at all certain that it
would work, but surely if that was how Dementors did it then there must be
something to the whole kissing thing. Fortunately, it seemed to come to him
almost naturally; he couldn't say now, looking back on it, exactly how he'd
done it, but he had felt her soul fluttering inside of her and had gathered it
to himself just as easily as he had always gathered his magic inside his own
body.
It was rather painful, actually. Seemingly more so for Tom than for Ginny.
When he finally couldn't take it anymore—seconds, minutes, maybe hours later—he
pulled back with a gasp that didn't quite catch in his half-formed lungs and
let her limp body fall to the Chamber floor. It wasn't complete, not yet. He
could still feel just the slightest tendrils connecting his soul to the girl's,
and connecting his body with the diary. But he could feel those connections
lessening with every passing second. Now he only had to wait for Harry Potter
to come, as he knew the boy would.
When Tom pulled back from Molly Weasley, her eyes were almost a perfect mirror
of how Ginny's had looked when the girl had realized that she was going to die.
He had been worried, at least on some level, that Molly would fight back or be
consumed with the need for revenge and regain some of her spark, and then he
would have had to change his whole plans around and he would have been quite
irritated. Fortunately everything went as he had hoped, and the woman sagged
bonelessly in her chair and stared forward with sightless eyes.
"Ginny…" she moaned. "Oh, my Ginny… Dead. Dead dead dead."
"Oh, Ginny isn't dead, Mrs. Weasley."
She gasped and her eyes seemed to regain their focus. They were full of such
hope and longing that it made Tom want to vomit. "Not… not dead?"
Tom took a seat on the footstool resting in front of Molly's chair, taking a
moment to situate himself comfortably and brush his hair out of his eyes before
he looked back into her face.
"No, not dead at all. Ginny can never die," he said matter-of-factly. Molly
leaned forward until they were only a half a foot apart, and Tom could smell
the mixture of Calming Draught and mint that lingered on her breath. She made a
wordless sound from the very center of herself, and Tom patted her knee kindly
and offered a sympathetic expression. "Of course she can't. I took her soul."
Molly screamed so loudly that it probably would have hurt Tom's ears had he
been human and not just a physical manifestation of a Horcrux inhabiting a
vessel created using the soul and magical essence of the woman's only daughter.
Undoubtedly the hospital staff would have come running had he not completely
shielded the room beforehand. Mrs. Nettles jolted in her bed, but her eyes were
no more lucid than they had been before.
Tom patted Molly's knee again while he carefully aimed his wand at her temple.
"Oh, sure," he continued calmly so that he had her full attention on himself
and not on what he was doing with his wand, "her body expired, what with it
lying in the Chamber for so long, but that hardly matters because it hadn't,
you know, had anything inside it." He chuckled once, then glanced up from the
clock to frown at her. "Well, even if you cannot appreciate what I am saying,
surely you can appreciate this."
He reached towards the table between her chair and her bed and picked up her
clock so that she could see. If it were possible, she went even paler than
before.
Tom set it back on the table from whence it had come and leaned back to admire
his handiwork. "Now it's more accurate, you see. Ginny isn't 'Dead,' but she is
in 'Eternal Torment.'"
Naturally he was making it all up as he went along. Tom knew not a thing about
souls other than that they could be used to make Horcruxes and to bring
Horcruxes back to some semblance of life. It was entirely likely that poor
little Ginny had ceased to exist when Tom had taken her soul, or that even if
she did exist it was not any form of conscious existence. But it all worked out
so much better if Molly spent the rest of her days seeing that her daughter was
in Eternal Torment.
Only Molly could see that on the clock, of course. It was just an illusion
created in her mind. In the same part of her mind, in fact, where his presence
and their entire conversation and everything he had shown her from his memories
were locked away so that nobody else would ever be able to find them except for
Molly herself, who would no doubt spend most of her time dwelling on them.
He couldn't have fiddled with the clock itself, because her friends or family
or Healers might have eventually noticed that it had been tampered with. But
her mind was already such a mess, and he was skilled enough at mind
manipulation, that he would be beyond surprised if anybody ever figured out
what had happened.
===============================================================================
The civil trial of Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy, on behalf of their son Draco,
against Rubeus Hagrid and Albus Dumbledore began on a chilly Tuesday morning in
the beginning of October. Tom wished desperately that he could go, but he knew
that it would be impossible to disguise himself well enough that Dumbledore
wouldn't recognize him, even in a crowded courtroom.
Being a Horcrux was a bit of a disadvantage sometimes after all.
Lucius assured him that it would be rather boring anyway. The trial was only
about whether Hagrid had been reckless in allowing third years to handle
hippogriffs, and whether Dumbledore had been negligent in hiring and
supervising Hagrid. The investigative hearings and possible criminal charges
would come later, after the Malfoys won this trial and set the stage for them.
Malfoy had carefully choreographed all of it for maximum effectiveness.
Tom spent a few hours in the library meticulously designing complex runes, but
at some point he had to acknowledge that he was too restless to trust himself
to do the job properly. He briefly considered going out and collecting a new
plaything—he was really missing his old Muggle one since he'd accidentally
killed it—but he decided that he wouldn't have time to properly enjoy it after
Voldemort showed up.
He was getting impatient to visit both Hogwarts and Diagon Alley, but it was
too dangerous to risk being discovered quite yet. Unlike St. Mungo's, he knew
that the school was full of people who would recognize him on sight. And there
was no point taking the risk in Diagon Alley when he hadn't even prepared all
of the materials he would need yet.
Finally, after exhausting all of the other appealing options, he found himself
entering the little cottage where he kept his pet Mudblood. It had been a
couple of weeks since he'd last visited her, and he hoped that she was feeling
even more forgiving towards him now that she'd had that long to spend with her
parents as they got used to the environment outside of the closet they'd been
imprisoned in for months. If Tom could just get the stage set for Voldemort to
make his entrance, then he knew he could easily hoodwink Potter's Mudblood into
trusting him, or maybe even more.
When he entered the cottage, the Grangers were seated around the table enjoying
a late lunch. The girl had stacked all of the books she wasn't working on in a
corner of the small sitting area, and the one she was reviewing and her
parchments had been carefully arranged at one end of the table so that the
family could gather around the other end.
Mrs. Granger reared backwards in her seat when she saw him, but she threw one
arm in front of her daughter as if that would do any good.
Tom supposed he would never understand any feeling as strong as the maternal
instinct that made a mother throw herself in front of her child even when she
knew it was hopeless. After all, his own mother hadn't even cared enough to
keep herself alive to meet him, so how could he be expected to feel or
understand any such bond?
Mr. Granger, who was facing away from the door, spun as he rose from his seat,
his chair clattering on the tiled floor behind him. The man's eyes burned with
unsuppressed fury, and his entire face was tense with the want to do something.
"Dad!" Hermione said sharply, before Tom had to decide whether it would
seriously injure his plans if he were to react to the man's aggression. "Daddy,
go into the other room."
Her parents clearly did not want to leave their daughter alone with Tom,
although he couldn't imagine why not. She'd been meeting him alone for months
now. He probably wasn't going to kill or anything today when he'd managed not
to do it so far. With only a raised eyebrow to show his mingled confusion and
amusement, he stood casually next to the door and watched as the Mudblood
frantically but firmly herded her parents into the home's single bedroom.
Finally, with one last reassurance that she would be safe, she pulled the
bedroom door closed and let out a sigh as she leaned her back against it.
"I'm honored that you feel safe with me," he told her, his tone quite serious
even if his eyes glinted with humor.
She squinted her eyes up at him from beneath her growing curls, weighing his
mood. After a few moments, she seemed to judge how far she could push him
today, and she said, "I feel secure in the knowledge that if you were going to
kill me, you would have done it already." She straightened and glanced
backwards at the bedroom door, where they both knew her parents were listening.
"Could you…?"
Tom shrugged easily and lifted his hand to magically give them privacy. She
really ought to have asked would he, but he was not of a mind to antagonize her
today, so he refrained from saying as much.
"It would be more accurate to say that if I currently had a good reason to kill
you, I would have already acted on it," he informed her. "For the moment, you
are worth more alive."
At the beginning of her captivity, the Mudblood undoubtedly would have been
terribly riled by that comment and it would have set Tom's plans back. Now she
accepted it for the bald statement of fact it was and appeared unaffected as
she crossed the narrow space and sunk down onto the loveseat in the sitting
area. According to her thoughts, she actually appreciated his honesty! It
really was amazing how the shift in her feelings from open hatred to
disgruntled curiosity had affected the way she perceived the things he said and
did. If he had still needed confirmation that he was handling the girl
effectively, that would have been more than enough.
She nodded as if she had just confirmed something for herself that she'd
suspected for a while. "You want me to join you so that you can use me against
Harry."
Tom chose a chair on the other side of a small coffee table from Granger's
loveseat, keeping his face impassive.
"I would prefer for you to join me rather than to see your mind wasted on the
trite simplifications that others would use to limit you."
She pursed her lips, partly in disapproval of his characterization of her
friends and the adults she respects and partly to try to mask how much it
stroked her ego to have him praise her intelligence.
"You don't seriously think that I will become a Dark witch?" she asked finally
in a shrill, incredulous voice. "I'm a Light witch!"
Tom allowed himself to let out a single sharp laugh. "A Light witch? Pray tell
me, Granger, what exactly is a Light witch?"
"A witch who only practices Light magic, of course!"
He merely raised an eyebrow in response.
"And what is Light magic?" That seemed to startle her. She sat up straighter in
her seat and opened her mouth several times as if to answer him, but clearly
she could not think of exactly what to say. Tom gave her a wry smile. "Dark
magic is defined based on the fact that the spells are normally used
maliciously, but that is no real definition at all. It's about the intention of
the caster, not the magic itself."
She blinked at him owlishly for several seconds before he could see her shrewd
mind suddenly kick into a higher gear.
In a strong but not entirely confident voice, she said, "But there are some
spells that can only be used to harm others no matter the intention of the
caster, like the Unforgivables, so they would still be Dark magic even if you
dislike the current definition. Since there are also spells that can only be
used to help people, such as healing spells or—or the Patronus Charm, then it's
only fair to have a corresponding label for Light magic."
"Ah, but whether a spell could be used to harm or to help is often a matter of
creativity or subjective philosophical determinations, not objective fact," Tom
replied easily.
He kept his tone even and engaging but was careful to strip away any
inflections that might have seemed angry or argumentative, and she seemed to be
paying proper attention.
"I could use the Killing Curse, for example, to give a person or an animal an
easy death. We might disagree about whether death is morally correct in a given
situation, but surely you can agree that here are at least some situations
where a quick, painless death would be a mercy. And there are some situations
where, although you might vehemently oppose the death, you could agree that if
you can do nothing to prevent it then at least it would be better for it to be
instantaneous and pain-free than the alternative. For example, if the law
determines that an animal must be executed because it is a danger to humans,
surely you can see how the Killing Curse might be preferable over the
imprecise, sometimes ineffective blow of an axe."
She bit her lip in silent contemplation, and Tom could see that she was
carefully considering everything he said. He allowed himself a mental pat on
the back and continued.
"The Imperius Curse, of course, could be used to prevent someone from
continuing some dangerous or harmful activity, perhaps even as an alternative
to sentencing the worst sort of criminals or dangerous animals to death. It
takes many witches or wizards working together to Stun a dragon, and using
something like the Conjunctivitis Curse to blind it would hardly stop it from
causing terrible damage until you could properly subdue it. A single skilled
practitioner of the Imperius Curse could subdue the beast. The Cruciatus Curse
is perhaps the one you will have the most trouble envisioning, because I
imagine that you will have a difficult time agreeing that torture could ever be
justified in any situation. However, if torture were used, the Cruciatus Curse,
like the Killing Curse, would likely be the most humane method—it does not
cause any actual harm to its victims, unless the caster allows the victim to
flail into something or leaves the curse on for literally hours."
"But how could someone use healing spells or the Patronus Charm to hurt
people?" she asked softly. "You can't hurt somebody by healing them or keeping
Dementors away from them!"
Tom grinned at her, flashing his white teeth and allowing her to admire the
effect on his handsome face. "You could answer your own question if you would
only allow yourself, for a moment, to think like someone who might want to use
those spells to hurt others. It is very important to be able to step into
others' shoes."
Granger visibly swallowed, but she took the challenge for what it was. After
several long moments, she released her worried lip from between her teeth and
glanced up at him.
"I suppose that one could use healing spells to prolong torture."
There were several other more creative uses that Tom could think of just off
the top of his head, such as purposefully healing an injury incorrectly and in
a painful or disfiguring way, or placing some harmful object inside a person's
body and then healing the incision so it stayed inside. He figured that
pointing them out to the Mudblood would only make her focus on how evil he was
and on whether he'd ever done anything like that, which would have gone
completely against his current goals.
"Indeed, and if one wanted to use Dementors against others, the only way it
would be possible would be to use a Patronus to protect oneself. That is what
we currently do at Azkaban: the guards use Patronuses to protect themselves and
also to keep the Dementors focused on the prisoners," he pointed out.
Of course, there was another way besides the Patronus to avoid the effects of
Dementors. Tom had long hypothesized that he would not be affected by them,
because his worst memories merely enraged him. They certainly didn't cause him
any guilt or shame or emotional pain. But he supposed one had to be born with
that particular ability.
"That's true," she answered, much more confident now that she felt like she was
able to contribute to the discussion.
Tom decided to pull the rug out from under her feet again.
"Speaking of which, Granger"—he was sure to address her personally, as it was
so rare for him to use her name—"I don't see any righteous indignation on the
part of these so-called Light wizards regarding the humane treatment of the
prisoners in Azkaban. Surely we can agree that whether a man has been sentenced
to life for his crimes as a Death Eater or for a few months for stealing bread,
he does not deserve to be starved and left to sit in his own filth, and to be
literally driven insane by the Dementors."
Of course Tom could not possibly care any less about the treatment of Azkaban's
inmates, but he could see that it made the Mudblood view him in a kinder light
when she thought that he actually held some sort of morally upright opinion.
"You're right," she admitted. Her voice had taken on the kind of righteous
indignation he'd mentioned before. "Well, if I ever have a chance, that is one
of the things I will try to fix!"
Tom laughed as he rose from his rather uncomfortable chair. "If you ever get
the chance, I'm sure that you will be a force to be reckoned with. Now, have
you completed any assignments, or have you been spending all of your time with
your parents?"
It would have been dangerous for her—or more likely her parents—had she not
been able to give him anything, but she was not that irresponsible. Tom left
the cottage with a stack of new parchments and a greater understanding of
exactly how to manipulate Hermione Granger.
===============================================================================
The trial lasted a full three days, and when it was over the Wizengamot awarded
Draco five hundred Galleons for his medical expenses and pain and suffering, to
be paid jointly by Dumbledore and Hagrid. The money was nothing to the Malfoys.
Lucius had already had Draco pre-write a statement (with a certain amount of
guidance, of course) and planned to inform the media the following morning that
the family would be donating the money to Hogwarts, perhaps towards new
facilities to house the animals used in Care of Magical Creatures.
"I hope that Headmaster Dumbledore and Professor Hagrid will both resign their
positions," Lucius's own rehearsed statement said. "Anyone who could, through
such negligence and even outright recklessness, allow harm to come to any of
our children is clearly not qualified to protect them. Of course, if they do
not do the right thing and instead leave it up to the Board of Governors to
decide, then I will naturally recuse myself from the decision. However, I trust
that both men are honorable enough to take responsibility for their mistakes."
Tom could admit, if only in the privacy of his own mind, that he deeply
respected Malfoy's political savvy and the near effortless way he had backed
Dumbledore into a corner with only a few words.
He would probably hold off killing the man, if only so that Draco could learn
from his father.
The two of them were in Tom's study discussing the next step in their campaign
(a full investigation into events at the school in the past several years, and
hopefully eventual criminal charges against Dumbledore) when the door opened
without anyone having knocked first. They both turned towards the intruder in
surprise, and in Tom's case a Cruciatus Curse ready at the tip of his fingers,
and immediately stopped short after they saw who it was.
Crabbe had returned. Only he looked more like somebody else wearing a Crabbe-
shaped suit that was many sizes too small. His entire body was tense and his
movements obviously strained and lacking a bit of fine motor control. It was
somewhat amusing—if anything in such a situation could actually have been
amusing—since Crabbe was at least twice Tom's size, but clearly it was the
volume of the magical essence that mattered and not the physical mass.
"Leave us, Lucius," Tom ordered rather sharply, yet in a much more controlled
tone than he could really have hoped for given the circumstances.
Lucius assessed the narrow space between Crabbe's body and the doorframe rather
dubiously and turned to give Tom a panicked, pleading sort of look.
Tom had no patience for such things.
"Enough," he barked. "Go. He won't harm you."
There was a yet clearly implied at the end, but it remained unspoken. Tom
couldn't guarantee it, of course, but he assumed that the other man—or spirit
or whatever—was too interested in him to waste any time considering for the
moment whether Malfoy deserved to be punished for his part in Tom's existence.
For his part, Lord Voldemort stepped further into the room with his eyes firmly
boring into Tom's the entire way, letting Lucius squeeze by him and out the
door unmolested. Tom was quite glad that it was impossible to miss seeing the
gaudy Gaunt ring on his finger, and Slytherin's locket was visible between the
undone top buttons of his shirt. It really let his other self know exactly
where things stood.
It was probably very stupid on all different kinds of levels, but Tom really
couldn't resist saying, "That looks incredibly uncomfortable."
Crabbe's body did not even blink; Tom personally would have felt a lot more
comfortable if it had.
"Jokes!" hissed Voldemort in such mingled English and Parseltongue that it took
even Tom a moment to decipher it. "You wouldjoke?"
Tom thought that what he was feeling might be properly defined as apprehension.
Not apprehension of Voldemort himself (he didn't even have his own body!), but
rather apprehension about exactly how difficult it was to keep himself from
crossing the room and flinging himself at the man. If he had thought that he'd
gone a bit loony when he'd first been in the ring's presence, then it was only
because he had not yet experienced being in the presence of the original soul.
And if he had thought that the delicious licks of magic he'd experienced in the
past had been addictive, then he would really have to watch himself around
Voldemort.
He kept his expression and voice neutral when he replied, "You will have to
forgive me. I am in a festive mood, as I just managed to effectively oust
Dumbledore from Hogwarts."
Voldemort—Crabbe—tilted his head jerkily to one side and considered Tom
silently for several long seconds.
Eventually, in that high, unnerving voice, he half-hissed, "Tell me."
Chapter End Notes
     There actually is not a single mention of Light magic or Light
     wizards in the HP series. (If you don't believe me, pull up your e-
     books and search for those or similar terms.) I find this pretty
     annoying, because the whole concept of Dark magic is so important,
     and the whole conversation would be heavily influenced by the
     definition and whether there is actually "Light magic," as opposed to
     just non-Dark magic used for nice reasons most of the time.
     Also AAAAAHH VOLDEMORT IS FINALLY BACK!
     Thank you to everybody who commented! It always makes my day.
***** Full Circle *****
Chapter Summary
     Life and death repeat themselves, and the world continues to go
     round.
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
Tom was fairly certain that he had never experienced anything as bizarre as
standing a few yards away from Voldemort. That was really saying a lot coming
from somebody who had lived in a diary for fifty years, been rather thoroughly
buggered by another version of himself, and sat in a room full of Molly
Weasley's knitting. Maybe it would have been easier to handle had Voldemort
been in somebody other than Crabbe, but there was nothing to be done about it
now.
The need to touch Voldemort, to curl around him and crawl inside of him, was a
persistent itch beneath Tom's skin. He'd thought that it had been intoxicating
to be around the Gaunt ring for the first time, but that didn't hold a candle
to this.
He felt absurd.
He hoped that Voldemort felt something like the same way, but if he did then
the man was incredibly able to conceal it.
Without warning, Voldemort took a step further into the room. Tom definitely
did not jump in surprise like a first-year Hufflepuff.
"Dumbledore's popularity has taken a nosedive of late," Tom said abruptly,
fulfilling Voldemort's request for information and hopefully distracting them
both from his ridiculous reaction. "No doubt the public is still reeling from
what happened during the last school year when I reopened Salazar's Chamber.
Four students were petrified by the basilisk, and I killed two more plus a
professor."
Voldemort never took his eyes off of Tom's face as he flicked the fingers of
one of Crabbe's hands behind him to close the door. The Dark Lord's magical
presence was palpable enough that Tom could sense even that simple thread of
magic from across the room. He wanted to shudder in response, but he managed to
suppress his reaction so that the only outward sign of it was a slight flaring
of his nostrils.
The feelings he was experiencing were very nearly overwhelming, but Tom Riddle
did not let anything overwhelm him. Not even the presence of Lord Voldemort.
The entire interaction had taken mere seconds, and Tom went on with barely a
pause.
"But truly we owe the headmaster's downfall to Lucius Malfoy and how terribly
he's indulged his son. The boy is a spoiled little thing who has virtually no
concept of boundaries, and he managed to insult a hippogriff and get attacked.
Lucius, of course, has been instrumental in turning public opinion against
Hagrid and, by extension, the headmaster who hired him to teach."
"Hagrid?" echoed Voldemort. "Dumbledore hired Hagrid to replace Kettleburn?"
Tom was too fraught to laugh, but he managed a smirk.
Other than that brief moment of surprise, Voldemort did not seem at all amused
or otherwise bothered by any emotion whatsoever. He continued to stare
intensely at Tom's face with an unreadable expression.
Tom was acutely aware of the way they were both just standing there awkwardly.
He didn't think he had ever felt particularly awkward in his life—he had always
been self-assured and managed to control nearly every situation he'd
encountered, or adapt and make the situation work for him even if he wasn't
able to control it—but he'd felt nothing but awkward while in the presence of
his older self, his master soul. It made him blabber like an idiot and feel
unsure of himself. He decidedly hated it.
He glanced down, just for a moment, to gather his thoughts again.
When he looked back up, he realized at once that he had played right into
Voldemort's hands. Tom only barely had time to think "Of course!" before
Voldemort slammed into his mind.
Tom's body screamed, a raw, tormented thing that tore at his throat and made
his toes curl, but his soul submitted with a whimper as Voldemort curled around
and in and through every single part of him until there was no telling what was
Tom and what was Voldemort. It was endless pleasure and unfathomable pain, and
they shattered into a million pieces and reformed into a single whole a
thousand times over.
Then he felt the sensation of being ripped out of his body, and he panicked and
clawed at the thin tether that held his mutilated soul to his mortal vessel
like a wild creature of pure instinct and no thought. He was being brutally
torn away from himself and shoved into the diary, alone alone he was alone and
trapped. The thing holding his soul into his body had been severed by his own
Killing Curse and he was expelled formlessly into the ether and he couldn't
touch or see or smell anything and his magic was gone and Oh, Salazar, no, no,
nononoplease no anything else he would do anything, give anything, please God
no….
He was staring at the unchanging shelves of the Hogwarts library, which by now
(however long "now" had been since he'd been shoved into the diary) had faded
to a dreary sort of gray scale in his memory, and then he was screaming and
throwing himself uselessly against the boundaries of his memories, because
there was nothing else, just him and his own illusions. He would have screamed
had he been able, but he could only drift in silence, unheard and unseen by
anything or anyone, and he wasn't even sure he really existed anymore and maybe
Horcruxes didn't really keep you alive but kept you both from living and from
moving on.
August 19, 1992. Dear diary…It had been fifty years. Fifty years. Five decades.
The first human he was aware of encountering was a poacher who stumbled across
the dank little patch of forest that he'd made his own, and he wasn't strong
enough to possess the man no matter how much he hoped otherwise, but he did at
least brush the man's mind closely enough to find out that it was 1988. Seven
years, he'd been without a body for seven years…
He had never felt true fear before until the moment when Harry Potter brought
the basilisk fang down towards his diary. He was intimately acquainted with the
sick feeling of fear that permeated his mind as he was cast out of Quirrell's
crumbling body in almost the same way he'd been cast out of his own a decade
prior, and both times were because of Harry Potter.
He was staring at Crabbe, who was really his older self, with equal parts
fascination and nausea. He was at once fascinated and sickened to see his young
body standing before him, the very image of himself at sixteen.
He was suddenly in his body again, and his throat hurt and his ears hurt and
everything hurt. Tom closed his mouth and stopped screaming and breathing and
moving at all.
Voldemort hovered against him, half encompassing his body for several seconds
longer, until the amorphous spirit finally lurched and stuttered across the
floor to where Crabbe was moaning faintly and beginning to stir. It was Crabbe
who screamed then, but only for a moment before his master took full control of
his body again.
Tom could hear Crabbe's body taking faltering, rattling breaths. He stared up
at the pattern on the ceiling and focused on the sound of the arrhythmic
panting, using it to ground himself as he felt his burst eardrums heal and the
blood flowing out of his nose slow to a trickle.
It could have been worse, much worse. Tom hadn't even had time to slip the ring
off of his finger, which he'd always planned to do before Voldemort inevitably
tried to possess him, but fortunately the Horcrux hadn't tried anything. Tom
had feared he would. Further, the experience seemed to have functioned
something like an extreme version of immersion therapy, so that although Tom
could still feel the Dark Lord's magic and soul both calling to his own, the
awareness was no longer accompanied by a desperate needto be one with him. That
was something greater than a small victory, at least.
Finally, when he felt completely recovered (at least physically), Tom let out
the unnecessary breath he'd been holding inside his lungs.
"Have you got that out of your system?"
"Quite." Voldemort wheezed. It seemed to take a lot out of him to speak, but he
took another rattling breath and asked on a shaky exhalation, "How?"
Tom propped himself up on his elbows and looked over at the other man, who was
still laying prone, half on and half off the thick rug. The brief melding of
their minds and bodies had obviously taken as much out of him as it had Tom,
although Tom, being a Horcrux, was much better equipped to heal afterward.
"If it were possible to inhabit a Horcrux's vessel, I would've just shoved you
into the diadem and let you spend eternity with that lunatic instead of with my
excellent company."
Voldemort turned his head to shoot Tom a baleful glare, but he made no other
move.
Tom was distantly worried that he wasn't actually able to do anything further.
It was disgusting what Voldemort had allowed himself to become. He was a shade
of his former self, a shade of a man at all. But whatever he was, he was still
the Dark Lord and Tom's older self, and if he was this overwhelming when he was
little more than a spirit, then Tom could scarcely imagine what he would be
like once he was restored to full strength.
With a great sigh, Tom levered himself up to his knees and shuffled across the
parquet floor of Abraxas's office until he was looking down at Crabbe's broad,
ugly face. Voldemort continued to glare up at him through Crabbe's eyes. Tom
could imagine how distasteful it must be to be so weak in front of someone
else, even if that someone else was, well, yourself.
Tom curled his tongue up against the back of his front teeth and said in
Parseltongue, "You should rest."
There weren't exactly curse words in Parseltongue—most snakes simply avoided
offending one another, and, in the first place, most snakes never had any
reason to discuss anything beyond hunting and mating—but the intent behind
Voldemort's answering hisses was quite clear. Tom had apparently been correct
in his judgment that it was easier for Voldemort to hiss than to form English
words in his weakened state, although communicating complex ideas in the
serpents' language required rather a lot of ingenuity and liberal
interpretation.
Despite Voldemort's angry hissing, there was no real heat behind it. They had
experienced the best and worst of each other during their brief time rejoined
as one soul and one mind, so there was no real reason to hide anything from
each other. Other than out of sheer pride. Voldemort knew it too, and after
another indistinct hiss, he deigned to reply.
"This body will break down in two or three days," he said. "I had hoped that
your body would be compatible with my soul and magic, but it seems that I will
need another form."
A few drops of the blood that had flowed from Tom's nose during their earlier
encounter dripped down onto Voldemort's face as Tom leaned over him. The older
wizard darted out his tongue to taste it.
Tom was not at all enthusiastic about Voldemort's announcement. He could only
imagine that the other man planned to attach himself to the first wizard he
encountered and drink gallons of unicorn blood to keep the poor sod viable.
That wouldn't do at all. It was too unstable an arrangement, and anyway he
couldn't allow the idiot to curse himself even further by spilling more blessed
blood. Besides, the Mudblood girl's secondhand descriptions of Voldemort
sticking out of the back of the professor's head were quite revolting just to
think of, and Tom had no desire to witness it for himself.
He frowned and wiped away the droplets of blood that tickled his upper lip. "I
hope you aren't planning to slaughter anymore unicorns."
Crabbe's lips twitched unpleasantly.
"No. That was only an option because it was Quirrell who drank the blood, not
I," Voldemorted hissed, and Tom understood immediately that it had been
Quirrell who had needed the unicorn blood in order to sustain his body while
Voldemort inhabited it. "I will not be a parasite again."
That was understandable. Tom supposed that it wouldn't be overly difficult to
supply Voldemort with a constant supply of hapless victims who wouldn't be
missed, as long as he wasn't too picky and didn't insist that his vessels be
wizards.
"Fine," he replied, "but in the meantime you apparently need rest."
Voldemort was reluctant to let Tom levitate him down the hallways of the manor,
but he was apparently even more reluctant to forego the pleasure of a luxurious
bed in favor of the floor of Abraxas's office. It would have been impossible to
transfigure anything quite as comfortable as the real thing. Fortunately, it
seemed that the other inhabitants of the manor had seen fit to run as far away
as possible, so only Tom witnessed the indignity.
===============================================================================
Tom had never actually visited Little Hangleton or its cemetery during the day
before. What looked sinister and a bit spooky at night was revealed by the mid-
morning sun to be merely rundown and overgrown. The thatched roofs of some of
the cottages were seriously thinning in places, and the cobblestones along the
main street were in dire need of repairs. Tom didn't see anything worthy of his
notice in the three minutes it took him to walk from one end of the village to
the other, but he certainly drew attention from the inhabitants.
He'd known he would, of course—strange, attractive young men couldn't show up
in tiny rural villages without drawing some attention. One woman, who looked
like she would turn to dust and blow away if anyone sneezed near her, had
probably the first clear thought she'd had in years when she thought for a
moment that she was seeing Tom's father again. But she quickly put it down to
having lost herself in memories of her youth, which she was doing more and more
lately.
Tom offered her a smile just before he rounded the corner of the local bakery
and headed down the road towards the church and the cemetery behind it. There
was a risk that Dumbledore would eventually investigate Little Hangleton and
discover that Tom had been there, of course, but at this point it would be
delicious to watch the wizarding world at large accuse the man of making things
up in order to stay relevant. Who would believe that an apparently sixteen-
year-old Lord Voldemort had strutted down the center of a Muggle village in
broad daylight?
And Lucius had already done a fantastic job of discrediting anything Dumbledore
or Harry might say about the diary.
The important thing was that Tom hadn't seen any memories of Dumbledore having
visited the village. It was possible that he had and Tom just hadn't
encountered anyone who had seen him. Or that he had but Tom hadn't been able to
access the relevant memories. Or that he had and had then modified the memories
of anyone who had seen him. But Tom doubted it.
So Dumbledore probably didn't know about the other Horcruxes yet, or else he
didn't know enough that he'd started searching for them.
The Little Hangleton graveyard was situated behind the church, running down the
side of the gently sloping hill on which the village sat and spreading across
the valley below. On its other side, Riddle House loomed over them both from
the top of a taller hill. Although he'd only ever seen it at night, Tom could
tell that the ring Horcrux's graveyard was still quite a nice place to be
buried, at least in the wealthier sections. The present-day version, however,
had clearly been without a dedicated groundskeeper for some time, and even the
Riddles' elaborate statues and mausoleums were overgrown and starting to look a
bit rickety.
Perhaps at one point Tom would have been interested in the graves of his father
and grandparents, but he'd had enough of them by now. He'd been shagged on them
by now, pressing his face into the grass and dirt of his father's grave and
later scraping his knees and elbows on the rough patches of his grandfather's
sarcophagus. He bypassed them now with barely a glance and carefully picked his
way up the increasingly steep hill towards the crumbling stone wall that
separated the cemetery from the grounds of the Riddles' manor.
There was a small grouping of trees along the boundary. Tom made his way
towards an enormous tree at the center of the small wood, situated just on the
other side of the boundary. It had a trunk at least five feet in diameter, from
which grew a mass of curving, tangled branches that would have formed a
beautiful canopy had the tree not been bare of leaves.
It was a yew tree. And it was perfect.
After a moment spent contemplating the best way to go about things, Tom climbed
over the short stone wall and clambered up into the branches with as much grace
as he could muster, which wasn't much. This was the first tree he'd ever
climbed; he'd never been invited to join the other children, and he wouldn't
have joined them even if they had ever asked. He got his shirt caught in the
branches and tore it when he pulled free, and he kept scratching his skin
against the bark, but eventually Tom reached the top, where the branches were
thinnest.
He didn't know exactly what he was looking for, but he experimentally ran his
hand across the wood and wrapped his fingers around some pieces, carefully
freeing the parts that felt right to him.
"What are you doing up there?" demanded a gruff voice.
Tom had been so focused on his task that the sudden intrusion startled him, and
he had to tighten his legs around the narrow limb, on which he was perched
rather precariously, to keep himself from tumbling off it.
There was an old Muggle man standing several yards up the hill towards the
house, one hand gripping a cane and the other curled into an angry fist at his
side, craning his neck to glare up at the boy trespassing in the branches of
his yew tree.
"I've told you lot time and again, I have!" he continued without waiting for a
response. "You're to stay off this property!"
When Tom turned his focus to the old man, he got flashes of Muggle teenagers
tearing up the lawns with their bicycles and throwing rocks through the windows
of the manor house. Although the gardener—Frank, his mind supplied—couldn't
imagine what new mischief was to be had by climbing trees, he was sure there
was some. Behind the recent memories of petty vandalism lurked a far more
sinister memory from a time long past, but still very much a constant part of
the man's thoughts, of another teenager—tall, dark-haired, and pale—walking
briskly and confidently up the drive towards the large front door of house on
the night that the Riddles had been murdered just as they were about to sit
down to a late Sunday supper.
Tom sucked a hiss in through his bottom teeth.
"Hold a moment and I will come down."
He wrenched the last of his sticks until it came free and added it to the
bundle in the bag he wore across his body. Then he brought his leg over the
branch and to the other side and, without a pause, leaped from the uppermost
limbs. The Muggle hardly had the time to yell out in alarm before Tom landed at
the base of the tree with barely a sound of exertion.
Had the ground seemed to sink slightly and spring back up under the boy's feet,
as if he were a child jumping on a bed? The Muggle blinked and brought his free
hand up to rub his eyes.
Tom allowed himself a brief smile of amusement as he stepped out of the shadows
cast by the branches and fully into the autumn sun, where the Muggle gaped at
him in still more astonishment, for he was the spitting image of the old
master's son when he had been a young man. Tom caught the gardener's gaze with
his own and pressed his own memories of that night fifty years ago into the
Muggle's mind. The pinched, furious expression on his face as he stalked
towards the house, filling in all of the details of his features that the
Muggle's brief glimpse through his cottage window had not allowed him to
discern; the unlocking spell he used to let himself inside without alerting any
of the inhabitants or staff; the mixed shock and anger on the faces of his
father and grandparents at the sight of him, which turned to incredulity and
confusion when Tom raised his wand but quickly settled into unmitigated terror
when he cast the first Cruciatus Curse of the evening.
When he released the Muggle's mind, Frank staggered backwards several steps and
lost his footing. He landed on his ass in the overgrown grass, his arms and
legs flailing briefly and his cane flying several feet away.
He stared up at the handsome trespasser with bulging eyes and stammered,
"What—you—but—!"
Tom smiled again, the full grin with gleaming white teeth, which lately had
sent the Granger girl into fits, and raised his wand for a practical
demonstration.
That night, the inhabitants of Little Hangleton would be deeply amazed when a
group of teenagers, who had gathered in the cemetery to smoke and snog among
the gravestones, all came tearing up the hill together screaming in much the
same way as the Riddles' maid had done just after dawn some five decades
before.
The police from Great Hangleton would be all the more astonished when the
medical examiner's report contradicted their original supposition that Frank
Bryce, who would have turned seventy-six had he lived three more days, had
suffered a heart attack or stroke while tending the grounds. No, the doctor
insisted in her report, Mr. Bryce was as healthy as a man of his years could
expect to be, aside from the arthritis afflicting his leg (and, of course,
aside from the fact that he was dead). There was absolutely no sign of a heart
attack or stroke or any other natural cause of death. The police discussed in
hushed, nervous tones how the condition of the groundskeeper's body matched the
condition of the three bodies at the center of the area's only unsolved murder
case, in which the dead man had been the only suspect fifty years ago, right
down to the expressions of abject terror on the Riddles' and Bryce's faces.
This time the sighting of a stranger—a pale, dark-haired youth—that everybody
had believed Bryce had made up during the original investigation was
corroborated by nearly a dozen residents of Little Hangleton, who all
separately claimed to have seen such a person strolling casually down the main
street of the village that morning.
The police were still quite sure that nobody could simply die of fright, and
they were also quite sure that it couldn't have been the same teenager that
Frank Bryce had insisted killed the Riddles in the summer of 1943, but the
situation clearly warranted further investigation.
Dot, a lifelong resident of Little Hangleton who was nearing her ninety-eighth
birthday, insisted that the stranger had looked so similar to Tom Riddle that
they must have been directly related. She told one newly minted and slightly
nervous member of the police force, who had not yet learned how to extract
himself from over-eager witnesses, all about that business with Riddle and the
tramp's daughter and the rumors of a pregnancy, but everybody dismissed her
theories. Dot was prone to calling the baker's son by his grandfather's name
and the curate by his predecessor's name, even though the baker's grandfather
had been dead for forty years and the curate wasn't even related to the man who
had held the position sixty years (and three curates) ago.
For their part, the other residents of Little Hangleton spent several evenings
and nights at the village's only pub, the Hanged Man, discussing the events.
They ended up split nearly evenly down the middle between those who thought
that a whole lot of ado was being made out of Frank's clearly natural death,
and those who thought that the only reasonable explanation was that the
vengeful spirit of Tom Riddle had given the gardener his comeuppance for the
triple murder he'd committed fifty years before.
===============================================================================
Tom was more than a little miffed to find Voldemort's bedroom empty when he
returned to the manor. He briefly checked his own room, just in case the older
man had decided that he ought to have the best guest bedroom, before giving in
to the desire to pinch the bridge of his nose in irritation and heading back
down the stairs to search for the erstwhile Dark Lord.
He eventually picked up on a sharp feeling of disgust and horror, which he
followed to a parlor on the first floor with overstated furnishings and an
ornate gold-leaf ceiling. Voldemort was there, sitting straight-backed in a
chair and casually reading a book. So too were Lucius and Narcissa, who were
both doing a poor job of pretending to do anything other than watch Voldemort
out of the corners of their eyes.
The horror was obviously coming from Narcissa, who had never been much in the
presence of her husband's master during the last war. The disgust was coming
from Lucius, because Voldemort was wearing his father's body.
Tom clenched his jaw for a moment. Then he deliberately relaxed his muscles and
strode fully into the room.
"Well, I'm glad to see that you're up and about," he announced, only just
keeping his annoyance from infiltrating his tone.
Voldemort glanced up from his book and arched one of Abraxas's well shaped
brows. "I am sure that you aren't."
Neither of the Malfoys dared look up. Lucius pretended to be completely
engrossed in his newspaper and Narcissa wrote her letter so diligently that Tom
was sure her script would be perfect, but Tom could vividly hear their
terrified thoughts at the exchange. He ignored them and settled himself
comfortably into the chair across from his older self's, allowing himself to
adopt a much more relaxed posture than Voldemort.
"You are mistaken." Tom took a moment to pick a bit of bark off his trousers
and then folded his hands over his knee. "I care a great deal about your
health, in fact. That is why I am so concerned to see you wearing Abraxas."
Voldemort placed his open book face down across his lap and stared at Tom
silently for a few moments. Finally, he said, "I saw no reason why I should not
use his body. He is older than I would prefer, but his form has been
meticulously well preserved. Since you have not seen fit to kill him for his
betrayal, he has just been gathering dust in your… playroom."
"Well, I had planned to use him in your resurrection ritual, but if you would
prefer to possess him until he wears out instead, then I am sure we can find
some other true pure blood who won't be missed." Tom offered his other self a
placid smile. "Perhaps one of the Weasleys? There are more than enough of them
left, and the girl did well enough for my ritual."
Although his wife maintained her admirable stoicism, Lucius could not quite
repress the startled noise that worked its way up from his throat.
The sound caused Voldemort's head to swivel towards the pair.
"Leave us," he ordered quietly.
They did not need to be told twice. They barely managed to offer proper bows in
both Voldemort's and Tom's directions before they rushed out the door with as
much dignity as they could manage. It was obvious that they would have sprinted
out of the room if Malfoys did such things.
Voldemort turned Abraxas's flinty gaze back on Tom. However, Tom had taken all
of that day and the previous night to compose himself and steel his mind, so he
did not let his older self affect him nearly as much as he had during their
first meeting. He put his uncharacteristic reactions the previous evening up to
his complete shock at Voldemort's abrupt arrival.
Now, he merely stared back.
Eventually Voldemort's lips twitched, though Tom couldn't tell whether it was
in anger or amusement, and he asked, "Are you going to elaborate on this ritual
you have planned?"
"Certainly, since you were kind enough to ask. I have learned through my
experiments that the method I used to create my body in fact created a new
vessel for me. I have been effectively transferred from my diary to the body
you see now—"
"Which is why you feel the need to protect your body by keeping all of the
other Horcruxes on your person," Voldemort interrupted.
"Quite," Tom replied in a clipped tone, his mind flashing briefly to how he'd
had to temporarily stash the diadem in the Gaunt shack before he'd gone into
Little Hangleton, just in case Voldemort woke up while he was gone. "I have
further confirmed, through more experiments and an examination of my memories,
that until the very moment that Ginny Weasley's life force was destroyed, the
diary was still my vessel."
There was no need for him to elaborate further, as Voldemort immediately caught
on and interjected again. "You want to use one of the Horcruxes to create a
body in the same way that you did."
"And for you to take possession of the body just before the moment of
completion, yes," confirmed Tom.
Voldemort leaned back in his chair and brought his fingers up to steeple in
front of his mouth. He stared straight ahead, seemingly at nothing, as Tom
counted the ticks of the antique clock that stood in one corner of the parlor.
When he blinked and refocused his eyes on Tom, their natural gray was swirling
with red.
"How do you know that such a thing is possible? I might not be any more able to
take over the vessel just before the ritual is complete than I was able to
possess your vessel. And I must point out that, although I do not often make
mistakes—"
"Except in matters relating to Dumbledore. And creating Horcruxes. And hiding
them. And Harry Potter," Tom felt behooved to say.
The Dark Lord's eyes flashed vibrantly red for a moment before the color
receded partially back into Abraxas's gray.
"Although I do not often make mistakes," he repeated, sharply enunciating each
word, "there remains the possibility that I will wait a moment too long, and
the Horcrux will claim its vessel before I can."
"I don't know with certainty that it is possible, which is why I sent Crabbe
for you now rather than later. Although I am good—well, I don't have to tell
you how good I am—I am not a master in arithmancy, ancient runes, or
ritualistic Dark magic. Yet," he added, because he knew that he would be
eventually. "In any case, I don't see the harm in trying. Certainly nothing we
can do could relegate you to a worse state than you're in now. If it doesn't
work, then we will simply regroup and find another way. And if the Horcrux
manages to inhabit its vessel, then I will be there waiting to destroy it."
"You are serious," said Voldemort. His tone was bland, but nonetheless it was
clear that he could hardly believe it.
Tom met his eyes, direct and unflinching. "I am serious. I want to work with
you, not against you. I want to learn from you."
Voldemort regarded him curiously for a moment before he asked, "What do you
propose that I would get out of such an arrangement?"
The answer was incredibly easy. In fact, it had all but been confirmed during
their conversation, when Voldemort had been able to keep his cool, for the most
part, despite Tom intentionally provoking him. And if he was this much improved
after less than a day in proximity to his Horcruxes, then hopefully prolonged
exposure would allow him to reach the same level of clarity that Tom himself
had reached after he'd found the others.
Tom allowed his mouth to stretch into a grin and leaned forward in his chair.
"You get your sanity."
Chapter End Notes
     Citations: Some of the details and language in the second section of
     this chapter is taken from Goblet of Fire, Chapter 1, "The Riddle
     House."
      
     Author's Notes: I hope that you were all able to figure out what was
     going on with the mind-melding sequence. I intended it to be
     confusing at first but to eventually become clearer for readers that
     it was going back and forth between Tom's and Voldemort's parallel
     memories.
     I greatly appreciate all of the comments, kudos, and bookmarks/
     subscriptions. I felt terribly guilty every time I saw a new one in
     my inbox and still didn't have this chapter ready. I struggled
     massively with the first section and must have fiddled with it and
     entirely scrapped it and started over and then repeated the whole
     cycle a couple dozen times before I was happy with it. So if you
     enjoy it, please leave a review and let me know, so that I will feel
     guiltier the longer it takes me to update again.
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