Touching you makes me feel alive.
oOo
Minerva closed her eyes as she watched the Headmaster walk out of the hospital wing. She knew that he would return, that his retirement from their conversation would not continue for very long. After all, she glanced at the many bandages on her arms, her first year as the newly appointed Head of Transfiguration had not even begun before she had become a victim of assault.
Albus had been quite upset at the sight of her lying on the bed, covered in a great many superficial wounds. She sighed, those being the ones that he could actually see. The rest of her body, covered by more of the carefully placed bandages, had gone unnoticed by her superior. For that she supposed she should be grateful.
The conversation would not have been dropped so easily if he had seen the true extent of damage done to her person. It was not something that Minerva wished to discuss, or even think about. She was ashamed. Everything that had happened less than an evening's length prior, she had brought on herself.
Thinking back, she knew that it had been dangerous to consort with the man that Albus himself had warned her against. However, no amount of caution could have prepared her for Tom Riddle. The man was charming with a serpent's tongue. Minerva sunk further into the pillows with sorrow holding her heart - he was enthralling.
She had been introduced to Albus' former student during his discussion with the man about a position of employment. Tom had returned after time spent traveling abroad to inquire about the Defense Against the Dark Arts position, having been offered the possibility by Armando Dippet just a short decade ago.
After the Headmaster had politely declined the offer, Tom had requested that Minerva walk him back to the apparition boarders. Albus had allowed the request at Minerva's behest, not wanting to upset Tom any further. It was then as they walked towards the entrance hall that Tom had unloosed his tempting and prepossessing words.
Like a snake hissing its song, the promises he wove together were like an addictive poison catching her in their grasp. Those enrapturing words had been her weakness - her downfall. He had ensnared her mind and had taken advantage of her youth.
It had been rough and coarse, forceful and reckless. There had been hard touches and fresh pain. She had been pitched into a place between heaven and hell - from Samaritan, to Sin. Water cascaded over them, washing away the immorality of their lust laden crimes.
A deep bite of bitterness had run along her flushed skin before her screams deviated from pleasure to agony. His inevitable lasting shudder had given her peace; a reprieve from the ache he had blessed her with. It had been when her hollowing vision at last faded into that of darkness.
Upon awakening from that ceaseless tunnel of shadows, she had pulled herself from the bloodied bathroom floor. Tears of fear and shame fell from her eyes as she found the dagger, glinting tauntingly from its place stuck in the floor just inches from where her head had lain.
Minerva placed a hand over her tired eyes, burning with tears as her lips trembled into a distressed frown - she could still feel the pull of the blade against her skin, the sting as it nicked her endlessly. Anger flooded her veins, at the man who had done this to her, but even more so at herself. She was better than what she had allowed herself to become.
Now lying in that forsaken hospital bed, with bandages covering wounds that not even magic could heal, she felt shattered and broken. There would be terrible and ugly scars. His gift to her, with the help of a poisoned blade, was that of memory; something that Tom had forever cursed her with.
oOo
And touching you makes me die inside.
::
Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed!
