Tom Riddle's Grand Adventure
Summary: During the summer of 1945, Tom Riddle is fired from his position at Borgin and Burkes. Desperate, Tom needs a new plan fast or he'll end up owing the Black Family more than he's willing to give. Single point of departure fic.
Disclaimer for all chapters: I don't own Harry Potter.
July 19, 1945
Borgin and Burkes, offering confidential valuation services for unusual and ancient wizarding artifacts since 1863.
At least, that's what the sign outside the window said. Inside the dimly-lit shop was a collection of strange curiosities.
Piles of scrolls and tablets looted from ancient civilizations were crammed into an antique cabinet. Next to that was a long, low table bearing bird skulls and delicate piles of bone. Racks of bottles, partly dissected and preserved porlocks, and mummified legs crowded the shelves.
In the corner, a covered cage rattled. It was inside there that snatches of warbling and the occasional screech could be heard. From the ceiling hung rusted hooks and saws. They clattered together, twisting and writhing on their chains. Each hungered to bite into flesh. Add that to the clinging smell of incense, candle wax, and the sour rank of natron, and it was no wonder Tom Riddle had a headache.
Tom leaned against the counter, elbows resting against the display case. He breathed out the stale air with an irritable huff.
A shrunken head leered up at him, and Tom blocked it from view with a piece of parchment.
Borgin and Burke weren't here today.
It was the only good thing about today. With them gone, he was free to take out a book and read between customers.
He spent his morning reading about ritual sacrifices. Eventually, Tom lost his focus and put it down in favor of compulsively checking his pocket watch every few minutes.
The day couldn't go by any slower.
Next to the discarded book were several pages of parchment, filled with his detailed notes. The borders were covered in doodles, sketches of a particularly striking cursed necklace.
As the afternoon stretched on, it was getting harder to ignore the sour twisting in his gut. He hadn't taken a potion in four hours. His temples were throbbing, mouth dry, anxiety prickling across his skin like crawling spiders.
A shadow passed in front of the paned window, briefly casting the shop into darkness. A customer?
The door opened with a tinkle of bells.
Tom stood up straight, brushing the papers into the book and under the counter with a wordless spell. Time to look professional.
She was a woman, tall and overweight. The old floorboards groaned as she stepped further into the shop. Her face flowing into her neck, which bulged around a pearl necklace. A sleek fur collar was draped around her shoulders, and the swooping plunge of her neckline left far to little to the imagination.
Briefly glancing around the shop with narrowed eyes, she met Tom's gaze.
He kept the gaze, and spoke, "Hello, miss. Is there anything I can help you with?"
She smiled wide under her witch's hat, "yes, I'm looking for a conversation piece. Something I might put on display in my home, perhaps."
"Of course," Tom scrambled out from behind the counter, "right this way, miss."
It was intentional. She wasn't young, but that's what she wanted people to think. And flattering her might warm her up to a sale.
"This, here, is a cursed necklace, it's beautiful," he met her eyes, "but deadly. The curse shortens the chain, and the wearer will find they can't remove it until it's choked them to death."
She stared at him with narrowed eyes for a moment, before frowning in disapproval.
Tom, for his part, was trying not to watch as one of the hooks hanging from the ceiling creaked ominously against its chain. It was straining to slice at her, and almost nicked the top of her hat.
It was distracting, and a bit funny. But if he laughed, she'd no doubt think he was laughing at her, with her weight and choking pearl neckla—
Fuck, that's why she was displeased.
She thought he was taking a subtle poke at her weight.
"What sort of area are you planning to display your purchase in?" he asked, for lack of a better thing to say.
"My parlor, on a stand or a table." She was fingering the pearl necklace straining around her neck.
"Then we don't want something someone might easily pick up, or anything with a lethal curse." Tom nodded.
"Oh," she smiled, "that's not a concern at all."
Ah, so she wanted someone to pick it up and curse themselves. Either that, or she wanted him to think she planned on cursing someone. Why, he had no clue. It was patently idiotic to go about hinting how you were planning to murder someone. He walked a few steps to the back of the room, where the more dangerous objects were stored.
There was a tall box he paid extra mind to, skirting around it with some caution. Inside was a particularly jumped-up inferi, from ancient Babylon. About a month ago, the blasted thing smashed through its box, scaring the shite out of him.
The effect was destroyed all but a moment later, when the inferi tripped over its own grave-clothes and tumbled over, teeth clattering across the floor. It managed to knock over two displays, releasing a crate of bewitched scorpions. The thing then picked itself up, and started shuffling across the room before Tom managed to trap it in an incarcerus, and wrestle it back into its box.
It was now wrapped in three enchanted chains, and a strong stasis charm. If any one of those broke, the bloody thing would escape. Again. And the last thing Tom wanted was property damage and a terrified customer.
Leading the woman around the inferi's giant box, he stopped in front of a glass display which contained a glimmering bronze vase.
"This one's locked away, and for good reason," he nodded toward the vase in the case, "it's alluring." He took another glance back at her, smiling.
"Alluring?" She raised one brow, giving him a look like she knew exactly what he was trying to do, and found him embarrassing.
Tom dropped his head down, a bit abashed.
He thought back to that time he caught Walburga doing something entirely inappropriate in a broom closet, and felt a flush come over his cheeks and the tip of his ears. A blush from embarrassment and a blush from arousal were indistinguishable, in this context. If he really felt embarrassed, he'd get angry. And anger wasn't the emotion he wanted to display, not to a customer.
Tom Riddle looked up at the woman, looking properly ashamed and a tad bashful, "alluring, yes," he cleared his throat, "once someone touches it, of course, their arms wither and— well, I've heard it's an excruciating death."
The pause worked perfectly, and instead of irritated or exasperated, she looked amused.
"An *excruciating death?"
Tom smiled, a bit shy, "yes, horrific, in a word."
"That's an awful coarse decoration, I think." her tone was sharp and scolding.
The smile dropped off Tom's face, and he quickly turned the flash of irritation into an expression of deep thought. His brows drew together and he glanced off into the corner of the room.
"I think I might have something you'd like." Tom said, softly, like he was mulling it through.
He didn't bother glancing back at her, trusting he had her intrigued. Two displays down was a silver chalice, delicately ornamented and completely deadly.
"The curse is subtle, but powerful," Tom said, glancing back at her with a smile, "anyone who touches it with a bare hand finds themselves unlucky. A sort of reverse-rabbit's foot, if you will. The effect accumulates with time, but the victims invariably find themselves tripping over their own feet and into a convenient fire."
"Oh my!" the older woman's eyes lit up with delight, "that is lovely."
"It's one of a set," Tom lied, "the other was destroyed in the 1200s, sadly."
Nothing like a bit of old-fashioned false scarcity to speed up a sale.
"A shame," she said, pursing her lips, "a set would be elegant."
"They would," Tom nodded, and then paused, "are you still interested, even if it's not part of a set?"
The woman leaned back, adjusting the fur on her collar. The fur and the thick cloak had to be an affectation, really. It was August, hot and muggy out, which meant she was using cooling charms to keep comfortable. The animated fur, subtly shifting colors, and glittering embroidery on her clothes were all cues so other witches would think she was fabulously wealthy.
"I think I might be," the woman gave Tom a warm smile.
He wondered who she was planning to subtly and elegantly kill with that chalice.
Tom brushed his hand over the price tag, sending a jolt of will to adjust the number upwards. His fingers curled around the tag, and he lifted it into her view.
She plucked it from his hand between two long fingernails.
"Five hundred and ninety-nine galleons." Her voice held almost no affect. "That's a tad much, isn't it?"
Tom bit his lip, "I could give you a bit of a discount, but—" he lowered his tone, "Borgin won't like it if I go any lower than five hundred."
"Five hundred?" she snorted, "a hundred galleons is the highest I'll go."
"That—" Tom gaped, "I'd never be able to— Borgin would kill me. Five hundred, no lower."
"I might have to walk out on this one," she said, frowning.
Tom held his ground, "I can't go any lower than five hundred."
"Then I won't buy it," she said, before taking several steps to the door.
Tom didn't say anything to stop her.
She halted in place, "five-hundred it is."
Which lead him to his second favorite reason to enjoy Borgin and Burke being away.
The actual list price was 459 Galleons.
Borgin and Burke expected customers to haggle, within reason. And Tom had been instructed to go no lower than 385 galleons.
It was the best of all worlds. The customer walked away thinking she'd haggled some poor shop boy down to the minimum price with no effort, and Tom pocketed the extra 115 galleons. It wasn't often he could run this scheme, but when he did, the payoff was enormous.
Those 115 galleons were worth about eight months of rent.
Money exchanged hands, and Tom watched the the woman leave the shop, bells jingling as the door shut.
He exhaled the musty air, relaxing against the counter.
115 Galleons found their way into his pocket, while the other 385 were deposited neatly into the cash register. The price tag slowly bled back to the original 459, and everything was returned to its proper place.
At least, until it all went wrong.
Caractacus Burke was an old man, at least a hundred years old. His scraggly beard was speckled through with gray, and his skin bore the cast of a cadaver. Too much time spent in dark and windowless rooms, if Tom had to guess.
"I see you've been busy while I was away," Burke said.
And with those words the 115 galleons flew out of Tom's pocket and into Burke's outstretched hand.
Tom went so stiff he could've been propped like a broom against the wall.
"I tolerate no disobedience," said Burke, "no slacking on the job, no frivolity, no disrespecting customers, and no thievery."
Tom, past his brain's incoherent panic, stuttered out, "you have my deepest apolog—"
"I don't want your apologies," the man spat, sharp eyes narrowing, fingers tapping his wand like he might use it for a moment, before halting their motion.
Burke slowly began to pace the length of the store, keeping Tom in the corner of his eye.
"I've owned this store for eighty-two years. Eighty-two years, and not one single shop boy ever dared defy me in this way. Not one, because they understood when I said there'd be dire penalties for disobedience. But you? You stupid boy, are incapable of even that."
"You have your money back," Tom's mouth was dry, throat closing in panic.
"You pathetic little—"
"Do you want to take me to the aurors, or work something out privately?" Tom asked, voice tight. His mind was whirring, and he didn't like his options. He saw that gleam in Burke's eyes, the way he kept clenching his wand in his hand.
Burke wanted a fight, he wanted vengeance on Tom, personal vengeance. But Tom didn't want a fight, here. He wasn't afraid of a battle, but there were other considerations he had to take into account. No, it was the fallout after the fight that scared Tom.
If Burke killed him, there'd be no recourse under the law. Burke had nothing to fear, not when the Wizengamot presided over trials, and were composed of half of Burke's customers. That was assuming it'd even make it to trial. Burke could simply have the records of the duel destroyed. With no evidence, there'd be no trial.
On the other hand, Tom Riddle the shop boy would be sent to Azkaban for the rest of his life if he managed to kill the pureblood Burke. He'd have to leave Britain, or go into hiding. Fuck, he'd thought Burke was gone for the day. He wasn't supposed to be here.
"Bargains?" spat Burke, with a laugh, "you can't be serious."
Tom raised his hands, a visual sign of surrender. "I know some ancient lore, the locations of several objects that might be of value to you—"
"Liar."
"I offer you Ravenclaw's diadem." Tom said, ignoring him, "it's worth much more than a paltry hundred-fifteen galleons, more than anything I could've stolen in the entire time I've worked for you."
He didn't mean it.
Sure, Burke would get his hands on the diadem, but then a week later, Burke would mysteriously die. There were many undetectable ways to kill a person, if Tom got sufficiently creative. And it was better to kill Burke on Tom's own terms, in a way that wouldn't be traceable back to him.
For now, Tom would let Burke get his petty revenge for the wrong Tom did to him.
"It grants the wearer wisdom beyond measure," Tom continued, "Helena Ravenclaw was jealous of her mother's brilliance. I learned this from the Grey Lady in Hogwarts. It would shock some to learn the Grey Lady is Helena Ravenclaw, who stole the diadem from her mother upon her deathbed, and fled to—"
Burke's eyes narrowed, and he hissed a spell without any warning.
Tom saw it coming, and half a second before the spell hit he was ducking, but—
A second spell smacked into his shoulder, flipping him over the counter and hard onto the ground.
"Defodio!" Burke spat, hissing out a fucking gouging spell.
That one barely missed Tom as he scrambled out of the way. Fuck, that old geezer was actually trying to kill him.
Tom crouched behind a table, listening as Burke slowly advanced. He supposed Burke was attempting to be intimidating.
Well, that deserved special consideration. Burke wasn't going to settle for Tom owing him a debt. One didn't attack with explosive hexes, expecting their opponent to get out alive. Instead, Burke wanted Tom dead. That changed things.
Apparating away was impossible, not with anti-apparition jinxes covering every shop. It was a common protection against thieves. Likewise, his portkeys weren't an option, either. With all the expensive items in the shop, the windows, door, and floo were likely booby-trapped, as well.
Tom wouldn't be able to dispel any of those protections in time.
If Burke had planned to kill him before Tom had started talking, no matter what Tom had said, then he would've triggered the defenses in advance, so Tom couldn't have run away.
In other words, Tom needed to fight his way out, or at least distract Burke long enough—
No.
This was a matter of life and death. There'd be no Great Dark Wizard, Tom Riddle, if he fucked around right here. Too many things could go wrong, if Tom tried to draw out the fight long enough for the aurors to arrive.
Tom's original plan was to exploit the tension between the Ancient families who were battling Dumbledore's faction.
Burke was friends with some Noble and Ancient families. Those families were enemies of Dumbledore's faction, and Dumbledore would no doubt use a fight in Borgin and Burkes as an excuse to investigate what was sold there. Borgin and Burke would be too busy fighting Dumbledore to care about Tom Riddle, shop boy.
But as a general rule, it wouldn't be smart to provoke the Ancient and Noble Houses. It'd be hard enough in the first place to disable Burke without injuring him badly. And then Burke would come back later with his allies, demanding revenge.
Worse, Dumbledore was suspicious of Tom already. This battle would definitely come to Dumbledore's attention, and Dumbledore would definitely use it as an excuse to have Tom tossed in Azkaban.
On that note, there was another, more costly, way to handle this. It was a last resort, but Tom could pay one of the Ancient and Noble families for help.
If Burke could pay someone to destroy Ministry records, then so could Tom. It might cost him all of his savings, but it was worth averting the fallout from this battle.
The Black family would know people who could erase all records of this day from the Ministry's little spy department. The records of which spells were cast where, and who was at which locations would be gone. So long as Tom didn't cast any illegal spells that'd set off an alarm, like avadakedavra, he'd be free to kill Burke and arrange his death in such a fashion that Tom wouldn't be implicated.
"One last offer," Tom's voice took on a warning undertone, "a thousand galleons. I walk out of the shop and we never speak of this again."
That was a rather large sum of money, enough to buy three houses on the muggle side of the border.
"Confrigo!" Burke spat in response.
Tom twisted out of the way, a fiery explosion singing his robes.
"Expelliarmus incarcerus stupefy!" Tom fired jinx after jinx, but the old geezer was fast on his feet and sharp with his shields.
In response, Burke sent back a knee-reversing hex and a blood-boiling curse. Tom was losing the advantage, and he needed to think fast.
He snapped a spell back, diffindo! And old Burke twisted out of the way.
But Tom hadn't been aiming at Burke.
The three chains binding the inferi's box snapped with a friendly clink, and the blasted inferi burst from his confines, for the second and final time.
Burke caught it with a confringo, exploding it messily into a dozen fiery pieces. The blazing head shot off like a bludger, cracking into the ceiling before bouncing to a halt in some dark corner of the shop. A yellowed fingernail stuck out of a hunk of gore, spattered across the window.
A shame. It was a well-made inferi. It even made realistic wailing noises when it charged you.
Burke spun back around, and Tom ducked, waving his wand to cast— but Burke was faster. He caught Tom in the chest with an expulso while he was trying to get his footing.
The spell didn't work, not like it should. The combination of two horcruxes, an amulet defending against battle magic, and a bracelet be-spelled to deflect spell damage did their job.
Instead of being blasted to smithereens, he was knocked backwards into the table of skulls and bones.
That was the second time the old geezer tried to kill him in less than a minute! Right, well then.
The parts of him that weren't boiling in rage at the fool who dared try to kill him, were coolly noting that Burke was a competent dueler, with fast reflexes. Another part was deciding he was going to kill Burke in an excruciating manner. No simple avadakedavra for him, no, he was earning his torture.
Burke moved fast, "Oppugno!" giving Tom no time to react.
The bones and skulls which he'd been lying in, half-stunned in the mangled remains of the table, were suddenly animated. They gathered themselves mid-air, sharpening to fine points and hurling themselves at his head.
Tom cast a vanishing charm while rolling out of the way, but he wasn't fast enough. One caught him in his side, and another lodged itself in his shoulder. He wheezed, stumbling in pain, to crouch behind the remains of the counter. Taking a sharp breath, he shouted engorgio!
Engorgio, straight at the bloody attack-saws and hooks dangling from the ceiling, which were all but starved of blood.
With a groan, 40-some animated saws, hooks, and strangling-chains swelled in size until they were almost scraping the wooden floor. They swung wildly on their chains, smashing through displays and gouging cabinets.
Wood sprayed, glass shattered, and thousands of galleons in rare and precious artifacts struck the ground as the attack-saws shred them to pieces.
Satisfying, if he could say-so himself.
Tom threw himself sideways, out of the reach of a particularly ambitious attack-saw, and was almost struck by the stinger of a giant bloody scorpion.
In between vanishing the attack-saws, Burke managed to engorge the dozen or so bewitched scorpions, and set them upon Tom. The thing's tail was larger than a winged-back chair, and half of them were currently tangled in the remaining attack-saws. But a few managed to get across the room and at Tom.
All of this gave Burke enough time to vanish the rest of the attack-saws, hooks, and chains, and fire off a few decidedly unfriendly spells at Tom, while he was distracted by the bloody scorpions.
It was bad. His range of mobility was limited thanks to the bruising on his one shoulder, and now a bone was lodged in his other shoulder. That wasn't even mentioning the bone sticking out of his side. He was decidedly not thinking about the sort of internal bleeding he was going to have to heal, after this.
Thank fuck he had horcruxes.
Scrambling back through the debris, Tom spotted two more scorpions skittering toward him and cursed. Fuck it. He banished a shard of glass straight through the scorpion's mandibles. The other skidded out of the way, and Tom banished an entire cabinet straight into its midsection.
"Bombarda!" Burke shouted, firing a blasting curse straight at Tom. He dove out of the way of the curse and whipped up the glass shards into a rough swarm of cutting blades.
It was a crude spell, cast wandlessly, but it'd be a shame not to use all the debris Burke carelessly left lying about.
The glass shot toward Burke, and he countered with a clever shield and counter-hex.
But Burke was slipping. He hadn't even noticed the guts of the partly dissected portlock hovering behind his head. The glass shards were serving as the perfect distraction. With a squelch that set even Tom's stomach turning, the intestines of the portlock wound themselves around Burke's neck and squeezed.
Burke's eyes bulged, hands immediately grasping the rings of intestine wrapped around his throat, all magic forgotten in the face of sheer, animal panic.
And that was all it took.
Tom banished another two glass shards at Burke. The first was long and narrow, jamming itself through the man's eye socket and into his skull. The second slipped through the space between his sixth and seventh ribs, piercing the heart.
Burke went limp, and the portlock's intestines ceased being held up by Tom's magic. The corpse toppled over and hit the floor with a loud thud.
"You should've taken my offer, Mr. Burke." He said to the corpse, lips curved upward in amusement.
The general gist behind dueling was to evade your opponent's defenses, while trying to make it as difficult as possible for them to hit you. This was complicated by several factors, only one of which was relevant at the moment.
Witches and wizards wore enchanted robes, amulets, rings, hats, and doubtless other trinkets with the intention of defending themselves. Everyone who could afford them wore them, and it was an ongoing arms-race in Wizarding Britain, where you couldn't find a single witch or wizard who wasn't weighted down by a glittering array of protective-whatsits claiming to do everything from automatically clean their clothes, to defending against almost any spell.
Most of these charmed trinkets were expensive, short-lived, and rarely followed through on their promises.
Regardless, Tom had expected Burke to go down harder. There were enchanted rings that could make objects moving quickly at you swerve out of the way, last moment. Some robes stiffened upon contact with banished objects, hardening like armor.
All of these were expensive, but Burke was surrounded by ancient dark artifacts, most of which were extremely expensive. He could afford it.
Yet, a common banished piece of glass pierced his skull and killed him. It was odd.
Burke must've gotten arrogant in his old age. Either that, or something else was afoot.
Tom glanced around the room now, slightly anxious.
He cast several spells to detect disillusionment, and another to detect the use of an invisibility cloak.
Nothing.
With that, Tom summoned his bag from underneath the ruins of the counter, and dug around in it.
A poor muggleborn, even one with supposed ties to Slytherin himself, was not well-liked in his House. It took years to gain their respect, and by the time he had, he'd developed a number of useful habits. One of those was always carrying on him whatever he could conceivably need.
He'd enchanted his bag with an undetectable expansion charm in his fifth year, and it boasted dittany, skele-gro, wound-cleaning paste, burn-healing paste, various antidotes, and a bezoar.
This time, he withdrew a sneakascope and a small foe glass.
Beyond the typical you are in a room filled with dark objects alert, nothing.
Tom then cast a couple cautious spells on the corpse, to detect if Burke was under any potions or spells that altered his appearance.
None.
Alright, then the Burke Tom fought wasn't a polyjuiced imposter under the imperius curse. Good to know.
Tom pointed at the door, murmuring a charm to make the sign read closed. Just in case the spells failed with Burke's death, Tom cast a locking charm on the door. Then, he cast another charm to alert him if anyone else appeared in the store.
Once it was tripped, it'd set off a shrill alarm. He never used it before now, largely because he hadn't wanted Borgin or Burke asking why he needed to be alerted to their presence. They would've wanted to know what he was hiding from them.
Namely, the theft of hundreds of galleons.
With that, Tom staggered across the room to slump down against the wall with a groan. His hand was pressed tightly at his side, to keep the piece of bone from moving.
He summoned his healing supplies out of his bag with a wave of his hand.
Tom braced himself before pulling out the bone. A spurt of blood trickled down his side.
Three charms, wound-cleaning paste, and a dab of dittany took care of the puncture wound in his side. It'd gone deep and speared his colon. It'd barely missed his kidney. The wound was now stuffed with wound-cleaning paste to prevent sepsis, and the dittany was closing it right up. The damage to his colon was repaired with a couple delicate charms.
The shoulder with the bone sticking out of it only needed an episkey, and the bruise on his other shoulder could wait. Likewise, the cuts from the wood when he'd shot out of the shop only required some cleansing and dittany.
The real concern was his chest. That spell should've shattered his bones into a hundred little pieces. Instead, it ached every time he took in a sharp breath. It didn't feel like a fracture, but the adrenaline was still rushing through his system, dulling pain.
If there were fractures, an episkey followed by a drop of skele-gro should do the trick. Skele-gro was expensive, though. He didn't want to waste any of it, but— but it'd be worse to go around with fractured ribs.
He took his medicine and sat there for a moment, pain fading as the magic knitted his wounds. He'd be fine, physically. Now for the real trouble.
It was time to call Walburga Black.
edited: 10/30/2016