Chapter 3: The Ghost of Merope
In the present time, the Muggle housekeeper came into the office of Mr. Cook. She was pushing in a cart bearing a teakettle, cups, and a dish full of steaming soup.
"Care for some snap pea soup?" Mr. Cook asked Ms. Flamel.
"With this weather? Gladly." Ms. Flamel nodded. The housekeeper poured in the soup in bowls, placed them before the two folks, and made her way out. Once she left, they went back to their conversation.
"I won't lie, it took me like fifty minutes of reading that section to fully let it sink to me." Mr. Cook poured some tea in his cup. "It's rather unbelievable how such parental abuse even exists!"
"At this rate, 'abuse' would be too merciful a word. Unfortunately, I don't know a worse word to replace it." Ms. Flamel tasted her soup. "Flavorful. My compliments to your cook!"
"I'll let her know." Mr. Cook nodded. "You know, when you submitted your manuscripts, you also provided dated, written notes from actual interviews. Did Penna De Mort tell you all of this? How her father abused her even in such a fragile state?"
"It was actually difficult to take that information. Pénélope did tell me of her experiences, but some of them I had to find on my own since she wouldn't say. I had to spend nearly a year in Little Hangleton..."
"Little Hangleton?"
"A very small Muggle village in the Yorkshire region of England." Ms. Flamel nodded. "Vast fields, the dark glens that hid Voldemort's home, generally cloudy... Honestly, for a city witch like myself, I understood why I barely saw any wizard living in the area. Anyway, I tried asking the local Muggles as cautiously as I could if they knew anything about the odd family of Riddle. All I heard were things like 'Oh, nobody really liked them', 'Just a bunch of snobbish well-off landowners who owned most of the lands where the town stood', or 'the family with the son who saved himself from a bad marriage'." She tapped a finger on the desk. "That got my attention. Luckily, I managed to find a local wizard peasant or two. They said 'Oh, yes. The Muggle heir. The one who got off the wires thanks to Merope Gaunt and later got killed by his own son. You-Know-Who. He made a palace out of the family house and grew the glens to hide it. He apparently got some lad to harass.' Though, I must admit, I did manage to get Bloodyle Silisk to tell me the best details."
Mr. Cook and Ms. Flamel continued eating their snap pea soup until they ran out. "The part of the 'Sacred Twenty-Eight Families'. I mean, I only managed to understand that it was part of 'purebloods', or however you call it..."
Ms. Flamel rolled her eyes and sighed something in French before speaking back to English. "It's racism for you. Keep wizards hidden from Muggles and those who manage to have families with not a single Muggle-born relative grow the pompous belief that they're superior. It gets worse when they alienated the pureblood families who do befriend Muggles and they call them 'blood traitors'. Perfect examples of the fanatical among the Sacred Twenty-Eight are the Lestrange and Gaunt families. So fanatic and determined to keep the wizarding gene clean, they are willing to go as far as incest. And since the Gaunts are Slytherin's legacy... well, you know where Voldemort got his psychotic tendencies."
"In your notes, you made the connections between Penna De Mort and her deceased grandmother." Mr. Cook flipped through the pages of the manuscript. "The similarities between De Mort and Merope Gaunt are beyond surprising."
"Well, when both were tormented by their fathers, what do you expect?"
August 1902
Penelope kept crying and Voldemort couldn't stand it.
Ever since her father restricted her free time to be in the castle so that he'd keep an eye on her, the child felt more miserable than ever. He now came up with different reasons to torment her, whether it was in DED or anything else at all. When she was being 'educated' by Bellatrix and Crouch, he now sat opposite to Bloodyle and kept a stern look, freaking out Penelope when she took notice. After the basilisks adjusted her nursery into a bedroom accommodated for a toddler, he added in a door with a lock that only he could open, thus trapping Penelope in her room so that she wouldn't try sneaking out again. The basilisks still made her meals but now their master limited their ingredients so that she only had sour-flavored foods.
And honestly, must we get into the details of her second birthday? Yet again, she couldn't force herself to kill the victim, who was a Mudblood this time, and yet again, her father managed to find some method to make her kill the victim unwillingly. Another pure white soul fragment pulled itself out of her body and into the bottle Voldemort kept. Still angry that the murder did not corrupt the toddler, Voldemort 'punished' Penelope by over boiling the water in the tub when Bloodyle gave her a bath. Two months had passed and Penelope was still crying over the burns she had on her wrists.
"If my plans didn't rely on her, I'd kill her on the spot! Her crying is worse than those of Mandrakes!" Voldemort passed angrily around his office.
"Well she understands her family's level in society," Crouch said, "but the trickiest part will be the reward."
"The reward?"
"Yes. It's something that I learned while raising my Brittany. Many children will perform better when they are aware that their deeds come with satisfying rewards. In others, if you want Penelope to do what you tell her, you must bribe her."
...
Bloodyle was padding some cotton endorsed with Cretan dittany on Penelope's wrists in the drawing room when Voldemort apparated. The toddler screamed and hid behind Bloodyle. "Leave me alone!"
"I come in peace." Voldemort raised his vicious hand up.
"That's rich, coming from you," Bloodyle commented. The Dark Lord bit his lips and forbade himself from trying to respond. He shook his head and directed his cold blue eyes to Penelope.
"My methods are harsh, but they serve a cause. Our cause," he told the toddler. "So, I'm here to smoothen the process. If you can manage to execute what you are told, I'll see that my beatings are... less violent by ten percent."
The toddler just stared at him with a scowl. "I'm not convinced," she said in full English.
"What if six months before your birthdays, I let you decide the blood status of your victims? I'll swear on the River Styx that I'll keep my word."
This got the toddler interested. She didn't know much about the well-spoken River Styx, but she was well aware that whoever swore on it would be condemned should they break their word. And Voldemort, who always meant business, swore on that river a lot.
"I also want to go out," Penelope said.
Voldemort scowled and hoped she wasn't going to start making a list of things she wanted so that he'd get her cooperation.
Luckily, Bloodyle intervened. "In fairness, my Lord, it's rather unhealthy for children to be cooped indoors. Plus, rather than just bringing in victims into your living room, you could just bring Penelope to the victim's house and kill him there. Nothing terrorizes wizards more than being killed in their own house."
Voldemort pondered. "That's actually not a bad idea. Fair enough. I'll let you choose the blood status of your victims and you get at least two hours outside, and in return, I won't beat you too hard if you do as I say. Also, if you go outside, Bloodyle or a Death Eater must either accompany you. I keep my word on the River Styx. Understand?"
The toddler still frowned at him. Crouch didn't make the mistake of not noticing that Penelope was above the intelligence of a mere two-year-old, but as Voldemort made his own observance, he saw that his daughter had one thing that his Death Eaters didn't.
She was fully aware that he was beyond dangerous even if he promised to 'protect' those who pledge loyalty. Like many of his Death Eaters, she was terrified of him, but unlike them, she didn't believe in his 'nice offers'.
"I'll do my best," she merely said.
"Very good." One of his hands was hiding something behind his back. He pulled out, revealing a sketchpad with a green cover and a box full of colored pencils. "A little something to remember our conversation." He placed it next to Penelope and apparated himself out of the room.
"This is complete bribery," Penelope said in Parseltongue.
"Glad you noticed." Bloodyle sighed. "You're clearly going to keep it."
"Well duh! I'm two and I'm selfish."
Bloodyle smiled and ruffled Penelope's hair.
...
The end of the month came rather quickly. The Dark Lord did stay true to his word.
With whatever free time she had, Penelope chose to go outside. Either she'd go play with Bloodyle in the glens or she'd be watched by either Crouch or Bellatrix, who were more open by taking her around the hills and fields that surrounded Little Hangleton. During those outings, she'd take the 'gift' Voldemort had given her and you'd go on to sketch what she saw. The more she did, the more it looked like an actual wizarding photo in the sense it looked real and alive, only it was colored. She'd draw the hills, the sunsets, the little Muggle village isolated at the heart of the valley, and the rocky quarries. When the outings were done, she'd bring her sketches to her room and use dead snake guts to stick them on her wall. That way, when she had to go to sleep in her locked up room, she'd lie on her stone cold mattress and watch the landscapes move on the paper. Seeing the drawn grass be blown by the invisible wind was enough to lull her to sleep, but enough to keep her from wishing that she could sleep on that natural blanket of greenery.
Noticing her interest in sketching landscapes, one of the Death Eaters, Alecto, saw an opportunity. With her master's permission, she began bringing potted plants from her home and by September, she tutored the two-year-old prodigy into scientific illustrations. Penelope found herself drawing the different organs of individual plants with great interest and did her own, daycare version of Herbology, squeezing the life out of plants and using their blood to make liquids that even she didn't know how they'd work. One time, she managed to grow some Devil Snare to fill an entire broom closet, only for it to accidentally bruise Bayen Lestrange. Though she did not mean to do so and despite how she found Bayen annoying, Voldemort was pleased by the accident.
Another particular accident occurred on September 30th. Alecto had brought a potted Mandrake and sedated it to ensure it would be asleep. However, even being five inches near the Mandrake and with earmuffs on (just in case), Penelope immediately began to hallucinate and passed out, not waking up until the next evening. Soon enough, Bloodyle threatened to murder anyone who grew or brought a Mandrake in the Dark Lord's lands, for now it was clear that Penelope was highly allergic to Mandrake plants.
In October, it was the turn of Amycus, Alecto's brother. If his sister managed to rise the Dark Lord's offspring's talent in scientific illustrations and early Herbology, he decided to use the new tricks to fulfill what the Dark Lord wanted: getting Penelope into the Dark Arts. He'd bring skulls, femurs, and vials of blood that came from a Squib, a Muggle, a Mudblood, a half-blood, a half-breed, or a pureblood. How, he'd teach her, can you tell anatomically that this blood status is much more inferior than this particular blood status by comparing and contrasting those skull structures? He'd perform spells in front of her and she had to draw the physical or ethereal effect they'd create.
Positively speaking for Amycus, the Dark Lord's daughter was retaining what she was learning, but as Halloween passed and November came, he had to share the good and bad news to his master. The good news? Penelope knew the names of every single Dark Arts spell and could blindly sniff out the odor of a Mudblood. The bad part? Penelope directly refused to use any of them.
Then again, perhaps now wasn't a very good time to get Penelope to perform magic. One of Voldemort's spies alerted him and the other Death Eaters that Aurors were circulating around the Yorkshire region. Apparently, the Trace had alerted the Ministry of Magic that an underage wizard was performing magic.
"Limit the patrols. Pause Penelope's sessions. The last thing we need is for the Ministry of Magic to 'rescue her'."
...
Amycus and Alecto were on their way out of the castle when they found Penelope standing on a stool and trying to reach for a bookshelf too high for her to reach from the floor.
"Careful, little one." Amycus picked her up and brought her back to the ground. "Do you need something?"
"I need more paper." Penelope pointed at her sketchpad, which was sitting on the floor and only left with close to ten remaining pages. "I ran out."
"Ran out?" Alecto picked up the sketchpad and opened it to see the last pages it held. Each of them was full by a drawing, and each of them had the same context: a graveyard background, a leaning dead willow tree, and a pale woman. The only thing standing out from that woman was a locket.
"Artist block?" Alecto guessed.
"I guess." Penelope said.
"Well here, you can take this." Amycus looked through his bagged belongings and pulled out a black book. He opened it, revealing blank pages. He ripped off a quarter of the pages. Roots grew on the spines of the ripped pages while in their old home, new pages grew, perfectly straight and clean. Amycus then brought the ripped pages to Penelope's sketchpad and the roots immediately attached the pages to the pad.
"Hydra paper. Rip off a page, a new one grows." He closed the pad and gave it back to Penelope. "That way you never run out of paper."
"Thank you," she said.
The siblings made their way out. Soon enough, Penelope's bedtime called in, and after the basilisks wished her goodnight, she was sealed inside her room. With the window's moonlight as her source, Penelope pulled out her sketchpad and looked at the repetitive illustrations of the woman with the locket in the graveyard. She didn't understand why she kept drawing her.
Penelope turned to one of the new virgin papers and grabbed a black colored pencil. She stopped herself. She didn't know if she ought to draw? What if she kept drawing the same thing? And if she didn't, what else could she possibly draw? The door? The leaking tiles?
Perhaps she could write.
My name is Penelope Svjetla Marvolo Riddle, she wrote. Nothing happened... until something showed up right underneath the sentence Penelope had written.
Hello, Penelope Svjetla Marvolo Riddle. Are you my son's daughter?
Penelope's eyes widened. Are you my grandmother, Merope Gaunt?
I believe so. You have the name of my father, Marvolo Gaunt, and the last name of my former Muggle lover, Tom Riddle. I named your father Tom Marvolo Riddle.
Are you a ghost?
Yes. I currently live in a ruined cemetery in London. I can't leave unless I am invited to be by someone's side.
Perhaps this was why she kept drawing the pale woman in a graveyard. Penelope had been drawing the ghost of her grandmother. "Please come. I'm lonely."
The ten illustrations of the ghost of Merope ripped off from the book and ripped themselves into tiny pieces. The pieces landed on the floor and assembled themselves to create a mosaic portrait of the ghost. A gelatinous mass with the same texture as tar grew from the picture and solidified itself to become the ghost.
Merope's hair had the same dark tones as Penelope's, but hers were so straight, she almost looked like she came out of an eternal bath. Even though she was a ghost, her skin was so white pale that if you looked through her, whatever was behind her seemed to be as white as her. Despite her obvious young looks, she was horribly dried out of life, hope, and water.
Or as Penelope put it simply in her mind, her grandmother's ghost looked terrible.
"You have your grandfather's eyes," the ghost sighed. She reached out to touch the toddler's cheeks. A softness like the one of a cloud reached Penelope's skin, relaxing her a bit. "There's some saturation around it, but it's very pretty."
"He hates me," Penelope said. "Your son."
The ghost of Merope pulled her hand away from the toddler in guilt. "So... the Gaunt insanity still lives."
"You're not crazy." Penelope said nicely. "You just made terrible choices."
"Not terrible choices!" The ghost raised a finger. "Just one! I should have never removed that love potion from my lover!"
Penelope sighed. This was bound to be long.
...
Throughout the months of December, January, and February, snow covered the hills surrounding Little Hangleton. As Aurors thought that 'white snow could show out dark wizards and underage wizards on the loose', Voldemort declared that he and his followers would really stay low until the Aurors had given up. The Death Eaters split to avoid suspicions, Bellatrix went with Bayen to see her sister, Crouch took Brittany on a trip to the Scottish highland, and Amycus and Alecto went off to London to keep an eye on the Ministry activities. Voldemort and the basilisks put themselves in hibernation mode to save energy, but before he did, the Dark Lord locked up Penelope in her room until the coast was clear.
The sole problem was that Penelope couldn't hibernate like they did. As her window did not have any glass, the wind would blow into the room and make a hissing sound through the stones of the wall. The toddler shivered underneath her pathetic rag of a bed sheet, which only got worse as snow fell into her room and melted. Every day, her stomach would gurgle, and eating the snow did not help.
With Bloodyle hibernating, Penelope got used to summoning the ghost of Merope. For a dead woman who had given hope on everything, she sure knew how to distract her granddaughter by telling her stories of Salazar Slytherin and some of their Gaunt relatives, like Penelope's grand-uncle Morfin, her great-grandfather Marvolo, and their long-deceased relative Gormlaith, whose niece brought the Gaunt line to America, where it ended with her children.
When Christmas Eve came, the ghost of Merope urged Penelope to come to the wall, sit underneath the window, and listen. As they sat and listened, the only thing they could hear was the wind blowing... then came church bells, pulled carriages, and what sounded like happy Muggles singing carols.
"I always enjoyed listening to them sing from my father's shack." The ghost of Merope sighed. "The singing's even better when you're dead silent."
"Why?" Penelope asked.
"Because when you don't say anything and you just listen, you can hear the singing at the fullest." So they sat there for a straight hours, enjoying the unreachable vocal joy, until it ended.
"I wish I had Christmas like others," the ghost of Merope sighed. "My father and brother never gave me presents. They said Squibs don't deserve good treatments."
"But you aren't a Squib," Penelope frowned before shedding a tear. "And the only 'gift' your son has ever given me was a mere bribery."
The ghost of Merope gave a small smile.
"I know!" She said. "Let's spend the rest of the night doing some illustrations! I'd tell you all that I remember about that time, you draw it in your sketchpad, and we'll put them on the wall.
Penelope nodded. The ghost of Merope went on to tell her about Muggles in winter clothing singing in the snow, churches ringing bells, bakers selling fruitcakes, Muggles cutting down pine trees, dragging them through the woods, and bringing them back home to decorate it, children excitedly opening presents, and couples kissing under the mistletoe. Penelope did so many wonderful sketches based on what her ghostly grandmother told her. When she was done, they put away the papers she had on the wall and replaced them with the new ones. The two of them admired their work but Penelope felt rather sour on the inside as she saw each image showing off a happiness she didn't have. Where were her singing Muggles? Why didn't she live in a church with harmonious bells? Who'd give her fruitcakes? Who'd bring her a tree to decorate and hide wrapped gifts for her to open them? Who'd love her enough to give her a kiss under a poisonous plant?
Penelope went to sleep in her cold bed. Around down, she felt Merope's cold ghostly hands shaking her shoulders and waking her up.
"Penelope! You must see this! It came when we were asleep!"
"Aren't you already rested in peace?" Penelope asked as she stretched herself up. She turned and saw something that immediately made her shed tears. Somehow, when she was sleeping, somebody had brought in some wonderful treasures and left it just by her bedside. There was a miniature pine, potted and half-Penelope's height. It had the scent and wonderful stickiness, but each tip was silvery, making the tree shine like tinsel when hit by the window's sunlight. Two wrapped presents rested by the potted presents, and to finish it all, there was a small stand the same height as the tree, only it was filled with slices of fruitcake with chocolate icing, a Chocolate Frog box, a pack of Bertie Bott's Flavour Beans, and three bottles of Pumpkin Juice.
"I guess somebody wanted you to have a happy Christmas," the ghost of Merope smiled. "Go on, open them!"
Penelope rushed to her presents and opened them like any eager child would. The first one turned out to be a thick, cozy blanket with a beautiful black and teal blue pattern of ghostly blue animals leaving trails of mists as they ran about in the dark wilderness.
"So pretty!" The ghost of Merope commented. "A blanket that shows the different forms of Patronuses! They take on the form of your happiest memory to protect you from Dementors!"
"It's really pretty," Penelope sighed. Whoever sent it to her must have known that she was having cold sleeps. "But I can use it without your son taking it or wondering who gave it to me?"
"Just take what you have of your current bed sheet and sew it onto one side of your new blanket. That way, in case he checks on you, he sees only the rag side, but you'll actually be sleeping in a much more comfortable blanket."
"Great idea." Penelope folded her blanket and put it aside while she opened her last present. It turned out to be a box with golden leaf carvings, and in it, more treasures: a pocket-sized storybook, a barn owl plush toy, and a red-feathered quill. "This is all wonderful... but where am I going to hide them? If he finds them, he'll destroy everything."
The ghost of Merope flew her way into the ground. Penelope waited until a stone popped open. She rushed and lifted up the stone: Merope's head was sticking from the base of what seemed to be a secret compartment. Seeing that she was getting the same idea as the ghost, she tested it to see if the box fit in the compartment and if the stone could be placed above it. It was perfect.
Christmas left and Penelope was overjoyed with the presents. She took her ghostly grandmother's advice and using a hair strand fro Merope's ghostly hair and the needle of a spider, she sewed her snakeskin bed sheet on the ugliest side of her Patronus blanket. Thus, when Penelope would go to sleep, she'd bundle underneath and be cradled in a dreamland of mist-made beast running around the dark, snowy woods. She especially adored the Patronuses of different forms of snakes, though she wished there'd be basilisks.
She didn't rush in on the food she received. Despite her hunger, she'd spend at least an hour's worth of meal to put some fruitcake slice or a sip of pumpkin juice in her mouth and let it sit. Penelope saved the Chocolate Frog for another time, but she enjoyed sharing the Flavour Beans with the ghost of Merope (oddly enough, the ghost could consume them). They had this fun shared quirk that should one run into a flavor they disliked, they'd spit it out and give it to the other. For instance, if Penelope found herself spitting a bean flavored in cherry pie, she'd trade it for the bok choy flavored one that Merope spit out. Before going to bed, Penelope would sit with the ghost of Merope and read from the storybook. Reading to her granddaughter also helped Penelope improve her English and her reading.
Penelope assumed this was the last of her generous giver, but she was wrong. Around January 6th, what was labeled by most Muggles as 'Epiphany', when the mage kings visited the son of God, Penelope woke up yet to find another 'present'. This time, it was a perfectly baked, still warm galette cake. On the first slice she took, she found a hidden miniature silver figurine of a phoenix that flew around Penelope's room, bringing some sparkles. And yet, despite it being the second time, the 'giver' still didn't bother leaving some kind of note.
"You're sure it's not you?" Penelope asked one night later on while using the mini phoenix trinket to melt the Chocolate Frog into hot chocolate while the ghost of Merope played around with the Chocolate Frog card of Merlin that came with the now melted frog.
"How do you expect me to move anything when I'm like this?" The ghost practically whistled to her own see-through body. "Besides, if I were you, I'd just be grateful that somebody out there giving me food and some treats while the people I hate were in hibernation!"
"Would you know who?" Penelope asked. That made the ghost shut up. "Yep. I thought so."
Around the last two weeks of January came a rather violent blizzard. Snow poured in the window and threatened to bury Penelope alive, weren't it for the mini-phoenix flapping its sparkling wings and making the white layers melt. Unfortunately, the exposure got Penelope coughing and sick. Luckily, around the morning of February 1st, she woke up to find a box full of medicine, a syringe, and pumpkin juice. The ghost of Merope guided her granddaughter on how to do her own shots and take her medicine until she got better.
"Now I take back what I said," the ghost admitted. "Who could possibly be giving you first food and now medicine?"
"Especially since no decent wizard is crazy enough to go in your son's house." Penelope nodded. "I'd really like to thank him, but how can I do so without even being able to see him?"
"What if you leave him a letter while you sleep? I'd stay awake all night and see if he comes?"
It was a great idea. Penelope immediately used paper from her sketchpad to write a letter (though Merope had to chide her in grammatical errors). She used what was left of her Christmas ribbons to keep the rolled up letter in shape and rested it by her bedside. For many mornings, the letter was still in the same spot until February 14th came. The letter was gone and replaced by a pot of red-colored soup, a heart-shaped box full of Cauldron cakes, and another box of Chocolate Frog.
"This is frustrating! I could only see his cloaked figure and not his face!" The ghost of Merope finished whatever was left of the Flavour Beans while Penelope savored the soup. "He apparated in here, made your meal appear, took your letter, stroke your hair, and left off without so much of a hello!"
"So how do you know it was a wizard and not a witch?"
"Because when he touched you, I saw his hand with that finger structure most middle-aged men have!"
Penelope sighed.
"Eventually I'll have to go back to the cemetery," the ghost of Merope warned the toddler. "I enjoy spending time with you, Penelope, I really do. You are by far the kindest relative I've ever known and you are incredibly brilliant for a little girl who's not even three yet!"
Penelope blushed a bit at the compliment.
"But ghosts are bound to the places they died at. I died in London, so I must go back home."
"Will I ever see you again?"
"Of course! All you need is to write on hydra paper to let me know you want to see me and then wish out loud that I'd come! I'll be there for you when you are lonely."
The ghost of Merope placed a kiss on the toddler's forehead. The latter watched sadly as her ghostly grandmother flew out of the window and somewhere south on the white horizon. Part of Penelope reprimanded her for not keeping the ghost here with her for good. For once, having the ghost of Merope around made her feel like she was actually wanted by her family in a loving manner.
Unfortunately, Merope could only provide Penelope the love that the latter's mother had given to her before dying. Voldemort, for his part, had no love to give for his own flesh and blood.
The small girl cleaned up her room once she was done with her meal, making sure she hid her treasures in her compartment so that nothing would be seen. She stuffed her Christmas drawings in the box, put her original landscape drawings back in place, and ate her Chocolate Frog.
"Why's the world unfair?" She whined in Parseltongue as she put her Chocolate Frog card of Albus Dumbledore with her one of Merlin in the box, put the stone over her safe, and went to bed.
