Chapter 4

For two blessed weeks, she was free. Tom barely spoke to her, if at all, and stayed in his room at all times. Hermione could not believe her luck. She exulted in this god-sent interlude. She could breathe again, could feel her stamina returning.

Tom, on the other hand, turned pale and sickly. He was sulky and unresponsive to his parents, so much so that the Grangers thought he had come down with some bug. They took him to see a physician. He recommended fresh air, exercise and above all, some company.

"The poor boy just needs more friends!" was the general consensus.

Hermione did not really see the point. Tom wouldn't want friends. He was a self-sufficient oddity who did not seem to care about people, as a whole. No, he was upset because he wasn't so special anymore. He wanted magic to be his thing. And it wasn't. It wasn't hers, either. There must have been – she imagined with some trepidation and excitement – many others in the world like them, living in secret, perhaps. And she was sure Tom would resent every last one of them.

Much to her surprise, though, he appeared to have some friends at school. She was made privy to that information when her mother burst into her room one evening to tell her she had to accompany Tom and his friends to an outing in the park.

Hermione put down her book.

"Why do I have to go if his friends will be there?"

Cora shifted her eyes towards the window. She twisted her mouth awkwardly, the way adults do when they have to explain something complicated to a child.

"To tell the truth, Tom doesn't want to go to the park with his friends. But I've spoken to the boys' mothers and everything is already settled. I think he might be less stubborn if his sister joined him. You might make him feel better."

"He said he doesn't want to go?" Hermione asked, slightly surprised that Tom would risk spoiling his "perfect little boy" image.

"Well…he was very shy about it, but I'm a mother. It's not hard to tell these things. I'm sure you would notice too, if you spent more time with him. Oh, I know you and he have had a rough time getting along, darling," her mother blurted out, eyes growing hard, almost as if she were afraid of revealing too much. She sat down next to her on the bed and tucked a stray lock from her forehead.

You don't know the half of it, Hermione thought, accepting her mother's caress notwithstanding.

"But you're a sensible girl and he's a good boy, if you only let him show you. He's had a bad start in life, but that doesn't mean he can't grow up to be a wonderful man. He's frighteningly clever and so sweet... I will admit there is something distant about him..." Cora trailed off with a glazed look.

Hermione's heart stirred. Might her mother feel, deep down, there was something wrong with him? Could she hope to have an ally, after all?

"Which is why we must get him out of this bad spell," Cora continued soberly, all thoughts of his strangeness pushed aside.

Hermione blinked. Spell. There was something cruelly ironic about the word.

Whatever else Cora said, she wasn't paying much attention. She nodded her head perfunctorily. She had to admit, she was a little bit curious about these supposed friends.

Her mother had put a ribbon in her hair. It was a dirty blue, gone faint from washing, but she liked it best. It was wrapped around her head, its bow resting on top of her hair like a diadem. Years ago – it seemed like centuries – she had pretended it was a real diadem and she was a very important duchess. Not because she cherished the idea of royalty. She was more interested in the duchess' pets. She had heard these great old ladies could keep several dogs at once. Her parents didn't allow such fanciful scenarios.

Happier days.

Now, she touched the tight knot in the middle of her bow and looked over the boys in front of her with a growing sense of unease. They were…not what she had expected. And yet maybe they were.

They made up a very eclectic, very Tom-group, if she could say so herself. Two of them were bespectacled and pimple-cheeked. They smiled nervously and played around with their caps. The other three were large and bulky, and they didn't smile; they only leered, their lips spreading upwards like dead fish. They made witless jokes about school and girls and the War. The ever-looming War they were sure was going to happen.

"They'll make little Jews fly up in the sky like on Guy Fawkes'."

Hermione wrinkled her nose. They would have been vulgar had they possessed even a drop of imagination. But she could tell right away, these were the innocents. The schoolboys with big fists usually were. They meant no ill, personally. But they were used for ill by others. Girls like Elspeth liked to gather heavy-footed soldiers around them, in the eventuality of a threat. Riddle was following an age-old tradition.

But the shy, consumptive boys who could hold better conversation - what were they used for? Did Tom actually enjoy their company? Did he see something in them?

It was a small mystery. Did all these boys really like Tom? A bigger mystery.

They spoke to him in a friendly, off-hand manner, and they even let him take the first dip in the delicious tomato sauce Cora had packed for them, but they kept their distance. It was like watching strangers meet for the first time. They were cheerful, but aloof, as if Tom was an acquaintance they weren't sure of, yet.

Did they suspect his true nature? It didn't look like it. And yet, they must have sensed something if they were still holding back.

One of the more skittish boys – his name might've been Eddie –was saying something with mild enthusiasm. She decided to listen.

"…and I reckon my dad will take me to see Mr. Prescott's Lagonda. Yeah it's not brand new, but it's a 16/80 and four years is young for a car, especially for a 16/80. And anyway, who wouldn't want an original Lagonda?" The boys sitting next to him nodded their head in understanding, but upon seeing Tom frown and remove a piece of dust from his jacket, they looked away and scoffed. The poor Lagonda fan swallowed thickly and leaned forward to grab a piece of cold toast. He asked for the marmalade. She handed it to him out of pity.

Hermione had done all the work; she had set the blanket and the basket and the little saucers, but no one had thanked her for her trouble. One of the boys had given her his magazine, as a token of appreciation. But her place in the group was fraught with ambiguity. In their eyes, she was in cahoots with the "grown-ups" and was going to tell them everything the boys had said and done. Every girl invariably became the Mother, in such a group.

Tom was frosty towards her and barely addressed her a word, although sometimes, he had to acknowledge her presence.

"Pass the salt, will you?" he would say in a toneless voice.

"Of course, Tom," she would reply with a smile. She wanted to save face in front of strangers. But she also liked how Tom's lips twitched when she acted sweet.

He saw her like an inconvenience the Grangers had forced on him, which was not far from the truth, but Hermione would've liked to tell him she wanted to be here as much as he did.

"Well, this is rubbish," he concluded with authority after leafing through a film magazine which had landed on his lap. Hermione saw Greta Garbo's stern face on the cover. She noticed that the boy sitting next to her – Rob, was it? - was looking intently at the cover too. Tom had dumped it in the middle of the blanket, and Hermione bent to retrieve it. She wanted to give it to him, but the boy shook his head with alarm and pushed it aside.

Hermione was miffed. Elspeth was at least popular and so, it made sense that girls listened to her, but Tom did not appear to be "popular", not by any true sense of the word. Why would they care what he thought? Cleverness and charm were all well and good, but you needed something extra to get ahead, you needed -

She narrowed her eyes at him.

Had he shown them he could do magic? Or…had he shown them he could make things happen? No, he wouldn't be that foolish. Yet he was very proud.

The conversation had changed from cars and films to the War again. The boys were talking about its imminent start with the certainty of adults. They seemed really eager, too, like they could hardly wait for it to begin. Even the smaller ones were confident about it. But what did they know? They had not even seen the first War.

"My dad says they're going to draft Kronenberg first. He's the factory owner. He acts all smart, even has his own driver, but he's so fat he can't see his legs. They'll send him off to fight in Germany and he'll lose that weight pretty quickly!" one of the boys – George, she thought – was saying with a laugh.

Hermione felt her cheeks grow red. She glanced at their chaperone's spot on the bench, above the lawn. Clara Stoltz had probably heard the boys' remarks. She must have heard all their comments about the Jews. She didn't look upset, but it made Hermione feel bad, either way. Clara was a nice twenty-year old girl who lived down the block in one of the shabbier-looking houses on the street. The Grangers never talked about that because it was very insensitive to discuss the lives of the less fortunate. Clara had agreed to look after them for a fee. But she was nothing like a fat factory owner. The Stoltzes were the owners of nothing, really.

She was pulled away from her thoughts, when George, who was now staring at Clara too, said in a low voice,

"She's a looker. I'll bet you no one here has the guns to go kiss her."

"On the cheek? Or on the…" Eddie asked, uncertain.

"On her foot, where do you think?!"

"You'll get the back of her hand, if you're lucky!"

Tom coughed once and set his sandwich down. "A kiss. That doesn't take that much effort, George. How about a slap?"

His audience went quiet. Hermione stared at him.

"I only mean, a kiss on the cheek… that's expected. A slap is a bit more daring. So, who's up for it?"

The heavy-set boys looked interested, but wary. The thin ones only smiled reluctantly. Hermione was about to open her mouth and say something, anything to break this awful silence, when Tom's lips suddenly contorted in amusement and he started laughing. Lightly.

"The looks on your faces. You're all milksops, the lot of you." He went on laughing. The others joined him awkwardly and tried their best to pretend they never, for once, really thought about it.

"No, no. I'm teasing," Tom began again apologetically. "A kiss, a slap…child's play, really. I think what would really make her itch is calling her a dirty Jew. To her face."

The laughter resumed uneasily. The boys didn't know anymore; was he joking again, was he in earnest?

Tom shrugged, raising an eyebrow. "George. You started this whole thing. Go tell her she's a dirty Jew or you'll be called a coward for the rest of the day and you won't get any cake." He laughed again lightly, as if this was only jesting, but you couldn't be sure. You never could be sure.

"Tom," Hermione warned.

He looked at her blankly. "Yes, Sis?"

"That's not funny."

"I find it funny. Just as funny as Archie's joke about flying Jews on Guy Fawkes. Right, Archie?"

The boy in question chuckled awkwardly. "That's right."

"Oh, come off it," she said, when she saw that George was actually getting up to speak to Clara. "This whole thing is pretend."

"The War isn't pretend, though. Is it?" Tom asked his mates.

The boys somberly shook their heads.

"Yes, it is," she insisted. "That's why children talk about it so much. Because it's like a story."

Tom's lips twitched. "My sister is saying we're children."

"That's not what I meant!"

Rob frowned at her. "Sorry, Hermione, but you're a girl. Of course you don't like wars."

"I don't like them because there's nothing good or interesting about them, just as there's nothing good or interesting about going up to Clara to tell her hurtful things."

It had been the wrong thing to say. If before it had been a hypothesis, now she certainly was the Mother of the group, the one who cohorts with grown-ups and uses words like "hurtful". She could see the boys shifting their eyes away in irritation.

"All right, then. Who here thinks George should man up and go to Clara?" Tom asked lightly. "Raise your hands."

One by one, some more hesitant than others, the five boys raised their hands.

"Who thinks we shouldn't?"

Hermione raised her hand.

"It's settled, then."

George got up and dusted his knees with great interest. Hermione swallowed thickly. Anyone could tell the boy wasn't looking forward to his task, but he had to prove Tom right and her wrong.

The other boys all got up with great interest. They wanted to watch the performance. Only Tom and Hermione remained sitting on the blanket.

"Clara will tell Mum and Dad what happened," she informed him coolly.

"Yes. She'll tell them Tom doesn't have very nice friends. And Cora will think twice of calling their mothers for an outing again," he replied evenly.

Hermione blinked. She had to admit she was impressed.

"That's…that's pretty brilliant, actually."

She had blurted out the words without thinking. She winced and chanced a glance at Tom. His mien had not changed, but something about his eyes bothered her. They seemed pleased. She bit her tongue angrily. She shouldn't have given him satisfaction.

Emboldened by her anger, she asked in a whisper,

"Did you – did you show them you could do things?"

Tom's countenance darkened by degrees, as if an afternoon shadow had flickered across its smooth surface.

"Is that why they listen to you?" she continued heatedly.

"You insult me. I don't need that to convince them."

"But you did it anyway, didn't you? You scared them with some awful trick," she pressed on, glancing from time to time towards them.

He kept his face straight, but his mouth was cruel and ready to bite. He didn't say yes. He didn't say no.

"Are you jealous?" he asked at length.

"You're joking. As if I would ever want to manipulate people like that–"

"Nothing's stopping you," he shrugged with scorn.

"I'm not like you. I'm going to use my magic for good," she said in a low voice.

Tom was watching George attentively. Hermione turned to look. He had reached Clara's spot and was holding his hands knotted behind his back. Some moments passed in agony and uncertainty. The other boys were standing close-by, listening intently.

Then – Hermione saw it with a flinch – Clara's face went white. She put a hand to her cheek and turned her body away. She lifted her arm to shoo the boy, but she was obviously discomposed.

George stood still, amazed at the eerie effect of his own words.

His friends cheered mildly and he staggered back towards them, smiling a heroic smile. He had returned from war.

"No one's good, you see," Tom told her, watching the spectacle unfold.

Hermione shivered. His eyes were consumed by hunger and what he had seen had not sated him. Not yet.

When George and the boys returned to the blanket, Tom clapped his hands in congratulations. An empty sound.

"Well done, George. As reward for your bravery, Hermione will give you her ribbon."

She jumped, as if burnt.

"Come on, Sis. Be a dear," Tom beckoned with venomous fondness.

When Hermione didn't reply, he leaned forward gracefully. Before she could stop him, his hand was on her bow. He gently tugged the knot free. The ribbon caressed his fingers as he pulled her hair loose. She felt a frost in her bones.

"There," he said, standing back. The ribbon was dangling from his fingers. George received it with a blush.

"Now, shouldn't we have some cake?" he asked amiably.

Hermione got up and tossed the basket aside, spilling some of its contents on the blanket.

"Have at it," she replied with biting sarcasm.

The boys watched her walk away with shame and relief. Tom stared at the ribbon George was now holding weakly in his hand.

He leaned against the lamppost, leafing through a tattered edition of the Hermetica. He wasn't much interested in Hermes Trismegistus' wisdom, but he was curious about his theories on alchemy. These were the portions he would read with a passion. He suspected there was a way for him to transform and alter substances using magic, the missing element the ancients had not possessed.

He checked his watch impatiently. She was late again. Stupid girl.

He watched throngs of girls walk hand in hand down the school steps, but no Hermione to be seen.

At long length, her bushy head made an appearance. She was carrying her schoolbag at arm's length and she looked quite dishevelled. Tom closed his book with a thud.

She walked to him quickly.

At closer inspection, she had suffered an altercation. Her palms were red, her knees were scratched and her uniform was tousled.

Tom felt a stab of anger at the sight. If someone had already brutalized her, what was the point? He wanted her fresh and clean, untarnished by the common mob.

"You're late. What happened?" he asked resentfully.

"What happened is you upset Elspeth and turned her against me," she retorted, not even bothering to look at him. He could understand now why she held her bag away from her. It was soaked. And it smelled vile. Like something had died in it.

"What did she do?"

"Why do you care to know, anyway?"

"Simple curiosity," he said, eyeing a cut on her knee.

"Her cronies dumped my bag in the toilet. I tried to fight them, and voila," she replied, glaring. "I was late because I had to stay and dry my books. Half of them are ruined anyway."

Tom licked his lips. He remembered Elspeth. Ugly cow. He pictured holding her head above the water closet. He pictured bunching her hair tight, pulling on it until she cried out. He would push her head in and watch her struggle desperately as her shouts gurgled to the surface in tiny, helpless bubbles. A Chinese form of torture, except not quite, since he wouldn't pull her head out. He'd hold her still, until she became still too.

"And it's your fault," Hermione continued angrily, walking two paces ahead of him.

"Why didn't you use magic?" he asked wanly, trying to appear disinterested.

Hermione shot him a look of surprise. She probably thought he still harboured some childish grudge against her powers. How daft. He didn't care a jot. She would never harvest her powers, never know their reach and depth like he did. She would hesitate, because she was naive and tragically cowed by her sense of right and wrong. So what if she also happened to have magic? No doubt plenty of miserable fools did, and look how well they managed. He would surpass them all, he was more than sure.

And he certainly didn't need her to reach greatness. You were weaker before me, she had said, but she had no idea how much more powerful he would be. He'd show her, then, who was truly the inferior. And she would sorely regret her words.

"I – I could have harmed them. I don't want to harm anyone," she replied, confirming his thoughts.

"You tried to harm my snake. And I bet you've had thoughts of harming me."

Hermione blushed a deep red. "That was – that's not true."

"Isn't it?"

She turned away, obviously disturbed. "Elspeth's girls didn't hurt me on purpose. They were just following orders."

"What if Elspeth had told her girls to kill you?"

Hermione gasped. "That's ridiculous! She's not stupid or insane."

Tom shrugged. "Doesn't have to be. She could've told them to put your head inside the toilet instead. Maybe one of the girls would've held your head in for too long and..." He saw Elspeth's gurgling shouts form tiny bubbles on the dirty surface and smiled to himself.

"Accidents happen," he finished. "What then?"

Hermione was visibly shaken.

"You'd die for their sake?" he goaded.

"No," she spat, looking him up and down as if he was diseased.

"So you would harm them, after all."

"That doesn't make me a monster," she retorted. "Like you."

Tom smirked. "No. You'll never have it in you."

She hurried her step. She had taken out her handkerchief and was pressing it to her knee. A dry crust of blood adorned the white lace.

He scowled with disgust. He did not abide by outside intrusions. He was supposed to have her all for himself. That's what family was. That's why she was his sister.

"Tom."

He was absorbed by his thoughts and the sight of her blood and he did not hear her at first.

"Tom," she repeated.

They had turned into an empty alley. Except it wasn't empty. A gang of young men, a couple of years older than him, was walking towards them. They looked suspicious, to say the least. Dirty clothes, trousers too short for their ankles, black nails and hardened grins. They swore and laughed and slapped their backs. Their object of amusement was him and Hermione, since they kept looking their way.

"Should we turn around?" she asked warily.

"No. They can't harm us."

It was too late anyway. They were quickening their step. Soon, they were right in front of them. He was not afraid.

"Look what we'ave here, Steve. A regular Stanley and Cissy Baldwin! How are things in Parliament, Prime Minister?" one of them bellowed in his ear.

"Get lost," Tom muttered, swerving past him.

"Ohoho! Not so fast, champ! Where's the rush?"

The others laughed, but made sure to block their path, so that Hermione almost knocked against a sharp elbow.

"We don't have money or anything else you might want," he said flatly, hoping they'd take the hint.

"Hang on, hang on! Are you callin' us thieves? S'that what we look like to you, Minister?"

One of them made a kissing motion to Hermione, who turned her head away.

"We're honest blokes, we are. But if you badmouth us, weeell we're gonna have to defend our honour."

Tom didn't have time to register what happened next. There was an impact. Someone got hit. There was a creeping pain between his teeth, like too much air had escaped his lungs at once. He tasted blood. Not dry, on a handkerchief. But wet and alive on his tongue.

He wheezed and danced in a dizzy circle, his head pounding.

"Tom!" Hermione yelled through the fog in his brain.

He put his hand to his mouth. He saw her, getting shoved by two of them and then grabbed by the leader, the one who'd punched him. He felt the tangy, metal fluid slip down his throat.

"Get your hands off her," he rasped, wiping his lip.

The young men sniggered. Their leader pretended to let Hermione go.

"Oh, dear. Best we do what Gov'ner says."

He sniffed at Hermione and turned up his nose. "You stink, Cissie. How about a clean up?"

"Let me go!"

He ignored her and started going through her pockets, keeping a tight grip on her wrists. Hermione tried to hit him with her foot, but one of the other guys grabbed her from behind.

Tom felt his hands shake. He registered a blistering warmth at the tip of his fingers.

"I said get your hands off. Her."

His fury was something removed from him, an object he noticed from afar. It looked like a brilliant ball of light. It swarmed his sense and made it hard for him to control his movements. A wave of energy cut through the air like a blade. His head was ringing.

Hermione's attackers kept laughing, but the noise was strangled somehow, like they'd choked on their own tongues. And then, they really were choking. One of them started scratching at his throat. His eyes were bulged in terror, face blue with effort. The other clutched his mouth open, trying to get the air in. Both, in the grip of horror. Hermione was released from their grasp.

Tom held up his hand, feeling the energy float from him to them, like a powerful cord that connected his wrath to their withering bodies.

He felt exhausted, but sated, as if he'd scratched the growing itch inside of him.

Hermione was looking at him, bewildered but relieved. Her eyes roamed over his features like he was not all there. And then she looked past him and her mouth formed a perfect 'o'.

"Tom! Be careful! Behind you!"

He tried to turn, but fists and feet kicked him from behind. And he collapsed on his knees, spitting blood.

"Stay away from him!" Hermione hollered and she threw her bag at them. Except, the thing was on fire now. And the flames rose high towards them, like claws that were trying to catch them. Their screams would have woken up the dead. Tom saw them from the corner of his eye.

"Crazy cunt!" one of them expelled. They grabbed their mates who had stopped choking and were gulping for air like newborns, and ran down the alley, out of sight.

Their voices died down, at length.

The only sound remaining was the crackling flames, which had made a ring around the burning schoolbag.

Tom was still kneeling. Hermione knelt too, clutching at her chest. They were both panting. Hermione took out her handkerchief. The one with dry blood.

"Here."

He grabbed it and dabbed it faintly over his mouth and nose. It turned a deep crimson. His blood had swallowed hers quickly.

He felt a strange sense of pride. For once, he didn't protest at the thought of his sister having magic.

They looked into each other's eyes. The schoolbag was still burning.

"At least it doesn't smell anymore," she remarked dryly.

Tom pressed the soaked cloth to his mouth. He gasped, let out a short laugh. And suddenly, Hermione was laughing too.

It was short-lived. The smile quickly faded from her lips.

"Mum and Dad are going to kill us."

A/N:

Hi again! I'm really wowed by the number of people who reviewed the last chapter! Thanks so much to all of you, it's really great to read your feedback! Thanks to anon reviewers Guest1 (wow, I'm really flattered, thank you!), Jessica, Anon (I'm really glad you liked it and you're so right about Tom still being a child deep down), M.M (*blushing* thanks so much, you're really kind and I'm out of words, except to say I'm so glad everything is to your liking! and I'm a hopeless romantic too), Guest2 (Happy you like the pacing and yes, it will definitely make for some interesting school years once we get there!), real talk (aww, thank you, that's lovely to hear. I'm glad the characters aren't OOC and that my fleshing out gives you a better grasp on them. I love developing them.), Guest3, Guest4 (Very interesting point about Tom's muggle-hate and how living with the Grangers will affect him! I've given that some thought myself, and you'll see how it turns out. Also yeah, Hermione won't catch much of a "break" during school breaks, will she? Anyway, I'm glad it's compelling so far!), Guest5 (thank you & you're in luck because there's some Tom POV this chapter wink wink), Red on the run (I'm assuming it's a good 'woah' haha).

We're still not at school yet, but we're getting very close to it :) *hopes no one is glaring at their screen right now*

Anyway, I hope you liked this chapter! I got a bit inspired while writing it, and because I listen to lots of music that reminds me of Tomione, I decided to make a playlist for the fic. If you're interested you can find the link on my profile! (the playlist is called "peccatophilia" on 8tracks and my username is cherry cup)