Author: Silverhair Theory
Rating: M
Disclaimer: I nothing. JKRowling owns everything. If you prosecute me all you're likely to get is my sweet stash and my teddy bear, so I wouldn't advise it.
THE GIFT OF A SECOND CHANCE
Chapter 3: Dreams and Revelations
When Tom woke up to find himself stiff and painful from sleeping on a hard floor, he wasn't too surprised. After all, he had slept down in the Chamber before, and all it would take was one cup of strong black coffee and he would be fine. He got up and stretched before making his way back out, thorugh the tunnel and up into the girls bathroom. He sneaked out, the same way he had come in, and the ghost girl didn't notice him.
He got to breakfast late, Hart, Azul and the others were already there, eating. He went and sat down in the place which was almost automatically reserved for him in the very centre of the crowd. They ate quickly and then set off to lessons.
The day passed fairly quickly for Tom, lessons brushing past, nothing really staying in his mind. Even Azul remarked at lunch about how distant he seemed today, but Tom didn't tell him why. He was thinking about the Horcruxes, and who the sacrifice could be. It had to be a human, that much was certain, but he couldn't think of who he could actually get. He didn't want to use a muggle, although they were the easiest as the muggle police were worse than incompetant when trying to locate missing persons.
No, it would have to be a wizard, because only the blood of a wizard would be enough to tear his soul the first time. In fact he wanted to use a wizard every time, but that might not be possible. A muggle would do, for the others, but for the first cut he needed a wizard. What he needed was some event, some place in which people were expected to die, then he could just pick anyone attending and use them.
But what event could possibly happen in which people were expected to die? There was nothing coming up, no dangerous contest, no attack on dangerous creatures, so if he wanted to have danger he would have to engineer it himself... The only time when he could realistically strike was at the Winter Dance. But what about all of his associates? He didn't really want to ruin their nights, they would moan at him for weeks.
Unless, of couse, he warned them about it beforehand. They knew well enough that when he had one of his schemes running that it was unwise to get in the way of them, and he could probably trust them enough to keep themselves and their dates out of trouble. He hoped they could, because he wasn't going to go round looking after them.
But what about Hart? True, the boy had been almost seamlessly accepted into the group, as if he belonged, but there was still that unknown factor about him, and Tom didn't want to trigger that by telling him to keep himself and his companion, whoever that turned out to be, away from his plans.
Then a rather interesting idea struck Tom. Why not use Hart as the assistant? He would have to be careful, that the boy didn't know what he was doing, or else he might refuse and leave Tom with the incantation half completed, in unimaginable pain as his soul was torn but not seperated. If he used Hart as a helper then he could get the spell over much faster, be back to the castle before anyone realised the commotion was him.
Now he only had to decide how to cause a deadly panic. He toyed with the idea of loosing one of the creatures from the forbidden forest onto the grounds, but decided against it as it was too easily discovered, he might be blamed. He needed something that could be blamed on anybody, or even better on the person who fell foul of it, so that everyone would think that whatever happened had been the victim's fault. That way nobody would think to blame him.
Not that he would be blamed anyway. Of course noone would blame him, he was the Head Boy, top of all the classes and liked, or at least tolerated, by most of the school. There were a couple of Gryffindors who had serious problems with him of course, like those damnable weasleys, but apart from that... noone.
Even the teachers seemed happy with him, everyone except Dumbledore. The old man was paranoid, Tom was sure of it, even though his suspicions were likely correct, probably even more dangerous. Tom held a kind of grudging respect for the old man, but knew only too well of the way he meddled in the affairs of students, trying to win them over with favoritism and escaping punishments. And Dumbledore never had liked the Slytherins, preferring the Gryffs, those proud, loyal, brave, idiotic Gryffindors who got away with more than the rest of the school put together, and any number of times more than what the Slytherins were allowed on their short leash.
None of the Slytherins really liked Dumbledore for the way he treated them, much preferring Headmaster Dippet, because Dippet could be relied on to rely on others, and that made him easy to manipulate and control. And in that respect, the stereotypical image of the Slytherin was right. Slytherins, especially Tom, liked control.
For the whole day Tom plotted and schemed until, by dinnertime, he had an almost perfect plan of what he was going to do on the night of the dance. The plan was this.
Assuming Hart kept his single status, which Tom expected him to do, and even if he did, they would stay at the dance until the general aura of the night had dissipated and the couples were retreating outside where Tom knew there would be lavish decorations and an atmosphere of peace, serentiy and romance. He would post Hart to make sure that all the Slytherins got away safely, then Hart would signal to Tom, who would release the spider-like creatures from the crates outside the gamekeepers hut.
The spiders, or acromantula, as they were specifically called, which the fifth years had been studying for a couple of weeks now, were vicious, scary and violent. The crates they were kept in were fairly flimsy and it was only through delicate strength charms that the creatures were kept in there. Tom knew that if an acromantula got out then it would be blamed on the gamekeeper or his assistant, for not locking the crates properly. He personally hoped it was blamed on the gamekeeper's assistant, Hagrid, the bumbling, idiotic Gryffindor that he had got expelled around the time he had learnt about the chamber of secrets.
Once the acromantula had casued a suitable amount of panic Tom would corner one of the students and kill them. He would do it quietly, while Hart and the others were helping everyone else up to the castle. Then he would call Hart over and tell him that the acromantula had killed the student, and that he needed help to try and perform a spell which might bring them back, and that it needed to be done quickly.
Both ressurection spells and the Horcrux spell took a while to cast, so it wouldn't seem too suspicious. When the spell was complete, Tom would say sadly that it hadn't worked, and then they could go back to the castle with the last few people and noone would be any the wiser.
There was only one problem, and that was Hart. For starters, the boy was clever, competant enough in class to know things that none of the rest of them could, especially in Defence against the Dark Arts. In that class he could beat everyone, but for some reason he refused to pair with Tom. He wouldn't say why, but went with somebody else, usually Azul who was more than happy to oblige. Tom was a little annoyed by this as he knew Hart was the only one in the class who might be a match for him. Officially he was still top of the class, because Hart hadn't taken any exams with them yet, but he knew that if they ever did duel there would be a great interest from the student body. It had taken less than a day for the school to notice the new addition to his associates, and those who were in his DADA class had obviously spread the news about how good the other boy was.
The other problem with the boy was the fact that he might bring a date. Tom knew, logically, that there was little chance of him meeting someone in four days, but if it did happen and Hart felt responsible for his date then Tom might have a problem getting him away. If only there was some way of arranging it so that there was no way Hart would bring a date...
As the day came to a close and everybody started drifting back to their rooms from the Slytherin common room, Tom was surprised to see Hart and Azul having a heated conversation by the fireplace. They were talking quietly, too quietly to hear, but Tom could tell by the way Hart's eyes were blazing that he was het up. Azul seemed calm and composed to the casual; eye, but Tom, who knew him well, could see that the icy demeanour was just the boy's way of displaying his anger and fury. Truly, he seemed more angry than Hart.
Tom nonchalently walked over and sat down at a table near them, taking a book from one of the piles and opening it. He stared at the words, not reading them, concentrating on listening to the conversation nearby.
Harry was seriously annoyed with Azul. He had been having this conversation for about half an hour now and he was no closer to finding out what he wanted.
"But what is he?" He asked, for about the fifty-millionth time. "He must have some preference?"
"I don't know." Azul said haughtily. "Look, I've tried explaining this to you, I can't think of any other way of explaining it. He isn't either, he just doesn't do that sort of thing. At all. Ever."
Harry sighed, exasperated. He had been wondereing about the conversation he had had with Tom the previous day about dates for the dance, and it had struck him that Tom might be gay. It was a novel idea but Harry had gathered, from what Azul had been telling him, that really there was no way to tell, because Tom Riddle had never dated anyone in his entire life.
Azul proffessed that it was because his mind was on other things, but for some reason that just didn't cut it with Harry, There was something about that explanation which just didn't work when you applied it to Tom, even though there certainly were other things he was obviously thinking about. He had to have been, after all, he was the future dark lord.
Tom had seemed especially distant today, more distant than Azul said he'd ever seen him, any Harry knew he wanted to know what was going on in the other boy's mind, kept wondering whether it was something to do with the Horcruxes.
He looked up, and spotted Tom sitting at a desk near them, close enough to hear what they were saying. He suddenly realised that the other boy had probably heard a decent part of the conversation, and realising this he jumped up, faking a yawn.
"Well, I'm tired out. Arguing is exhausting, especially when it's pointless. Goodnight Azul." He walked away from Azul and as he passed the table where Tom was sitting said "Goodnight Tom." He stifled a chuckle when the boy jumped, obviously concentrating on either the book or their conversation to realise that Harry was near him.
When he went into the dormitory he found Jerry, Rupert and Vlad already asleep. As Harry got ready for bed he let his thoughts rest on Vladimir. Really, Harry wondered who he was. He didn't have any decendants that he knew of, but seemed fairly close friends to Tom. Harry wondered what would happen to him in the fifty years that would come to pass.
He got into bed and drew the curtains around him, snuggling down under the covers against the cool air in the dungeons. He hadn't dreamt the previous night, and absently wondered whether that was a good thing or a bad thing. Sometimes he thought he didn't want to dream again, becasue he hadn't liked where the last one had been leading for a few moments. But there was also something about the dreams that was different, special, and Harry knew his subconsious wanted more. Sighing, he wondered whether Tom ever dreamt of him, or even at all.
"Harry...Harry..." Somebody was calling his name, and he shifted slightly. There was a hand on his arm, shaking him softly, then the hand moved to his cheek and started stroking it gently, almost lovingly. Harry tried to think logiaclly about who it might be.
Not Ron, not Hermione, not Sirius, not Ginny, they were all dead. So was everybody else who touched him caringly, everyone was dead and gone...
"Oh Harry, don't cry..." The voice said, and Harry felt tears being wiped away by a warm hand, tears which he hadn't even realised were there.
There was the sound of breathing above him, and it moved closer until it was fanning over his face. Harry couldn't seem to muster the strength to open his eyes, couldn't do anything as the warm air furled around him like a gentle caress.
"Who's there?" He asked. "Who are you?"
"Why Harry," The voice said, light, playful, almost mocking. "Don't you remember? It's me. Tom."
Harry's eyes flew open and it was indeed Tom, and they were in a weird position. Harry was lying on something cold and hard but he could hardly feel it. Tom was straddling him, his legs either side of Harry's, his arms on either side of Harry's head. Harry looked into the pure green orbs that were staring just as intently at him, and felt a small shiver run down his spine.
"Tom? Why...why are we..." He could hardly formulate the words, it was so hard to move, to care about anything.
"Like this?" Tom laughed softly, quiet and calming and Harry wondered again how he could dream Tom's laugh. "We're like this because this is your mind. This is all concocted by you, yourself. So you tell me, why are we like this?"
They stared into each others eyes, and Harry was very aware of the breath playing around his face, of Tom's lips being just a couple of inches away, so close that Harry would only have to move his head a tiny bit to kiss the other boy.
Tom seemed to read his mind and he laughed again. "Go on then, Harry. Kiss me."
The words were like fire in his head. Before he could stop himself he had moved forward that vital inch or so and was pressing his lips against the other boy's. Tom's lips were soft and Harry could feel him smiling into Harry's mouth. Then Tom was kissing back, running his tongue along Harry's lips in a gentle caress which made Harry gasp and open his mouth, letting Tom's tongue enter. Harry tentatively pushed forward with his own tongue, hesistant and unsure. He felt rather than heard the chuckle from Tom, and the tongue in his mouth gently caressed his own, Harry just letting Tom show him what to do and trying to copy it. Tom licked the roof of Harry's mouth and it made Harry shiver. Harry put his arms up around Tom's neck and pulled him closer and heard Tom's elbows hit the ground either side of his head as he bent down.
Tom broke the kiss, pulling back and smiling at Harry. Harry looked at him through foggy eyes and with foggy thoughts, and then logic kicked in and his eyes widened with shock.
"What...what did I just do!" He said, putting a hand to his head, and he heard Tom chuckle again.
"You kissed me. Rather well, actually." Tom smirked at him as Harry's face wemt through several emotions, shock, embarrassment and turning to anger. "Now Harry, I'm sure you reaslise that your mind is the one inventing all of this, that this is your doing." Tom was smirking down at him, and Harry's blood raged at the sight of the other boy's expression.
"If you're in my mind...then I can make you go away...like this!" Harry said, and focused on waking up.
With a start the dream faded and Harry was left lying on his back, staring up at the ceiling of his four-poster and wondering what in Merlin's name had just happned.
What the hell did I just do? Was I dreaming about kissing Tom Riddle? Harry asked himself. He put a finger to his lips and could still feel the other boy's mouth on his. What's wrong with me! I can't have dreamt that! It's sick and wrong and I like girls! I went out with Cho and Ginny and I liked them, didnt ?
It was only after Harry had lain there for a few minutes that he realised he was waiting for someone to answer him.
Tom woke up the next morning and lay in his bed, enjoying the warm, comforting feeling of not having anywhere to go. He had a free lesson until ten and it was currently about nine o'clock. He would probably stay in bed, then lesiurely pull himself up and order breakfast from the house elves, then maybe take a look in his library to see if there were any interesting books he felt like reading.
He stretched out, spreading his arms and legs across his bed, and they hit something.
Something warm and heavy.
Something which groaned.
Ah. So it had been one of those nights.
Tom cracked an eye open and looked across his bed to see who he had had the misfortune to have slept with. Even as he did so he was running through the possibilities in his mind.
It was most probably a Slytherin, since he couldn't have gone to one of the other common rooms and he definitely remembered the Slytherin common room the previous night. He didn't feel particularly sore, so it was also probably a girl, unless it was a boy and he'd gone top, which was equally likely.
He saw who the person was, and one eyebrow raised slightly. Well, it wasn't a Slytherin. Officially. It was in fact the Gryff who hung around with the Weasley brothers. Tom struggled to remember the boy's name. Zibini? Zabini? Lufi Zabini? Yeah, that sounded about right. So, Lufi Zabini.
A boy then, which meant that he, Tom, had gone top and the boy in front of his would be feeling some pain when he woke up. Tom sighed and sat up, the cool morning air playing across his torso. He swung his legs out of the bed and placed them on the cold, cold floor.
Yes, he was naked, which meant that they had almost certainly gone all the way. Tom sighed again and pulled a hand through his hair. These night didn't happen often, in fact they'd only ever happened twice before, once with some Ravenclaw girl and the other time with Vlad. Both had been last year and Tom had been hoping he wouldn't ever wake up like this again. He'd had to put a strong memory charm on the girl and had adapted Vlad into the group, making sure that Tom was safe from jealous ex-lovers. The girl didn't remember a thing and Vlad had understood that Tom was not into relationships. They had a kind of comfortable truce now.
But what to do about Zabini? Tom made himself use the boy's last name as a protection against feeling. Tom pulled his wand from the pocket of his robes, which were lying crumpled on a chair, and flicked a charm at Zabini which would keep him asleep. Then he dressed quickly and transfigured his cover into a set of school robes for Zabini. Using his wand, he levitated the sleeping boy and took him outside, out of his quarters, and put him down the corridor, far enough away from the door to prevent suspicion. Then he flicked his wand again and removed the sleep charm, before going back inside.
Tom went and sat down on his bed, thinking. Both times when this had happened before, it had happened for a reason. The first time, with Vlad, he had been being sought after by Azul, and the blonde had practically molested him in the library. Tom had been almost in a panic, and when he had come across Vlad drinking wine by the fire in the common room he had asked for a goblet and recieved some of the heady, rich liquid. Things progressed from there, and the next thing Tom remembered was waking up with the other boy in bed with him and a horrible sinking feeling as he realised what it meant.
He had let someone in. He had willingly broken down his emotional walls and let somebody get close enough to hurt him. For a couple of days he had alienated Vlad before realising that avoiding him was going to make the other boy unpleasant to work with, and who knew when he might need to work with the other boy. So he had approached, and invited Vlad to sit with them at dinner. One thing followed another.
With the girl, it had been different. It had been the monthly Slytherin club night, when all the sixth and seventh years went clubbing and brought their mates from other houses. Tom had been gotten extremely drunk by Azul in an attempt to lure him to bed, but Tom had once again resisted and picked up the first person he bumped into, which had happened to be a seventh year girl from Ravenclaw, who was also Head Girl. He had woken up the next morning in her arms and, disgusted with himself once again, memory charmed her before leaving the Head Girl quarters and running back to his own dormitories in a state of shock and horror that he had once again let somebody close enough to hurt him.
Now was no different. If he was correct, Zabini would have no more of a memory of the previous night than she did. Hopefully he would leave and not put together the fact that he had woken up sore with the fact that he was only twenty metres away from the Head Boy's quarters.
He wondered what time it was and checked the clock on the wall. It was half past nine, plenty of time for some breakfast before he headed off to Herbology with Hart.
For some reason, when he thought of Hart his heart sank and he felt a sensation in the pit of his stomach which he identified as guilt. It was connected with his position when waking up and for a second he wondered why he was feeling guilty. He was allowed to make mistakes. Everyone did. And why should Hart have anything to do with his sex life either?
Tom brushed the thought away and called one of the house elves to order breakfast. Soon he was tucking into toast and coffee, purposefully not thinking about either Hart or Zabini.
When he had finished breakfast he pulled his books into his bag and left the Head Boy quarters, heading for Herbology. When he was walking across the grounds he saw Hart in front of him and immediately all the feelings of guilt came back. Tom pushed them away forcefully but he couldn't remove all of them. He purposefully kept walking and made himself fall into step with Hart, like it was a normal day.
Harry felt Tom fall into step beside him, and had to fight extremely hard not to blush. He had hardly been able to get up this morning when he had realised he was going to see Tom in the first lesson, but he was here now and he seemed to have been mostly sucessful with the blush. Honestly, here he was like some red-faced school girl over his arch enemy! Or what would become his arch enemy...
All through the lesson there was something tense between them. They talked to each other normally and replied when Azul came over to talk to them, but there was a tension in the air that Harry knew was not just radiating off of him. Tom was also tense when close to him, and Harry couldn't understand why.
After the lesson Tom put a hand on Harry's arm to make him stay behind. Harry turned back and waited while the other students streamed past him.
"Hart." Tom said. "Have you decided who you're taking to the winter dance yet?" Why is he asking? Harry wondered. Does he want to ask me? Oh Merlin, what do I say if he does?
"No, I haven't" He answered.
"Ah, good. I need your help with something that evening." Oh. Not an invitation then. Harry wondered vaguely why his heart was sinking as if it had just suffered a great disappointment. "It's a sort of joke, a prank, if you like. I made a bet with sombody and I need to complete it. I need you to be my lookout."
"Why me?" Harry asked, slowly.
"Because the others all have dates." Tom said, as if it was obvious.
"Oh. Right." Harry said.
"Right. Meet me outside the Great Hall at a quarter to midnight then, on friday."
"Got it." Harry said, and watched as Tom walked off to their next lesson. Did he just ask me on a... date? No, he couldn't have done.
Harry watched Tom as he left the room, unconsiously running his eyes over the other boy's body. The straight black hair that fell in a way which at first glance looked like a mess but at second glance was in fact perfect in every way, with not a single strand out of place. The edge of Tom's torso just visible under his robes, then flowing down to the floor where it billowed slightly.
Harry mentally sighed. No, he couldn't have done.
Tom walke away from Hart, running through their conversation in his mind. There was something strange about it and he wasn't quite sure what. He thought the words over again, then tried to imagine himself being Hart and hearing them. Then it hit him what had been strange.
It might have sounded like Tom was asking Hart to the dance. Or at least on some sort of midnight meeting, which on the night of the dance would have been taken by anyone to be the offer of a date. Tom mentally slapped himself and hoped that Hart had enough sense to realise he never would have offered such a thing.
However, though part of him was adamant that he wanted Hart to forget about it, another, barely identifyable part was apparently hoping that the other boy wouldn't. Tom almost stopped in his tracks as he realised this, but forced himself to keep walking. Why on earth did part of him want to go on a date with Hart? This...couldn't be normal. For him, at the very least.
He pondered to himself during Potions. Slughorn was doing a fairly complex potion, but Tom had brewed it for a plan when he had been in third year, so he really wasn't bothered. His thoughts were focused on the boy a couple of seats on the left of him, whose balck head was bent close to Azul's blond one. They seemed to be comparing notes or ideas or something and Tom noticed Hart's eyes flick up to his and away again before he realised he was staring.
He quickly moved his eyes away from Hart and looked down at the piece of paper in front of him. It was boring, trivial stuff and he wouldn't need it for his N.E.W.Ts revision, so he turned it over and wrote a title at the top of the page. Why Hart Peake is Attractive it said, and Tom proceeded to write down a list of everything about the boy that was attractive.
He started with the personality and worked his way through to physical appearance. When he had finished listing everything he knew about the boy, he reagrded his list, frowning slightly. There was nothing spectacular on it, no reason why his traitorous mind should want to date Hart. And yet he did. Really, it was most strange.
He thought about it during lunch too, and was annoyed when he discovered it was as much of a puzzle as Hart himself. Tom resigned himself to the fact of the enigma, just as he had with the questions about Hart, and finished lunch with what he supposed must have been a vaguely depressed look, because Pearl Goyle asked him if he was alright.
After lunch they had the afternoon off because it was the night of his astronomy lesson and now that they were in seventh year, they were expected to spend most of the night up there. They were encouraged to spend as much of the afternoon sleeping as possible because they wouldn't get much rest after the lesson before breakfast. Tom liked astronomy lessons, because he had always found the night sky beautiful.
Tom went up to his quarters and kicked off his shoes, not bothering to take his robes off before lying down on the bed and putting his mind into the blank void-like state that sent him almost immediately to sleep.
Harry was dreaming again. He knew it was a dream by the way the hands on his shoulders felt, the not-quite-there feel that made everything unreal and he knew that if he were to pinch himself, he would not feel it.
He knew the body above him, knew whose hands were resting on his shoudler and whose legs were draped over his. He knew whose eyes he would meet if he opened his own and he knew what the person had come to do.
"Tom." He said, and the person above him chuckled in the way he knew so well.
"Yes. It's me. I'm here." He said it in a way which made it sound comforting, as a mother might say to comfort a lost child, and Harry could feel his traitorous body responding to the words, trying to get closer to the other body, to nestle in against the warmth that it provided. Tom seemed to know what Harry's body wanted to do, and laughed again. "Can't even control yourself, can you Harry. Anyone offers you the slightest promise of warmth, of love, or even the idea of love and you're falling over yourself to reach them. Pathetic."
The word hung like a curse in the air and Harry shivered. Tom laughed again, and Harry cursed his body for reacting to the laugh, cursed the way he could not stop a tiny gutteral sound escaping from his throat.
"Open your eyes, Harry. I want to see green looking back at me." Harry grudgingly opened his eyes, and sure enough Tom was staring down at him, his dark bangs falling around his face and a little over one eye. Harry gulped and Tom laughed.
"Stop laughing dammit!" Harry exclaimed. Tom smiled, a predatory gleam in his eye, and leant down until his mouth was close to Harry's ear. Harry felt a few strands of black silk brush his ear, and he shivered. Tom's chuckle, so close and so low, almost animal, made sparks trickle like a waterfall down his spine.
"Make me." Tom growled, and Harry had one glimpse of the handsome, smirking smile before he had pressed his lips to Tom's, unable to stop himself, and he could feel the soft velvet of the other boy's lips on his own.
Tom's tongue flickered out like a snake and licked Harry's lips. Harry opened his mouth and met Tom's tongue with his own, vaguely aware that he was making little gutteral cries like the one before every time Tom licked the roof of the cave of his mouth, or brushed his teeth along the backs of his gums.
A sharp pain, but interspersed with the pleasure, and Tom was biting down, had his white teeth on Harry's lip and Harry heard himself whimper at the combined emotions. Tom released him and allowed just enough time for Harry to catch his breath before capturing his mouth again, dancing with Harry's tongue and making Harry feel inadequate with the skill and tenderness that Tom kissed.
Then the mouth left his own, and Tom was next to his ear, breathing slowly, seductively into the shell of Harry's ear and making him shiver. Tom flicked his tongue over the skin and then bent his head a little more to the space just below the ear and placed a series of feather light kisses on the hollow there, like a butterflies touch but sending shocks of electricity though Harry every time they touched.
Slowly Tom moved his mouth down, across Harry's skin, which erupted into gooseflesh under his touch. Tom trailed faint but tantalizing kisses down Harry's neck, to the hollow at the base of his throat, and nipped slightly at the skin, making Harry yelp slightly. The bites continued and morphed into teasing licks, and Harry had to hold back a moan.
"T...Tom..." He stuttered, his voice husky and lower pitched than normal. The other boy's ministrations increased in fervour until Harry was gripping the stone floor underneath him so hard that it hurt, and his breath was shallow and fast, panting. "Please...stop..." He said, and the light touch stopped.
He looked down and saw Tom looking at him in puzzlement. The other boy's face was tinged pink and he was breathing heavily as well. "What's wrong, kitten?" Tom's voice was, if possible even huskier than Harry's had been and Harry had to push away the rush as his body responded to the unpoken longing in the voice.
"I...I don't...I don't want this." Harry said, and for a second disappointment flashed across Tom's face, before he smiled in a way which, had Harry been standing, would have sent him to the floor as his legs turned to jelly.
"Are you sure you don't want this?" Tom said. He raised one slender hand and stroked Harry's hair with it, making little crooning sounds under his breath. Harry's body leaned in to the touch and Tom laughed. "It certainly seems your body does, even if your better judgement hates it." He cupped Harry's face with the same hand and bent down to give Harry a chaste kiss which he couldn't help but try to deepen immediately. Tom pulled away and laughed again at the denied look on Harry's face. He trailed his hand down Harry's face, down the side of his neck, and Harry shivered under his touch. Tom bent his head and kissed Harry deeply, making him gasp into the other boy's mouth. Harry could feel Tom's smirk through the kiss and didn't notice until it was too late that the hand Tom had been trailing down his neck had seized the neck of his robes and ripped them open.
Harry broke the kiss and gasped at the sudden coolness. His robes had been torn apart at the front and his naked chest was now bare for Tom's roving eyes. The boy laughed at Harry's fluster and trailed one hand butterfly-style across Harry's collarbone, while the other reached up to the collar of his own robes and unfastened them.
Harry bit back a moan as the teasing touch on his collarbone moved down to his breastbone and towards his belly-button, making shivers of hot and cold erupt all over his body. It was torturously pleasureable and Harry wished with all his might that he could have the use of his arms instead of being unable to do anything except clutch the flagstones.
Tom's ghosting touch moved again and Harry couldn't stop the moan of pleasure as it flickered over one already hard nipple, stroking it and making it burn. Tom bent his head but instead of going to Harry's mouth he went to his chest and warm trails of fire were dancing across Harry's chest before centreing on the other nipple, licking and sucking.
Harry's mind was blank with the pleasure and yet at the same time it was screaming out at him to focus, telling him to push Tom away, to tell him to stop, to make him stop...
No!" Harry said, forcing the word out against a significant part of his own better judgement. The hands paused and Harry's mind screamed at him to put them back, to let the hands continue where they wanted. "No...I don't want this!" Harry said, knowing only too well that he was trying to convince himself far more than Tom.
"You don't?" Tom said. He moved his hand, trailing it down Harry's stomach and the tortuously light movement made it incredibly hard for Harry to think. "Are you...sure?" Tom put his mouth right next to Harry's ear and breathed slowly into it before licking the shell and making Harry shudder.
The hand ghosting along his flesh passed over his crotch and even the slight touch was enough to make Harry hard. His breath hissed out of him and his whole body went tense. Tom laughed, quiet and soft into Harry's ear. The hand rubbed over the patch again, then lost all traces of innocence and slipped in to Harry's trousers, taking hold of his shaft.
Harry couldn't stop the little cry that came from his mouth, and it seemed to excite Tom. Slowly, languidly, he moved his hand on Harry, up and down, calmly and methodically at first but speeding up until it Tom's breaths were harsh in his ear and Harry knew he was moaning in pleasure.
"You know..." Tom said, his voice huskier than Harry thought possible, capturing green eyes with green eyes. Harry could see every detail of the orbs, every fleck of mottled green in the thin ring of lust-clouded emerald surrounding the pupils that were large with desire. "You know...I think you do want this."
The hand hadn't slowed, and Harry's mind exploded into white as he came onto Tom. His breathing was laboured as Tom slipped his hand out of Harry's trousers, and brought the hand up for Harry to see. It was dripping cum, and Tom put it to his mouth and licked it all away, never breaking Harry's gaze and knowing that Harry was watching him the whole time.
Tom bent close to Harry and kissed him again, deep and hard and passionate, and Harry could taste what he knew to be himself in Tom's mouth, could taste it on the tongue that fondled his and numbed his mind to anything else. Tom broke the kiss, and stared into Harry's eyes. They were so close that Harry felt Tom open his mouth when he spoke.
"You see? You do want this."
Tom woke with a start and sat up in his bed, breathing hard. He could feel the sweat running off him in waves and his recently-transfigured covers were soaked. He put a hand to his head and pushed his damp hair out of his eyes, trying not to think about his dream.
Hot, slick bodies moving around him, touching him, reaching inside his mind and his body and making him feel dirty, violated, and the whole time Hart's face, there in front of him laughing, laughing at him and kissing him mockingly, all the time and his voice in Tom's ear whispering his name...
"No!" Tom said, startling the house elf which had been tidying one of the corners of the room. Tom turned to it and stared at it, frozen in its fear of him. "I. Do. Not. Care." He said, very firmly and slowly, speaking to the house elf and making it quiver pathetically in terror. "I don't like him, I don't and I never will. Do you understand? Do you understand me!" He screamed at the elf, and it nodded frantically, putting its hands over its over-long ears and whimpering as he yelled at it.
"Get out!" He yelled and it shrieked before high-tailing it out of his room, its little brush flying through the air after it. Tom thumped the wall next to his bed in frustration and was rewarded with a chip of stone embedded in his hand. Wincing, he ripped the sliver out and chucked it away, putting the cut to his mouth and licking away the few drops of blood which came to the surface.
That, however, bought back yet another memory of the dream and Tom screwed up his eyes in frustration and another feeling which he refused to name. He fisted his hands in his hair, not caring about the trickle of blood that he left in his black locks.
"He would never do that. he would never do that. He would never hurt me. He would never do that. I do. Not. Like him. He would never do that. I don't care. He would never, never do that!"
He spent a long time like that, reciting the same words again and again, like a mantra, until the moisture on his skin cooled in the cold evening air and became ice against him, and shivers trickled down his spine.
Beep beep. Beep beep. The alarm spell went off next to him, the little floating globe flashing and telling him that it was time to go to astronomy. With Hart. Hart would be in astronomy, he would be there and he would want to know what was wrong, want to know why Tom couldn't look at him, why every time he spoke Tom winced.
But he had to go. It would be even worse if he didn't because then he'd have everyone on his back, not just Hart. Even though Hart would be the worst. He vaguely wondered why, as he mindlessly got up and started sifting through his robes, mechanically trying to find something to wear.
When he had dressed he looked around the apartment again, dark and cold and unwelcoming as he himself was, and the lonliness of the place made him shiver. He allowed himself to do so, allowed hiumself to shiver and to think morbid thoughts because he understood that everyone had to have morbid moments or their emotions went haywire, and much as he hated showing his emotions, he had to grudgingly admit that they did exist.
He let the thoughts take hold of him for a few seconds then, judging that they had had enough time, pushed them away back to their secretive little corner and left his quarters.
It didn't take long to reach the astronomy tower. Most of the class was already there, yawning and stretching. He went over to where Azul and co. were standing and together they waited for the teacher.
Although Tom was looking out of the window, admiring the view and the way the moonlight shimmered off the surface of the lake far, far below, he knew instantly when Hart entered the room. It was like he had a proximity spell on the other boy, and he found himself watching Hart's progression over to their little group, subconsiously hiding his interest at the same time.
Come on, admit it. You like him
His subconsious voice was getting on his nerves. He was not attracted to Hart. He wasn't. It was absurd, he was Tom Riddle, he didn't have crushes. Crushes were for silly simpering schoolgirls like Vivian Parkinson and all-loving people like Azul. He, Tom, was cold, calculated, and above such petty affections.
Yeah, cold, like your depressing room. Come on, you don't want to be like that, do you? You like him, just admit it and save yourself the trouble of denial.
Seriously, Tom was tiring of the silly voice in his head. He was sure other people couldn't have such vocal and decisive consiences, not like his at any rate. They'd all go mad. It was only through the building of an emotional wall around himself that Tom had kept his sanity, and sometimes he wasn't even sure he had that.
Thankfully, he was saved from any more internal debate when the teacher entered. Professor Oria was ancient, wizened and beautiful as a ninety year old witch got. There were rumours that she had been a model when she was younger but Tom had always thought she was more of the mysterious fortune teller type, and her fine features and gracefully flowing white hair lent itself so well to floating around mystically.
She was also an extremely gifted astronomer and knew the location of stars without having to look up at the sky. Tom had long ago decided that if he was ever in need of a star-reading he would go to someone like her, only the best.
She seemed about as otherworldly tonight as she ever did, dressed in an elegant swirling robe of deep purple, almost black, which set off her loose silver hair and the purple tint in her milky eyes.
Yes, Professor Oria was blind, but despite that she was still better at astronomy than anyone else Tom had ever known and even though he knew for certain that she couldn't see the stars, she always looked straight at them. Noone ever asked her about her mysterious ability to sense where the stars were and it only elevated her higher in status among the students because of her unknown ability.
"Greetings, dearest children. Tonight, we will be observing Venus and its passage through the orbit of Mars, where they will pass so close to each other that for a few hours they will seem as one star. During this time we will be taking note of the location of the other planets and also the relation of the stars to the crossover and what conclusions about the future we can draw from this."
Professor Oria's voice always sounded to Tom like flowing milk, reminding him of her eyes, and he knew that it had a similar effect on most people as everyone set about aligning their telescopes. According to his lunar calendar the crossover was not due to start for about an hour and until that time they were meant to prepare their equiptment and notes for the main event. They all had to get into partners, one to look at the stars and the other to write down what they said.
Not surprisingly, he got paired with Hart. Azul went with Vlad and Rupert with Jerry. They all chose telescopes away from the rest of the class, in the shadows at the back of the tower room, and there was no need to talk while they aligned the telescopes and set out the parchment onm the desks around them.
Unfortunately, the work didn't last very long and before he knew it Tom was left to talk to Hart as everybody else drifted off into a doze. Tom, however, could not relax. Just knowing he was inches away from the face that had haunted his dreams, had laughed at him in his pain and taken pleasure from it, was almost too much. He knew he was tense, knew that Hart had probably noticed it, but couldn't stop himself from either avoiding Hart's glace altogether or only looking at the other boy quickly before turning away.
Surprisingly though, he didn't seem to be the only onee with the problem. Hart, also, seemed to be unwilling to look at him, keeping his eyes firmly staring ahead. Once or twice their eyes met as they both took surrepticious glances but ended up staring forward again almost immediately. Tom couldn't work out why Hart was acting strange. He sincerely doubted that Hart had had the same sort of dream as he had, indeed he would have been extremely worried and unnerved if he had.
It was just that Hart wasn't acting exactly the same way as he was. Whereas he was wincing when he caught Hart's eye as the contact reminded him of another unpleasant recollection, Hart's reaction was vastly different, even, if Tom looked carefully, a blush? Now that was interesting. Why would Hart be blushing?
It reminded him of something though. A long while ago he remembered someone else blushing when they were around him, although it had been a lot more violent than Hart's light colour. He cast his mind around for the memory, and it caught. Suddenly he remembered, and it made him shudder inside.
It had been the summer of fourth year when he had met her. He had been at a night club somewhere in london with Azul, on a "Babewatch" as the other boy had put it. It had been a muggle establishment and that was why Azul liked it, he needed no connection to these people and had none either. He often dragged Tom on these nights and when Azul left with whatever girl (or guy) he'd picked up, Tom would leave the club and resignedly go abck to the orphanage. Azul was always bugging him to find someone on one of these nights, and however many times Tom tried to explain his theory of not letting anyone get close enough to hurt him, Azul never gave up.
It was about the sixth time he'd been one one of these nights with Azul when they both discovered a a large group of girls in one of their regular haunts. They were all very pretty, very flirtatious and very blonde. They were also french. Ever since that fateful night Tom had never trusted anything french. Most of the girls had been perefectly charming, but Tom just wasn't interested and they were all more intereested in Azul anyway.
Well, not all. There was one girl who didn't fawn all over Azul like the others. Her hair was a dirty blonde, obviously dyed, and Tom could see the roots of her dark hair underneath. Her eyes were blue as the summer sky, too blue in fact, and it didn't take him long to work out that they weren't her natural colour. That puzzled him for a long time, becasue the only thing he could think of that would chage a person's eye colour was the trans oculo spell, and he was sure the girls were muggles.
He struck up a conversation with the girl, trying to discover whether she was magical or not. In doing so he discovered a lot of information about her which he really hadn't needed, the girl basically spewed knowledge. Her name was Carmen Velirox, and her surname sounded familiar to Tom. He talked to her for a long time, while Azul flirted with the other girls and bought them drinks upon drinks, until they were all very drunk.
When Azul left with all the other girls, yes all the other girls, at least five of them, Carmen rolled her eyes and we both exited the club. Tom guessed that she was a little like him in that she always got left behind when the sexual riots started. She gave him her phone number and he gave her the number of his wizard communicator which worked in the same way as a muggle phone and she left.
The next time he had met up with Azul he told her about Carmen, and Azul seemed delighted that Tom had finally found himself a romatic interest. Tom insisted he was just curious about her but Azul obviously didn't believe him. He spent a couple of weeks looking for the name 'Velirox' in the books he usually read, but came up blank and eventually forgot about her.
It wasn't until nearing the end of the summer holidays that he thought about her again. he was reading one of the newspaper articles in the Daily Prophet and it was a discussion of the vampire movements in the french alps. Tom had been stunned to read that the name of the vampire that was causing all of the problems was 'Methuei Velirox'. He had a sudden revelation and went to check in one of his books of vampires, a little read novel about the history of one of the vampiric lines.
It was a magically charmed book which had magical links to that particular lineage, and sure enough, when Tom looked through the records he found the name of Methuei Velierox, whose sire had been the childe of one of the greatest vampires of an age, one who had had connection with Salazar Slytherin himself. Methuei had many children, mostly sired through power though three through actual intercourse, two males by the names of Vekhun and Eltarre and one female, Kirmuin.
When a vampire sired a childe, it was either through power or intercourse. If sired through power, a childe would change from a human to a vampire, and as their human body aged their vampiric powers increased, resulting in a power burst as the time came for their human body to die and they began solely relying on their vampirity to keep them walking. A childe sired through intercourse, especially between two vampires, was as powerful as the stronger of their parents from birth, and although their power did not grow as fast as that of a childe sired through power it was still vastly greater, and always would be.
It didn't take long for Tom to recognise 'Carmen' to be Kirmuin. He went and searched for details on Kirmuin Velirox and found them unsurprisingly more available than on 'Carmen Velirox'. He sent an owl to the Velirox castle, never expecting a reply, and was shocked beyond reason when Kirmuin turned up in his bedroom at the orphanage the very next day!
It didn't take lone for Tom to realise what had happened, even though it worried him significantly. Kirmuin had an obsessive personality, meaning whatever she decided was hers, was almost certainly made hers. And she decided that Tom belonged to her.
She followed him around constantly for the rest of the summer holidays, refusing to leave him alone, acting like she was his girlfriend when people got curious and always bugging him, asking him if he would be her boyfriend and so on and so on. She looked over his shoulder when he wrote letters and tore up ones which said bad stuff about her, so he couldn't even tell anyone because noone ever believed that such a pretty girl would do that.
It even continued when he went back to Hogwarts. She sent owls to him every single day, in the mornings, evening and even in lunchtimes. She even found a way of getting her pet raven to deliver love notes during classes and Tom was humiliated more than once by teachers confiscating the letters and reading them out to the class. No-one ever believed him when he told them that he didn't want to see her.
Surprisingly, Azul was the most sympathetic. He explained that what Tom had gotten himself was a stalker, and as he had supposedly been assaulted by stalkers previously, though he admitted none were as persistant and deicated as Kirmuin, he agreed to help Tom get rid of her.
It had taken until christams, and Tom was never quite sure how Azul had done it, but the ravens stopped bothering him in class and the owls petered out until he only got one a day, then one a week, then none. Over the christamas holidays he went to stay with Azul, even though his parents frowned upon his halfbloodedness, and while they were there there was a formal dinner evening at the Malfoy Manor, which Kirmuin attended.
She didn't speak to him for the whole night. Tom suspected it might have had something to do with the was Azul kept giving her filthy looks, but none the less she stayed clear of him the entire time. She did however stare at him for five hours solid, with as rosy a blush as a vampire could get, and it was that image, of Kirmuin blushing furiously, that had linked itself to the sight of Hart with the faint blush adorning his cheeks now.
It was funny, Tom thought. Kirmuin had looked silly, awkward and pathetic when she was blushing. Hart looked cute and even endearing and even though Tom pushed the thoughts down deep hinside him he could stop the want to go over to Hart and hug him, maybe even kiss him.
Alright everyone, time to start viewing your stars. If you would take your positions by your telescopes and begin." Professor Oria's voice floated over to their corner and Hart sighed and got up from where he'd been leaning on the wall.
"Do you want to write, or shall I?" He said, and Tom had to force himself not to flinch as the voice sparked painful memories of the dreams.
"You write. I'll look at the stars." He decided, and Hart nodded before pulling up a chair to beside the telescope and taking the paper, turning to look at Tom expectantly. Tom forced himself not to shudder and turned away.
He gazed up the telescope and out into the night sky. There was a blessed absence of clouds tonight and so every star was clear and bright. Tom liked astronomy, but never seemed to get the hang of it, usually getting too transfixed by the beauty of their glow before he could make any conclusive findings.
No, I must show Hart that I can do it. He told himself firmly, and sought out the fuzz of light that was Mars and Venus passing in line with one another. He looked to the left of it, and murmured the star name and location to Hart, who he saw immediately take it down. They continued like this for a while and it was peaceful, not having to do anything, and Tom let himself relax slightly.
Harry concentrated on writing down what Tom was telling him, and not reliving the dream. It was hard, and it had been getting harder ever since he had entered the room.
When he had first woken up he had been momentarily horrified with himself, having such a dream about Tom, but after hyperventilating and waking up Azul he had been almost force-fed a calming potion. After a few gulps of the cool liquid Harry could think rationally again, and began to explore his feelings regarding Tom.
Maybe it was the effect of the potion, or maybe it was just that something in Harry was tired of self-denial, but as Harry sifted through his feelings he discovered that he did feel something for Tom. It was similar, but different to what he'd felt for Cho and Ginny though, and Harry put it down to Tom being a boy and not a girl.
When he entered the classroom and saw Tom standing there he forced himself not to react in any way, nor to give any sign that he had noticed Tom more than any other person. He knew that even if he did feel something for Tom, there was no way on earth that Tom could feel something for him. Lord Voldemort, and subsequently Tom, was cold, unfeeling and unflinching, he always had and always would be.
If got more difficult as they had to spend time near each other. Harry noticed the wary glances Tom was giving him and using very faint traces of Legilimency deciphered that Tom had dreamt about Harry, though that was all he could discover and from the apprehension in Tom's being, it hadn't been a very nice dream.
Working so close together was torturous. Tom was looking through the telescope so Harry could stare at him as much as he liked, and he caught himself doing it several times. Every time Tom spoke he was jolted out of his reverie and quickly wrote it down, not pausing to let himself enjoy the low tone of Tom's voice or imagine it husky with lust like it had been in the dream. Harry didn't know if Tom even spoke like that.
The starmap took a while, but after it was finished Harry helped Tom pack away. Their hands brushed more than once and Tom pulled away, visibly forcing himself from flinching. Harry wondered what the dream had been about that made him so adverse to even touching Harry.
By the time they had finished they were one of the few left, Tom seemed to have been working slower than others. Indeed, Azul and the rest of the gang were long gone and as Tom and Harry walked down the long spiral stairs to the ground floor there was an awkward silence.
They spilt off at Tom's dorms and Harry left, down the corridor to the dungeons. Harry knew that there was something seriously wrong with him. He needed to go to the library and find the spell that would send him back, because when he finally managed to pull himself together enough to kill Tom there was no way he could afford to make any mistakes with the time travel.
The thing was that Harry was becoming less and less sure that he would be able to kill Tom. Every minute he spent in the other boy's presence just made it worse, made him feel more like forgetting all about his own time and just stay here in the past, maybe he could stop Tom from becoming evil some other way, without having to kill him at all.
No. Harry shook his head, angrily. He had to kill Tom, because if he let Tom continue in the way he was there was no way he would be able to guarantee that Tom wouldn't turn evil. All he had to do was remember back to the fiasco with time in his third year to know that he had to make a significant change or the timestream would just work itself all back out and he would be dumped right back where he came from, two seconds away from a one way trip to the afterlife, courtesy of the person he was currently trying to keep himself from fancying.
As he walked he chanted in his head his mantra, even though he knew it was wrong, and even though he knew that nothing would ever come of it, just to be able to say it gave him strength and comfort.
I like him. I like Tom. I like Voldemort.
Tom was sitting on his bed, his robes thrown over the chair haphazardly, which was extremely unusual for him, and had his head in his hands. He was breathing slowly, taking deep, calming breaths as he tried to organize the maelstrom of thoughts running thorugh his head. His back was drenched in cold sweat and he was shivering, even though there was a warm fire in the tiny fireplace and he had cast a heat spell on his covers.
He had just woken from a dream, his second of the night. After he had got back from the astronomy lesson he had changed quickly before sliding into bed, refusing to let himself think about anything. He knew that he would come to some rather unpleasant conclusions if he did and it was definitely not something he wanted to do. He didn't want to ruin what aquaintablility he had with Hart, especially as the boy was so interesting.
The dream had been almost a repeat of his nightmare earlier. The same sorts of thing, mocking voices and laughter, cold, clammy hands touching him and bodies slick with sweat around him and in him, and all the time Hart's mocking laughter and his face so close, kissing Tom roughly and possesively, kissing him so hard that it hurt, biting and drawing blood to make Tom scream in pain, because it always hurt so much when those green eyes were watching him, always watching him...
Suddenly Tom froze. He ran through the last thought in his mind. Green. Green eyes. In his dreams, Hart always had green eyes, the black pupils surrounded by a ring of molten green, like liquid fire or the colour of the Avada Kedavra spell. Now that was very strange. Hart had brown eyes, the colour of dark chocolate, Tom knew he did because he had spent quite a while watching Hart, first to learn his secrets and then just because he liked to.
When Tom had first found Hart on the edge of the lake, hadn't the boy had green eyes then? Yes, he had, Tom could remember being surprised at just how green they were. But later on they had met again and Hart had had brown eyes. What was it he had said? Something about contact lenses? But what were they? And how had Hart managed to grow his hair four or five inches in such a short time? Maybe there was a spell, somewhere.
Tom made a mental note to research how Tom could have changed his hair length so fast, and also to look up what contact lenses were. He thought they sounded muggle, and his intuition was rarely wrong, but you never could tell.
Sighing, Tom reached for his wand and cast a drying charm on his bed and then lay back down in it, trying to keep warm. As he stared up at the ceiling he could feel the thoughts and feelings clamouring behind his eyes, wanting to be explored and explained. If he didn't do it now he might never get to sleep.
There was something about Hart, that was obvious. Something about the boy who, now he came to think of it, looked so much like Tom himself it was almost scary, and who had just as many secrets. Tom could still see, if he focused hard enough, the green eyes snapping open as the boy lay on the ground beside the lake, and the way, even before they looked at him, they were haunted, filled with such an unbearable pain that it had almost been enough to make Tom recoil in shock.
Now that he examined the memory, he realised that what he had seen that one time in Hart's eyes was the same emotion he saw in his own every time he looked in the mirror. And if his own past was anything to go by, Hart must have been though hell to get the same eyes as Tom.
Thinking back to the exact way Hart's eyes had looked, all the creases of pain around the face and the eyes, Tom could guess at what exactly had happened to Hart. He must have killed, yes, there was the deep, dark shadow of a killer in there, and he must have watched people close to him die as well.
He lay back down on the sheets, but rose again almost immediately, unable to bear the feel of the clammy fabric beneath his skin. He got up from the bed and pulled on a pair of muggle jeans and a warm jumper before crossing the rooms and leaving his quarters.
His idea had been to go to the library to do a little late-night studying, to take his mind off of things, but he found instead that his feet lead him back to the astronomy tower. He walked over to the edge of the stone floor and leaned over the edge, leaning on the wall and looking out over the lake and the forest beyond.
The landscape really was beautiful at night. The lake sparkled with moonlight as if there were a million fairies flitting above its surface, and the trees rustled in the distance, like they were whispering to one another of secrets that only trees knew. Tom let the cool night wind play through his hair and could feel it blowing around his face, black strands brushing his forehead and getting in his eyes.
Unbidden, the image of Hart slithered into his mind like the snake Tom knew he was, and sat there, brown-no-green eyes staring at him and asking silent questions which Tom refused to answer.
"You are nothing. You haven't got half of my power and you are nothing to me." He said to it, but the image wasn't listening, and kept watching him, asking and asking.
"I can't like you. You are... you are a puzzle, and puzzles are dangerous. Getting close to anyone is a risk, but getting close to you would be like asking to be hurt."
But isn't that what you want? What you need? You've spent your whole life hiding from the things that are dangerous. Maybe by experiencing danger and surviving it, you will grow stronger. Loving someone doesn't necessarily mean pain, you know. The voice whispered to him, traitorous and tempting.
"No. Love does not make you strong, love makes you weak. And I will not be weak. And I don't love him"
But why shouldn't your weaknesses be ommited by his strengths? Why shoudln't you help each other? Together, you could have more power than anyone in the world. Even Dumbledore. And you are very, very close to loving him.
Enough power to outwit Dumbledore. Now that really was tempting. Dumbledore had been a thorn in his side, a glitch in his plans for years. Dumbledore was the only person who Tom feared, albeit with the grudging, respectful fear of a student towards a teacher. All the other members of staff loved him, but not Dumbledore. He hoped that he would be the one who killed the old man.
What had the voice meant, 'close to loving him.'? Tom didn't love Hart, that was preposterous, love was for sappy schoolgirls and weaklings. More power than anyone else in the world... Power was good, and if Hart was completely on his side then he knew that his power would be magnified immensely.
"I...love him." Tom tried out the words. They sounded false, but there was that little twist of his heart that he realised, with a sinking feeling, that was the sign of his heart wanting the words to be true. "I love him." He said again, and now they sounded less false, and were accompanied by a definite twinge of emotional pain.
"Dammit, this is what I wanted to avoid, emotional pain!" He said to nothing in particular. "I don't love him."
He almost cried out. The weight of the words was heavy, and the emotional pain was far, far worse than it had been before, accompanied by a twinge in his chest that he knew meant that it was wrong.
"Oh Merlin." He said, shaking his head and rasing his eyes to the stars far, far above him in the heavens. "I love him." Pain, but not a lot, a lot less than before. "I love him." Again, and now the words sounded almost true, with hardly any falsity about them whatsoever. "I love him!" He said louder, and as it echoed around the stone tower room he felt something rise in his heart and a little blossom of fire. This was good, this was right.
He gripped the stone wall with both hands and leant far over until he was almost half way off the tower. The stars glittered in the corners of his vision and the lake was spread out before him, reflecting the stars and the moon and the forest whispered its secrets. He took a deep breath of cool, beautifully sweet night air and raised his voice to the heavens, shouting with all his might as the blossom of fire burst into a thousand sparkling tingles that were like miniture stars all over him.
"I love him!."
Author's Notes: I know, I know, I said id write around easter but the stupid story wouldnt cooperate. Thankfully I got a bunch of pre-exam inspiration and so I wrote this while I was meant to be revising. Oh no, how terrible. Not. So, I finally buckled down and wrote partial-smut, even if it isnt in real life yet. Dont worry, There will be real life smut in the next chapter, which will probably be posted after my summer exams are over. Damn, why do there have to be so many exams? Review people, you know you want to! Let me know you love me!