Warning: There are graphic depictions of violence and gore in this chapter. It shouldn't be too bad, but if you are squeamish and/or vegetarian, I advise you to proceed with caution. If you don't want to risk reading anything that might gross you out, there will be a summary of the chapter posted at the bottom with the author's note.

Word Count: 3,955


Previously: Tom arrives at a town on the borders of Hogwarts and finds that discontent and poverty is rife in the once robust and wealthy village. He investigates, discovering a demon is taking residence nearby and extorting the residents. Meanwhile, Harry Evandel quite literally drops into Tom's life after being surprised by a giant snake.


"… observed Potter and Black in the lower towns of Hogwarts, looking as though they were trying to pass unnoticed. Lucius also saw Potter speaking very seriously to Amelia Bones' niece outside the Ministry. I have once more enclosed Lucius's letter, and written down Scabior's account for you. He's illiterate if you would recall." - From Orion Black to Tom Riddle.


Tom had barely registered a short, sharp burst of a scream before a figure dropped in front of him, landing with remarkable agility.

The stranger was saying something. Tom heard the vague, awkward attempt at greeting, but he did not reply. His eyes were wide as he took in the new arrival.

The first assessment of it told Tom that it was not human. Its ears jutted outwards, too large and too pointed. Bright green irises were split in half by slitted pupils. When it spoke, Tom saw two fangs, small but evidently inhuman. His first thought was that the being was a vampire—yet it stood in broad daylight, pale skin almost aglow beneath the spots of sunlight that shone through the cracks in the ceiling. Distinctly male, though its frame was mostly hidden beneath a thick, shapeless cloak.

"What—" Tom cut himself off, stilling. There was a strange hissing noise. It was low and sibilant—the voice of a mere snake, yet he felt an inexplicable unease. Then a smell hit his nostrils, and he grimaced at it. It was pungent and thick, like the smell of the sewage that ran beneath Hogwarts. Tom's eyes darted around, but he saw nothing.

Tom paused. He saw nothing; he was alone.

He cursed. Where did that strange—

Suddenly, he froze, his head tipped upwards and eyes fixed on a horrific sight. Distantly, Tom felt a sense of realisation as understanding of why that creature had screamed in the first place clicked.

A pair of large, yellow eyes glared down at him. But that was not the worst of it. The eyes belonged to a reptilian beast of some sort, hideous in its vivid green scales. A crown of spiked horns ringed its triangular head, each large enough to impale a grown man.

He felt a stiffness settle in him. His fingertips and toes felt the cold first, a numbness accompanied by a chill of realisation. The mesmerising gaze seemed to compel Tom to maintain the eye contact. He watched with a distant, muted horror as vicious fangs drew closer until he could see yellowed venom dripping down them. A tongue, forked and purple, slithered out of its hideous maw, and Tom could feel its wet, acrid breath brush across his face, the source of the smell he had noticed earlier.

The numbness had crept up to his knuckles. His feet felt like lead beneath him.

The snake's jaw stretched impossibly wide, and Tom felt an old, all-encompassing coldness spread deep within him again—not the coldness of the snake's gaze, but something else. Something he had felt long ago and vowed never to forget. It made his hands shake, made the hairs on the back of his neck stand. It crept up against his senses, pressing into him with its icy, rattling breath.

Death was near.

Tom snarled, ripping his eyes away. The thrum of terror in his head slowed, its high-pitched wail becoming a mute thing, suppressed through sheer concentration and relief.

He felt the shift in the air, the snake's realisation that its prey had escaped its trap. Keeping his eyes averted, Tom leapt away, staff thrust out with a shout of, "Praesidio!"

A pulsing, purple shield burst into existence but faltered a beat when Tom stumbled on his feet. He looked at his hands, grimacing when he saw the paleness of his skin, a greying shade like it was turning into stone. It was likely that his feet were the same way, from how heavy they felt.

Petrification.

The snake's jaws slammed straight into his shield. Tom could see straight down the tunnel of its ugly, purpled throat as it snapped futilely against his shield, could see the shine of its flesh and saliva.

His lips pulled back into a semi-permanent snarl. His weakness still clawed at him—watching death approach and feeling helpless… He twisted his staff so that it was upright and one end hovered just inches above the ground. "Terra ruptor," he hissed. His shield flickered as his magic drew away to power the new spell, and in the next moment, it vanished entirely. But in the same instant, he had struck the ground with the butt of his staff, and the very earth shifted beneath his feet.

The snake reared back, shrieking and spitting. Half of its massive body had still been draped over the second-floor balcony, and now, as the old ruins shook and crumbled around them, its tail slid over the edge and thudded onto the floor. The snake writhed on its side, struggling to upright itself.

In quick succession, Tom fired off a chain of spells. But the snake's scales were too thick, and his curses washed off its body like water. He grimaced when even the Cruciactus Curse only caused the beast to spasm before it turned malevolent eyes on Tom.

He changed tactics. "Reducto." The red spell shot off at the ceiling directly above the snake, impacting it with a shower of debris and dust. Blocks of stone as large as Tom's torso rained down on them. He shielded his eyes from the oncoming wave of dust that assaulted him, leaping away from the destruction. The snake fought against the rain of stone, its massive head rising even as it was struck again and again.

It was not looking at him, seeming to have lost sight of Tom in its panic.

"Eruerio."

The spell shot true, shaping into a curved disk, spinning in the air. It carved into the snake's eye, worming deep into the flesh of the socket. The beast roared in pain, trying to get away from the spell, but its struggles were in vain. With a sickening squelch, an eye, coated so thickly with black blood that it was impossible to see its yellow, popped out. It bounced onto the floor.

Tom Summoned the eye, bringing it to a hover before him. The dark blood that dripped from it confirmed that the beast was a demon. Likely instinct-driven, from the look of mad bloodlust in its eye, without a single intelligent thought in its reptilian brain.

He flicked his hand, and the severed eye was ripped into shreds. The remains splattered onto the ground, and Tom stepped over the mess, striding forwards. The snake heard his footsteps, its triangular head swivelling towards his direction. Again, Tom looked into its eye, but the effect was far duller. A gentle tug at his senses, instead of a consuming pull.

He flexed his fingers. They had regained a flush of pink, but they still looked ashen.

The snake's hood flared, its rows of teeth bared. Fury burned in the only eye it had left, but Tom did not care. The chill of his close shave with death had settled at the base of his spine, and the feel of it burned. He would ensure this pitiful, mindless creature fear him before he ended its miserable life.

Tom was no meek prey for it to hunt. He would ensure the beast knew that before it died.

The snake lunged, and Tom responded with a wordless wave of his staff. Water roared into existence, tendrils of it tangling and condensing together into a monster the mirror image of the snake demon. Two beasts clashed, one of flesh and glimmering scales, one of magic and shimmering water.

Tom's summoned creature wrapped its body around the demon's, tightening and strangling it in its grip. It slithered up the demon's body, its head twisting around, watery fangs poised to bite. A swing of Tom's staff changed the water snake's head into a dragon's. It roared out a torrent of boiling hot liquid, straight into the demon's face.

The demon screamed, throwing its head back as its remaining eye was hit with a vicious jet of steaming water. It toppled sideways to the ground, imbalanced by the pain and the thick body of water that trapped it and bound its movements.

Tom Banished a large piece of debris into the snake's mouth. It lodged itself there; he could almost taste the demon's fear as its jaw worked helplessly around the stone. It tried to bite down and crush it, but its teeth were made for piercing skin and swallowing its prey whole, not for crushing stone.

He summoned a spear of water, as he had done during his Selection. The snake twitched as he walked closer, hissing around the stone that blocked its mouth.

Tom looked into its eye. It did not fix on him, only stared uselessly off into another direction. Splotches of ruptured blood vessels coloured it with a reddish tinge. When Tom's boots scraped against the ground, it moved its head towards him. Even the sound of the roiling water wrapped around it, steady and low, seemed to disturb it, as it tried in vain to slither away.

It was blind now, only relying on sound. But emotion still shone clear in its eye, and Tom knew it was terrified.

How pitiful.

He drove his spear into the snake's eye, his magic easing the way for it to pierce through the softened flesh of the socket, through the snake's skull and straight into its brain.

The demon bucked wildly, even after Tom's spear and water snake had dissipated. It seemed to be going into overdrive, unable to reconcile the destruction of the brain with what it meant for the rest of its body.

Tom idly ran through the list of spells he knew in his head, wondering which would be best for removing a spell-resistant snake's head off its body.

It took thirty-nine Sectumsempras to achieve.


Tom paused, his entire upper torso stilling between the snake's jaws. He'd plucked every tooth out from within, all of them already safely pocketed away. There was nothing else left that could be considered valuable left to harvest in the head. He withdrew himself, dispelling his Bubble-Head Charm. He grimaced—the charm only covered his head, and the rest of his body had not been spared from the reek of the snake's breath that now clung to him.

He glanced behind him. "Come out," he commanded. "You didn't think I'd forgotten about you, did you?"

There was a long silence. "I was kind of hoping you had, actually." The words were sheepish but when Tom turned, he saw white teeth trapped within an unrepentant grin.

The creature the grin belonged to was an odd one. Not a vampire, Tom confirmed on his second assessment of it, and male. Tom thought they were about the same height, though the way the stranger stood, a lazy posture, with a kind of relaxed confidence that bordered on arrogance, made him seem just slightly shorter than Tom.

"What are you?" Tom asked finally.

The creature ignored the question and the resultant twitch in Tom's eye. "Terribly sorry about running off like that," he said, though he didn't sound very much so. "I'm not much of a fighter, and you seemed like you handled everything pretty well."

Tom's gaze travelled down the stranger's body. His shoulders hung low—perhaps too low, an exaggeration of relaxation. He stood with his feet a fair distance apart. Tom quietly cursed the bulky travelling cloak the creature wore; it obscured much of Tom's observations. He couldn't be sure because of it, but he had a strong suspicion that no matter what this being said, he was a good fighter, if not a talented one. It was in the way he stood.

The creature shifted a foot backward. Not much, but enough to tell Tom that he was anxious under Tom's scrutiny. Tom gave a tight smile. "Tom Riddle," he said. "And your name is?"

"Harry Evandel," he said, smile still in place, a perfect facade of calm and nonchalance.

"Evandel," repeated Tom. "What are you doing in a place like this, if you can't even fight?"

"I was looking for something," was the reply. His eyes flickered away from Tom.

Tom eyed Evandel. "And you simply happened upon me here?"

"I was looking for some plants and herbs," replied Evandel, seemingly oblivious to Tom's suspicion. He pulled out a small sack from his cloak pocket, dangling it from his fingers. Tom studied it, though he was more interested in the hand than the ragged leather pouch. Slender. Too delicate for heavy weapons. "They only grow on these mountains—specifically, in the old gardens around here."

"Were you looking for Alihotsy leaves?"

Evandel smiled innocently. "Oh no," he said. "Alihotsy trees can't be found here. I was looking for Leaping Toadstools, actually."

"Ah yes," said Tom, as though he hadn't known this all along. "It was Leaping Toadstools that grow here. I'd forgotten."

"It happens to the best of us," said Evandel. "What about you, friend? What were you doing here?"

Friend. Tom scoffed; this entire conversation was a farce of hidden traps, misleading remarks, and too-polite smiles. "I was exterminating a pest." He tipped his head to the demon's corpse—the one he'd learnt in its own mind was called Valanc, hiding a scowl as he did so.

He'd learnt a great many things in Valanc's mind. He'd learnt a bit about demonic magic—that it was, essentially, scavenged from human magic, thus how similar but flawed they were. He'd also learnt that the whole reason why Valanc was here was that the demon was in hiding, hunted by the Demon Lord. It was an interesting bit of information, suggesting that the demons weren't as tightly bound under their Lord's control as he'd thought.

Or so he'd thought until Tom tried to dig deeper into Valanc's mind about the Demon Lord, trying to learn his strengths, powers, appearance. Valanc had literally destroyed his own mind to prevent Tom from finding out anything more, despite the violent intensity of his own hatred towards the Demon Lord.

Evandel's eyes drifted to Valanc's corpse. "Right," he said. "He must have pissed you off."

"Oh? Why do you think so?"

"I watched you torture him," said Evandel with the same tone of one commenting on how lovely the weather today was.

"Ah," said Tom, pausing. "Not my best moment, I'm afraid."

"No, your fight against the Basilisk was much more interesting. I was impressed," said Evandel, his smile tugging wider, to an almost genuine curve.

Tom frowned. "Basilisk?"

Evandel raised an eyebrow. "I would have thought you humans would know the legend," he said. "Isn't Salazar Slytherin a bit of an important person to you all?"

"Salazar Slytherin?" Tom leaned forward. "He is associated with this Basilisk?"

"Of course. He was the one who created it," said Evandel.

"Tell me more."

Evandel's eyebrow rose higher. "Not even a 'please'? Pushy, aren't you?" Tom simply waited patiently, and finally, Evandel rolled his eyes and continued, "The Basilisk is a demon bred by your Slytherin. According to the legend, Slytherin hoped to use the Basilisk to destroy all demons—he must have thought the irony wonderful: a demon moulded into a weapon against demons." Evandel's lips twisted upwards. "He got his irony in the end; the Basilisk turned on its creator and ate him."

"Slytherin died in a battle with Godric Gryffindor," sneered Tom.

Evandel shrugged. "Perhaps he did. I admit, the ones who told me this story are a little biased when it comes to humans. But the legend is true as far as I can tell—it said that the Basilisk's gaze Petrifies." He glanced at Tom, who felt his displeasure bubble in his chest.

"Where did you hear this legend from?" said Tom. "It certainly isn't the humans—I would have known of such a… tale." He gave Evandel's ears and slitted pupils a lingering look. "And you are not human. That much is obvious."

"You're like a dog with a bone," said Evandel with a low chuckle. "I'll have you know I am part human."

Tom raised an eyebrow. "And the other part?"

"Parts, actually," said Evandel. "I do believe Mum had some hag in her." Tom twitched. Hags were notorious for their diet—humans. Evandel pounced on his discomfort, openly leering at him. "Yes, you do look quite tasty, don't you? Lots of muscle. I do like my humans a bit on the tougher side." He licked his lips exaggeratedly.

"You look like a slobbering mutt," said Tom shortly. He boxed away his discomfort to deal with later. "Part-human and part-hag. What else?"

"On second thoughts, you are a bit too skinny…"

"Do get to the point, Evandel."

"Fine, fine," he said. "I'm part-demon if you must know."

Whatever reaction Evandel expected—likely a violent one, judging by the slight bending of his legs, as though he was preparing to run—it clearly wasn't for Tom to nod in satisfaction and say, "I see."

Evandel looked delightfully thrown. "I—wait, what?" he spluttered.

Tom smiled blandly. "I see," he repeated. He turned his back on Evandel, returning his attention to the snake's headless corpse. It was still twitching, but nowhere nearly as violently as before. That was good enough. He palmed his wand in his hand; he always preferred his wand for more delicate work, like skinning and disembowelling a sixty-foot long snake.

"You're not afraid? I could run you through right now!" said Evandel. So he did have a weapon, Tom noted.

Tom snorted.

"But I—" Evandel cut himself off, frustrated. His tongue was not as quick when he was flustered. "You knew?"

"You have some physical characteristics that betray your heritage. Secario," murmured Tom. The spell glowed at the tip of his wand, ready to use. He bent closer to the severed end of the snake's underside and touched his wand to its skin. He drew a line along the middle with it, frowning when it only made a scratch. He waved away the spell. "The slitted pupils, the ears and your teeth, for example. Infindio."

"You can't have guessed just from that. I could be—oh gods, that is disgusting," said Evandel. He sounded like he was retching, but Tom couldn't be sure, too focused on sawing his way through the snake's skin, wand held with the hilt against his chest like a dagger. The new spell was more effective, but it was still slow progress.

"I would have thought anything with some demonic blood in it would be less squeamish about blood," said Tom.

"A demon who is watching you gut another demon," countered Evandel. "And don't call me it. Gods, I'm looking away now—anyway, as I was saying, you can't have guessed just from my appearance."

"I didn't," grunted Tom. He wondered if he should summon a House-Elf to do this for him. But no, House-Elf and demonic magic might interfere with each other. "You were uncomfortable with telling me your heritage. You told me about your mother's hag descent, so it wasn't shame. You also told me about the Basilisk's legend, one I had never heard before. In that story, there were two main parties—demons and humans." Tom grimaced as black blood poured all over his arms, covering them from elbow to fingers. "Therefore, it is most likely that the story was passed down between one of the two races. Seeing as the humans have never heard of the legend, the only possible candidates are the demons. And demons are not known for speaking to many outside of their own kind."

Evandel was silent for a long moment, and focused though he was on his work, Tom still felt the flutter of smugness in his chest. Then, "That's very good," said Evandel. "You're not the only one who can do a bit of guessing though."

Tom paused, glancing at Evandel. "Oh?"

"You're the Champion," he replied. "I could give you a pompous speech about how I deduced your identity, if you like."

"No need," said Tom. He yanked hard at his wand and felt the snake's skin split all the way down to the halfway point of its body. He smiled in satisfaction. "You deduced it after you watched my fight."

"Yes, that is an easy one," admitted Evandel. "Try this one: you're a pompous shit who spends his days surrounded by other pompous shits, and your definition of fun is sniping at those pompous shits while they snipe right back at you."

Tom blinked. "I don't think anyone has quite put it like that before." He dragged his wand all the way down to snake's tail; the cutting had gotten easier once he'd made decent headway in, his magic adjusting to maximise his efficiency. "You're correct—except none of those pompous shits, as you say, snipe at me." He stepped back, a rush of air leaving his lungs. "Excellent."

Evandel stepped up next to him, staring at the long, even split down the snake's belly that revealed fleshy white within. "You're not going to eat it, are you? A legendary creature, and you plan to eat it."

"What I plan to do with it is none of your concern," said Tom, his voice cool as he flexed away the ache in his knuckles. He flicked his wand, and the tail end of the corpse rose into the air, hovering just an inch above the ground. Enough space for Tom to begin peeling off the skin.

Evandel quirked an eyebrow. "If you insist," he said. "Where are you heading to after you finish doing… this?" He waved a vague hand at the corpse, his expression one of distaste.

Tom pursed his lips, considering the half-demon. He was an irritant, with his attitude and the utter fearlessness and ease with which he spoke with Tom. But his attitude and what he was intrigued Tom.

Most people, Tom knew, tended to be anxious when they had just seen a man kill a sixty-foot snake. Displays of power and violence frightened them. It made them feel as though they were in the presence of a predator. When that happened, they did one of two things—run or stay. Most that stayed ended up becoming his followers, drawn to his power like a moth to a flame due to having an utter lack of their own.

But Evandel was not like that either. He was neither fearful nor admiring, neither nervous nor in awe.

If anything, he had seemed… fascinated. In a way that made Tom feel as though he was being scrutinised under a magnifying glass and prepared for dissection.

That's fine, he thought. He may try to dissect me, but I'll be the one holding onto the scalpel in the end.

He glanced at the half-demon from the corner of his eye. Evandel was lounging against the wall, looking at Tom as he awaited a reply.

"I'll be going into the town," said Tom finally. "I have business to take care of there." He looked at Evandel, his mouth lifting into a smile. It did not reach his eyes, and he knew Evandel saw that. "Care to join?"

Evandel grinned back, eyes equally cold. "Why not?"


[A/N]: Things to clarify in this chapter: Tom is not a Parselmouth. I've decided to remove such abilities from the humans' set of skills-i.e., Parseltongue and Metamorphmagi are skills only possessed by demons in this world. So Tom wouldn't be a Parselmouth, but Harry is one.

With this chapter I was particularly worried about the characterisation. It was actually really hard to write an introduction scene where they didn't both end up killing one another, so I'm hoping their interaction was interesting and believable, as well as the choice Tom made to invite Harry along. I also don't write a lot of fight scenes, so I'm not sure if what I've written is good or not. If any of you have any comments on the characterisations and the fight scene, whether it's good or bad, I'd love to hear it so I can improve on that!

Finally, and not at all importantly, but maybe of interest to some of you, I tried really hard to avoid mentioning 'Tom's snake' throughout the chapter. Because while amusing, an innuendo like that probably wouldn't have worked well with the more serious tone of the first scene that I was going for.

PS: Thank you for all the wonderful reviews from last chapter. I'm glad that that one was so well-received, and everyone who commented was very kind. Thank you, thank you, thank you! I hope this chapter didn't disappoint.

Oh, and I nearly forgot. This is a bit late but, Happy New Year, everyone :)


The promised chapter summary: After their impromptu meeting, Tom is forced to fight a Basilisk while Harry conveniently disappears on him. Needless to say, Tom defeats the Basilisk. He proceeds to behead and harvest the Basilisk, and somewhere in the middle of all that, Harry reappears. They trade banter while Tom skins the Basilisk, and eventually, agree to head into town together. Both are not so subtly trying to get an upper-hand over each other, and neither trust the other more than they can throw them.