Chapter Ten: Identity Crisis.
The weeks went by swiftly for the students, Professors, and ghosts of Hogwarts and all too soon September had given way to the first of the month of October. Morning dawned silently in the Slytherin dorms seeing as each of it's members were still fast asleep and quite unaware of the time, save for two human members and one serpent of the First Year dorms. Salazar Chantt was laying flat on his back, fully dressed in his school uniform, legs spread out across the bed as if he had landed after a failed jump and hands clasped firmly together on his stomach. He was staring at the canopy of his bed with a rather irritated expression on his pale face which only added to the unusual darkness of his eyes this morning. Darkscale was coiled near his head on the pillow, throwing a hissy fit over her master's choice of words in the current conversation.
Neville was sitting at the edge of Sal's bed near the foot and was eyeing the hissing pair with slightly narrowed eyes; it seemed that he was concentrating on what was being said. Draco had told the boy two weeks ago that if he listened hard enough to Sal, he would be able to understand what he was saying to his snake. Of course everyone knew he was just pulling Neville's leg, but it was funny to watch the pudgy boy turn red in the face from straining so hard.
"You know better than that Sssalazar!" she snapped, rearing up so that her head was now quite in view of his wandering eyes. It was slightly aggravating the situation, she knew that, but right now Darkscale could care less; he needed to be taught a lesson. Neville backed away from them both, now shifting his gaze to Darkscale completely because the snake looked agitated.
"Do I? It's not like I have a fellow Parsselmouth to asssk...And I AM the lasst of Ssslytherin's line-" he started, pushing the medium sized head of his pet away from his nose so that he could sit up. He then shot his now frightened dorm mate an apologetic look. Really, sometimes he regretted keeping the scaly beast, a dragon would be easier to handle!Maybe he should have picked a rat?
"Ssso you believe it isss up to you to decide thesssse thingss then? You are ssstill a hatchling! You know nothing of your family's hissstory or how thingsss were done! And you are changing Ssalazar Ssslytherin's viewss around to work in your favor, you're no better than HIM! With thiss idea of yourss, you will desstroy everything that Ssslytherin built, a true heir you are not!"
And those, perhaps, were not the right choice of words on her part to get the boy to understand the fault in his plans.
Sal shot up out of bed, landing with a soft thud as he whirled around to fix Darkscale with a glare so intense, she recoiled violently. This sent Neville scurrying in terror toward his own bed, stumbling and muttering as he went. He didn't once turn around to face Sal until he was securely in the center of his bed with his wand in hand, looking like he was going to fight a duel in his perfect wide step stance. But he couldn't see Sal or Darkscale because the curtains were now closed all the way, probably his own doing on his way out, though he couldn't remember grabbing anything let alone tugging the curtains closed.
Sal's face was screwed up in a look of pure fury as he stood, rooted to the floor beside his bed, still well under the drapes that hid his world from the rest of the dorm, hissing furiously at his pet in anger. But his words were lost to her, none of them made any sense at all as he spouted off random sounds and pointed at her with one scarred finger, making her whole being suddenly burst into pain. The more he hissed at her, the more his eyes seemed to take on a crazed gleam, like he knew what he wanted to happen to her and how to go about it. It was at that time the thought occurred to the serpent, maybe he was speaking a spell? She was never really good at recognizing spells or even understanding the words they were written in called Latin.
The last thing she remembered before she passed out was the satisfied smirk her master directed at her just as he disappeared out from under the curtains and the look of horror sent her way from the boy across the room called Neville, who was still posed in the middle of his own bed, wand in hand.
At the Slytherin table, almost two hours after what Neville called 'The Hissy fit of Doom', all the First Year Slytherins who were Grims sat in awed silence. Neville relayed the whole event, even his failure to hear what Sal and Darkscale were saying, which brought both Theo and Draco into hysterics and earned a 'you are stupid' glare from Pansy. Apparently, Sal lost his temper and punished his snake in a way that proved to be humiliating and enlightening for all parties involved. She was still being 'punished', stuffed in Sal's breast pocket, even as they enjoyed the last scraps of food before their lessons began.
Shortly after breakfast had cleared itself away, Neville got to his feet at the same time as Sal and leaned around the front of his friend, trying to gain yet another look at the not-so-lucky-serpent; his fellow year mates followed his lead because they hadn't seen it yet.
The lot of them had History of Magic this morning first and it was best to arrive early to catch up on some reading of History before the horrid Ghost started droning on or else you won't learn anything for the duration of the class except how to properly sleep on the pile of books from your bag now sitting on your desk.
Only two seventh years and a third year still remained seated close by at the table after having received their extra assignments from various Professors; the reason they weren't running off to class was painfully obvious to any who stopped to watch them try and stuff their normal sized books and other supplies into oddly shrunk packs. The Weasley twins were to blame for this latest prank on the upper year Slytherins, Draco was sure, but no one had caught them at it so no points could be taken.
All the First Years had their bags currently slung over a shoulder or protectively in hand as they walked to the History of Magic classroom, discussing how October's lessons would fair compared to September's in all subjects. So far Transfiguration, Charms, Potions and Herbology were Sal's favorites and DADA, Astronomy and History of Magic were his least favorite. DADA wouldn't be so bad if Sal didn't start feeling like someone had let a Horse run over him every time he shared the same space as the odd Professor.
It would start off as a mild headache when Quirrell entered and faced Sal and then explode into full body prickles when he faced away from the young Slytherin. By the time the class would end, Salazar would be so sore that Draco would have to walk behind him for hours after that in case he fell. It was unnerving, and even Draco complained about the strange symptoms his friend had after class, but the powerful Garlic smell was the main reason he fussed when speaking of DADA; it was too much for his delicate nose.
A slight smirk crossed Sal's face as he took a front seat in the History of Magic classroom. He could still remember his first DADA lesson like it was only yesterday. About ten minutes into the Class, while Sal himself was suffering the 'invisible needles', Potter passed out, slipping out of his seat and hitting the desk with his head before landing hard on the floor. This caused Theo and Draco to both bite their lower lips in an effort not to laugh while Sal wasn't able to suppress his outburst and got points docked for snorting too loudly at the display.
Quirrell almost looked like he was in pain for a moment after docking the points but the man quickly recovered, however, and sent Empty-Headed-Weasley off to the Hospital Wing with a semi-conscious Potter in tow. Now that Sal looked back on it, he found the whole affair more than slightly disturbing. A frown now appeared as he brought up two very important yet nagging questions that he had been pondering over for weeks. Why did he feel so bad whenever Quirrell was around, but only when the Professor had his back to him? And why did Potter pass out like that? He too looked like he was in pain.
None of it made any sense. And he had been forced to actually seek out and ask Dumbledore about Potter's strange illness when the questions became too much to handle on his own. He conveniently left out the fact that he too wanted to pass out in Quirrell's class; he just didn't trust the old man at all with that kind of revelation. The meeting was fruitless as far as Potter was concerned, but Sal did get some more information about his father and mother out of the old coot. Dumbledore seemed inclined to share only the good things he noticed about Tom Riddle, however few they were, and actually explained that in a way, Voldemort killed Tom Riddle.
That little line was reminiscent of the whole Darth Vader killed your father thing that Obi-Wan pulled in the Star Wars films that Sal had snuck a peek at more than a few times in the past; he almost laughed at the old man, whom he knew had no idea just how funny that was to hear coming from him. After gaining that little information about Tom, Sal felt he needed to know his mother better and pushed for whatever he could gather from the Headmaster. This turned into multiple meetings spread out over the weeks of term and soon proved to Sal that Dumbledore was not the man he thought he was. He knew much about both his parents, little about them together, and nothing about Sal himself, which meant that he wasn't as 'all seeing' as others warned. This was excellent news to the young man's ears, for now he felt confident that his plans could be hidden right under Dumbledore's nose and the man would be none the wiser...If Sal and company were careful that is.
Sal quickly shook himself out of his musings as Binns entered the room through the chalkboard as usual, making many of the First Years present groan in defeat; looks like they won't get that chance to read up on the class after all.
"So, let me see what happened to Darkscale, I still don't believe Neville.." Draco drawled from Sal's left, which was unusual as the boy normally sat on his right, and Theo on the left. Lately they had been swapping off, which caused some confusion among the ranks that Sal had to deal with in private.
"Later, and why don't you believe Neville? Not like he would lie about something like that, especially not when I'm sitting next to him." Sal smirked, looking over his shoulder at Neville, who was grinning from one ear to the other. "Fine" the blonde huffed, pulling his book up to his face so that he could attempt to learn something today.
From inside Sal's breast pocket came a soft squeak, so soft that it went unheard by all except Sal and Draco. The latter shot his companion's pocket an amused look and took to sniggering under his breath at the smirk that still graced Sal's features. "Told you so" came the only oral reply to the event from any who could hear the sound and Draco whirled around to give Neville a good lashing, only holding back at the look he was given from Theo and Sal.
After History of Magic, most of the Grims headed out to their favorite studying spots to finish up some homework before the Astronomy class they would have that night. Sal, Theo, Neville and Draco, however, all crowded around a small table in the empty classroom near the broom closet, all of them, save for Sal, were clutching their sides as they laughed at the poor snake...er...not so snake. There in the center of the table, was a small, black mouse. Her ears were perfectly rounded and her eyes were perfectly beady. Her body was covered in fine fur, which also littered her tail and nose, while her naked feet slid on the slick surface of the table.
"Well, I lost my temper and decided to show her what I thought of all that annoying hissing." Sal said proudly, studying the tiny creature with a bored expression.
It was obvious that the mouse was not used to walking, but rather slithering, which didn't work if you had legs to drag and a spine that wasn't meant for slithering. She kept trying to walk on her shaky feet, giving up every so often and tucking her legs against her body to try and wiggle across the table. But she wound up doing nothing more than merely mop the top of the table in the one spot she was sitting in or managed to slid to while looking like an idiot. The boys would roar with laughter every time the tiny mouse would wiggle, which in turn would make the mouse's ears and head droop in shame; she would learn her lesson this time and remember that Sal was the wizard and she was the 'pet'. Darkscale only hoped that her master would soon loose interest in this game and would change her back, seeing as she had spent the whole day as a mouse now.
Sure enough, after twenty minutes of howling at and poking at the mouse, Sal pried the mouse from the hands of Draco and picked her up by the tail, fixing those black, beady eyes with his blue-ish silver ones. Over the months he had been losing the charm on him, though he only vaguely remember what he looked like before, Sal's eyes had gone from green to teal, from teal to teal-ish silver, and now from teal-ish silver to a startling blue-silver color. Each shade was darker than the first, leaving him with deep blue eyes that seemed to turn silver the closer it got to his pupils, which would only turn slitted when he was very angry. His hair was now a short, dark brown and would lay flat on his head if he didn't run his hands through it. And his face was even more angled than before, making him a literal copy of Tom Riddle, save for the eyes. This made the mouse shiver as she gazed upon him, remembering the memories her mother shared with her of the young Tom.
"Are you sorry?" he said simply, his face a blank canvas. The mouse curled up on herself and nodded ever so slightly.
This brought a face splitting smile into existence and Sal dropped the mouse back onto the table top, pointing his wand at her and spewing out more of that unrecognizable speech. Darkscale felt pain in her body as it stretched one way, than another. Her empty black fur vanished and gave way to patterned scales, and her rodent teeth changed back into the fangs and small teeth she had as a snake. Now feeling that her body was back to its old shape, even though the pain wasn't completely gone, Darkscale slithered up to her young master and dipped her head as she came to rest on his shoulders.
"I am sssorry little one."
"I know" was her only reply from her master, who was now being spied on by a very worried looking Charms Professor.
Flitwick blinked a few times and watched as young Harrison Riddle, now only known as Salazar Riddle, preformed a very complex animal transfiguration spell on his mouse, turning it into a snake. It wasn't until he really looked at the beast that he noticed it was Darkscale. So the boy had turned her into a mouse to punish her? So like his father this one and poor Flitwick had hoped the boy wasn't like him. Harry Potter was like his father in some ways and now it was obvious that Salazar was too, but at least both boys still had enough of their mothers in them to keep their father's chaotic ways in check...for now.
The one thing that the Professors seemed to stressed the most, in either a good or bad way, was how much like their fathers the boys looked. The humor in the whole situation was now James Potter and Tom Riddle were going to school at the same time, and neither seemed to like the other at all, which made it even more humorous; perhaps they remembered who they were and that it was Tom who killed James? At least that was how most of the Professors acted, like they were James Potter and Tom Riddle, not their children. Potter didn't seem too upset about being compared to his father when it wasn't Snape doing it, but Sal hated being compared to his sire, no matter who was doing the comparing.
Mcgonagall sometimes slipped up and called him Tom whenever she was having a difficult time with the boy or seemed to be lost in thought. Though he didn't mind being called Tom, he just didn't like it when it was because they were addressing him as his father, not because his middle name was Tomas.
A soft cough from behind the tiny, lost-in-thought Professor made him jump straight up into the air and grab at his chest when he finally noticed who it was. "Oh...Dear me, I'm sorry I didn't...see you there Mr. Riddle!" he squeaked, reminding Sal of his serpentine mouse only moments ago. That thought sent a smile creeping up onto Sal's face before he could stop it.
"Quite alright Professor, I didn't see you there either...Good evening." he stated smoothly, motioning for his companions to follow him out into the halls. They each passed the still panting from fright Professor and gave him a curt nod as they left, all heading back to the dorms for a quick game or nice read before class that night. But Sal wasn't heading back to the dorms with his friends, he had noticed three shapes heading off toward the stairs while they were leaving the Charms Professor in their wake and knew it had to be Potter, Weasley and Hermione. He needed to speak with the latter about some disturbing things he had learned about his bloodline on both sides of his family and it couldn't wait. So, as they headed back toward the dungeons, Sal let Draco bring the others into a long conversation about one thing or another while he slipped away from them to head back toward Gryffindor tower, where he knew Potter and his friends were heading.
"Go back to the dormsss with them, I'll catch up later" he hissed to Darkscale, who gave him a suspicious glare, but didn't argue for fear of being turned back into a helpless mouse again. She dropped off his shoulders and slithered quickly to catch up with her master's followers, while Sal turned around and took off at a dead run, hoping to get to Hermione before she got to the common room
AN: BEWARE! LONG AUTHOR'S NOTE!
Sorry for the wait guys! Work has been busy and I've just recently acquired a new animal from the Humane Society so I've been settling him into his new home and getting him used to the other animals here.
Thanks for the reviews and no I'm not going to rewrite this story, I like this version and I know that sometimes it seems rushed or is too slow, but I'm new to Fanfics in a way, having not really been writing them much; they're not like Rps, as you have more than one person helping you write those! Although this chapter was more a filler with some important things in it, I still thought it was stuffed enough for a posting all by itself, meaning I didn't have to cram Chapter 11 into it in order to make it a good Chapter 10. Forgive me if I'm wrong.
The personalities of the kids in this story are going to vary from time to time, just like any normal child's personality would. Sometimes they are happy with how things are going and are quite bubbly, trusting and what not. While other times they turn downright nasty...I know, I have three younger siblings and tons of cousins who tend to throw a hissy even though they are now nearing, or in some cases are in, their 20's.
The adults will tend to lean toward keeping Sal happy just because he looks like Tom Riddle, acts like Tom to a degree and has a powerful aura like Tom. Only a few of them know he IS the son of Tom Riddle. Others assume he is or is a grandson somehow and that is why they will seem too friendly with him; it is out of fear that this is so.
In the case of Minerva, she wants to believe that she can change this kid, feeling that if someone had been there for Tom that he wouldn't have gone the way he did. Perhaps this is true, perhaps he was just destined to be evil, either way, she thinks that if the boy is kept out of the dark and has someone to turn to he won't follow his father. But don't expect her to always be this friendly, yes she will still be there for him but I do plan to make her get back into the 'not liking Slytherins all too much and as such not trusting everything they say' attitude, just because she gets comfortable with how things are going and doesn't want to seem too 'soft' on that house of aspiring dark folk.
As more time passes, they will all fall into a more cannon routine, even Snape and will quickly learn that Sal isn't Voldemort and won't kill them all while they sleep. At this point things will be a little more normal for them all, but for now it will not change.
No Tom Riddle will not be a softy. He will not want his kid the way a true father would, Sal will be just an object to him, a way to continue the blood; a pawn much how Harry Potter is for Dumbledore. Just thought I'd get that straight, quite a few people off of FF had asked if Voldemort will change into this strange and unrecognizable version that some have used in their fics. While that may work for them, it will not work for me. I believe that even if Tom had someone in his life who cared about him and if he did in fact have any kids, they would all just be trophies to him or treasured items like Nagini.
Yes I know that Wormtail isn't outed until the third book and that Sirius doesn't escape until then either. This will be true for this fic as well, except that Minerva will know that Sirius is innocent of the Potter's murder at least, but not of the Muggle's and Wormtail's. Because of this, she won't bring it up at all that Wormtail was the traitor because it wouldn't do any good, Sirius killed the Muggles and Wormtail and for that he should be in prison; no matter what else he is actually rotting in there for.
Sick I know, but if you think about it, he used the Killing curse (they think) and he is in prison for it, it doesn't matter what other charges are on him; in the wizarding world, that makes you evil plain and simple.
Hermione is only being accepted by most of the Slytherins, save for Sal and Neville, because they want to use her for her talents, no matter what her blood is. Most of the Grims are starting to lean toward Sal's ideals about Muggleborns, but old habits die hard they say, it will take time. Yes she is part of the Golden Trio, I don't plan to break that up. It is important, even if Harry and Ron don't like that she is friends with one of the Slimy Snakes, they won't give up her friendship because of it. The Trio is still going to be doing most of the cannon stuff, seeing as Sal won't want to get involved in much hero work, mainly because he doesn't have Dumbledore pushing him to do it. Remember, he doesn't know HE is the chosen one so why should he?
I know the story is confusing in some areas but that is the purpose of it! You see, in most books, the reader gets hold of some kind of information which gives away some part of the plot early, so they know what is going on, while the characters are still blissfully oblivious. In many cases, this may frustrate the reader because they think the characters are stupid for not figuring out what is happening by now because the reader learned it all four chapters ago.
My way I hope keeps the reader in the dark as much as the characters are so that when a character finds something, the reader feels they are with them on the find instead of just viewing it as an "I knew that already you dolt".
Keep those reviews comin' an' I'll keep the chapters updated fer yeh! Got questions? Ask away!