A/N: Hey! Glad to see you all liked the last chapter. Quite a few of you mentioned that you'd like to see a bit more of Draco and Hermione, but I have to warn you that while this may be happening in the near future, it won't be for a while. Sorry! No worries.
Anyway, here you go! Chapter 12. It's Roderick's POV, and back to Hermione next.
Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter, Tom Riddle, or Hermione Granger. Yeah, they all belong to JK Rowling. Surprised?
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Chapter 12: Caught
Dear Roderick,
I'm glad to hear that you're happy at school. As you well know, I thoroughly enjoyed most of my years at Hogwarts, and I do hope that your time is far better than my own.
As for the sorting, I am very proud that you got sorted into Slytherin, and you should be too! It is only a stereotype that all Slytherins are unfair and evil, and I have known a few who are trustworthy and kind. Blaise was a Slytherin and he expresses his congratulations that you joined his old house. However, just being a Slytherin does not mean you don't have to worry about Professor Snape. I warn you once again to watch your temper around him, and never say anything to provoke him. Professor Snape is very unpredictable and it would not be beyond him to turn against you without any reason. Please, dear, I trust you but I know how your temper can flare. You got that from your father.
Megan sounds like a lovely person. A little perkiness never hurt anyone, and that may be exactly what you need to balance out all the pressure of your first year. It gets easier, I promise you.
As for Professor Malfoy, you needn't worry. Unlike his father, he is one of the Slytherins I mentioned; trustworthy and kind. Still, I urge you not to break cover, and be careful what you say in his presence. He is a good man, but is still a Death Eater and has obligations of his own. Do not force him to break them. He is, after all, Lucius Malfoy's son.
Take good care of your necklace, and it would be wise for you not to wear it to classes. The two of us are the only people who know of it, son, and it must stay that way.
Keep up with your studies and stay safe,
Mom
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My mother was a researcher, always working impossibly hard to know every scrap of knowledge possible. She knew everything about magic, light or dark, and somehow she'd seen it all. Mom could brew potions without the aid of a book, and recite the complete Hogwarts: A History backwards. She could explain Muggle sciences and recommend further readings on any topic. Anything I asked her, she would answer.
But I didn't want to ask her about this particular question, and instead I answered it myself. After all, I was my mother's son, and had inherited her ability to find anything in the text my peers avoided. So, I spent my first weekend in the library, pulling large volumes of names off shelves. The sorting hat had said a man named Riddle was my father, so that was where I looked first. Riddle was not a pureblood name, and there was only one Riddle who had attended Hogwarts in the past century. Tom Riddle, Slytherin, Head Boy, unbeaten NEWTS scores.
I found him in an old yearbook that the librarian dug out for me. My guess was true; I looked identical to my father. My hair, my face, my posture even! While it was also true that I had my mum's eyes, it was evident that I was Roderick Riddle.
I snuck out a copy of the yearbook and duplicated it in my common room, watching my father smirk at the camera. It still didn't make sense to me, though. Why had mum been with him? Why was I even here? Although it sounded arrogant, my father had been handsome in his teenage years, but my mum hadn't even been born while he had looked like me. From what I knew and could dig up in the library, Lord Voldemort hardly ever made public appearances and if he did, it was in a flurry of memory charms, so I guessed he was still the pasty white serpent man that Terry spoke of. But his looks weren't the point.
There was always the rape idea, as unpleasant and vulgar as it was. However, I couldn't see how Professor Malfoy would fit into that equation. I preferred to believe that he wouldn't allow her to come to such harm. And for the Weasley lie to work, she would have had to… conceive me around the time of the Final Battle. And two plus two didn't equal four with this information.
My mother's letter arrived on Sunday morning, and did nothing to improve my morale. I had subconsciously chosen to forget that Professor Malfoy was a Death Eater, but remembering that fact triggered an idea. My mum had been marked down as a missing person after the end of the war, but what if she had lived with Professor Malfoy? I did remember them together, after all. And perhaps Mum had her fling with Voldemort at some point then? But that scenario was even less appealing than the rape one. In this one she was fully aware of what she was doing, allowing herself to be used by the Dark Lord and his side. At least in the first she was a victim.
Still, I refrained from wearing the locket outside of my shared bedroom, and mourned its loss. My confidence took a huge hit, and I stopped answering questions in class, unless asked by a teacher directly. Megan stuck by my side, however, and found ways to cheer me up somehow. In fact, she even found a way to help me enjoy our flying lessons, which started toward the end of September. The week before we were to meet with Madame Edgecomb, the flying instructor, Megan taught me all about Quidditch. At first I had been irritated by her chatter, but I quickly became fascinated by the sport. This news surprised my mother endlessly, although she quickly blamed it on my 'dad's' talent with flying. I said nothing on the topic in my letter, and only wrote how I wished Ron were around to teach me how to fly. She wrote something along the lines of an apology, and didn't make any reply to aid my Voldemort Theory.
Regardless of my previous training, or lack there of, I ended up a pretty good flier. Not excellent, of course, but I could get off the ground before Austin Flint did, who had bragged endlessly about training with his father Marcus, captain of the Ballycastle Bats. I had snickered as I hovered over Austin, my left foot by his ear, as he yelled repeatedly at his broom to lift. Megan was overjoyed and had clapped like a true friend as I raced around the courtyard, drawing the attention of Madame Edgecomb. She had nodded encouragingly, giving me permission to fly higher. It was relaxing, relieving really, to be good at something without having to work constantly for perfection. And Mum was proud, but since she had never been a successful flier, she didn't know how to be involved in my new interest other than to send me a few flying guides that Dennis had dug up.
I began to look forward to flying lessons on Sunday mornings. I could endure Snape's heated glares and Professor Malfoy's nervous glances and this whole Voldemort ordeal, because in those brief minutes when I was on my own, I didn't have to think.
It was in November that I had the idea. It sprouted up randomly when I least expected it, in the middle of Dark Arts class. Snape had been greatly irritated when I had started to smirk during his lecture on the differences between hexes and jinxes, though he had been unable to prevent it. I suppose it was Mum's letter that did it, how she avoided addressing my father in particular, reminding me of Ron Weasley. No, he was not my father, but I had been told enough about him to know that he had played on the Gryffindor Quidditch team. His best friend, Harry Potter, had, too. They both had brooms. Brooms that would still be untouched in their dorm room. Brooms free for my taking.
It was alarmingly easy to remove the boards covering the entrance to Gryffindor Tower. I shimmied through the portrait hole, taking care to keep the cloak tight around me before illusioning it quickly. When I turned around, I gasped. The common room was untouched, appearing exactly as it had in Dennis's old photos. The fire was burning in the large grate across the room, its curls lapping at the stone calmly as if it had been recently stoked. Homework was still laid out across the tables as if everyone had just suddenly left the tower for dinner, and several chessboards were still set up by the fire. It was creepy, to be honest. I looked away from the round tables and sofas, and instead looked for the two spiral staircases.
They were to my right, and I quickly pulled off the invisibility cloak and dropped it on a nearby chair. I hurried up the boys' staircase and walked down the hallway on the next floor to a door marked '7th Years' on a small bronze plaque. My heart beating, I pulled open the door.
This room, unlike the freakishly neat common room, was an absolute mess. Someone had dumped out their entire school bag in the middle of the room as if searching frantically for something. The beds were made but most of them were piled with school books and a few school robes. On one bed was an open book of defensive curses, and I realized what had happened. The Gryffindor boys must have yanked out anything they'd need for the final battle before running off to fight. The thought gave me goosebumps.
Ron's bed was the easiest to recognize because of the abandoned Weasley sweater hanging off the bedpost, and a ragged-looking family portrait taped on the wall. Unnerved by the silence, I rushed to it and lowered to my knees on the carpet in order to dig my hand underneath. I felt around for his broomstick and immediately my hand hit the smooth wooden handle. It was a relief to find it still intact, and though the broom was over a decade old, it was nice to know I now had my own. First years were now allowed to have their own brooms and hopefully no one would notice I'd suddenly gained ownership of one.
While I was at it, I collected a very large Gryffindor Quidditch robe from Ron's trunk, a set of pads, and a pair of cleats. My plan was to magic them all down to fit me and change the colors in order to wear them in public. Feeling satisfied, I shrunk them and slid them in the pocket of my jeans, along with the broom, and turned to leave. However, to my horror, there was already someone in the doorway.
"Students aren't allowed in this tower," sneered the shimmering teenage boy blocking my path. My jaw dropped as I slowly examined the ghost who had caught me, from his messy dark hair, glowing eyes, and bloody Gryffindor school robes to his huge, ruby adorned sword. There was no doubt in my mind that this was the boy who my mother had once followed into battle. This was Harry Potter.
"Merlin," I mumbled, still stunned. He glared at me with more hatred than I'd ever seen in my life as his fingers tightened around the sword in his hand. Harry's eyes narrowed when he saw my grip on Ron's left kneepad.
"Raiding student belongings? How dare you, you little snake?!" I gulped, realizing how the situation must appear. He didn't know who my mum was, and he probably recognized me from how my father must have once looked. Desperate to get away and also quite nervous, I stammered,
"Please, I didn't mean to-"
He cut me off, "Who are you?" My eyes darted to the doorway behind him, but there was no hope of running. Sure he was dead, but he could still rat me out to a professor. "A Slytherin, I see," he continued, noticing the green patch on my robe. "No doubt a direct descendent, judging by how much you look like Voldemort himself." Yup, he knew. This was not good.
"Roderick Matthew," I answered, my voice shaky. Ashamed of my lie, I looked down to the floor. He gave me a calculating look before drifting closer. He was radiating cold. I shivered.
Harry smirked as he drawled, "You're lying, aren't you little Slythie?"
I bit my lip, thinking longingly of my locket. I hated being afraid, hated it more than embarrassment or confusion. Here I was, afraid of a dead person. How wonderful. "Roderick Granger," I whispered, closing my eyes. There was no response to my confession, so I hesitantly added, "Although Mum's friends call me Roderick Weasley."
"You are neither a Weasley nor a Granger," he protested, his voice low and steely. I winced, reopening my eyes. He was glowering at me. "You're a first year; they died before you were born. Lying gets you nowhere, you little brat, it would do you well to stop."
This was getting annoying. I glared back at him, slipping my hand into my pocket for my wand. It would be useless of course, but I felt better holding it. My voice was even as I snarled, "Hermione Granger's not dead, and I would know. She lives in New York City in America with some other survivors."
My words were met with silence. Harry no longer looked so furious, though his face was creased by confusion. I continued, "As for Ron Weasley, he died a few months before I was born, true, and I've recently realized that it wouldn't matter anyway. You're correct in saying I'm not a Weasley." This comment, so casually thrown out, irritated him further, and I could see him flexing his fingers around the sword. Sensing he wouldn't trust me until I had told him everything, I shamefully looked down at the floor and finally added, "The hat said I was a Riddle, but I never met my father."
He scoffed and growled at me, "That much is obvious, but you're not a Granger. Hermione Granger died in the Great War!"
Now I was more annoyed. How dare this ghost tell me my own mother was gone? No, wait, how dare he tell me my mother wasn't even my mother? My eyes flaming, "Don't tell me she's dead! She's thirty years old and she lives in a flat in New York City!" I sighed and closed my eyes. I shouldn't have lost my temper. I tried to never lose my temper if I could help it. Breathing evenly through my nose, I hesitantly opened my eyes.
Harry was gone.
Dejected though successful, I left the room and slowly wound down the spiral staircase, wondering what to do. This meant I didn't fit in anywhere, not at home, not with the Slytherins, and not even here with my mother's dead best friend. The warm colors looked so welcoming but I felt that if I were to sit down and try to get comfortable, the room would reject me and spit me back out. It wasn't supposed to be this hard. For one fleeting moment I wished that I had a normal life, just as I had so many times in the past month.
My head hanging, I crawled back through the portrait hole as quietly as I could, before slowly stretching my arms and turning in the direction of the Slytherin common room. However, before I could walk a single step, I saw my path was blocked by a very tall, dark figure.
Frozen in fear, my eyes widened as I slowly looked up; seeing the frock coat covered in buttons, the long arms folded across the figure's wide chest, and the beaky nose topped by the two black eyes.
My heard sunk to my toes as Professor Snape smirked grimly and drawled, "Mr. Matthews, what an unexpected surprise."
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A/N: So… yeah. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with Harry for a while. Eh, well. I'll figure it out. Next chapter we switch to Hermione for quite a long time. She gets herself into a bit of a mess, and Tom comes back, too! And…Hermione's a slut! Ha ha, couldn't help but say it. Teaser?
"You're not weak, Miss Granger," he whispered, the familiar rumble in his voice sending tiny shocks down my spine as I wept. Suddenly I was nineteen again, my back against the spines of the books behind me. My hair was in braids, my dress tangled in my lap, the carpet pressing against my skin, my kingdom falling to pieces. But now I knew what I hadn't then.
Dun dun dun. So, yeah. I don't have much to say. Happy summer everyone! Review!
Word Count: 1908