After that Christmas they barely spoke one word to each other anymore. Tom worked his way up the ranks of Slytherin's hierarchy and discovered that he was a natural snake speaker or as the wizarding world named it Parseltongue. Using this knowledge he managed to finally find a family link with Slytherin's last known descendants and he planned to visit them over the summer holidays at the end of his fourth year.
Harrison gave up on trying to find anything out about his history. He spent his holidays earning money and respect from friendly witches and wizards in Diagon Alley. The few times he ventured into Knockturn Alley he managed to gain a reputation as danger behind the mask of a child. Eventually he made a bank account to store all the money and interesting objects he had managed to accumulate.
While at the bank he set passwords on his accounts and asked that in the case of his death they be held until someone gave the correct password. The goblins were overjoyed with the prospect of withholding so much from the greedy wizards and agreed. One of the goblins, noting his muggle name and lack of family, suggested a blood test to find any unknown relatives. Harrison was intrigued by this but decided against it until a later date, leaving a vial of his blood in the vault as well just in case.
While at school though Harrison was a completely different person. He spent much of his time with - and - playing games and keeping up to date on their homework. But in his spare moments he would sneak away listen in on Tom's conversations with either the other Slytherins or the snake that Harrison had managed to anonymously give him. It was listening to these conversations that helped him to teach himself Parseltongue. Tom, while loving the snake never, noticed his brother's involvement in anything and pretended as if the Gryffindor did not even exist.
During the summer holidays directly after fourth year Tom disappeared for a short time and returned with a look of immense satisfaction on his face. Harrison worried about the cause of that expression but let it slide as he intercepted a letter from the Headmaster. The letter was addressed to the Dark Lord Grindlewald and was incredibly worrying for the young boy.
Dear my old friend,
I know that we have not been in contact much since my sister's tragic event but I have some news that I must share with you. There is a young child studying at Hogwarts who I believe may usurp your position as Dark Lord and become even more impossible to defeat. I have figured that if we could remove his motivation then you would remain the Dark Lord and the Light would continue to have a slight chance. I believe that he is motivated in his goals by a boy named Tom Riddle. I myself cannot dispose of him but think that it would perfectly likely that you could. The death could even be explained away as a demonstration of you power.
I hope that you will take my request into consideration and make the choice most useful to us both.
Regards, Albus.