Chapter 13: Of Mothers, Earthvines, and Selfies
"Merlin, what a mess," Sabine remarked, throwing her hands up in frustration.
It was the night of the Samhain festival. The section of activity supervised by Riddle had gone off without a hitch, as expected. No, it was decorating for the dance that was difficult. Even with the support of Sabine, whom Luna had expressly recruited for the purpose of charming various pieces of foliage, coordinating the prefects according to Riddle's methodology was nearly impossible. The solution (to Luna) was therefore obvious: avoid Riddle's methodology at all costs.
"Sonorus," Luna cast, pointing at her throat. "Attention, please?"
The room hushed. She smiled.
"This," she said, indicating the drooping garlands arranged in a perfect grid with a grand, sweeping gesture, "is aesthetically horrid. Too many squares and not enough circles. Could everyone pick a set of materials to stand by?"
Visibly confused, the prefects did as they were told. Perhaps there was some value in being on the right side of public opinion after all.
"That's wonderful! You all may do whatever you'd like with whatever you chose. That will be all."
The minute Luna ended the Amplifying Charm, Sabine grabbed her by the arm.
"Are you insane?" her friend hissed.
"Have some faith. Samhain is supposed to be wild and unrestrained." Immune to Sabine's skeptical glance, Luna bobbed her head in a quick, birdlike manner. "We can always reorganize if necessary."
"True," Sabine conceded grudgingly.
Two hours later, the dance floor was finished.
They had decided to hold the entire event outdoors. In the center, under the clear night sky, a towering pillar of fire that was easily fifty feet high, composed of brilliant, colored flames, served as the bonfire. Looking at the tight structure, the artfully orchestrated swaying lights, and the way heat evenly warmed the entire area, Luna recognized mastery-level (or perhaps even beyond) charms work when she saw it. Tom Riddle was many things, but a mediocre wizard he was not.
"You're impressed."
"You've been holding out on our work," she noted evenly.
Riddle raised an eyebrow, having approached her from behind. "I amend my statement. You aren't impressed, because you have an exceedingly high opinion of me already."
"Your skill has never been in question."
"I don't doubt yours either – the dance floor turned out almostas wonderfully as the bonfire."
Smooth, snarked Rationality, rolling his eyes.
She cast a glance at the games, the piles of sweets heaped on an enchanted table, the trees that had somehow twisted themselves into a sparkling wall to enclose an area roughly the size of the Great Hall. Above, the clear night sky was lit by stars and moon, black velvet and white beading. Glowing flowers provided lighting closer to the ground. Perhaps a little subtler, quieter than the massive bonfire, but beautiful all the same.
"A backhanded compliment. Thank you."
"The pleasure is all mine," said Riddle, amusement playing at the corners of thin, shapely lips. "You aren't going to go to primp and preen with the rest of the students?"
"Whatever's there will always remain visible to anyone who can see. Your excuse?"
"I don't need to."
In spite of her rising melancholy, she almost smiled. She couldn't, however, quite muster the movement. It had been exactly a decade ago that she'd lost –
Merlin. She was ridiculous. Ten years, and she still hadn't managed to let go.
Oh, she wasn't utterly devastated, forever avoiding emotional attachments, or anything like that. She'd moved on to live her life as she saw fit. It was only this day each year that she was reminded of – hammered with, almost – her loss.
Memories, faint scraps worn down with time, of gentle laughter and fairy tales at night brought a lump to her throat. Lavender, she remembered, always the smell of lavender.
Please don't let me inexplicably burst into tears in front of Minimort.
Yet, from the stinging in her eyes, that seemed like exactly what she was about to do. A little embarrassment never killed any turtles, Compassion tried to console. It didn't work. Blindly, Luna turned to hide her face – and promptly stumbled over one of the floor lights in the process.
He caught her before she could hit the ground.
His embrace was warm and solid, stabilizing in its hold on her, keeping her aloft and on her feet. Just as she remembered from after the fight in Hogsmeade. Although there was a portion of her mind that pleaded with her to remove herself from his grasp, namely Rationality, she couldn't bring herself to. Because in his arms, for some inexplicable reason, she knew she was (for however brief a time) safe from everything with the exception of Riddle himself.
Riddle, who was probably the greatest threat to her in existence.
But for some reason or another, she couldn't make herself care.
When the moment faded away, reality settled in, bludgeoning them both. Tom released her as if scalded; Faulkner jumped backwards like a skittish animal. He was breathing slightly harder than the simple act warranted, heart rate a hair faster for reasons he couldn't name.
Merely the thrill of success. He had, after all, gotten under her skin. It was obvious from the brilliant flush of her cheeks, the way she'd leaned in until separated by a mere centimeter as they danced. Just one more way to infatuate her. A step nearer her secrets and her loyalty.
"The students will be here soon," she commented with a forced sort of gaiety, but the slight tremor in her voice betrayed her.
"Ashamed to be seen with me?"
"Not quite. I – I don't know what came over me."
Neither do I, rose the unbidden thought that he immediately brushed away as falsehood born of the slightly unsettling effect the night was having on him.
"Samhain can be a narcotic," he said calmly. It wouldn't do to scare her away, and he could see that she was a step away from bolting. He almost frowned. She had asked him, not the other way around. Why was she so…nervous? Tense? Impossible girl.
And, by Merlin, he was Tom Riddle. The pre-accident Luna Faulkner and more than half the girls at Hogwarts, stupid creatures that they were, chased him as if their very lives depended on it. A brief touch of comfort shouldn't make the recipient look as if they were about to vomit.
"You're scowling."
Damn it, he was.
"And you look ill. Have a drink."
"Only if this one is potion free."
Irritation sparked, tempered by dark satisfaction. Abraxas had screamed for his incompetence after that miserable failure. If I ever decide to poison you, you wouldn't be expecting it.
"Of course."
She cast him a suspicious glance before steeling herself and resolutely downing the glass of cold water he pressed into her hand in one distinctly unladylike gulp. "Refreshing," she lauded, sounding genuinely grateful as a smidgen of pink briefly returned to her cheeks.
Still, judging from the pallor that hadn't yet truly receded, he decided not to push too hard tonight. Tom owed his success in no small part to his gift at reading others, and Luna Faulkner appeared about to shatter – and not in a way that would benefit him.
But taking advantage…that was another story.
"Are you feeling alright?" he inquired solicitously. "If you need assistance – "
"Not from you," she interrupted, somehow excluding even a hint of knowledge that she was being utterly offensive. "Samhain is – it's not a good time for me."
"Of course not. A squadron of dark wizards can be taken care of like clockwork, but a holiday? Terrible business, that."
"Are you teasing me?"
He almost smiled at her wide-eyed incredulity.
"Only if you want me to be."
"You know, tonight…I think I almost like you," she decided, skipping towards the refreshment table to pour another glass of water. Her gait, however, was uneven, so very unlike the almost spritely floating quality she usually possessed. Tom's eyes narrowed.
"Tell me what's wrong," he demanded. Warily, she eyed him, and in that moment, Tom imagined that her brilliant gaze could cut through deception like a knife. In spite of that – or perhaps because of it – he summoned a thick coat of concern, layering it around his voice, weaving it into his expression.
"Why does it matter to you?"
"Polite inquiry? Perhaps I don't want to see the effort I expended to keep you safe in Hogsmeade wasted. Or I might even be mildly concerned for your well-being out of the goodness of my heart." He shrugged, lightening the act. "Your choice."
"It's only the Wrackspurts."
Too much blinking. She was lying. While there was undoubtedly indignant anger at the thought that she dared lie to him, it was remarkably and unusually contained, a drop instead of a full-blown tsunami. He found himself more intrigued – what was it about this night that made the unflappable Luna Faulkner look about to faint? The only other time she had appeared this rattled was when she had lost her father –
"It's the anniversary of someone's death," he deducted with calm, calculated certainty. She went utterly white and still under his sharp scrutiny. "Not recently, or I would have noticed it in the obituary section of the Prophet. Considering how affected you remain – a family member? Your father passed under a month ago – your mother – "
"Stop."
For some reason, he did.
There was a nearly wild quality present as she shook her head, flaxen curls flying around her luminous, heart-shaped face. She was clearly distressed; her plump bottom lip was bleeding, as if she'd bitten into it too hard without noticing the pain.
Careful, Tom. You're blurring the line – she's about to break.
"I apologize," he said quietly. The two words – usually so hard to force out, so false, so bitter – dropped from his tongue easily, almost as if he meant them. Almost.
She closed her eyes and drew in a deep breath. It was fascinating, how she calmed herself; her shaking fists gradually unclenched, and her shoulders loosened, until she regained her usual relaxed, open stance. Except…under the veneer of spontaneous eccentricity, there was a cool, deliberate quality he had somehow missed until now. As facetious as she seemed, Luna Faulkner was very much in control of herself.
She was also very possibly the most riveting creature he'd ever met.
"You're right," she admitted, so softly that he might have missed it if not for a flutter of golden eyelashes in his peripheral vision. "It was my mother."
It would have been easy to give false sympathy to anyone else, honeyed words sliding out from between gleaming white teeth. But despite her obvious emotional fragility, her stare was as piercing as ever, and Tom instinctively knew that this was one phrase was one that could not achieve even a semblance of truth.
"I don't understand," he affirmed instead.
She blinked twice, unconsciously moving a pale hand to her throat before a smile touched her face. It was not her carefree one. Instead, it was thin and sharp, with, enigmatically enough, a layer of half-weary, half-mocking bitterness. It also appeared utterly out of place on the smooth lines of her stubborn yet imperturbable mouth.
"I don't suppose you would."
Something unfamiliar in him stirred. Heartless. Unsettled by her recognition of what you really are?
"What I meant was that I never knew my mother. She died when I was very young."
"Did you ever wish that you did – know her, I mean?"
A thousand times.
"No," he answered flatly.
To his surprise, her lips curved into a small, knowing grin. Tom itched to curse it off her face.
"Liar," she remarked in her dreamy way as she stared straight at him – almost as if she could see through him.
His grip on his wand clenched. A dizzying vision of her under the Cruciatius – No. He would break her later. For now, the priority was still divesting Faulkner of her secrets and gaining her loyalty. Neutralize the threat first.
"Perhaps I did, once," he allowed. Her eyebrows rose in surprise that she was unable to hide. "But I realized that I was wasting time on futile dreams." And that both she and my father deserved their respective ends.
"You're utterly bound by the Earthvines."
"Earthvines don't – "
"All dreams are futile if you think of them that way," she interrupted matter-of-factly. "Dreams are special and separate from goals. They don't have to be achievable. They provide us with something beyond the pragmatic, the mundane."
White hot anger rose within him. He was not the mundane, and never would be. He prepared a curse, some sort of violent pain to punish her for daring to insinuate he was – and let it fall.
Color had flushed her cheeks, as if lecturing him drove her demons away. The blush of rose suited her, pulled her back from the abyss of…normality. Of losing the luster that was part of what made her unique and worthy of his attention.
He didn't ever want to see her without it again.
So he contained his anger and boxed it away for a later date. If she needed an argument now to distract her, he would oblige.
"Your dreams bar you from reality. The time to accept that she is dead has come and passed."
"She's there, you know, just behind the veil. Those we love never truly leave us."
"Then by your logic: if she remains with you, then there is no need to grieve for her."
His slightly mocking words made her look up in a sharp, bird-like movement, as if he had brought her out of a memory and back to the present. Her eyes were contemplative – not quite warm and shining, but distinctly softer than he'd ever seen them.
"Thank you."
He didn't understand it. Sunshine washed over his skin, a glow of pleasure at that small phrase saying so little and so much. It frightened him. His grasp on the mask tightened on reflex; he used it to rein the situation back under control.
"Thank me by being cheerful for the prefects, lest Fortescue decide that I scarred you for life." He gave her a crooked smile of sorts. "Your friends are…terrifying."
"I can't quite say the same for your minions," she quipped, the ever-present spark of irreverent mischief returning in her mock glare. He couldn't hold back his laughter. Salazar, the number of times he'd thought that exact thing.
"Considering the raw material I started with, there's been a substantial level of progress already. At least Goyle is mostly literate now."
"Mostly?"
"He still occasionally struggles with polysyllabic words." She struggled to hide her amusement at his deadpan statement. Not so morally uptight that she can't laugh at the expense of others, then. "Evan and Abraxas, on the other hand, are considerably more erudite."
"Malfoy is a connoisseur of the arts?"
"Dilettante. How did you guess?"
"The framed paintings of peacocks I saw being delivered to the Slytherin common room were something of a giveaway," said Faulkner dryly. "And Rosier?"
"A collector of flattery."
"Ah."
"Evan is also under the unfortunate impression that the larger the words he uses, the more favored he will become."
A tiny crease made its way between her brows.
"If you dislike your friends, why do you spend time with them?"
Because they are from powerful families and easy to manipulate.
"Contrary to your belief, I enjoy their company above that of others."
"I never said you didn't, considering the level of regard you hold everyone else. For a misanthrope like you, there's no need to constantly socialize." She waved carelessly at the castle, ignoring Tom's frozen smile. "Hogwarts is full of the petty power plays of children. Their combined ability doesn't come even close to matching yours. Spend your time honing your magical skills instead, and after you graduate, focus your efforts on the adults – and avoid the annoyance of unnecessary human contact."
Danger. Threat. …Knowledge. Power.
"Your perception is astounding," he murmured softly, once his still icy lips, immobilized by shock, could move again. He examined her with a piercing stare. "In fact, it's as almost as if you know me better than myself."
"Those who are blocked by the Selfies are not often disillusioned."
"Pardon?"
She tilted her head as if he was a specimen she needed to observe from every angle. "You answered my question in a roundabout way, so I decided to do the same for you."
"I – "
"Luna?"
Tom barely managed to retain control of his magic at the furious wave of irritation that swept over him at the sight of Greengrass.
"Nigel, you're early!"
The redhead grinned.
"I came to help set up, but it looks like you don't need me. This place is great!"
"You're sweet," Faulkner beamed. Five descriptive letters of meaningless, cloying sentimentality. It inexplicably made Tom want to see how the Ravenclaw would appear disemboweled.
"Sweet? I prefer something more manly, like – "
"Greengrass," Tom interjected smoothly, curbing his sudden irritation with a vengeance. "What an unexpected pleasure."
"Hey, Riddle," said Greengrass with an apologetic smile. "I need to borrow Luna for a bit, sorry."
Faulkner was his and no one else's.
Tom forced a pleasant nod.
"By all means."
A/N: This one's really short, so I just posted it (non-betaed) to show that I'm still around (and updating). The next one will be a lot more interesting...
I really can't express how much the reviews mean to me. And lady madland, you might get your wish :P
-Alle