Tom has seen the Mirror of Erised three times. The very first time he wasn't even sure what it was. He was pacing the hallways wondering if he should ask Slughorn about the horcruxes when he found a door he did not recognize. At the time, he had no clue about the powers of the Room of Requirement. He stood in front of the mirror and saw himself at the head of the huge army he envisioned, invincible and as powerful as any wizard ever could be. The sight gave him the conviction to continue on his mission.

The second time was earlier that year, while he was doing patrols shortly after winter break. Vera had sent some Gryffindor to do patrols in her place and Tom had dismissed him out of sheer annoyance. But he kept walking down hallways two or three times, too caught up in his memories and thoughts to pay attention to where he was going. He found the door again and saw the same thing in the mirror, only with the added splendors he had seen in her mansion.

Tom wants to see the mirror one last time the night before their graduation ceremony. As soon as the feast ends, he strides over to the room. He wants one last jolt of motivation before he finalizes his plans now that his schooling is done.

Instead, he sees something that make him sink to the ground, kneeling before the mirror and touching the image with his hand. Vera's sitting next to him in that ornate library in her great big manor and she's holding a baby in her arms with his dark blue eyes.

He somehow thinks he can correct the mirror's image, that he can tell this inanimate object that this is the wrong vision of his future. It isn't just wrong, it's utterly impossible. For all the things he had strived to achieve until this moment, this was the one he knew he could not reach. He feels like the mirror is just mocking him. He focuses on his future, on the band of followers ready to do any despicable act he orders. Tom tries to will the mirror to change but it does not even flicker. He grows so frustrated that he begins to pound it with his fists and actually feels tears begin to well in his eyes for the first time he can remember.

"Excuse me. Excuse me. Move for Merlin's sake," Dante calls out as he guides Vera through the crowd of photographers that's been following her ever since she exited the castle. Vera rushes into the small tent, finally dropping the hood she had been hiding behind as she goes to fix her hair. Dante stands in the doorway, blocking the view of the reporters, "Now, I'll give you all two choices. You can take the pictures you have and retreat to the public viewing area. Or you can elect to bother us by lingering out here, right after you hand me your reporter's credential so I can give it to my father."

All of the photographers quickly shuffle away and Dante closes the tent opening before walking over to Vera as she's putting on her graduation robes. She looks up at him as he straightens her sash and just whispers, "I don't want to do this bloody speech."

"Darling, you'll be fantastic, just don't worry too much about it," he reassures.

Tom is sitting in the corner reviewing his own speech one last time, hating the fact that he has to be the only audience for their little show of affection. All of the teachers have already left to greet the parents as they arrive.

She sighs, "It's a stupid ceremony. Do we even have to go to it?"

Dante chuckles, "You know we do. Don't worry, you can laugh at me as much as you like at my ceremony next week."

"Speaking of, you should floo back and study for your exams."

"It is ridiculous of you to assume I would miss the culmination of all your hard work for anything," Dante answers.

They are interrupted by a flash as a photographer sticks a camera through a hole in the tent only inches away from them. Dante steps over, grabbing the camera and pulling the reporter in. He pops the film out before handing it back. "Here, now leave. If you aren't afraid of my father, you should be afraid of hers."

She looks at him in confusion, "My father's coming?"

"Yes, your parents are coming."

"No, they aren't. I sent them the invitation and they informed me that they did not have room on their schedule to attend."

"Well I talked to them about it last night and informed them that, as your parents, they had a duty to attend your graduation ceremony – and if they didn't, you certainly didn't have a duty to invite them to your wedding."

"I am surprised my mother didn't choke you to death on the spot."

"I think she was trying but your father stopped her before she could get her wand. They came around after a few minutes of extolling how hard you worked for this. Now I have to go make sure everything about their box is perfect before they turn on me again," Dante says with a half-joking smile.

"I'll see you out there?"

"Right by your side as always darling," Dante says, kissing her before he leaves.

Tom rolls his eyes and shifts so he is facing away from her.

Dante was going to let Tom fade from her memory like all the other boys had. He was going to let her little affair go unmentioned because, in the end, he'd won, and that was all that really mattered. It doesn't matter if he wants to tear Tom's heart out, wants to make him feel just like the useless little snake that he is - there is no point to taking that risk now, with only a few days left until she arrives in Italy to prepare for their wedding.

Dante knows that it is not love that has held them together thus far, at least not her's. She had never really loved him. He'd known it as soon as he saw her expression when he proposed. It was logic then - if she had to get married, of all the people she could be forced to marry, Dante was the least worst option. And now it's fear. Her own father had assured him their wedding would happen, and, for as long as Dante has known Vera, he had never known her to risk absolute ruin by displeasing her father.

Then, as he had been sitting in Vera's room while she did her hair and makeup for the ceremony, he had noticed something that made him doubt that she wouldn't hesitate to be ruined if the chance came. The stunning engagement ring he had given her, diamonds sparkling in the early morning sunshine coming through the window, was on the wrong hand. Dante stood, walking up behind her and kissing her head, all the while keeping his eyes on her hands. In the place where his engagement ring should be was another one, gold with a triangular black stone. Dante smiled at her through the mirror and walked over to the window as if nothing was amiss.

It was a signet ring, and he recognized it from his childhood days, when, as the children of many aristocrats were forced to do, he had memorized all of the wizarding nobility's titles and coats of arms. It was the Peverall family, later the Gaunt family. Back when he had memorized that book, Marvolo Gaunt had been the patriarch of the family, which had long since fell to disrepute. Funny that a certain boy at Hogwarts should share that uncommon name.

Dante doubted that Vera had switched the rings on purpose. No doubt she had woken up groggily after a farewell party that morning and spotted the rings on her nightstand as she hurried to get ready, putting them on without much thinking so as only not to lose track of them. The unconscious can convey so much that humans cannot, or dare not to, grasp when their minds are fully awake.

"We still have hours until the ceremony darling," Dante whispers in her ear after sneaking up behind her again. "There has to be something we can do that's more exciting."

He kisses her and draws her up out of her chair, pushing it away from them. Vera giggles as his lips move down to her neck and his hands pull her dressing robe apart. He turns her around and pushes her back so that she is sitting on the vanity. As he distracts her with his kisses, he nudges the ink well she's left in the corner toward her leg. As soon as she moves to let him get closer to her, the ink is knocked over and spills all over her thigh. She jumps up, using a spell to clean the table and suck the ink away.

Vera sighs and hits him playfully, "Because of your little antics I'll have to take another bath to scrub this off."

Dante smiles and kisses her again, "I am so sorry. Don't forget to remove your ring. I'd hate for the diamond to shine any less than you do my love. I'll ensure a more appropriate setting when you are all nice and clean."

Vera laughs at his sweetness and removes her rings without looking, leaving them on her dresser as she walks toward the bathroom. He couldn't have embarrassed her or, worse, drawn her attention to the messages of her subconscious by pointing the mistake out. He also couldn't have let her go out in public wearing the wrong engagement ring.

And he very well couldn't let some poor, filthy bastard from a poor, filthy family, convince her that following the desires of her heart was worth losing everything she had in life, whether or not that was what he had intended.

Once her parents arrive, Dante returns to send her over to greet them. As she leaves, he says he will join them after going to talk to some of the professors in order to give them time to catch up. Instead, he lingers in the tent until she's stepped far away enough not to hear.

Dante takes a seat in the armchair across from Tom and calmly asks, "So, which one of you started it?"

"I am busy and I have no clue what you are talking about," Tom replies without looking up from his speech.

"Fucking each other, did you make the first offer or did Vera?"

Tom looks up. He only has to see the way Dante is glaring at him to know there is no point in playing dumb. Still, he had promised Vera he wouldn't tell anybody. Even if Dante knows, Tom knows better than to provide an official confirmation, "Neither."

"I am not playing that game. We both know it was Vera that started it, and Vera that ended it. Let me enlighten you as to why, just in case she has not. You are nothing. In our world. To her. To me. Nothing but an orphaned bastard with no legacy to give your name any meaning or power. Vera likes to play with such people, those so hungry for what they don't have that they are willing to do anything to please someone who does have it."

Dante pauses, waiting for Tom to bite back. Tom is too smart to respond with anything but silence, so Dante continues with a smirk, "Now, of course, you will be wondering the same thing that all of them do, even though surely you think you are different. Do you mean anything to her? In that aspect, you are a bit of an exception – the rest of the boys were just harmless flights of fancy, but you … you are a liability. Just imagine if I found out, I would have a reason to call the engagement off and where would she be then? Luckily for you, I'm feeling unreasonably kind today, so I won't mention what I know to her."

"I think it would be luckier for me if you weren't," Tom says, jaw set. He knows that he still won't stand a chance with her if she isn't engaged, but hopes that would at least mean she doesn't have to leave.

"And how do you think she'd assume I found out? We both know Vera well enough to know her reaction to betrayal, real or perceived."

"Perhaps she trusts me to keep a secret more than she does you. Not that there is any secret to keep, no matter what unfounded accusations your unbridled jealousy has driven you to."

"Let me make myself perfectly clear Riddle. As of today, consider Vera a married woman. If you touch her again, I will destroy any chance you have of achieving anything at all in life. I will make sure no one will ever dare to speak your name in a positive tone. So before you even think of her again, I want you to ask yourself if this little fling - because I assure you, that's all it is to her - is worth losing any chance you have of attaining anything else you have ever wanted. I think the answer will be satisfactory to both of us."

"There's only one problem. She isn't a married woman. She could leave tomorrow, return that ring, and never see you again. Isn't it just your fear that she might do so that is driving this little tirade?"

His tone is sharp enough to cut through glass, "Vera loves me. Has she ever told you the same?"

Dante knows the thing Vera loves, the thing keeping her with him, isn't anything nearly as abstract as love - it's her inheritance. Regardless, she had said it to him, and there was no way in hell she would ever bother saying those words to this mutt.

"I suppose she respects me enough not to lie to me," Tom returns with a smirk. "Obviously you can't say the same."

Dante clicks his tongue mockingly as he stands to leave, "Poor little half-blood. Are you still delusional about the fact that she will never respect anyone below her station? You must have seen the way she treats filth like you by now. Just because you have bribed yourself into a reprieve from her malice it does not mean that she has forgotten who you are. She remembers your place. And you should too."

Their argument had started at the celebratory dinner being held for the seventh years and their families in the Great Hall. They had to sit next to each other at the head table. Dante was sitting next to Vera, with her parents between them and the professors. Tom had mostly remained silent as he watched the professors sing her praises to her parents, pushing ideas about independently studying this or that subject she had so excelled at now that she was finished with school, proposing writing books related to projects she had done, listing off this or that theorist she could meet with. Vera had too, slowly cutting and eating her food while her face remained living stone. She almost hated him more for his silence, at least at first. She could see the thoughts floating around in his head, could see him rolling his eyes at her parents' supportive facade, could see his sideways glances at her for being so ungrateful for it even if it was fake.

What had finally gotten him to stop making faces and speak up had been when Slughorn had proposed that they write a potions book together given their success as partners in his class. He replied, "I am sure Vera will be too busy taking care of the many little princes and princesses soon to be running around her manor to bother with her own potion making. Right, Dante?"

Vera locks eyes with Dante, daring him to answer. Dante, knowing better than to take her up on the challenge, looks back at his plate. His silence doesn't stop her father from interjecting instead, "We can only hope fate blesses our family with such happy returns as soon as possible."

She responds smoothly, "I think that matter is best discussed privately between myself and my future husband."

Tom continues, ignoring her, "So, have you two decided how many little heirs shall be entering the halls of Hogwarts soon enough? Three? Four?"

Tom feels Vera kick him in the leg under the table, but maintains his false little smile and his insistent stare at Dante. To Vera's surprise, but not exactly delight, it is her mother that jumps in now, "Five, like my mother."

Vera rolls her eyes and sidesteps the conversation, "I will look into it, Professor. I suspect Riddle will be too busy hawking artifacts to bother with such abstract pursuits, but I am sure there are many other talented potion-makers such as yourself happy to consult should I find an interesting subject."

Slughorn nearly spits out his juice at the mention. She knows Tom has been stalling him all year, telling him he is still looking into various opportunities. From his tone, it is clear the disappointed she had expected at the news is quickly setting in, "Tom, you will be doing what after school?"

She smirks at Tom before turning back to her meal.

The tension between them finally moves from simmering to boiling over in the clocktower courtyard, after they have passed off all last minute instructions to the new Head Boy and Head Girl.

"We should at least get to keep the bloody badge," she mutters, rolling her eyes as she watches their replacements walk away.

"Why? Not like you deserved it in the first place," Tom hisses back. He is mad at her for turning Slughorn against him and for insisting that Dante come and wait for her in the courtyard during the meeting. He is mad at her for not wanting to be alone with him, for not getting over her self-absorption long enough to at least say a proper goodbye to him after everything.

"I deserved that badge just as much as you did," she responds. "Come off your high fucking horse just because you had to work harder for it."

"You think you deserved any of this? After having a repertoire of willing victims write your every essay and lend you every answer? I wouldn't be surprised if your father sent Dippet a very short letter and a very hefty donation to win you the spot of head girl. Despite the fact that actual work is much too mundane for a princess like you, you don't deserve things simply on account of being born a Sinclair."

She barely registers his words. It's his tone she can't stand, the way his words pierce her like a thousand pieces of hail, because they are both far too worried about what the future will be to worry about what is right and what is wrong, about whether they are right or wrong. Vera smiles at him mockingly, "That is not what I meant, but at least I wasn't born a bastard."

Dante holds back a laugh, approaching Vera and taking her arm. He begins to pull her away, pretending to try to get her to give up the fight. Tom does not know how to play this game. He does not know the right moves to make with Vera, and it does not help his situation that Dante does. Dante knew exactly what Vera would say to hurt him, knew exactly the words to set echoing in Tom's head the entire afternoon to provoke him into creating this moment.

Tom's eyes are as dark as a storm and his knuckles as white as snow. The curse simply flies from him. He doesn't know what it is, he doesn't even really know how to control it. It's like all those curses he had cast when he was just a seven-year-old with no idea what these strange powers were but a whole lot of rage toward the world. She feels the stinging on her arm when the curse hits her skin and, without even thinking, shoots back a nasty cloud of fire. It engulfs him but does no harm other than raising the temperature for a few seconds, just a warning not to try anything else.

"Dante, I believe we have a celebration to attend," she says as she turns away. Tom lures her back with another stinging spell.

"I told you never to call me anything like that again," Tom says before launching a cruciatus curse at Dante. She sees the tell-tale color of the spell and nearly jumps to block it, but Dante beats her to it.

"I didn't do anything to you, and Vera didn't mean what she said," Dante says. "So we are going to leave…"

Vera laughs, interrupting him, "No, I did mean it."

Tom isn't sure who to be more angry at, the wizard who pretends that he's harmless or the witch who pretends she wants to harm him. Regardless, the magic bursts from him, spells flying from his wand before he can say the incantations. Vera's not firing back, just casting shield and repulsion charms, figuring he will wear out eventually. He doesn't, and ten minutes in she falters, her wand dropping to the ground as her wrist seizes up.

Dante responds to this development by trying to disarm Tom. Their spells collide in the middle of the field and battle for control for a second before Tom's sectumsempra curse wins out. Dante's spell fades but, in the process, the remaining curse splits, quickly heading off in both directions. Vera sees this and knows she only has a moment to react. She jumps in front of Dante, her shield charm rising just in time to shatter the spell threatening him. Vera looks back at Dante quickly to make sure he's unharmed, then her eyes land on the boy on the other side of the courtyard. Tom had dodged the curse, but not quickly enough. Blood from his right arm is spilling out onto the grass. Pain contorts his usually perfect face. His wand shakes in his left hand as he tries his best to heal himself.

Dante steps out from behind Vera and walks over to the other boy, kneeling and starting to cast healing charms. He looks back at Vera and smiles reassuringly as he's almost finished. To Tom, he whispers, "It really is a shame that she didn't choose you – for you I mean. For a while, I must admit I was afraid she was losing her edge, contemplating straying from her duties for the sake of ... well, I don't really know what she saw in you. She could have crowned even you a minister. But now you'll never be more than a half-blood, and a poor one at that."

Dante thought he had won, that she had chosen to protect him because she cared for him more. But from the flash of agony and guilt Tom had seen on Vera's face when she glanced over to him, he knew that Dante's thinking was flawed. Vera had expected Tom to take care of himself. She had protected Dante because she had registered him as the boy in need of protecting and she had registered Tom as the stronger wizard, able to block the spell himself. And usually he would be, except he was too preoccupied making sure that her shield went up in time to cast his own.