Chapter 22: The Wand

Marina wasn't surprised when the next day an owl from Dumbledore arrived letting her know that Riddle intended to go for the next Horcrux that very week - what did surprise her was the fact that he'd chosen the Gaunt ring over Hufflepuff's cup. Dumbledore had included in his note an invitation to discuss this with him, and at his request, Marina stepped through into his office at midday on the dot.

"Take a seat, Marina," Dumbledore said without looking up from the scroll of parchment he was bent over.

She did so as Fawkes ruffled his feathers and gave his mournful little cry. Marina brought from her pocket a small bag with a gaudy purple and gold tag that read "Waldo Walper's Phoenix Feasts" in large, shimmering letters, and she extracted one of the sooty black lumps. Fawkes flew over immediately, landing on the back of her chair and snapping up the treat at once.

"A delicacy from your place of employment, I presume?" Dumbledore said with amusement.

"Yeah we got them in just before Christmas," Marina said, picking out a second lump and letting Fawkes take it from her palm. "They're bloody expensive though, not many people have pet phoenixes. I had to use some mad employee discount to get them."

"I do not consider Fawkes my pet," Dumbledore said with a thoughtful smile as he watched Fawkes crane his head towards the bag in Marina's other hand hopefully. "More my companion."

"My bad," Marina said with a lop-sided smile as she gave one last treat to Fawkes before stowing away the bag. "He's very cute though." Fawkes pressed his beak against her face and cawed again.

"He had been in a particularly good mood as of late," Dumbledore mused, "though Tom might disagree with your assessment – only last week Fawkes regurgitated a wad of undigested plant remains into his lap."

Marina laughed out loud – the image of Fawkes throwing up what was effectively a hairball on portentous Riddle was just too good. "Thanks for that, sir," she sniggered, shaking her head. "That's cheered me right up."

"You're very welcome," Dumbledore said, his smile reaching his eyes. "Now, I wish to discuss Tom's upcoming Horcrux recovery."

"Right, yes," Marina said seriously. "The ring, huh? He wants to visit his dad?"

"He does," Dumbledore nodded, "and I must say that I am impressed at his suggestion. Hufflepuff's cup would be more difficult logistically – considering its concealment in the Lestrange vault – but it would be significantly easier emotionally. His determination does not go unnoticed."

"Good," Marina said firmly, feeling a sense of deep satisfaction. It was very gratifying to hear Dumbledore finally acknowledging that Riddle was doing something right.

"However, he has also levied me with… a surprising request," Dumbledore continued slowly. "He has asked that I accompany him to visit his father, rather than yourself."

Marina stared. It was one thing for Riddle to ask McGonagall to go with him to talk to Myrtle, but for him to turn to Dumbledore?

"Oh," she managed to say in a horribly strangled voice.

"You feel as I felt," Dumbledore said gravely. "It is not Tom's typical preference of company."

"No," said Marina. Fawkes gave a concerned wail in her ear, obviously noticing the shift in the mood of the room. She reached up and patted his head absent-mindedly.

"Perhaps once I would have suspected that Tom wished to take advantage of this situation, hence his request," Dumbledore was saying, "but now I believe his motivations are elsewhere. I think that Tom has grown… embarrassed."

"Sorry?" Marina gaped.

"You must understand, Marina," Dumbledore said, "understanding the gravity of Voldemort's actions does not only allow Tom to reclaim whatever fragment of his soul he has found. It is changing how he views himself, and how he feels about others. I myself only came to realise the extent of this change upon his return from visiting Miss Warren – after Minerva told me of his request that she accompany him, we came to the conclusion that perhaps Tom did not want you to see a side of his past that gave him great shame."

"Shame," Marina repeated weakly.

"Yes," Dumbledore nodded. "It is my belief that Tom has grown ashamed of his past, and of Voldemort's actions."

"I mean," Marina swallowed, "I suppose that's a good thing, right?"

Dumbledore watched her a moment. "It is," he said softly. "Tom should be ashamed of this facet of his past. And you should know, as he does, that when the time comes Tom must face the appropriate consequences for his release of the Basilisk on his fellow students, and for Miss Warren's death."

Marina nodded, feeling hollow but knowing it was right.

Dumbledore continued. "That being said, Tom must also learn that trusting others means that you must allow them to see the parts of yourself of which you are ashamed."

Much like Fawkes into Riddle's lap, Marina's brain regurgitated the phrase 'if we want the rewards of being loved we have to submit to the mortifying ordeal of being known' unsolicited into her consciousness, and she held back the bizarre, stress-induced urge to laugh.

"So, what are you going to do?" Marina said, fighting down her out-of-place response.

"I thought that I would ask for your opinion," Dumbledore said genially, resting his hands together before him.

For the second time in their conversation, Marina was flummoxed. "Alright," she said, astonished. "Well – I suppose I think you're right," she began slowly, "I mean, the part about him needing to trust people. But –" Marina hesitated, unsure how to phrase her feelings. "Riddle does do this a lot, push people I mean. I get that it's for a different reason this time, but it's also not normal for people to have, like, endless patience and energy when you deliberately distance yourself all the time," she said. "I guess what I'm saying is that if he chooses to push me away, I'm not going to force him to come back again. Doesn't that set sort of a false standard for what he could expect from people?"

"Interesting point," Dumbledore nodded. "You are referring to Tom learning to take personal responsibility for the consequences his actions have on his relationships."

"Yeah," Marina said, relieved that he understood. "that's a much better way of saying it."

"Are you saying that we should allow him to distance himself from you? That you are happy with my accompanying him to Little Hangleton?" Dumbledore asked, assessing her.

Marina frowned. "I mean, it does suck a bit," she mumbled. "I thought he'd want me to come, considering everything. But I guess it's his choice, right?"

"Indeed," Dumbledore said pensively. "If that is the case, I will inform Tom that he and I will leave for Little Hangleton tomorrow. Though, I feel it is only right that I discuss this with him first. He may change his mind, and it is only fair that he remains informed…"

But Marina had stopped listening – she had realised with a sickening jolt that Dumbledore probably didn't know that the ring was also the Resurrection Stone. She wrestled with the decision to say something, her silent conflict not going unnoticed.

"Is everything alright, Marina?" Dumbledore asked curiously, mistaking her evident turmoil as indecision.

"Oh, yes," she said distractedly. "Sorry, I was thinking of… something else." She shut her mouth, unsure if it was the right decision. Whilst Dumbledore himself had urged her to keep as much information as she could about their world to herself, the realisation that he might still attempt to put on the ring and curse himself swirled in her chest. Would she be responsible for his death if she knew of the effects of the ring and said nothing? The thought pushed her over the edge.

"Sir," she said slowly, "about the ring…"

"If you are intending to give me advice relating to future events, I must ask you to desist," Dumbledore said, as astute as he was firm.

"But sir –"

"I think it best that you consider this world like a train, and each timeline like tracks leading to its destination," Dumbledore interrupted, leaning back. "Your arrival here has turned a switch bringing us to a different set of tracks, but we are ultimately heading in the same direction. If you offer too much about our future, it will not so much change where we are going as it will derail the train."

There was a long pause as Marina considered what he'd said. "Are you saying that the events I read about will all happen anyway?" she asked, slightly horrified.

"I cannot be sure. I think it evident that some things, at least, have been irreversibly altered," Dumbledore said, brow creasing in thought, "but it uncertain which are concrete and which are fluid, and that is exactly why you must keep those things to yourself. We must not fall into the trap of trying to avoid anything unpleasant from happening – some things, no matter how difficult, must come to pass." He gave her a significant look over his spectacles and Marina nodded, throat feeling tight. She wondered wildly if he somehow knew that she'd been intending to warn him of his death, or if that was too much for even Dumbledore's capabilities.

Dumbledore smiled. "I believe that I am correct in that assessment of our situation, and – forgive me – I have rather a lot of faith in my assessments."

"I know," Marina said wryly. "Well, if that's the case I guess all I can say is – be careful."

"I will," he nodded, "and thank you for your input, it was most helpful."

"Well, thanks for asking for it," she replied, smiling back. Fawkes flapped his wings and Marina felt heat radiate off of him as he soared back to his stand.

At around two in the afternoon the following day, Marina was crouched by the door of the Magical Menagerie with a lump of bloody steak in one hand and a long Augury feather in the other. Her calves were screaming to move as she forced her body to stay perfectly still, eyes fixed on the ginger furry face that sat motionless under the very edge the Puffskein cage before her.

"Come on," she whispered softly, "come out, here, look at the nice juicy steak…"

The huge yellow eyes did not blink, but Marina saw a single paw extend towards her as if its owner were moving to take a step. Her heart leapt but she resisted the urge to outwardly react.

"That's it… just a bit closer…" she coaxed, waving the feather slightly. Another paw extended, and the hint of the furry face inched into the light.

The bell above the door jangled loudly as it burst open and Crookshanks bolted back under the Puffskein cage with a loud yowl.

"Fuck!" Marina exclaimed, leaping to her feet before realising that a customer had just entered. "Oh, I –"

"Do you ever have a quiet day at work?" Riddle asked disapprovingly, looking at the raw lump of meat that was dripping blood down her wrist towards the rolled up sleeve of her Weasley jumper.

Marina stared at him a second, taken aback by his unexpected appearance - he was dressed in Muggle garb again which she assumed meant his journey to visit his father was still going ahead, but that hardly explained his presence.

"I was trying to get our eldest resident to come out and socialise a bit – but you've foiled my efforts," she said in mock melodrama as she dropped the hunk of meat into the Clabbert enclosure – the three monkey-like lizards descended upon it and tore it apart in an instant. "Aren't you supposed to be going to Little Hangleton with Dumbledore now?" she cast a glance over at the clock, confused.

"Yes," Riddle said, looking at the feasting Clabberts with some interest. "Actually, that's why I'm here."

Marina walked towards the backroom and gestured for him to follow her as she made her way to the sink and rinsed the blood off her hands. "Alright then, what's up?"

"Would you –" he paused. "Dumbledore's outside," he said quickly.

"Okay," said Marina as she dried her hands, giving him a curious look.

"He's waiting to take me to Little Hangleton," Riddle continued.

"That's good of him," she mused with a decent amount of sarcasm.

Riddle stared at her, but Marina didn't budge. She was fairly sure that he was trying to ask her to come after all, but she wasn't going to do the work for him. She let the towel down on the bench and turned to face him, crossing her arms patiently.

"So?" Riddle said, gesturing to the door behind them.

"So what?" Marina asked sweetly.

He rolled his eyes. "Are you coming or not?" he said, irritated.

"I think that's about as close as I'm going to get to an invitation, isn't it," she said, sighing. "Give me a minute, I'll let Verna know."

"Dumbledore's already talked to her," Riddle said, having the decency to look halfway embarrassed.

"You made some assumptions about how this conversation would go, huh," Marina said dryly. "Alright then, let's get going," she waved her hands at him and shook her head disparagingly. He gave a slight smile as they made their way to the door. Before they could reach it there was another loud yowl and Marina only saw a flash of bright orange fur before Crookshanks landed on Riddle and began tearing at his jacket with vicious claws.

"CROOKSHANKS!" Marina yelled. Riddle was frantically trying to push him off, but every time he put his hands too close, Crookshanks closed his teeth around them and Riddle was forced to retreat.

Marina dashed back the way they'd come, seized the towel, and sprinted to Riddle as she threw it over Crookshanks' body, wrenching the cat off him and heaving the yowling, writhing bundle over to the backroom. She placed the towel down as gently as she could and quickly shut the door to stop a repeat attack.

"I'm so sorry about that," Marina gasped, turning to check on Riddle. "Are you alri –"

There was a very recognisable clatter as something fell from Riddle's torn pocket to the floor of the shop and rolled towards her. Marina stared at the wand that came to a stop just before her feet.

"What is that?" she asked in a deathly quiet voice.

Riddle was not permitted to have a wand. It was one of the rules on which Dumbledore continued to insist, even more so now that Riddle was independent from the diary. He may have earned a degree of trust in the Order's eyes, but they still had their cautions, which, she thought brutally as she stared at the wand, were evidently well warranted.

"Nothing," Riddle said immediately, with an uncharacteristically bad attempt at nonchalance.

"Where did you get that?" Marina breathed.

Riddle didn't reply. He was looking between Marina and the wand looking like a deer trapped in headlights.

The bell above the door chimed as someone entered and without thinking, Marina pushed the wand under the cages to her side with her foot just in time as Dumbledore appeared in the entrance dressed in an eye-catching turquoise three-piece.

"Is everything alright? I heard a commotion…" Dumbledore said, trailing off as he assessed Riddle's state of tatters and the palpable tension in the room.

Riddle looked back at Marina with blatant fear in his eyes, knowing that in that moment she had the ability to destroy any faith Dumbledore had in him for good. Marina's heart was beating hard, half from the leftover adrenaline from Crookshanks' attack, and half from her mind reeling at Riddle's betrayal of their trust.

"We're fine," Marina said coolly, not looking at Riddle. "One of our residents took a disliking to Riddle." She seized her bag from behind the counter and walked past him without acknowledgement. She opened the door and held it pointedly as she waited for them both to leave - at least this way, Riddle had no chance to pick up the wand again.

Riddle moved first, passing her onto the street without managing to catch her eye. Dumbledore gave her a quizzical look as he exited but she just shook her head stiffly. Luckily, he didn't press it, perhaps assuming that she was just upset about Riddle flip-flopping around on his decision to take her with him to Little Hangleton.

They made their way out of Diagon Alley in silence, making good time as they arrived at the station and boarded a Muggle train. They took seats in a quiet section of the train, and Marina resolutely drew a book from her bag and set about pretending to read it. Her head was spinning – Riddle's underhand acquisition of a wand had so many connotations that she didn't want to have to consider, but the thoughts were coming thick and fast. Had he intended to use the wand on Dumbledore? On his father? On her, since he'd obviously changed his mind and asked her to come? Was it just for self-protection? Did he not expect to be caught? Why ask Dumbledore to join him if he was going to try something so stupid? Anger and betrayal writhed in her chest at his disregard of the rules he'd been dealt, the jeopardisation of a hard-earned budding trust between Riddle and the others, a trust that she'd bent over backwards trying to encourage.

A long hour passed, and Riddle wisely did not try to talk to her. Breaking the silence, Dumbledore stood and shuffled into the aisle.

"Excuse me," said Dumbledore with a wan smile. "I must find the restroom, much to my chagrin if what I have heard about Muggle trains is to be believed…" he strolled off down the train with a light grimace.

"Thank you," Riddle said quietly, the moment he was out of earshot.

Marina shot a sharp glare at him. "Don't thank me," she said icily, "how dare you force me to make that choice! You made me lie to cover your ass –"

"You didn't have to," he said, looking indignant.

"I did have to!" Marina whispered harshly. "If I'd said something, Dumbledore would probably give up on this whole bloody plan, wouldn't he!"

"That's why I'm thanking you," he said shortly.

"What the hell were you doing with that thing anyway?" she scowled. "What were you planning on doing with it?"

He fixed her with a stony glare and looked away without replying.

Marina gave a short sigh of frustration. "Listen, I get that things are tense right now, but you have got to tell me."

He continued to glower at the scenery speeding past their window, but Marina thought she noticed some other emotion seeping up underneath. She took a deep breath and held it a few seconds before speaking again. "Put it this way," she said, aiming for a slightly more light-hearted tone, "I can't get any more pissed off at you than I am already, so telling me will either change nothing or make things better."

Riddle finally looked back at her. "I thought –" he began before cutting himself off and frowning. "I'm good at magic," he said like it was a caveat, "I wanted to bring the wand in case my father –" but whatever he wanted to say wasn't coming to him easily, and he stared at the floor with an evident cacophony of emotion on his face.

"What about your father?" Marina prompted gently, trying to get him back on track.

"He left my mother after finding out that she was a witch," Riddle said flatly. "He was scared of magic – I thought that if I could show him what I could do, he wouldn't be afraid that I was a wizard."

The explanation seemed to hang in the air between them. Marina tried her best to believe it like she would have if he'd told her a few hours earlier before she'd known about his betrayal of their trust – but something had changed. A distinctly Dumbledore-esque voice in her head was asking questions about how legitimate he was being, if he was just telling her what she wanted to hear to stop her from suspecting him.

"You don't believe me," Riddle said in a horribly even voice, his eyes on her face.

"I – I want to," she said, frowning with conflict. "But if you're going around with a wand that you shouldn't have, that you were keeping a secret… it's a little harder to take what you say at face value after something like that."

"I'm not lying," he said in the same tone, "why else would I have the wand?"

She looked at him, the answer on her face before she had the chance to hide it.

"You think I intended to attack him?" Riddle asked, eyes narrowing. "You think that after all this, I'd throw everything away and carry on like nothing has changed?"

"No, I just –"

But before she could say more, Dumbledore reappeared at the end of the aisle and quickly approaching. Marina sat back in her chair and fell silent.

"That was just as bad as I'd been led to believe it would be," Dumbledore said bracingly as he sat. He didn't comment on the way that Riddle and Marina were resolutely refusing to look at each other, or the tense silence that permeated the remainder of the train ride.

By the time they arrived at Little Hangleton a bus and a taxi later, Marina was exhausted already. The atmosphere hadn't relented their whole journey, and she'd not had a chance to talk to Riddle in private again. Dumbledore was leading them through the small, sleepy looking village with long, energetic strides whilst Riddle and her trailed behind, half jogging to keep up with his brisk pace.

"Listen," she said quietly. "I didn't mean to imply that you'd just go off on a murderous rampage or anything, but –"

"You once said to me that a wizard without a wand is useless," Riddle breathed, eyes fixed on Dumbledore ahead of them. "I don't see what is so egregious about my wanting a wand."

"It's not about you having a wand or not, Riddle," Marina said fervently, "it's about the fact that you promised Dumbledore that you wouldn't have one!"

"Perhaps I broke that promise," Riddle allowed, his voice sullen, "but Dumbledore was never going to change his mind."

"You could have asked," Marina muttered, but she knew he was right. Dumbledore's trust was slow to extend and quick to retreat – even with Riddle's reasoning, she too doubted that he would have relented.

"My father already has enough reasons to refuse to talk to me, forgive me for wanting to assuage one of them," said Riddle, bitterly.

Marina stared, taken aback. Riddle, noticing her expression, gave her a horribly knowing look. "Did you think that I was still unaware of the circumstances of my parentage?" he asked, looking back at Dumbledore with a tight expression. "That my mother used magic to take away his will? That he never consented to have a child, let alone run away with her?"

She could say nothing. They trekked after Dumbledore for a long, silent moment before Riddle spoke again. "I would not be surprised if he turns me away at the door, he has every right to," he said quietly.

"He might," Marina said, grabbing Riddle's arm to stop him. "Riddle – look at me."

He did, his lips pressed together and his eyes wild.

"He might," she repeated gently. "But if he does, that is not a measurement of your worth. Your father had something horrible and unfathomable happen to him, but you're not inherently bad because of it. Since we met you've been working to change yourself – to get better! You did that yourself – not because you were born good or bad, but because you made the right choices."

Riddle's expression was still wild, but he let out a breath through his nose like he was letting some wall inside of him fall. "I want him to speak with me," Riddle whispered, like he was afraid to admit it. "I've been thinking about this meeting since the beginning – back then I wanted to show him what I could do to make him regret his decision to leave me –" he paused, eyes unseeing as he was lost in his thoughts, "– but now… I don't know what to expect. I don't know if my mere presence will remind him of what my mother stole from him, or if he will see me for my own merits, or if he will simply not care."

Marina could say nothing – Riddle was dealing with something that she could never understand. Instead, she placed her hand on his arm and squeezed, hoping that it conveyed her feelings better than anything she could say. Somehow she felt like Riddle wasn't the hugging type.

"Dumbledore's waiting," he said under his breath, jerking his head to the side.

Marina looked to see Dumbledore patiently waiting ahead of them on the road, pleasantly looking around the country scenery as he gave them time to talk. She felt a rush of appreciation for him.

"Let's go then," she said, giving Riddle a bracing look.

He nodded, lingering a moment longer before turning back to Dumbledore and continued up the path.

Ahead of them, nearly obscured amongst the trees on the side of the road, Marina began to make out a run down, overgrown shack. The former ancestral home of the Gaunt family was slowly drawing into view.

A/N: Extra quick update to make up for the fact that the last chapter was late 😬