Why am I posting this at such a strange hour (in comparison to my regular posting)? Who knows! Perhaps a strange form of self-torture, or perhaps I just wanted to force myself to do something, but here we are with a new chapter.
Very excited to see what each of you think with this update - thank you for your sweet words. There is some lovely quote I cannot recall - I think its Tennyson - but the gist of it is that "every time I think of you there is another flower in my garden" or yadda yadda something similar but much more beautiful. And that, you incredible people, is how I feel reading all of your comments and seeing favorites and follows!
Please continue to stay safe and monitor your mental health during these times3
Chapter 43
"No great mind has ever existed without a touch of madness."
― Aristotle
Tom stares at the tottering old woman before him, the toothless smile he has perfected over the years plastered across his face as she drones on in that papery thin voice he despises about the passing of her husband four years prior. It is the fourth time she has told him this tale, and yet Tom must pretend to care yet again because Mr. Borgin had assured him that the Bones Matriarch had several priceless Goblin-made artifacts in her care, hinting at how fortunate it would be if she just so happened to sell them to the shop instead of passing them on down the family line. Tom did not care about Goblin-made jewelry, but if he was able to secure these goods for the shop, Borgin had suggested that he could find more…interesting cases for Tom to work on.
"Of course, you must come back for tea next week," she wheezes, waving a gnarled hand before her as if batting at flies. "My own family never takes time to see me, and if you keep bringing me such delightful offers from Borgin, dear Mr. Riddle, I just might sell you my tiara."
"I am sure Mr. Borgin would be delighted were you to do so," Tom agrees coolly. "But I consider it a great pleasure to have made your acquaintance by any means. Such fascinating stories you have to tell."
"Humbug," Ms. Bones shoos, getting to her feet – quite a feat for a woman of over one-hundred. Tom can tell, however, as he follows her towards the front door past several suits of armor and expensive paintings he was sure that Borgin would want if he knew they were there, that she is pleased with his compliment. They were all pleased with his compliments he'd found – just like the Hogwarts professors, desperate to believe the beautiful face that they saw. Predictable, simple, foolish.
"I'll see you next week then, Ms. Bones," Tom says, stopping to bow low at her tottering frame. He does not smile, but he lets the corner of his lip quirk upward as if in the spirit of one, and the woman waves him off once more before closing the door in his face.
His vision is red the moment she is gone from it, whirling on the spot as he vanishes from the cursed premises he's been assigned to visit weekly, reappearing a moment later in the stone foyer of Cygnus and Alphard Black. Without waiting for the arrival of their house elf who typically appeared to take his cloak, Tom strode down the corridor, desperate for a drink and something to fill his brain after hours of dull work.
He is halfway to the parlor when the silvery-blonde hair of Abraxas Malfoy appears from a doorway, at once his gleaming head dipped in a bow.
"Bring the others to the sitting room," Tom quips as he passes the older man by, whirling around the corner in a flash of robes before he can even hear a reply.
The Black brothers, along with their sister Walburga, were recent additions to his little party. They'd needed convincing - the Black family had the largest bank account in Gringotts, but having Abraxas under his wing had toppled one pillar, and a lesson in Tom's finer methods of torture had toppled the other. He'd required them to change the wards so that he could apparate in and out as he saw fit, and their bachelor's manor had become something of a meeting space for his knights now that they were operating outside of Hogwarts.
He'd had no desire to allow them into his own apartment. Tom himself could hardly stand to be there for more than a few minutes, every surface, every corner, every empty room a reminder of the person who was not there, and the idea of his knights attempting to fill the void Florence had left was laughable. She had turned his world to technicolor, and now she was on the other side of the globe returning him to grayscale.
Thinking of Florence sends a further ripple of fury through Tom as he at last bursts through the door into the Black sitting room, making his way to the bar where he summons the bottle of Firewhiskey from the top shelf without a word. It was only last week that he'd gone to visit her as her date for the ridiculous Albion Allman's wedding, a painful reminder that he had years ahead of him to wait before he could claim Florence similarly. Patience, Tom was learning, was not something he specialized in, and the thought drove him to further rage. She'd been beautiful in a pale pink bridesmaid's gown and she'd danced every single dance with him, but Florence had still been forced to spend time with her family and participate in the various ceremonies, and it was infuriating to be so near her and be unable to touch.
He downs the first glass of whiskey and pours himself another two fingers before taking his seat in the hard-backed chair beside the fire, his gaze fixed upon the flames. Behind him he hears several pairs of feet enter the room, but wisely they do not speak.
Tom lets the next gulp of whiskey burn down his throat before he allows himself to think of Florence again, one second's reprieve from the thoughts that haunt him – her head thrown back in laughter, the way sunlight turns her hair golden around the edges, her voice when she says his name right before she comes…it is agony to know these things about her and to be incapable of acting upon them. He'd spent every night for the past month staring at the enchanted mirror that lay beside his bed. The portrait he'd given Florence for her birthday was of course more than a painting – he wasn't so foolish as to give her a regular gift – the Atalanta of the canvas bewitched so that one whispered word from Tom would show him what she could see. He'd instructed her to seek Florence out whenever she was in her home, moving through paintings to follow her every movement.
Most nights he watches her sleep, but sometimes he could catch glimpses of her changing or reading, and once he heard her humming a tune that they'd danced to on one night or another. That night he hadn't slept at all. The following night she'd whispered his name in her sleep he'd given in to his weakness and activated the portkey, rousing her from sleep not even half an hour later when he clambered into her bed, pulling the quilt and her clothing off of her with reckless need. Borgin had refused to pay him that week for missing work the following day, but it didn't matter. When she was in his grasp he could remember himself, and when she wasn't he found his mind a tempest, the cavern in his chest howling in the wind – cold and empty and useless.
He'd nearly burned his apartment to the ground when he'd returned from his first visit to America. Leaving her had been agony, but it had pained him even more to see the framed deed to the land upon which her house sat – Florence Livingston Allman scrawled across the owner's line. He knew without asking what it meant – that the land was hers, that it would only be that much harder to pull her away from Georgia when the time came to bring her back to England. Back to me. He knew also that she was growing stronger because every few weeks when he held her in his arms he could feel the waves of magic that radiated off her skin as a result of imbedding herself within those rituals she had been raised amongst, and yet Tom did not know if he would be able to wait the scarce years he had promised her. Already threads within his mind seemed to be unraveling without her present to ease his mind. He wanted her. He fucking missed her and the idea that he could miss anyone made him want to blow something up.
"Cygnus, run through the list of our people in Ministry positions," Tom barks, not bothering to turn and face him. "I want their specific roles, and I want to hear your plans for how the three of you intend to place people in those departments where we currently do not hold sway."
The only positive that Florence's absence had wrought was the forced refocusing upon his other goals – power, dominance, a return of his family name to prominence across England. He wouldn't go so far as to say that Florence had been a distraction during his final year of school, she was too remarkable, the feelings she stirred within him too strong to be labeled as such, but she'd certainly shifted his priorities. Without her here to spend every waking moment haunting, he'd filled his time – and his steadily agitated mind – in other ways.
"Of course, My Lord," Tom hears the older man say, at once rattling off the list of Tom's various knights that had graduated from Hogwarts. Tom listens with only half a mind's attention as Cygnus outlines those students still in school, how they could be transitioned into the Ministry and which would be taking over for their fathers at the head of family empires.
It had been simultaneously quicker than he had expected – amassing a base of pureblooded followers keen to reinstate what they believed was the proper social hierarchy – and slower than he had expected – placing people in useful positions, stirring whispers in the street, cultivating interest. Tom understood now why Grindelwald had moved into the public eye before he should have. He too wanted to claim the energy he was rousing, to be the face that led people into the next wave of British Wizarding History, and yet Tom knew he must wait. He must let his knights move out ahead of him, slipping in mentions of his name – his chosen name of course, subtle letters of blackmail, threats and carefully guarded invitations.
Tom knew without question it would be easier to pacify his impatience if Florence was present, but like his control of the Ministry, she was far off. He'd told her he wanted her to be powerful, the best version of herself, but after spending months away from her, Tom didn't care if she could cast a lighting charm or freeze the entire ocean, he just wanted her beside him.
"I want Lestrange promoted," Tom cut in across Black's monologue. "And I want him in Spencer-Moon's office. Wilhelmina Tuft and her son have already made it clear that they both intend to run for office. Send them both offers of support – separately, from each of your families. I want our next minister owing us favors."
"Consider it done," Abraxas agreed.
"Where do we stand with the Prophet?" He asked, glancing at the three men before him. Alphard's face paled.
"My Lord, we weren't aware…you've not mentioned previously…" Alphard stutters, and Tom feels the corners of his sight hinging on crimson. Must he spell out everything for them? Were they truly so incapable of thought without his guidance? Of course they would need someone inside the Prophet informing them of all information that passed through their doors.
"We will have someone on the inside by the end of the month," Cygnus smoothed over before Tom could draw his wand.
"See that you do," Tom commands, getting to his feet so that all three heads must turn to look up at him. He feels the familiar itch to pull his wand, to curse them into oblivion – three rich, affluential young men who had been born into the splendor Tom had been denied. As always, he contains himself, and with a whirl of his cloak he is gone.
.
.
.
The sight of Florence's home coming into view as he walks down the drive soothes Tom's mind more than he cares to admit, already feeling the pull of her magic, the frantic energy that she stirs within his gut that no one else can pull from within him. It will never cease to amaze him how even in the middle of November, cold air making the hair along the back of his neck stand on edge, the Allman land is in full bloom, the flowers that line Florence's drive open and inviting.
He's stepping into the loop before her house when the screen door flies open and she is there in a stream of caramel hair and with a scream delight, running across the porch and leaping down the stairs in a pair of those jeans that make Tom's brain go fuzzy. His world is thrown into sharp relief when body collides with his – hard and soft – the smell of coffee and dittany and something that is uniquely Florence, the floral perfume she wears, pleasant and simple and he will never get enough of it. He kisses her with abandon, his body nearly incensed by the magic of holding her in his arms after nearly a month apart, ruling in his darker thoughts to take her there in the middle of her front lawn. When she smiles against his lips, something that had been crooked within him bends slightly straighter, the beginning of a healing process only she can provide.
"I missed you," she murmurs, her fingers raking along his scalp and doing things to his sanity that he cannot voice with dignity. "I missed you so much I haven't been able to think straight, and I told everyone to stay away this weekend because when you were here for the wedding I didn't like dividing my time, and you turn me into the most selfish person – did you know that?"
Her words bounce off her tongue at a thousand beats per minute, as if she wants to share every thought that has passed through her head during their time apart. Tom loves this about her, that she can still be this endearingly excited each time he arrives at her door as if it is the first time they are meeting in such a way. Her enthusiasm is the only upside to the myriad forms of torture there separation poses, the gleam in her eye of undivided devotion like a regenerative potion, refueling him.
"I've got tea prepared, and a surprise for us at dinner," she says, taking his hand like it is her own and tugging him after her, up the stairs and into the front hall. Florence's home is decidedly less clean than the home in which she grew up, clutter amassing upon every flat surface. Letters – some opened, some resolutely closed – were stacked upon the table just inside the door, a ring of keys resting beside them. Coffee mugs were everywhere – half full, empty, still steaming, and copies of both the British Daily Prophet and American Wizarding Times abandoned mid-read. There were vases of dried flowers that Tom himself had sent, Florence presumably incapable of throwing them out even long after they had shriveled into nothingness, and moving replicas of his own face in silver or gold frames. These two items Tom found he enjoyed the most, a physical sign of his dominance over this space as well as its owner, and he could not admonish her for her untidiness of it meant cleaning up his own claim.
She is leading him to what he assumes is the back porch when he plants his feet, forcing her to turn and face him, her always expressive face wide with surprise. Tom feels the corner of his mouth upswing into half of a smile – incapable of a full one yet, although he is certain that with enough time in her presence, she will be coaxing a full grin from him.
"Come here," he murmurs, and at once like he is Theseus and she is the thread, Florence is in his arms and he can drag his fingers through her hair and tilt her face up to meet his. He can kiss her and press her against the wall and it doesn't matter that for the past few months he thought he was losing his mind, Florence is his once more. It is like being injected with morphine, the pleasure numbing and mind wringing and incoherent.
"Fuck I missed you," she hisses when his mouth moves to her throat. Tom feels laughter – the first time the sound has left his throat since he saw her last – rumble in his chest.
"Always so eloquent," he murmurs.
"Didn't you miss me?" She asks, her head leaning back against the wall as Tom's fingers trace the seam of her shirt down the side, his nail running along the waist of her jeans. Her responding shiver makes him see red with desire.
"I'm not so weak," he tells her, teeth sinking into her shoulder. Some form of strangled sound leaves Florence's mouth and Tom is heady with control, like he has summited a mountain or swam across the sea. It has been too long.
Yet before he can truly take advantage of his power over her, Florence's hand slides between his legs, clenching around the hardness there until Tom is hissing into her skin.
"I think you did," she accuses, her hand moving away just as quickly as it had found him. "But I'd like to hear you say it anyways."
Her voice is softer this time, a hint of longing in her tone, and Tom pulls his face away so that he can meet her gaze. She is so outspoken that sometimes he forgets she is just a girl who is desperate for him in all of the ways a woman can be. In others he finds these traits loathsome, in Florence they are a reminder of her goodness, of those feelings she had introduced into his world with a blaze of magic.
"Today was the first in a month I did not awake in agony," Tom says solemnly, and he cannot be embarrassed because it is only the truth. "It was only because of you, because I knew I was going to see you. You should not question what you already know."
To Tom's surprise, he notes that her gaze is swimming with tears, her lips wobbling around a smile that threatens to break across her face. When she laughs, it is small and broken and yet light as the first breath of spring. He does not know why pain ripples through his chest.
"You're absolutely brilliant," she murmurs, and Tom cannot comprehend, but it matters morethis time that she's just speaking about him – not his intelligence or his magic or even who he descends from, even though each of those things alone is magnificent. And yet, no one has ever thought Tom Riddle, half-blood with a filthy last name and too serious demeanor, was brilliant on his own, because of himself. Except Florence Allman. He kisses her again before he can register what it means, why her words summon that raw feeling within his chest.
"Come on, tea out back," Florence says after several moments have passed. "And I want to show you what I've been working on in the garden."
"I'll meet you out there," Tom agrees. "Restroom."
Florence presses her lips to his cheek and then slides beneath his arm, leaving Tom colder than moments before as she makes her way down the hall towards the back porch. He waits until he hears the screen door slam before moving into action, shoving one hand into his robe pocket to close around the package there while at the same time calling out loud:
"June, Cash!"
The house elves appear before him with a loud crack, bowing before him until their noses seemed to brush the floor. Tom has a strange moment in which he recalls that Florence typically gets to her knees when talking to her elves, but Tom kneels for no one.
"What can we do for young Mister Tom?" Cash squeaks, bowing once more. Tom feels an easy smirk spread across his face. Florence had instructed them upon his first visit to obey him as if he was a member of the family, and he had every intention of putting that to good use.
"I have an order for you, but I need a vow of silence from you both that you will speak to no one of it. No other creature, nor even a member of the Allman family," Tom hisses. June's eyes widen slightly, but her head bobs in a resounding yes.
"Of course, Mister Tom. We will not speak of whatevers it is you wishes unless told otherwise," she pipes up, her voice thin and reedy.
"Missy Florence has told us we are to listen to you like family, and we wills, Sir," Cash adds, and Tom's smirk broadens.
"This," Tom murmurs having received an affirmative, "is Dittany Concentrate." Tom lifts the crystal phial from his pocket, revealing the silvery-sage liquid which is now a shade darker, nearly moss, thanks to his adjustments. "It is a health restorative – something to protect her while I am away. I want you to add one drop of this to Florence's coffee every morning. Under no circumstances may she know what you are doing, and should she not have her morning coffee, it is vital that a drop of this be added to some other meal consumed during the day."
"And if Missy Florence is traveling, Sir?" June asks.
"Then you will travel with her, unbeknownst to her," Tom commands.
Without Florence present in England, he'd been able to accomplish far more than just the preliminary moves for his English conquest. He could still recall that day in Florence's potion hall as she told him that her Great Grandmother's life had been extended due to the effects of Dittany on her person. Tom had added rejuvenating spells to the vial of Dittany Concentrate he had brewed, shredded Agrimony picked on the new moon for restoration, and Hyssop sap for purification. It would not make her immortal, but it would reduce the greatest effects of time, increasing her cell replication so that any damaged tissues would return almost to new. The updated formula would most importantly buy him time until Tom could find a way to truly make her eternal. It had cost Malfoy several hundred galleons to secure the ingredients, and several hundred more to record the shipment off the books, but the updated potion assured Florence would stand by him for the rest of time, and that in itself was priceless.
"Of course, Sirs, that is easy enough. One drop a day," June squeaks cheerfully, reaching out with both hands to take the crystal from him. Tom nods and leaves, pleased that it had been so simple to implement, that like Florence, her house elves would choose to believe that his words. But it hadn't been a lie, he considers. It was a healing potion, just healing her from time itself, saving her for himself.
Tea is short lived before Tom manages to weasel both of them out of their clothes – not that it took much convincing. Only a look and a stray brush of his fingers up the inside of her leg and they were both on their feet, scampering into the first bedroom on the second floor, discarded clothes like a trail of destruction in their wake. Florence laughs when he lifts her from the ground and tosses her onto the guest room bed, her mouth wide and teeth white and gods she's fucking naked and desperate for him and all he can think is that it's the most wonderful sound he's ever heard. He kisses her to calm these thoughts, her body the anchor that ties his mind to reality. I cannot go so long without her again.
"We have to go to dinner," Florence says several hours later, her fingers running absent mindedly through his hair. His head is resting upon her stomach, Tom's mind blessedly still for the first time in recent memory.
"Why," he demands. He does not want to leave the safety of this bed, of this moment with Florence where he is warm and sated and she is easily within his reach and capable of meeting all of his needs.
"Because I have something prepared for us," she murmurs, the hand in his hair moving down to run across his cheek, his jaw, the bridge of his nose. No one has ever touched him so gently.
"Please, angel, for me?"
She looks at him with those wide, sincere eyes that make his stomach clench and jerks his head once in the affirmative, turning to press his lips to her stomach before giving her room to sit up. He tries not to dwell on the undeniable fact that Florence saying please is all it takes for him to give in, that her pet name for him makes his reason slip.
"Your stuff is in in the master, June is going to help me in the green room," Florence instructs, bouncing on her toes like she could implode at any moment. "You're not to come downstairs for half an hour, is that understood?"
Tom nods again, feeling the smile she has been coaxing out of him since he had arrived finally settle over his features. Florence's responding grin was bright enough to burn cities for. He will burn cities for it, if he must.
There is a set of black dress robes made of a thick, fine material waiting for him across Florence's bed – their bed as he thinks of it because no one else will ever share it with her. He dresses quickly, Cash appearing to help gel his hair, and then he must agonize for another twenty minutes before he sets off across the hall and down the stairs to the main floor.
At once he knows Florence is up to her usual surprises, the entire first level of the home darkened except for occasional sconces which flicker with blue flames. There is a soft humming of music, the swelling melody like a voice from his childhood – familiar, but unrecognizable. Curiosity sufficiently spiked, he makes his way with silent footfalls down the main corridor of the home, following the flickering blue flames towards the back porch where his eyes fall upon the silver clad figure of Florence, her back to him as she faces out across the gardens behind her house. There is a thickness in his chest as realization dawns upon him, and understanding of what she has done because he will remember that dress for the rest of his life, the constellations that are dusted across the thin fabric, the open expanse of skin on her back and shoulders that allowed him to first experience the thrill of holding her.
"Florence," he murmurs, stepping through the doorway and onto the back porch where the music is playing from a record player. She turns to see him, her face split into a wide smile, her hand seeking his at once.
"Tom," she mimics, and for a second he is not in Georgia but upon the balcony at the Greengrass estate, reliving the pull he had felt to her even then, the madness that had overtaken him.
"Samhain," he says, lifting her hand to brush his lips against her fingers. Even through the darkness he can see the flush on her cheeks, a trophy of his control over her despite the number of times he has done this.
"I was so sad to miss it this year with work, I thought we could have our own."
"Would you like for me to summon a dragon?" Tom teases, but his voice is dry and he can't seem to rip his eyes away from hers, his comment which was supposed to be a mockery coming out as more of a genuine offer.
"I'd really like to dance," Florence murmurs with another blush. "But if you'd prefer to eat dinner, we can do that first."
Tom pulls her to him without thinking, nearly laughing at the idea of food when Florence stands before him looking like a ray of starlight. She is warm beneath the pads of his fingers, and when she lays her head on his chest, heat seems to burn through him. Tom wants to ask her why she does things like this for him, what inside of her drives Florence to kindness, but he finds his tongue is glued to the roof of his mouth. If he asks, she will give him that look that is one part grief and the other pity, and he cannot stand to see anything but the adoration that is currently nesting there in the lines between her freckles, in the curve of her smile.
.
.
.
He wakes in the middle of the night to find Florence wrapped around him, a thin line of drool leaking from the corner of her mouth. Tom watches her for some time, aware that it is the first time he has seen her sleep in person in over a month despite having watched her from afar nearly every evening, and the thought is electrifying with the knowledge that he can touch her, if he wants too.
When he realizes that he will be unable to fall back asleep, Tom slides from the bed, casting wordless silencing charms to muffle his movements and a warming charm over the bed so as not to wake Florence. There is an entire wardrobe of clothes Florence has purchased for him for his visits, including his own sets of jeans which he finds stiff and uncomfortable, but which seem to send Florence into aroused overdrive. He pulls on a pair without thinking followed by a dirty t-shirt that smells like Florence and a pair of trainers before apparating out of the house and onto Illini's hill. Perhaps the great beast would be awake and converse with him until Florence had risen and he could lose himself in her again.
He appears from the void beneath his tree, the one that he can feel the traces of his own magic within, and pressing his palm against it, Tom can feel too the stirring of Florence's song – an amalgamation of what they could be together if only she would give in and follow him back to England. The thought sends a ripple of fury through him, and he shivers in the cool night air.
"Cub, what brings your restless wanderings to me?" A rasping voice echoes in his mind, and despite having visited Illini more times than he can recall, he is never prepared for the way her mind melding with his rips away his occlumency shields with such ease. It is this ability of hers which fascinates him – the only living being with unfettered access to his mind.
"Illini," Tom greats her with a bow. The massive white creature is seated before him, milky eyes fixed resolutely upon his figure. "I could not sleep, and thought it prudent to visit you."
"You have a silver tongue, cub, although why you feel the need to lie I do not know. If you would like to know what she says of you when you are away, you need only ask. It is nothing you have not heard before – I know, I see your mind."
"She speaks of me often?" Tom asks, and he tries to ignore the petulance in his voice.
"Florence visits her tree more than she visits me, but when we happen upon this place at the same time, her mind is filled with thoughts of you."
"She misses me?"
"Of course, you ask for answers you already possess," Illini rumbles in his mind, her voice dropping lower. "She is not driven mad as you are by the separation, but her spirit is intact while yours is only but a shadow of what it once was…"
Tom does not know what his horcruxes have to do with the agony he feels while he is away from Florence, but it is a small relief to know that she seeks out memories of him even when he is gone.
"Will she be prepared to follow me soon?" Tom asks, thinking again of his empty apartment that seems to scream with want for Florence's warmth. A cave as empty as the one beneath his ribs that only Florence can roost within.
"What do you mean by follow? Followership in body or in mind?"
Tom pauses – he considers what he wants from her, which is both. Her undivided attention, her support in those dreams of power he has nurtured in his mind since he first arrived at Hogwarts. But he thinks too of his vacant bed in England, of his dreams which he wakes from grasping for nothingness beside him, and he knows he wants this first – needs it even.
"I want her with me, in England," Tom declares.
"And what would you give her in return for leaving behind all she has ever desired?"
"She desires me – there is nothing more to give but myself," Tom counters, feeling his ire rise along the back of his neck.
"Loving is giving. She would give this up for you, but you who possess half a spirit – what could you give when you have nothing to give even yourself?"
"Love is weakness, disease," Tom spits, infuriated that even this seemingly all-knowing beast could be so swayed by thoughts of love, that pathetic and wretched mark of humankind. His mother had succumbed, but he would never.
"Is it weakness you see in her eyes when she looks at you? I see your mind, cub. You who believe magic itself had bonded you – you would label that wretched?" Illini's voice is loud within Tom's head, his skull threatening to crack under the pressure. Unbidden Florence's face swims before him, and he wishes suddenly that he had never left their bed, that he had woken her from sleep to be with him, to still his racing thoughts.
"What would you know of loving or giving?" Tom challenges instead. "You, Illini, who live alone, who exist outside the confines of time, who's reality is only that of a winged shadow. Who are you to judge me? What have you given?"
Before him Illini's tail thrashes, her milky eyes narrowing slightly, but her voice is silent in Tom's head. With a savage smile, he knows that he has backed her into a corner, driven her to silence, and he feels vindicated. He reaches into his back pocket for his wand, but Illini's head lowers to the ground before him, and he freezes.
"To forgo death is to sacrifice life," she repeats, words that had haunted him since their first meeting nearly a year ago. "You think yourself wise, Cub, but power is not wisdom and love is not possession. Go to her, fill the emptiness in you while you can, but ask yourself what you have to give – what you are willing to give."
Tom apparates back into their bedroom, unable to listen any longer to the winding musing of the Piasa. His heart thunders in his chest as he traces the profile of Florence's face, bronzed skin glowing like silver in the moonlight. He does not understand Illini's warnings, and why should he? He has everything already – Florence is his, why would he give something up to maintain that?
He undresses and slips into bed beside her, waking Florence without hesitation to share in that magic they have together, to silence the pulsing in the back of his mind, the splinters that are slowly wedging his brain apart.
I got even more incredible incredible song recs from readers on Ao3 I wanted to share. I listened to all of them and DAMN I'm continuously so impressed by the astute readings of these characters - you guys are incredible!
- Ane Brun's "I Wouldn't Hurt a Fly" from Tom's POV and "Lifeline" for Florence's are so haunting and beautiful I was ENRAPTURED (from the amazing Dolphingirl 16)
- StormAge shouting out some Taylor Swift Folklore vibes - I mean what a compliment. I personally think "Exile" gives me the most Limited vibes, but there are several on that album that are applicable in my paltry opinion.
- The stunning Tournesol15 recommended "Achilles, Come Down" by Gang of Youth which is incredible at capturing both Achilles' mindset and through him Tom, who in so many ways I see as a mirror. Seriously such a good rec!
Feel free to share anything with me - music recs, fic recs, any art if any of you are artists. I love love love seeing what you think and what you love!
Also this chapter gives me major "Tom is losing his marbles" vibes and it makes m cause I want my baby to be better and he just simply isnt!
