Hogwarts, March 1940
That evening, Professor Slughorn was absent from the staff table at dinner. This was not an extraordinary event by any means; Slughorn was known for being the only professor who frequently invited private guests to dine and entertain in his luxurious sixth-floor office. Sometimes, these guests were simply cliques of accomplished older students, the majority of whom were Slytherins. Sometimes, they were his fellow Professors. Sometimes, they were distinguished figures of society who had nothing to do with Hogwarts.
"You're sure you're not in trouble, then?" asked Florence, who unceremoniously gobbled down a slice of cheesecake.
"Certain as can be, Flo," said Mary. "He's going to introduce us to guests."
"But who? Udham Singh?"
Mary laughed. "I assume not. I don't know."
It was only a few days ago that Singh shot Sir Michael O'Dwyer, a British colonial officer who was responsible for slaughtering hundreds of his compatriots in Punjab. The event's resonance was so great that for a few days, it superseded even Grindelwald's war as the superlative topic of gossip within the walls of Hogwarts. It appeared that many of the purebloods knew little of the muggle British Empire; their reactions ranged from vicarious pride to outraged disgust. Muggleborns of both extreme proclivities, both self-fashioned tories and revolutionaries, were the chief disseminators of both views. The Gryffindors took it particularly to heart; for an entire week, their table in the Great Hall was split into two—one side was lined with Union Jacks, and the other, with the enigmatic Swaraj Flag of the Indians. Mary found both alien to her.
Florence's voice, which suddenly spoke in the uniquely sweet register that could have only been provoked by the presence of one particular boy, brought Mary out of her thoughts. "Oh, hello, Tom!"
"Evening, Travers," Tom slyly smiled, before tapping Mary's shoulder. "It's time to go, Mary."
"Good evening to you too, Tom," Mary said ironically. "I was wondering where you were."
"Business with Mulciber and Lestrange," he said courtly, pulling her robe at the left shoulder. "Let's go."
"But it's still quite early. Slughorn won't be expecting us for some time—"
"It'll take time to get all the way up there," he said simply.
"I've barely eaten!"
Florence, whose allegiances shifted with capricious fluidity between the twins, dared give her own opinion. "You should go, Mary—"
"Shush!" Mary sullenly stabbed a baked potato and gave it a large bite, scowling at both friend and brother before her.
"Slughorn will provide food," said Tom, as if he knew it for a fact. "It'll take time to get up there."
"Whatever," she conceded and rose. Tom took her by the waist.
Her brother proved to be right. None of their classrooms, nor most of the active classrooms in the castle, were situated above the third floor. Consequently the stairs of the fourth and fifth floors were rarely trampled on by the feet of hurrying students. Thus, when Tom and Mary roused them from their diurnal slumber, they became terribly impatient and capricious—they moved with a scornful quickness that forced the twins to clutch the handrails for their lives. After three minutes of being flung about directionlessly on the staircase to the sixth floor, Mary saw that her brother's patience had ran dry. "Enough," he said coldly, before standing up, drawing his wand, and pointing it menacingly towards the platform on which they were supposed to disembark.
Mary's dark eyes gleamed in awe and admiration as the stairs, now slow-moving as though in disgruntled defeat, succumbed to Tom's will.
"I'll lead the way. I've been to his office before," Tom said.
Walking behind him, Mary felt, as she often did as of the past few weeks, a perverse mix of haughtiness and self-consciousness—she had become so much taller than him. She easily saw above his head. It seemed that, where she had grown leaps and bounds in the past year, he had hardly grown at all. Though she understood that it was expected for girls to become women before boys became men, she could not help but sometimes feel as though Tom were a little boy. Indeed, there were no signs of adult masculinity on her brother; his skin was smooth and untarnished by facial hair; his cheeks, though handsomely carved, still round and often lightly tinged with pink; and his physiognomy altogether, equivocally that of a child's. It was a funny, shameful feeling, to observe Tom's childlikeness—a feeling impossible to have felt before Hogwarts, for back then, he had always been taller than her.
She patted his head.
"Stop that," he commanded.
Yet his appearance was utterly at odds with every other aspect of his being. His prodigious magic, the severity of his words, the callousness of his humour, the slight tremble and terrible yearning in his hands when he touched her bare skin—none of these were childlike. But neither were they adult. Tom was restless and obsessive—he had a mortal fear of wasting time. This obsessiveness was perhaps an adolescent quality; none of the Professors were so tense or goal-oriented as Tom was. Yet few of the other students seemed to possess it, either. Thus Mary knew that the fibre of her brother's being was not something generic to children, nor strictly to teenagers, nor to grown-ups. It was something unique to him, in the way that some spells required unique wand movements that could not even be found analogously in another spell.
Was she like that as well? Yes, and no. Mary thought that she possessed many of the characteristics that one would impute to 'girls', and she enjoyed these qualities. At any rate, she wondered what her brother would look like, once he grew into a form more fitting his essence, once he inevitably grew to surpass her again in height—he would be terribly handsome. She bit her lip at the thought.
"We're here."
Tom gently knocked on the door. It opened at once.
"Ah, my dear twins!" greeted an evidently drunk Slughorn, whose corpulent form buoyed about in an even looser deep-blue silk robe. In his hand was a glowing purple cocktail, from which two glistening white flowers sprouted. "Why, come on in! I'll have the elves fix you something—fruit juice? No, I imagine you'd want something savoury. Roast quail with bacon and peas! No? Then Cranberry cheesecake with white chocolate, perhaps?"
"Why, good evening to you as well, sir!" Tom sported a jubilant smile to mirror the drunken joy of his Head of House. "Fruit juice will suffice for now, thank you."
The rumours were true; Slughorn's office was utterly luxurious. It was as large as a classroom, but entirely unlike a classroom. The floorboards were dark and polished, though covered largely by many overlapping dark red carpets. All the furniture in the room was ancient and ornate. Even the quill-holder on his antique desk was encrusted with little diamonds. What consummated the room, however, was the fact that the oldness and elegance of the room did not suffocate its inhabitants, thanks to its great open balcony with a marble veranda, a fixture that looked like it belonged originally to an ancient greek palace—and a table whose attendants looked out at it, to the distant, everwhite mountains and the millions of overhead stars.
A pair of house elves in matching outfits—tiny little blue suits, an outfit much more dignified than what Mary habitually saw the laundry elves wear—suddenly appeared in front of the twins, bowing before them with holding trays on which sat two tall glasses of what appeared to be guava juice, a specialty that irregularly and rarely appeared on the Slytherin table some dinners.
But of everything in the office, it was the two men who sat at the table that drew Mary's attention the most. The younger one, were it not for the extraordinarily ornate cravat around his neck, would have looked like a well-to-do muggle businessman. His suit was plain, black, and in a way thoroughly boring. His hair was neatly cropped and slick with pomade, and the thick cigar between his fingers billowed only a dull gray smoke. Yet, Mary realised with a gasp, he was none other than—
"Minister Spencer-Moon!" she called, failing to restrain her surprise. "Pardon me, sir—I've never had the pleasure of meeting a Minister before."
Tom glared at her.
"Ha, indeed! Leonard!" called Slughorn. "Let me introduce you to two of your probable successors—Tom and Mary Riddle."
"Twins, are you?" The Minister for Magic raised to greet them. "I'd always wanted a twin myself, being the oldest of four children."
"It's a pleasure to meet you, sir," returned Tom in a voice that was almost comically obsequious, before bowing so deeply that his head looked like it was going to touch the floor.
Mary quickly gave a bow as well, before realising that she should have made a curtsy. But Minister Spencer-Moon, an economical man, did not notice her little lapse of ceremony.
The older man sitting across from the Minister had, though not as salient a bearing as the younger man, on account of the latter occupying the highest office of Britain's magical government, a much more visually striking presence. In many ways they contrasted directly. Where the Minister had short dark hair and a clean shaven face, the older man's head sported long, meticulously symmetrical white-blonde curls that fell to his shoulders. Where the Minister dressed like a muggle businessman, the older man wore a splendid green-black robe, with many accoutrements such as several necklaces and bracelets, reminding Mary of a painting of a dapper sixteenth century warlock who often recited Italian poetry by the entrance of the central tower. Finally, where the Minister was stockily built and somewhat tall, the older man, as he rose, distended like a ghost in his slender, stupendous height.
"Now," came Slughorn's drunken voice, "behold Longinus Malfoy! The seventh-year Prefect, if you will, of the Slytherin section of the Wizengamot."
Abraxas' dad! Mary covered her mouth; he was one of the chief objects of Slytherin girl gossip, and for good reason. They said he divorced his first wife, after their first son Cassius died. They said it was he who brought Minister Fawley to power, and he who then forced Fawley to resign. They said he was the richest wizard in all of Europe.
The Minister heartily laughed at Slughorn's jest, and to Mary's surprise, the senior Malfoy permitted himself a small chuckle as well.
"And finally, here," said Slughorn, petting the head of a tiny yellow bird perched on the armrest of the furthermost chair, "allow me to introduce your new transfiguration professor—Miss Dalia Lovegood!"
Mary could not believe what she then beheld; the bird transformed into a woman. An attractive but otherworldly young blonde who looked scarcely older than the seventh-year girls of Mary's house, Lovegood wore a loose-fitting light blue robe, which was so bright that it was almost white, and so clear that Mary could make out her soft, unblemished skin behind it.
"Tom and Mary—what lovely names!" Lovegood said with warm sincerity. "Professor Slughorn speaks highly of you. I can't wait to meet you in the classroom."
"Thank you, Professor," came Tom's equanimous voice. "I look forward to your tutelage."
"No, this can't wait!" shouted Slughorn, whose voice almost sounded angry. "Dalia—you must see what they can do. What they can transfigure. It'll amaze you. Why Tom, cast a spell, will you? Turn something into something else."
"I must defer your request to Mary, sir," returned Tom. "She's superior in transfiguration."
"Ah yes, yes, of course."
"Me? I suppose I am," Mary sipped her guava juice and wiped her mouth. "Sure—but please allow me a moment."
She drew her wand and scanned the room. Slughorn had a large bookshelf; the covers of many of his books were worn and loose. Thus she swished her wand several times, and the books, in droves, flew out of their shelves as pigeons. Very quickly there was a great band of them, cooing in a great dissonant symphony—Mary, now giggling hysterically, directed them out the balcony to fly in circles. She thought about perhaps trying to choreograph them into flying in even more complex patterns, like squares or zigzags, but decided against it—if even one pigeon well, her Head of House would lose one of his books.
At any rate, everyone was deeply impressed—the Minister even applauded—and Slughorn in particular sighed in astonished relief when Mary returned each bird-book to its proper place. Professor Lovegood softly touched her shoulders, squatted down, and told her solemnly, "one day you'll become more powerful than everyone in this room."
Though Mary blushed at the compliment, she cocked her head as though to ask, even my brother? Shockingly, Lovegood picked up on this, for then she nodded as though to say, yes, even him.
Longinus Malfoy spoke for the first time. His voice was slow, sonorous, and full of certainty. "What about you, Tom? In which discipline are you superior?"
Tom did not falter at the question. He at once answered, "Defense Against the Dark Arts."
"I see," said the senior Malfoy, in a tone that Mary construed as vaguely approving.
The twins took their seats. Mary sat between Professor Lovegood and Tom, while the three distinguished men sat on the other side. Conversation passed fluidly, though it was only the men who partook in it. Slughorn and the Minister, with their respective pipe and cigar, cocktail and whisky, quickly and verbosely coursed through the topics of the War, of old friends, of the British magical economy, of the British muggle economy, of new potions invented in South America, of endangered magical species in Australia, of the state of magical education in Grindelwald's European domain—of, in a word, what seemed to Mary everything in the world. Longinus Malfoy, though not a man of many words, occasionally interjected with keen insights or sharp judgments—everything he said was calculated and sober.
Neither the Minister nor Slughorn were sober. But where Slughorn prattled on with his head in the clouds of intoxication, there remained in the Minister always an inextricable solemnity, as though it were a part of him, just as his heart and lungs were a part of him. And his solemnity engendered a clearheadedness, a clearheadedness which compelled him to include Tom in the conversation, by routinely asking, "now tell me, Tom, what do the boys at Hogwarts think of this matter?"
He never asked Mary about the girls.
But Mary was content with merely observing the conversation of the men, for it was quite a spectacle, and an educational one at that. She enjoyed, as one of the two members of the audience of the parlay (the other being Professor Lovegood), the luxury of having house elves personally serve her—she got them to fetch her a pitcher of guava juice, and a plate of pan-fried potato slices doused in Mediterranean spices. She ambiently conversed with Professor Lovegood about a most riveting notion—animagi magic.
Mary had the elves get Tom his own plate. She piled it with pan-fried potatoes. "They're really good," she told him. But he had none of it, his attention was fully immersed in the conversation of the men.
"Forgive me, Minister," smiled Tom, "but I must ask—my curiosity allows me no other recourse—what do you think of former Minister Fawley?"
"Fawley? I don't know him well enough to say," came the Minister's gruff voice. "The Wizengamot was unhappy with him."
As though invoked by The Wizengamot, Longinus Malfoy spoke. "Ah, Hector … my old friend. We were yearmates in Hogwarts. Dormmates, in fact. He's a worthy Minister for peace, but not for war."
Minister Spencer-Moon scoffed. "A Minister who can't lead in war isn't a Minister worth a damn!"
"Now now, Leonard …" Slughorn halfheartedly chided. "Hector did keep the country in good shape during peace."
Tom asked another question, his voice perfectly level. "In your estimation, Minister, is Chamberlain doing a good job on the muggle front?"
"Certainly not," the Minister responded at once. "Even the muggle press call the affair 'the phoney war'—"
"But you must remember, Leonard," interrupted the senior Malfoy, who sounded like a gently reproving professor, "that the Germans have hardly given him a chance to act. You cannot expect Chamberlain to mount an offensive. Recall the 'Great War' his kind fought twenty years ago."
"The man lacks gall," the Minister retorted, as though this sufficiently negated all of Malfoy's argument. "At any rate, the muggle liaison office estimates that he'll be replaced soon—he's not popular among his own."
"Muggle politics," Slughorn muttered, shaking his head. "With who shall they replace him?"
"I'm afraid we don't know," said the senior Malfoy. "Nor are we allowed to decide."
As he intoned allowed, Malfoy looked towards the Minister, as though to allege that it was he who disallowed the most convenient and obvious course of action.
Of everyone at the table, it was Tom who offered the hitherto most daring piece of speculation, in a tone of perfect certainty. "They'll replace him with Churchill, the first admiral of the navy."
"Churchill? Winston Churchill? The muggle liaison office never made any special mention of him," came the Minister. "Explain."
Tom, clearly enjoying the sudden prestige conferred on him, gave the Minister a respectful smile. "Before the war it was Churchill who, for years, babbled on about the 'dangers of Nazism.' All the papers and parliamentarians thought he was a fool, especially when they signed the Munich Agreement—but then the Germans invaded Poland. Now consider also, Minister, that the only front of the 'phoney war' which is not 'phoney', is the naval one—and Churchill, as first admiral, has thus far done a swell job fending off the Kriegsmarine. In a word, in less than a year, he's evolved from the stooge to the most popular boy in the courtyard."
For a moment, all the men in the room were silent; Mary knew that they were all at once in awe, at the truth that poured so eloquently from her brother, a mere second-year boy, while also rapidly planning what they each ought to do, to accommodate with and make the best of the now inevitable ascension of Winston Churchill.
"Very well." The Minister broke the silence. "And how do you feel, Tom, about Churchill?"
"I welcome him," smiled Tom. "He reminds me of you, Minister. You'll both get things done, unlike your predecessors."
Mary, knowing that Tom was in fact an avid supporter of Grindelwald, nearly spat out her guava juice.
"Now now, let's be reasonable, everyone," interjected Slughorn, who sunk into his armchair like a bag of beans. "I'm mighty fond of the Fawleys … Ilus, Hector, Arcanius … they're a charming sort. They might not be fit for the task of war, but society will always have a use for them."
Mary knew as fact that her brother hated the Fawleys. He revealed none of this hatred as he gave his Head of House a thoughtful nod of the head.
"Minister," called Mary, not wanting to go the entire evening without in some way imprinting her presence among the men. "Your cravat's very lovely."
"Oh? Yes, I suppose so," the Minister awkwardly fumbled with it. "It was a gift from Longinus."
Mary smirked. Just as I thought, she wanted to say. But she held her tongue; it was good enough to have proven herself right, to herself. "Mr. Malfoy, sir, you have exquisite taste."
The older man, as though he intuited that Mary knew all along that the cravat was his gift, smirked back at her and dipped his head.
Conversation then dissipated into lighter topics. It seemed that Slughorn's drunkenness had reached a height where he became unreachable to both the sober and those who were still in the lower heavens of intoxication. Perhaps this, or perhaps tiredness, compelled him to withdraw into himself. Minister Spencer-Moon, to whom Slughorn acted as a conversational springboard, also went quiet—Longinus Malfoy, despite being one of the Minister's most eminent allies, neither possessed natural fraternal affection for him, nor the slightest morsel of the gregariousness of Slughorn.
"I want date pudding," Mary commanded one of the elves. "Serve it with thick cream—cold thick cream—and butterscotch sauce."
"Yes, Mistress," the creature said compliantly.
But before it could apparate away, Professor Lovegood raised a halting hand.
"You ought to be kinder to him, Mary," she whispered. "Look at him, at his eyes—don't you see how tired he is?"
Mary looked at the creature's great silver eyes; they indeed looked weary. But then she whispered to Lovegood, "he? Professor Slughorn and the Minister call him it."
"If someone referred to you by 'it', does that cease to make you a girl?"
Mary said nothing for a moment. She found that she enjoyed having the affection of Lovegood, whose ethereal tone and eccentric view of the world charmed her.
"No, I guess not," Mary murmured. "I'm sorry."
She reached out to gently stroke the elf's bony head. "That'll be all for tonight—thank you."
Mary received her date pudding. She wanted to feed Tom, but she knew that if she dared so much as to raise her spoon to his mouth, he would curse her afterwards for embarrassing him before the ministerial men. Slughorn, too, requested something from the elves—a tiny little vial of blue liquid which, miraculously, restored his sobriety ten minutes within his drinking it.
"Morning-after potion," Slughorn explained, coughing and clutching his forehead in pain. "Horrible stuff—you shouldn't have them until after you've slept. But we've still business to get through."
The business in question and the final topic of the night was 'portals'. When Tom asked them what a 'portal' was, none of them could quite coherently explain it. "They're doors you walk through, which'll take you at once from one place to another far away," Slughorn had tried to explain. But it was utterly unclear how they achieved this, and why this form of magic was generally viewed with suspicion in Europe. At any rate the twins learned that such portals would be installed throughout the castle, chiefly in the common rooms, to facilitate the escape of students in the event of an invasion by Grindelwald.
"The Unspeakables warn that they're 'brittle'," concluded the Minister. "We'll have to test them—as soon as possible."
A/N: Even though this chapter is literally just people having dinner, I hope it doesn't come off as gratuitous—let me know what you think. My original Chapter 9 draft felt too long and cumbersome, so I decided to cut it in half. You can expect the next chapter to be posted within a week—you will, I suspect, find it at least a little bit more exciting than this one.