NOUGHTS AND CROSSES

Why would I test my faith? Oh, why would I?

-Cold War Kids "Royal Blue"

December dawned cold and got colder within the week and Hermione, frustratingly, was no closer to figuring out how to get home. The Yule Ball was coming up in just two weeks, and most of the common room was atwitter about it, although Hermione had already confessed to not having any interest in it whatsoever.

She did know that Nadia had been asked by someone named Silas Agnew in Ravenclaw, though she was debating whether to say yes. Elaina was going with Danny Potter, which everyone had seemed to expect. Amias had asked another seventh-year girl named Althea Nott and Kerstan was going with a Beauxbaton transfer named Lila which seemed to be quite a coup for him the way the boys talked about it. Philia had been asked by Cygnus, which seemed to take the group by surprise. Such information was impossible to avoid even just passing through the common room.

"I might just go alone," Eris was saying – no one had asked. her yet, which had come as some surprise to Hermione since she'd seemed to be quite popular even if she wasn't particularly beautiful.

"Well familiars aren't allowed," Nadia said.

"It's not even mine," Eris replied, the snake at her neck giving an irritable hiss.

"I'll go with you," Draco offered, to Hermione's further surprise. "As a friend."

Tom was nowhere to be found at the moment, though Hermione guessed he was probably in the library, so she had no one to share a look with, but she hadn't thought that Draco and Eris were so friendly with each other.

"Maybe we'll just go alone together and not together-together," Eris said, "I'd hate to be a pity-date."

"Fine by me," Draco said.

Hermione herself had no plans to go at all and hadn't been asked at any rate. Not that she minded. It would be a good time to research with everyone else gone.

Although it hadn't exactly gone unnoticed to her that Tom hadn't asked anyone yet either…

O

Draco had actually wanted to ask Veronica to the ball, but when he heard familiars wouldn't be allowed, he thought it might be a good opportunity to grill Eris for more information and changed his plans. When she sort-of turned him down, he didn't take it to heart. He'd seen her turn down at least two other people that'd asked her flat, and then go on pretending that she hadn't been asked at all. He figured there must be some reason for it, but he didn't care to know what it was. All it did was tell him that she lied. Which he already knew. It meant she couldn't be trusted – not completely – but he thought he might still be able to get some useful information from her.

"We should all go shopping for dress robes at Hogsmeade this weekend," Eris said. "Hermione, you'll come too, won't you?"

"I'm not planning on going," Hermione kept her voice flat in reply.

And Draco thought it was odd that Hermione disliked Eris so much but spent so much time with He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Tom. Eris could be annoying, but she seemed rather benign to Draco – at least compared to He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Tom, who was clearly terrifying.

"But we could all go alone together – me, you and Draco," Eris offered brightly.

Draco wondered what she was playing at, but he'd long ago given up on trying to figure out her motives – at least not until he had more information about her.

"No thanks, I'm fine," Hermione replied, turning back to the book she'd been studying.

Eris pouted in a way that would've been cute on a prettier girl, but that just made her look a little pathetic. Draco couldn't help finding himself feeling a bit sorry for her.

O

Hermione had been spending a lot of time with Tom. It was strange to her that he was the closest thing she had to a friend in this time, but if her goal was to keep him away from Eris and out of her influence then she almost had to be friends with him, didn't she?

He'd asked her if she wanted to study Astronomy with him in the tower at eight, so when the time came she excused herself from the common room and headed over to the Astronomy tower. As she walked over, she went over everything she thought she'd known about him and everything she knew now.

She'd heard he was charming and had expected to encounter a smooth, silver-tongued talker, but what she'd found was an awkward, somewhat lonely boy who had an extreme fondness for peppermint toads. She smiled at the memory of his face when she'd told him Nadia thought he was Gollum. And he had opened the Chamber of Secrets – that was an irrefutable fact. But he seemed to deeply regret that action – not revel in it. She wondered if she'd be able to pry more information about it from him, but it seemed to be a touchy subject.

All she really knew was that he wasn't so far gone he was beyond saving, and she fully intended to try to pull him back.

"Hi," he greeted her as she entered the top of the tower.

He was standing next to a telescope and his hair had fallen forward a little as though he'd just been looking through it. Hermione, for a moment, thought he looked cute that way, before she squashed the thought. He might not be entirely evil yet, but nothing good could come from thinking someone that could very well become Voldemort was cute.

"Hi," she replied. "What were you looking at?"

"Just the full moon," he said. "I've always thought it was interesting that we only ever see one side – the other is a total mystery. At least to me."

Hermione stepped up to the telescope to take a look – it was certainly beautiful, she thought.

"Stars are quite interesting too," Tom said from next to her. "Do you know how they can tell how far away they are?"

Hermione straightened and shook her head. Astronomy classes were mostly about the movement of objects through the sky and their effect on magic. Muggle astronomy wasn't really covered in her summer tutoring sessions, which focused on maths, English and history. It was something she'd never thought about.

"Stellar parallax," Tom's hand hovered near her arm. "May I?"

Hermione felt a bit nervous about it, but her curiosity trumped her nervousness and she said, "Sure."

Tom raised her arm so that it was straight out in front of her. "Hold up your thumb," he said, demonstrating with his right hand.

Hermione did as he said, and Tom said, "Close your right eye and then your left."

Hermione felt a bit silly, but she did as she was told, wanting to know where this explanation was going.

"See how your thumb moves against the background a little?"

Hermione nodded.

"Each eye is a different vantage point," Tom explained. "From each point you see the object – your thumb – in a different spot against the background."

Tom reached for her arm again, bending her elbow so that her hand was much closer to her face.

"Now try it again," he said, and Hermione did, her thumb jumping from right to left.

"See how the movement against the background is more drastic now that the object is closer?"

"I get it," Hermione said. "From the same two vantage points a closer object appears in a much different position against the background than a farther one."

Tom nodded. "That's essentially it. Can you imagine something so simple used to calculate something so… universal?" he finished, struggling to find the last word.

Hermione had to admit she was wowed at the prospect. Measuring the distance to something so far away, using such a simple concept. It impressed her that he knew about it. She wondered what else he might be able to tell her and she had to admit that she really did like talking to him.

"It's very interesting," she agreed. "Thank you for showing me."

He shrugged and smiled and turned a little pink. "I – I actually have a confession to make," he said.

"Oh?" the sentence put Hermione a little on guard now as she wondered what he might possibly have to confess. Was he going to tell her about the Chamber of Secrets? She wondered. Reveal himself to be Lord Voldemort? Her head spun with all of the grave things he had to confess.

But no.

"I didn't just ask you here to study Astronomy," he was saying. "I actually wanted to ask you if there as any chance you might be interested in accompanying me to the Yule Ball."

Hermione's heart stopped. Literally skipped a beat. She felt like she was fourteen again and being asked to the ball by the Viktor Krum. Which was stupid, she thought, because Tom wasn't some Quidditch star – he was just a sixth-year prefect at Hogwarts. And the best-looking boy she'd ever seen. And the smartest she'd ever met. And also quite possibly Voldemort.

She realized she wasn't answering him as he shifted his weight in a way that looked nervous and somehow brought the word "cute" to her mind again. She mentally shook herself, not exactly knowing how to answer him, but knowing she had to make some kind of answer at some point. If she said yes, she'd be going to the ball with, improbable though it seemed to her, an incredibly dark wizard in the making. If she aid no, she might alienate him, sending him back under Eris's thumb to become the very dark wizard she feared. But that wasn't the main problem. Almost everything in her mind was screaming at her to say "no." It'd be getting too involved, she thought, it wouldn't be practical. They should just stay friends. The main problem was that in her heart – in her traitorous heart – she found that she really did want to say "yes."

"I'm sorry," he was saying. "It was stupid of me to think that you'd want to go with me."

And that tipped her. Because did he not know that he could ask any girl in the school that he wanted and she'd say yes in a heartbeat? Or did he really think so highly of her? She didn't know. All she knew was that in the next moment, the words coming out of her mouth were, "No, Tom, of course I'll go with you."

He smiled then and his eyes lit like the midnight sky next to a full moon. "Great," he said. "You'll have a wonderful time, I promise."

"I'm looking forward to it," Hermione said, a little frightened to realize that she actually meant it.

"I actually have a gift for you," Tom said, picking up a package Hermione hadn't noticed from a nearby desk.

Hermione took the package, noting that it was neatly wrapped and beautifully tied, and opened it carefully. Inside it was a dress, which she pulled out with just as much care.

"You don't have to wear it if you don't like it," Tom said, "The truth is I'd been planning to ask you for a while and I wasn't sure whether you'd have a dress with you, so I figured I'd buy one for you on the off chance you actually said yes, in case you didn't have anything to wear."

Hermione examined the dress. It was a deep crimson satin cut with a V-neck and cupped sleeves. A white sash went around the waist and tied in a bow at the back. It was both gorgeous and seasonally appropriate and Hermione had to wonder how Tom had been blessed with good looks, intelligence, and taste in women's clothing.

"You can exchange it if you don't like it," he said as she looked. "I've kept the receipt…"

"I love it," Hermione replied. She almost wanted to reject it, because it must've cost too much for an orphan with no inheritance working summers, but the truth was that she actually didn't have another dress with her and she only had enough money with her for the few butterbeers she'd planned to get with Harry and Ron. "Thank you," she said, impressed by his thoughtfulness.

"I'd hoped you'd like it," he was smiling again and Hermione couldn't help but think he really was at his most handsome when he smiled.

Something occurred to her then. "Was this the errand you ran – in Hogsmeade that day?" she'd thought it might be something suspicious, something darker, but…

He nodded. "A bit presumptuous of me, I know, but at least you've said yes."

"At least you kept the receipt in case I said 'no'," Hermione managed to joke. But her mind was in a jumble. Had he fancied her for that long? She wondered, reviewing every conversation they'd had in the month since, looking for signs. He must have, she thought, to have bought her the dress. But more importantly she had to wonder how she felt about him.

O

Draco always carried a healthy amount of money with him, so shopping for dress robes wasn't a problem. The problem was that nothing was really to his taste. Back home, he had a personal tailor for this type of clothing, so having to shop off the rack now annoyed him to no end.

The other annoyance was that Amias, Kerstan and Cygnus had all declined to take part in the shopping excursion due to their having personal tailors of their own and so they were all at the Hogs Head having butterbeers with Elaina who had one as well. Draco was envious, not just at their having tailors available, but at the fact that none of them were currently being dragged from store to store by a pack of picky Slytherin girls who constantly interrupted his own shopping with their constant requests for a "male opinion" on how various dresses looked on them.

"What about these for you?" Eris asked, holding up a set of simple, yet elegant collared dress robes in a deep forest green. "Unless you think it's too matching for a pair of friends going to the ball alone together." She held up the dress she'd planned to buy in her other hand. It was a slightly lighter shade of green with gold trim. Draco thought it was a good color for her, although he wondered that it was probably a few sizes too small. He banished the thought as irrelevant to him and scrutinized what she'd suggested for him. They weren't terrible, he had to admit, and better than anything he'd seen so far.

"Those are fine." He reached out and took the dress robes from her. He was eager to be done with shopping more than anything, and tired of looking at sets of stodgy old-fashioned dress robes. "I'm going to go pay and then head over to the Hogs Head."

Eris nodded. "We might be here for a bit," she said. "Philia's always been terribly indecisive."

"See you later then," Draco said, wanting to escape before he was consulted further. He paid quickly and practically dashed off to the Hogs Head

"They released you early?" Kerstan asked when he walked in alone.

"I ran away," Draco replied as he pulled up a chair.

"I went shopping with them once," Kerstan said. "Never again."

Draco nodded his agreement.

"Serves you right for only going to chase after Veronica," Amias wagged a finger jokingly at Kerstan.

"Well I caught her, didn't I?" Kerstan asked. "Though I'm still not sure it was worth it. Tom's got the right idea – he's never been dragged on any of these shopping trips."

"Where is he anyway?" Elaina asked. "Library?"

"With Hermione," Kerstan affirmed. "Did you know they're going to the Yule Ball together?"

If he'd had a drink, Draco would've spit it out just then. That's it, he thought. The world has gone completely off its rocker.

He had to wonder whether Hermione had lost her mind completely or if she'd just gone temporarily insane. It had to be one of the two, he knew, for her to agree to go to the Yule Ball with You-Know-Who. He almost wanted to ask her about it, but the only thing he wanted more than to ask her was to not get caught asking her, so it almost went without saying that he wouldn't do it. Still, the whole thing worried him, although he wasn't quite sure why. If the mudblood really wanted to dance with the devil, well that was just her funeral, wasn't it?

"Really?" Elaina was saying. "I wouldn't have thought she'd be his type. Not with all that hair." She motioned around her own head to indicate Hermione's frizz.

"She's got quite a pretty face, though," Amias said. "And they have been spending a good deal of time together."

"I suppose it could make sense when you put it that way," Elaina replied, waving a hand dismissively.

Draco couldn't help but think he was glad it made sense to someone because it made none at all to him.

O

Hermione had to admit that researching in the library with Tom was… pleasant. Mostly they just sat at the same table working independently in a silence that Hermione found quite comfortable. Nothing had really changed since he'd asked her to the ball either, and Hermione had begun to think he'd asked her more as a friend than anything else.

She still hadn't found any research applicable to her and Draco's situation. The most helpful text she'd found so far had been buried in the back of the Restricted Section and was actually authored by Professor Mortis himself. It said that time travel to any point in the past should be theoretically possible, though should not be undertaken in practice. It was only the barest mention in a book outlining time turner design, though, and Hermione deduced that perhaps the lack of exposition on this note was due to time travel laws and resolved herself to ask Mortis the first chance she got.

"I've found a rather interesting text on the morality of transfiguring objects into living creatures," Tom said, breaking her concentration. "It likens it to creating and destroying life if the object is transfigured back and posits that the transfigured creatures may have souls. Would you like to take a look?"

That did sound interesting to Hermione, so she nodded and Tom motioned her over. She took the seat next to his and read over his shoulder for a while. It was a rather intriguing essay, the author's main argument being that inanimate objects should never be transfigured into live creatures due to the possibility of those creatures possessing souls.

"It's actually a collection of essays on the moral implications of certain spells," Tom explained as she read. "Quite fascinating. Many of these arguments I hadn't considered before."

Hermione hadn't either, and it was a topic that greatly interested her. "May I borrow this when you're done with it?"

"Of course."

She had never actually thought of transfiguring an inanimate object into a living creature as anything more than complicated spell work and wondered what the other essays in the book might discuss.

"Ready to turn the page?" Tom asked, just as she was nearing the end. She nodded and he flipped the page over. She continued to read over his shoulder quietly, not missing the fact that Tom Riddle was interested himself in the ethics of spellcasting…

O

In their next Transfiguration class, Dumbledore asked them to transfigure their desks into cats, which Hermione felt a little odd about after having read the essay.

"I'm a little uneasy about it after that essay," Tom confessed to Hermione, echoing her feelings perfectly. "But, well, Dumbledore wouldn't ask us to do anything immoral, would he?"

Tom transfigured his desk into a perfect Persian cat and picked it up, stroking it with affection.

"I suppose not," Hermione replied, following suit and transfiguring her desk into a calico which she picked up to pet as well.

Not everyone was so successful. Kerstan now had a desk with legs that meowed and laid down in front of him, and Eris had caused a small ruckus by transfiguring a mongoose that was now screeching wildly at the snake around her neck.

"Ms. Daw, please transfigure your desk back and try again," Professor Dumbledore said, voice calm but raised slightly to get over the racket. "Mr. Malfoy – Kerstan," he clarified upon recalling that there were now multiple Mr. Malfoys in his class. "Please do the same."

"It's a little like killing it though, isn't it?" Eris said, before transfiguring her mongoose into a desk with a mongoose head and legs that caused another commotion when it ran away toward Professor Dumbledore.

"Some people think so," Dumbledore said, transfiguring Eris's desk back into a regular desk and then floating it back into its proper place. "I'm of the mind that it's not such an easy thing for a wizard to create a soul."

This allayed Hermione's worry, though it didn't escape her that the prospect of killing her mongoose hadn't made Eris pause in the slightest when she tried to change it back.

"I can't believe she got an 'O' in Transfiguration," Nadia complained from Hermione's left. "And the second highest score in our year."

"It's all for show," Tom put in from Hermione's right.

"I know it must be, but I don't know why she does it," Nadia said continuing in her complaint. "She says the score was pure luck, but it's impossible to luck into a score like that."

"You know Eris," was all Tom said back.

Nadia snorted, holding on to the Siamese she'd transfigured.

Dumbledore went over to correct Kerstan's form, and his second attempt was more successful – an all grey cat leaping to his arms from the floor. The Transfiguration Professor turned his attention to Eris next.

"There was nothing wrong with your form, but do please try to concentrate, Dear," he told her.

She nodded and cast the spell again, this time creating a female lion that roared loudly, sending all the surrounding students leaping away from what used to be Eris's desk.

"I was thinking of a big cat," she explained timidly, reaching out to scratch her creation behind the ears.

Hermione didn't miss either that it took much more magical skill to make the kind of mistake Eris just had than it would have to perform the assignment correctly. After all, it took much more power to transfigure smaller objects into larger ones than to go the other way around.

"I suppose that will have to do," Dumbledore said, eyes twinkling with amusement. "I didn't specify what sort of cat, after all. Please do change it back into a desk, though. I believe you're frightening the other students."

Eris wordlessly and perfectly did as she was told, and Hermione thought that perhaps the most dangerous thing about her was that she could even win over someone so normally astute as Dumbledore. Though Hermione also supposed that was what would come from Eris getting Tom to do her dirty work for her.

"All of you now," Dumbledore said. "Back into desks."

The rest of the class complied without much incident other than Headmaster Dippet poking his head into the classroom and saying, "Albus, I've heard there was roaring coming from your class?"

"Just Ms. Daw getting carried away again," Professor Dumbledore explained with a wry smile.

"Ah yes, Ms. Daw, do try to be more careful my dear girl," Dippet said, with a gently chiding look at the girl in question.

"Yes Headmaster Dippet," Eris replied, looking down a little.

"Thank you," The Headmaster said before exiting the room again.

"I generally do expect more of my 'O' level students, Ms. Daw," Professor Dumbledore said once he'd gone.

"It's all down to luck," Eris said – just as Nadia had said she would. "If I sat the exam again, I'm sure I wouldn't get more than an 'E'."

"Of course," Dumbledore replied with a knowing smile.

"It's because if she sat the exam again she'd know how much she could get wrong and still make it into the class," Tom whispered.

"I'll never understand it," Nadia snipped back harshly.

"Even you underestimate her," Tom said, still whispering. "It's the whole point."

Hermione understood. She didn't underestimate Eris one bit. In fact, she thought she was close to having the other girl's full measure.

NOTES: Blah, work got in the way of writing this, but I am still trucking along…