Notes: Thank you all so very much for taking the time to read! I appreciate that you've given this a chance.
Warnings: References to torture
6. The Rain on My Storm-Beaten Face
Tom is throwing invisible darts into the abyss beyond their cell. He lines up his shot, flicks his wrist and stares into the darkness. She watches him, a frown pulling at her lips as she studies his lithe fingers gripping nothing but air.
His hand is beautiful, fingers long and dexterous like a piano maestro's. She imagines them tracing intricate designs across her skin. Her breath hitches and an almost memory spreads warmth through her. She thinks perhaps she's had someone touch her as if she were an instrument and they a virtuoso.
Her cheeks heat and she looks away from Tom, from the temptation to remember.
"What are you thinking about?"
She feels his full attention on her, the crackle of electricity that always follows. "Nothing."
"Liar." But he doesn't sound annoyed by her refusal. "You feel… curious."
She hates that he can read her like this. "Get out of my head, Tom."
He gives her a knowing smile that she feels all the way down to her toes. She raises her chin and glares at him. "Now how do I feel?"
He twirls an invisible pen between his fingers. "I don't need our connection to tell you that."
"Have you always been this insufferable?" she grouses, mesmerized by his fingers once more.
"Me as I am now or me in general?"
The question throws her. She's never bothered to imagine what he was like before he became a part of the diary. Or even to wonder how he ended up there. She's been too caught up in the misery of their predicament.
Her stomach growls and she's reminded how easily the mundane has come to dominate her life. She has no use for Tom's history or Quidditch drills, only food and air. The building blocks of life that she has no guarantee of receiving.
"There should be food in the next few days, if they stick to the same schedule." Tom's voice is softer now, an echo of the caress she remembers from when he first appeared.
She won't starve to death. It isn't the comfort it ought to be. It would be easier if they stopped feeding her. The pain in her stomach would consume her, but then it would be over.
She chews her lip and wishes she could consume it, wonders if she could live off her own flesh.
"Stop." Tom ceases his mindless fiddling to glare at her. "Whatever you're thinking… just stop."
She searches for something beyond the miasma of her despair, but it crushes her, body and soul, like a board piled high with masonry atop her chest. She thinks she feels her bones shatter and break, sharp spindles cleaving her flesh until it is nothing but wet blood and almost memory.
"My name is Tom Marvolo Riddle and I was born on New Year's Eve 1926 to a witch and a Muggle. I was abandoned by my mother at birth—she had the audacity to die as I came into this world. My childhood was spent in an orphanage in London and then at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry until I was eighteen. Of course, I don't remember anything past 1943, when I was sixteen, since that's when I came to be trapped in the diary. I know what happened to me—the other me—and I don't particularly like it."
She slowly shifts until she's seated beside him, their shoulders touching. Or rather, her shoulder touching where his ought to be. She has entirely forgotten about anything but the boy beside her.
"Why did you go into the diary?"
The muscles of his neck shift as he swallows. His jaw is tight when he finally says, "it wasn't my choice. Not exactly. I knew what I was doing, but I never thought I'd fall victim to my own machinations. I was too clever for my own good and too arrogant to see it."
She tilts her head, pieces moving in her mind like a puzzle. She likes the feeling. "What was the purpose of the diary?"
"Eternal life."
"I suppose you've achieved that. You're, what? Over seventy? And you don't look a day beyond sixteen."
It's his turn to tilt his head, lips twisting into a wry smile. "I suppose I have. I meant for the part of me not contained in the diary to live forever, not… me."
"What did happen to the other part of you? And what do you mean by that? Part? Are you incomplete?" She finds the questions roll off her tongue with ease, as if she has been probing into the unknown for her entire life.
Tom lets out a soft chuckle. "Slow down, Hermione. It's not like either of us has anywhere to go."
She crosses her arms and glowers at him. "I want to know."
He brings an insubstantial finger to trace the line of her jaw, which quivers with impatience and something… deeper. "I prefer you like this."
"Tom," she whimpers, not sure if she's asking for answers or something else entirely.
He sighs and removes his hand, fingers tangling through his lustrous ebony waves. "You're not going to like my answers."
"I don't particularly like you, so I hardly see how that matters."
It's not quite a lie; she doesn't like him. She admires his physical appearance, but she can never quite forget a monster lies beneath. But she has come to depend on him. He is her last tie to sanity and she is unwilling to let him go, to lose herself so entirely she can never find her way back.
Tom sets his jaw and a chill runs down her spine. He's going to tell her.
"The man I became, the other half of me, is the man who keeps you here." He pauses, but doesn't look at Hermione. She feels the blood drain from her face, pooling in a clot of fear within her gut. He did this to her. She starts to shake. Tom continues, voice toneless, "His name is Lord Voldemort. I thought it was particularly clever, an anagram of my full name. It seems rather childish now.
"What I—we—he was trying to accomplish in 1944 was the creation of a Horcrux. He succeeded and I was created, or rather, I was separated. You see, Hermione, we are both pieces of my soul. To create the Horcrux required the physical splitting of his—our—my soul. He went on to split it over and over, so I suppose now I am more myself than he is."
Hermione's heart is a broken clock, stuck on the same beat over and over again. What he told her seems impossible, but the tormented expression prying apart his handsome features tells her otherwise. How could he be of the same stuff as the man that condemned her to this fate, who ordered her torture and her—
"I wanted power, power over Death and over life, but never this."
She wants crawl away from him, to scream at the top of her lungs until the masked men come down the stairs and tear the last vestiges of her soul away. She cannot possibly need him, the other half of the monster who has shattered her so completely. But she only takes gasping breaths of stale air, frozen in place by a terror that weaves through her veins like silken embroidery.
Tom looks at her. She looks back. His eyes are gaping holes to what is left of his soul.
"Why?"
He blinks, the truth of his decimation hidden for the briefest of moments. "Why what?"
"Why do this to me? You must know. You must understand."
She watches his hands clench to fists, imagines his nails digging into his pale skin. She wants him to hurt.
"I don't know," he murmurs. "Keeping you here I understand. Luring Harry Potter to come rescue you is smart. But why he lets them, encourages them…" but then he trails off and a haunted expression swallows him, dragging the light from his broken eyes. "Or maybe I do. I always enjoyed my power over others. I liked causing them pain, watching them suffer, having them know I could offer damnation or salvation with a single wave of my wand. I basked in their fear, craved it. Did all I could to cultivate it."
Tom licks his lips and angles his undone face to hers. "So, I know why I did this to you. I did it because I like it."
"But you never experienced it yourself, not until now." She has no idea how she finds the strength to speak, to pry deeper into the psyche of the monster who sits beside her.
"No." His voice is the type of hollow that reminds her of open graves.
Her lips keep moving. "You never once imagined what it would feel like on the other end of your wand. You never knew true suffering. Never understood fear beyond your terror of that more powerful than you, that which you had yet to control. We are all tools to you, a means to a higher, greater end."
He says nothing, but his eyes cling to her face like a drowning man to a log. "And then you found a way back to the world, through me. And you were prepared to do it all over again. To use me and discard me. But you couldn't merely kill me without trapping yourself, so you had to wait. And while you waited, you learned what suffering tastes like.
"How does it feel on your tongue, Tom Marvolo Riddle—Lord Voldemort? Is it everything you imagined it would be?" Her lips twist into a vicious sneer. "Are you choking on it yet?"
He hisses out a desperate string of syllables that slither together like oil. Then he blinks and tries again. This time she understands the words that tumble from his lips. "I'm sorry. Salazar, Hermione. I don't even know how to be sorry. I don't know what to do…"
Hermione wishes she could doubt his sincerity, but she senses the wrecked fragments of his incomplete soul in the hitch of his breath, the devastation of his expression. All of it is a reflection of the ruin etched into her.
Hating him would be so much easier than this.
"Get us out of here."
"I will."
She believes him and it is the worst thing that has happened to her yet.
Draco's breath echoes in the stairwell. He grips the ampules tightly in his hands, berating himself for not thinking to conceal them. If anyone is down here, he's in for some verbal gymnastics.
But no one ever visits her. Not even Draco.
He stills at the bottom of the stair, examining the darkness for a sign of life. He hears nothing. His chest constricts and Potter's furious emerald eyes flash across his vision. But then he hears the faintest scuff of flesh on stone and relief floods his veins. His knees nearly buckle as he leans heavily against the dungeon wall.
Thank Merlin and Salazar and Rowena and Helga and even bloody Godric.
The notion of telling Potter Hermione Granger is gone is inconceivable. Perhaps he could have before he knew the news would break the other boy's heart. But Draco is no longer willing to stand before Potter and speak that particular truth.
He rushes forward, murmuring a quiet lumos as he goes.
Granger is sitting upright in her cell, leaning against the stone wall with a vacant expression on her face that turns his stomach sour. He takes care to make an excessive amount of noise as he treads the final meters to her cell bars. She doesn't react.
"I've brought you something."
Her head slowly swivels. Her voice is less raw than he expects as she says, "oh, it's the bloody sunshine boy. I thought for sure you were dead."
The guilt is a living thing as it consumes him, clawing and twisting its way through his body. He trembles. The vials in his hands clink.
"Not dead, I'm afraid," he musters as he thrusts the potions through the bars and into her cell. They clatter noisily against the stone. Draco's focus snaps to the far stair, but all is silent above.
Granger doesn't move to touch them. He doesn't blame her. Her wouldn't trust him either. "It's just a variety of healing salves. Potter said—"
He realizes his mistake the minute the name leaves his lips, but she doesn't react. She doesn't remember who Potter is, let alone what he means to her. Cold tendrils of dread run down his spine, snarling inward to crush his lungs. He lets out a wheezing gasp.
"He said what?" It is the most tragic question she could ask. Cold, analytical, absent of all that matters.
"That I should give you something that would really help. Something much better than books." He's parroting Potter's words because he has no will to create his own.
"One of your books was very useful," she says, her focus on the spot next to her on the wall. Draco frowns, unsure of what she means. Her lips twitch, and her eyes burn brighter, searing holes into the stone masonry.
He stares at the wall, trying to divine her intentions. But it's useless. She's staring at nothing. Draco rubs a hand over his eyes and turns back to Granger.
"The ones in the dark bottles are for directly after…" he can't force himself to say torture, which is daft because if he's able to do it, he should be able to say it. He plows onward, "And the light ones—the green ones—are for later."
She picks up a bottle and slowly turns it in her hands. "And why now, sunshine boy?"
Because he's a bloody coward. Because he wants to help her, but won't risk himself. Because only the judgment in Potter's eyes could have driven him here. "I was busy."
"Lucky me." He doesn't begrudge her the sarcasm. Her eyes dart to the wall again. Has her mind finally cracked? But she seems more coherent than before, her voice no longer coated in the detritus of disuse.
He hasn't been here for two months. It's a minor miracle she still moves or talks. But he knows the Dark Lord will not let her die, that she is given the bare minimum to maintain vitality and not a scrap more.
Her clothes are mere rags now, coated in blood and grime beyond recognition. The ribbons stick to her emaciated form like sodden paper, hiding nothing. He hates that he can count every rib, that her collar bone is more cliff than curve. The hollows beneath her eyes are ghastlier than ever. She's lost whatever beauty she had, her face more skeleton than woman, skin sagging inward at every contour.
Draco can't help but compare her to Astoria. In health, Granger would be more vibrant, but now she makes Astoria's delicate bones and pale skin seem the picture of sun-kissed vitality. He yearns to sketch them both, side by side, life and death, morbid though it may be.
Granger is still looking at the wall. Draco clears his throat and asks the first thing that comes to mind, "why do you call me sunshine boy?"
"You bring the light." It takes him a moment to realize she's being completely literal. "And your hair is brighter than your wand."
"Oh." Some naïve part of him had hoped for a more inspirational origin to the nickname. Had wanted to bask in the satisfaction of giving her hope. But Hermione Granger clearly knows better.
"It's a shame you leave me in the dark."
Her tone is hollow, as noncommittal as if she were talking about the weather, but the serrated blade of guilt skims across his gut, leaving him nauseous.
He looks anywhere but her living corpse. "Do you need another candle?"
"No, we're managing. Perhaps in another week."
For a second he's sure he heard her wrong. But he replays the words backward and forward and still she says we. Draco looks at the wall with renewed interest. She is seeing something there, or perhaps someone. He only sees bloodied stone.
"I'll bring you one next time," he promises, doing his best to ignore her erratic behavior. He doesn't want her knowing he suspects… something.
She lets out a bitter laugh that shakes her frame so violently he's afraid she'll collapse. She reaches out toward the spot on the wall.
"I promise," he mutters, tasting the lie like a bitter herb.
Granger doesn't deign to reply and Draco can't stand to watch her anymore, not when she's more bones and sunken flesh than any human ought to be.
He flees. It's pathetic, but he can't help it. He nearly runs up the stairs, stopping at the top as his breath comes in panicked bursts. The hall above is deserted, so he collapses against the doorframe and closes his eyes, trying not to see the image of her seared into eyelids.
Slowly his breathing returns to its natural cadence and his eyes register only darkness beneath his shuttered lids.
Then he hears her.
Granger is talking. He dips his wand and waves it in a nonverbal auditory enchantment. Her raw voice is now crystal clear.
"I hate him."
There is no ambiguity as to whom she refers. He hates himself too.
Draco peers around the corner to the stairwell, but the hall above is still clear of any of his unsavory companions. He turns his attention back to the abyss below. Granger is speaking again.
"I bloody well hate you too, Tom. You're the entire reason my life—not that I even know what that was—is completely fucking ruined. We both know I wouldn't be down here if you hadn't set out to rule the whole bloody world or whatever the hell it is you thought you'd do as Lord bloody Voldemort."
It takes all of Draco's years as a Malfoy and a Death Eater not to react to her words. Who in Salazar's name is she talking to? It almost sounds as if she's talking to the Dark Lord himself, but that's preposterous. The Dark Lord hasn't deigned to see Granger since he found out he couldn't crack her mind open like a ripe summer melon. He has never set foot in the dungeons as far as Draco knows.
But who else would she call Lord Voldemort?
He forces his breathing into an even cadence and stares into the depths below, craving more. The words she speaks are wrapped in secrets, in knowledge that might be of some use to Potter. Perhaps he will not have to face the Savior of the Wizarding World empty handed. Perhaps he will not have to beg for his life when he doesn't deliver Hermione Granger safely to her lover.
"That's all good in theory, Tom," Granger says below. "But how the bloody hell are you going to do it?" There's a beat of silence and then she spits, "I don't need to know? That's rubbish. The moment you took my blood, you started playing with both our lives. So either bloody kill me already like you intended or tell me your plan."
Draco starts, his teeth clamping down on his tongue. He tastes blood as he hears her words reverberate through him. Bloody kill me already.
He's not ready for her to be gone. Not ready to face the consequences of his cowardice. Not ready to watch Potter's eyes dim, to feel his hatred and judgment searing into Draco's guilty bones.
But then she says, "How are we going to manage that?"
Whoever—whatever she's talking to hasn't killed her. Draco sighs and runs a hand through his hair, head thumping back against the stone in exhaustion.
"Yes, but the problem is I don't trust you at all, Tom."
"Are you alright?"
It takes him several seconds longer than it should to realize the second voice doesn't belong to Granger. A breath more to understand he's been caught loitering by the dungeon stair. And nearly half a minute to realize it doesn't matter since the speaker is Astoria Greengrass.
Draco quickly ends the sonic amplification charm and steps away from the wall. "As well as can be expected," he replies to her question, not quite meeting her warm honey gaze.
"Walk with me?"
He nods and falls into step with her as she moves down the hall, the dungeon stair soon falling out of sight. He glances over his shoulder, searching for the invisible presence Granger so clearly spoke with. But there's nothing but stale Manor air and the sound of their footfalls.
As they near the library, Astoria glances up at him through her golden lashes. "My mother asked about you."
He raises a brow and her cheeks flush a beautiful rose. "Ah, I see. What did you tell her?"
"That neither of us are ready for marriage yet." Astoria's color deepens. "She told me that if we aren't ready for marriage, we shouldn't be… intimate." She pauses, teeth worrying gently at her lower lip. "It appears our deception may have worked too well. She's fluttering about, asking constantly if I'm with child and other preposterous things."
Draco stifles the amused chuckle that rises in his throat. He can hear Astoria's mother screeching at her that she ought to have known better than to let the Malfoy brat into her bed. He supposes it amuses him the most because it is true, but not in the way the woman believes. He and Astoria have been sleeping together in his room more often than not. They thought it would keep their parents off their backs, not draw their focus toward their supposed indiscretion.
Of course, Draco hasn't heard a word of disapproval from either of his parents. He supposes that is the privilege of being the boy. His behavior is expected, even encouraged. But for Astoria they have crossed some sordid line that has no business existing.
He leans back against the library door and crosses his arms. "What do you want to do about it?" He got her into this bloody mess, he will certainly do what he must to get her out of it.
Astoria peers down both directions of the hall before tugging him into the library and closing the door. She weaves her way through the maze of bookcases and furniture until she's certain they are alone. Only then does she look up at Draco, her eyes heavy and serious. "I need you to tell me the truth."
He doesn't pretend to misunderstand. "What do you need to know?"
"Could it ever work? You and I? If you tried?"
Her words are a cold bucket of ice upon his head. He sucks in a breath and remembers his vow to help her. In this, at least, he will not be a coward. "No, I don't think it would."
"Am I not beautiful?" Her voice is small and lost and he realizes she doesn't understand. She thinks he desires another, more beautiful girl.
"You're the loveliest young lady I've ever seen, Astoria. I want to draw you constantly, to capture the perfect curves of your body." Her eyes brighten and he speaks quickly to forestall the hope rising in their depths. "But I find you beautiful in the same way I find a lion or tiger beautiful."
Her brow crinkles, a crease forming between her delicate brows. "What do you mean, Draco?"
"I don't want to kiss you—although you are a wonderful kisser. I don't want you because…" He takes a deep breath and gathers her hands in his. "Because I'm not attracted to women, Astoria. I like men."
"Oh." Her mouth forms a perfect "O" as she stares up at him. Her eyes tumble through a hundred shades of amber before she laughs. She pulls her hands away from Draco's and covers her mouth as her shoulders shake. "Merlin, Draco. Why didn't you just bloody say so ages ago?"
"I thought you knew."
"I knew you were in love with someone else; I didn't know it was a boy!" She laughs again. "Oh, the fun we could have had if only I'd known."
Draco blinks at her, eyes wide. She thinks he's in love with someone? That's why she'd been so willing to participate in their ruse? A hot lance of panic tears through his gut. She thinks he's in love with someone.
Astoria grins up at him, mirth in her honey eyes. "So who is he? Is it another Death Eater? No… you're far too touchy for it to be someone here. Is it someone from school? Someone your parents wouldn't approve of? Ah, I know! Harry bloody Potter. You're in love with Harry Potter."
The adrenaline in his veins is instant, more intense than what he's experienced in the heat of battle. His entire body hums, the danger of her words coursing through him like electricity. She cannot possibly know. The rational part of his brain tells him she's only teasing, picking the least likely boy she knows. But Draco isn't rational right now. He's bloody terrified.
"Shut up," he hisses, searching the shadows.
Astoria keeps laughing until she looks at him. And then in one horrible moment, she knows. More passes between them in that moment than he knew was possible. She knows how he feels. Who he desires. But also how utterly hopeless his feelings are. And most importantly, she knows he is in danger. That the very feelings that knot his sinews into tapestries of unrequited desire, will get him killed in an instant.
"Of course you don't like Potter!" Her laugh is forced, her voice shrill. She is trying too hard.
Draco scoffs, pretends the Dark Lord is just around the corner, listening to his every word. For all he knows, it's true. "I'd rather gut that Mudblood-loving bastard than touch him. I imagine I'd come down with some horrible Muggle disease if he ever put his filthy hands on me."
Astoria chortles and it's completely wrong. He swallows down the nausea that's threatening to devour him. He can fall apart later.
"I can't wait until the Dark Lord ends him for good."
"Neither can I." The words are harder to say than he expected, despite the stakes.
Astoria leans against the bookcase, her hip bumping the aging tomes while her arms settle across her chest. "So who is he? For real this time?"
Draco sighs and pulls a name out of his ass, "Blaise Zabini. He's got the best abs in the world."
It's honest to Merlin true and she hums appreciatively. "Mm-hmm. Too bad his mother took him to France this year. Although I'm sure he'll be back when all this blows over and you two can get to fucking like rabbits."
Her vulgarity draws a surprised laugh from him, his lips still tingling with adrenaline. "Salazar, Astoria, must you be so crude?"
"You strung me along for way too long. I can be as crude as I want."
The playfulness is slowly returning to her voice and he feels the tension ratchet down, his limbs no longer carved from marble. The rueful smile that graces his lips is almost real. "I deserved that."
Astoria stands on her tip-toes and plants a wet kiss on his lips. "You most certainly did. You arse."
Then she turns on her heel and struts out of the library. Draco realizes they never decided what to do about her mother. He sighs, burying his face in his hands. Merlin, he just wants a break. One moment where his entire world isn't collapsing around him. Where he doesn't have to pretend.
But Draco lives in a Manor populated by blood-thirsty monsters and ravenous monsters don't take holidays.
He swallows, drags his hands through his gel slicked hair and stands straight. Later. He can't afford to feel right now.
He skims his fingers, still overly sensitive, over the tomes, searching the rows for the section of Hogwarts student records he knows the Malfoys have kept for centuries. He pulls every twentieth century volume from the shelf and sets them with a dull thud on the nearest table. Somewhere in these records is the answer to the identity of Granger's Tom. To the identity of Lord Voldemort himself.