Notes: The scene you've been waiting for... or at least several of you have. Thank you so much for your support and comments. They are so appreciated.
WARNINGS: Sexual content, not super explicit, but we're more M than prior scenes.
17. The First My Thought, the Other My Desire
"Fuck."
Draco feels the curve of Tom's smile against his skin. He drops his head back against the cot and tries to swallow the moan edging up his throat.
They haven't put up any silencing spells and he has no intention of interrupting what little sleep Hermione can find. Tom moves his tongue in a particularly wicked way and Draco bites down on the inside of his own wrist. He tastes blood in his mouth, but he can't feel the sting of the wound.
All he feels is Tom's mouth on him, around him, his tongue doing hypnotic things to him. He knows he will never tire of this particular sensation. Tom hums and Draco's teeth clamp down harder.
Tom shifts, his mouth trailing lower as his hand replaces the bobbing of his mouth. Draco's breath hitches and a breathy whine escapes his clamped lips. Tom's laughter is dark and full of promise. Draco thrusts into the other boy's hand, impatient and near bursting with need. It only takes a few strategic swipes of Tom's tongue for Draco to explode, ribbons of white coating his stomach.
When he can breathe without danger of hyperventilating, Draco slowly eases his jaw open. His hand is a bloody mess.
Tom has already erased the evidence of their activity with a wave of his wand. He throws the sheet over Draco and settles on the end of the small cot. Draco might be offended if he didn't already understand Tom reserved all his pillow talk for Hermione.
Draco grimaces as he flexes his fingers. Rivulets of red drip down his hand.
"You could always just scream," Tom comments mildly, eyeing the blood.
"Or you could agree to bloody silence the room," Draco retorts, wincing.
The other boy sighs and motions toward the offending limb. "Give it here." Draco lets Tom grip his wrist, sliding along the bed as Tom pulls. "You've actually bitten into flesh. I suppose I'm impressed. Remind me not to let you get your teeth on me during a fight."
"Why in the world would I use my teeth in a fight?"
"Salazar knows, Malfoy. Desperate times call for desperate measures."
Draco doesn't bother to reply. "So can you fix it?"
Tom gives him an annoyed glance, azure eyes blue embers in the moonlight. "You can bloody fix it."
Draco bloody well knows that. "I thought you were offering…"
"No, I just wanted to see how much of an effect I have on you." Tom drops his arm and Draco tries his damnedest not to grind his teeth.
He pulls his wand out from under his pillow and heals the puncture marks.
"You don't have to be such a bloody ass, Riddle."
"You like it."
"I like it when your smart mouth is wrapped around my dick. I don't particularly enjoy it when you're treating me like shit," Draco snaps.
He feels the full weight of Tom's gaze focus in on his face. Now he has the other boy's attention. He's not sure if this is a good or bad thing. Tom studies him silently and Draco has no idea what he sees in the moon drenched shadows of his face.
"I was under the impression you were simply here for the shagging, Malfoy. That your interest did not extend beyond such base needs." Tom's tone is flat, the entire statement lacking any affect.
"I was under the impression you were simply ensuring my cooperation until you got Granger out." Draco pauses, eyes raking over Tom. "But she's free and you're still in my bed."
Draco sees the column of Tom's neck bob as he swallows. It's only the tiniest crack in his armor, but Draco will take it. He continues, "so it seems the situation has changed for both of us."
Tom's glare is sharper than a dagger as he stares back at Draco. "So you're no longer pining after Potter."
Draco certainly is, but he knows the futility of his feelings now. Any latent hope has long since dispersed. "No. Potter doesn't like boys. Kind of puts the odds of our relationship at nil."
Tom shifts, his jaw tensing. "And what exactly do you expect from me?"
He hasn't transferred his obsession with Potter to Tom, if that's what he's worried about. Draco doubts he'll ever feel so completely for anyone again. First love cuts the deepest and all that nonsense.
Draco honestly doesn't have an answer to Tom's question. He knows he wants more than a hook up, but he's not interested in full blown relationship either. He evades instead. "You love Hermione."
This time Tom's entire body freezes. His eyes hone to wicked daggers. "You know nothing about that."
Draco throws his hands up. "I don't, but I don't think it helps either you or I to deny that something lies between the two of you."
The darker boy looks abruptly away. Draco feels the absence of his stare like the absence of the sun. "Hermione and I are complicated."
"And I don't want to make it more complicated," Draco explains, voice soft. Tom seems to deflate as he looks back at Draco, becoming more human than usual. It's disconcerting, but helps Draco understand why Hermione views him differently.
Tom swallows and when he speaks, his voice is a ragged specter of its usual timbre. "When McNair came down the last time, we were still linked. I could feel everything she felt." Tom looks up through ebony waves and holds Draco's stare until there is no doubt as to his meaning. "I sucked his soul dry, but not before he'd—"
He cuts off and Draco doesn't dare say a word.
No wonder they're inseparable.
Tom clears his throat. His voice is still wrong when he says, "I wanted to hurt you for it. To make you pay for what he did to her. But then I spent so much time with you. I realized you might be a bloody coward Malfoy, but you're a piss poor Death Eater. Killing you wouldn't avenge a bloody thing."
Draco isn't sure this is a compliment. He licks his lips and meets Tom's broken stare. "I'd rather not be a bloody coward, but I'm okay being a rubbish Death Eater."
"Then start making your own decisions." Tom's lips press into a thin line before he asks, "What do you want? Not what's easier or better or the most practical decision. But what do you, Draco bloody Malfoy, want?"
The way Tom's features glow in the moonlight, the ivory of his skin a perfect contrast to the ebony of the night, makes the answer simple. Draco crosses the distance between them in a heartbeat. He has made this decision before. He will make it again.
Tom's lips are already parted. They crash into each other and tumble onto the bed. Draco doesn't bother to muffle his cries this time.
When they are stripped bare and panting beside each other, the scent of sex and salt mixing with the warm night air, Draco decides to take the next step toward embracing courage.
"We need to bring Potter here."
Tom's heaving breaths stop entirely. His voice is a dark growl when he asks, "what?"
"Not just for Hermione, but for all of us."
"Explain."
"You want to kill him, don't you?" Draco doesn't need to specify the Dark Lord.
"I want to take back what he's stolen from me. I want the rest of my bloody soul and all of my magic. And then I want to watch him burn for what he's done to Hermione."
Draco assumed as much, but it's different to hear Tom snarling the words into the space between them.
"Then you need Potter. The secret to destroying the Dark Lord lies with Potter."
The concept clearly pains Tom, but he nods reluctantly. "Fine. If you think we can trust him."
"I do." Never mind that Potter has no idea Tom exists. Draco knows their introduction won't go well, but he's come to the conclusion the mess is worth the alliance. They can't hide for eternity; Draco does want Astoria to know he's still among the living. But he can't reclaim that part of his life until the Dark Lord is well and truly vanquished.
Draco knows Tom is already spinning infinite plots involving Potter in his nefarious mind. He hopes one of them bloody works.
Draco clears his throat and Tom's focus returns to him. "And while we're on that subject, is there anything you can do about this?"
He extends his arm, the Dark Mark an angry welt against his pale skin. His previous attempts to carve it from his flesh have left it mottled, but unmistakable. Tom raises a dark brow in question.
"Since technically you created it, I was wondering if you could destroy it?"
Tom runs a finger over the enchanted tattoo. The snake writhes under his touch. Draco has noticed this before and hopes it might be a sign the mark reacts to Tom as if he were the Dark Lord.
An eerie smile settles over Tom's lips as he lets out a chilling series of hisses. Draco is well aware of his ability to speak parseltongue, but it is rather another thing to experience it. Shivers run down his spine, but his pulse spikes with excitement. It's a confusing reaction that Draco refuses to examine.
The snake on his arm uncoils from the skull entirely. Draco's skin tingles as if tiny particles of ice bite into him.
Tom's stare is pure sin as he grins up at Draco through ebony bangs. "I think I can definitely do something about this. You might even enjoy it."
Draco gulps, hand fisting in the sheets. Tom's smile only grows.
The train station is gigantic. At least, it feels that way to Hermione. She peers over the platform to the tracks below. She remembers trains. Whatever she may have forced out of her head, it didn't involve this particular form of shared transportation. She does not, however, recall the Hogwarts Express. She can't help but wonder what made the train to Hogwarts, which she has heard about from both Tom and Draco, so important that she had to forget it. No reasonable explanation occurs to her.
It's further proof that something went very wrong when she erased her memory. Hermione doesn't like to think about why that might be. None of the explanations are remotely comforting.
She watches the line of Draco's shoulders tighten as a double-decker train pulls into the station. This must be it.
Thanks to the Legilimency they tried before, Hermione knows who she's looking for. Her palms are sweating far too much for the early morning hour—the night chill still clings to her skin. She wraps her oversized cardigan more tightly around her shoulders.
Draco slides a glance at her. "Are you okay?" he asks softly, taking care not to let his voice travel.
Hermione is most definitely not okay. She wants to turn and run until the blue of the sky swallows her whole and she is no longer broken. But she already knows life is the harsh scrape of inescapable moments. So she smiles thinly at Draco and searches the disembarking passengers.
He's easy to find in the lazy morning crowd. Despite already knowing Draco was right, Hermione acknowledges Harry Potter shares a fair number of physical attributes with Tom Riddle. But what makes her feel so safe with Tom—the confident set of his shoulders, the keen edge of his luminous eyes—is absent in the boy who hurries toward them.
A smile tugs at Harry's lips—thinner and more chapped than Tom's. He runs the final steps to where they wait. Dark green eyes sweep over Draco briefly before drinking in Hermione. She feels distinctly uncomfortable, as if she were standing on the platform naked.
Harry's smile threatens to crack his face in half as he opens his arms and steps toward her. Hermione is behind Draco in an instant, his familiar bulk a shield. The smile extinguishes from Harry's face. He lets his arms drop to his sides.
"I'm sorry," she says from the safety behind Draco's shoulder. "I don't do well with new people. Or really people at all."
She can't miss the heartbreak that stretches across Harry's face. But his voice is even when he replies, "I understand. Draco told me what happened to you."
Her focus flickers to grey eyes. "Not all of it," the blond assures. "And Hermione has figured out more about what happened to her memory since we last talked."
"Right," Harry murmurs. He raises a hand, as if waving to a friend across the station. "I suppose we should do this properly then. Hello, I'm Harry Potter."
Hermione edges her way around Draco until they're shoulder to shoulder. "Hermione Granger. I've heard a lot about you."
"I hope all of it was good." The attempt at humor falls as flat as the departing train's horn.
Draco clears his throat and motions toward the exit of the station. "We should probably get going. We try to avoid extended periods in public."
"Of course," Harry agrees. "I changed lines multiple times England and I haven't used a lick of magic since crossing the channel. I'd say it's more than good enough if I didn't know how clever some of the Death Eaters have become."
She sees Draco's eyes flicker to his newly blank forearm. It is the most blatant sign he is no longer associated with the silver-masked monsters. She is not entirely sure how he destroyed the mark, but she suspects Tom had something to do with it.
Harry blinks as he realizes what both of them are looking at. He doesn't hesitate when he reaches for Draco's arm, and Draco doesn't resist as the other boy pulls the unblemished skin closer. Green eyes are wide as he asks, "how?"
For an inexplicable reason, Draco blushes scarlet. He clears his throat several times before saying, "I had help."
So Hermione is correct. She isn't particularly sure why that truth elicits such a dramatic reaction from Draco. She knows Draco and Tom are fairly close. They shared a room at the Manor and now spend much of their free time together, hushed whispers passing between them. None of that explains the flush still staining Draco's pale features.
Harry gives Draco an odd look, but lets it go. Hermione sticks close to Draco, keeping his bulk between her and the stranger who she's supposed to love.
She keeps trying to feel something, the embers of friendship if not love, but all she finds is a slippery wall of obsidian nothing.
She surreptitiously studies him over the line of Draco's shoulders. He's handsome, but not even close to as arresting as Tom. Strangers stare when she walks with Tom, appreciative glances trailing them no matter where they go. Harry draws no such attention. His hair is a touch too wild. His eyes are more moss than emerald. His shoulders pitch forward the slightest bit, as if he is unused to standing straight. It makes him seem smaller, less confident than he ought to be. His mouth is pleasing enough, but she can't imagine his lips against hers. Everything about him strikes her as a touch too dull. She wonders if Tom is simply too radiant.
She concludes the comparison is unfair. She endeavors to see Harry as an independent entity, entirely separate from her perception of Tom. It helps. She notices the subtle brush of freckles across his cheeks and the dimple in his chin. But it doesn't make her feel anything beyond detached interest.
Hermione sighs and gives up. She studies the seabirds instead, watching the vast arcs of their dance above the sparkling water. The heat is rising and she no longer needs to clutch her lilac cardigan closed, but she can't quite make her fingers unclench. She is still too aware of the stranger who walks beside them.
Draco is talking to Harry, but their conversation doesn't register. She counts the steps until they'll reach the cottage. It's less than a thousand now. She resists the urge to run. She is strong. She can manage meeting a piece of her past without breaking down, without running to Tom. She cannot afford to need him so completely.
Hermione is trembling by the time she takes the final steps into their cottage. It's an odd mixture of anxiety and elation coursing through her veins. The familiar walls assuage her, but the knowledge of what is yet to come brings a sharp tang of dread to the back of her throat.
Harry Potter doesn't know about Tom. And she knows that's about to change.
Hermione doesn't fear for Tom so much as for what he will do if the boy stepping across the threshold pushes him. She sees the same unease reflected in the silver mirrors of Draco's eyes.
Harry turns in a slow circle, examining their small sitting room as Draco clicks the door shut. All the air seems to go out of the room. Hermione's lungs strain, the atmosphere too thin to sustain her bated breaths.
Sensing the rising anxiety, Harry glances between them. He runs a hand through wild black hair. "What the bloody hell haven't you told me, Malfoy?"
"You know I have a partner." Harry nods and gestures for Draco to get on with it. "I never told you who he was for a very specific reason."
The brunette's brows narrow. "Who could possibly be so bad, Malfoy? You and I have bloody reconciled. I can hardly think of anyone less likely to be my friend."
Draco freezes for a moment, something in Harry's response catching him off guard. His cheeks gain back some of their earlier color. Hermione truly has no idea what's going on. She shifts beside him and Draco shakes his head. His gaze is sharp when he looks back at their guest.
"Believe me, there's someone less likely to be your ally."
"Sweet Salazar, this is ridiculous," Tom drawls as he emerges from the hallway.
Draco chokes. Harry's gaze swings between the two of them like a chaotic pendulum. He finally settles his bewildered stare on Tom. "Who the hell are you?"
"Don't you want the honors?" There's an edge to Tom's question Hermione doesn't understand. Sizzling heat seems to pass between Tom's scalding sapphire stare and Draco's equally charged metallic one. Hermione abruptly realizes she's missed something dreadfully important. At least Harry seems equally, if not more, confused.
Draco's teeth grind before he speaks, low and saturated with emotion, "Harry Potter, meet Tom Riddle."
The green jet of light is racing for Tom's head before Hermione realizes what Harry's said. She doesn't know the meaning of the two words, but she can see her own horror in the quicksilver of Draco's stare.
Tom ducks and the wall splinters behind him.
"No need to be so rude," he hisses, his wand weaving a complex pattern Hermione can't hope to understand.
Draco casts Tom a charged look before the blond plows into Harry. Harry's wand flies from his grip as they grapple on the floor. Hermione stoops to pick it up and Harry freezes. Draco immediately crawls off of him. Blood rushes to the surface of his alabaster skin in fist-shaped impressions. The blond rubs his jaw and gives Harry a rueful look.
"You've improved your punch since school, Potter."
Harry ignores him. He only has eyes for Hermione. He slowly scrambles to his knees, but doesn't bother rising further. Even though she doesn't know his features, she sees the devastation etched into them. She doesn't understand what she has done.
Hermione feels Tom come up behind her. No matter the pain that fractures Harry's mossy eyes, she can't help leaning back into the warmth of him. One of his arms snakes around her waist and she sighs. Tom's lips caress the curve of her neck. She feels his breath as he says, "lovely to meet you, Harry Potter. It appears we've gotten off on the wrong foot. I promise not to hold the murder attempt against you."
"Hermione…"
She can't tell if the word is a plea or a question or something else entirely. Harry stares at her, at them, with vivid shock. But as the moments trickle by, the emotion distorts to something sharper, all cruel edges and cold fury.
Harry rises deliberately to his feet and turns away from Hermione and Tom. "You've… with him?"
Draco's eyes widen to twin moons. Tom tenses, the arm around her becoming solid steel. She feels him shake his head, but can't fathom why. Draco looks back to Harry, something like shame wilting his angular features.
"That's hardly the point," he dismisses. Hermione once again feels out of sync, as if the world is moving a second or two faster and she can't seem to catch up. This isn't something she's forgotten; this is something she's never known.
Harry looks over his shoulder for half a heartbeat, just long enough for Hermione to see the naked betrayal beneath his calm façade. She should feel remorse, but her heartbeat is steady, soothed by the even rise and fall of Tom's chest against her back.
She is not what Harry expected. That much is clear.
The boy who loves her turns his venom on Draco. "You owe me a bloody good explanation."
Draco looks caught, desperate to avoid the conversation they all knew would come. He sighs and motions toward the small sofa and armchair that comprise their cramped living room. "Perhaps you'd better sit."
Hermione finds herself wedged between Draco and Tom on the couch as Harry glares daggers at the lot of them from the adjacent chair. She thinks none of them warrant this frosty behavior, but the then remembers how much of an ass Tom can be and reconsiders. He practically poured fuel on the fire when he embraced Hermione in front of her should-be boyfriend.
She tries to shift away from Tom, but the couch is meant for two and all she does is knock awkwardly against Draco. The blond gives her a side glance and she grimaces in the worst impression of a smile. He frowns, but goes back to watching Harry.
The silence between them is the most oppressive thing Hermione has felt since escaping Malfoy Manor. She has to fill it before her thoughts become silent daggers.
"I assume you've heard of a Horcrux."
Harry starts, his entire body going rigid. Whatever he expected to hear, this isn't it.
Hermione continues, "well, at Malfoy Manor Draco accidently gave me one of—" she cuts off, remembering the warning Draco gave her about the Taboo attached to Voldemort's name. "One of the Dark Lord's Horcruxes. But it wasn't simply a vessel for his soul, it was…"
"Me," Tom cuts in, voice smooth silk. "You'll find I'm not really the same as my counterpart. In addition to retaining my original body, I also have the majority share of… our soul."
"Excuse me if I don't roll over and believe a single word out of your foul lips."
Tom's lips are anything but foul. Hermione shakes her head. Now is hardly the time to be distracted by Tom's attractive qualities. She focuses on Harry, ignoring his bitter stare.
"He's telling the truth. For a while Tom was incorporeal because he didn't want to kill me." No need to explain that his reasons for the decision had been entirely practical. "During that time, we were linked. I'd used a bit of my blood to get him out of the diary Draco gave me—"
"You used her blood?" Harry is halfway out of his chair, the rage distorting his features into a wholly unpleasant visage.
Hermione flinches and Tom puts a hand on her knee. "I heard my counterpart came back in large part because of your blood."
Harry growls low in his throat, ire focusing on Tom like the sun through a looking glass. "That is hardly the same thing."
"I would agree," is Tom's calm reply. "Blood freely given should hardly be compared to blood taken. The magic is entirely different."
Harry deflates, both hands clawing into his hair. "Wonderful. You chose to resurrect the snake's younger, more rubbish half."
She feels tension coil in Tom's frame. She speaks before it has a chance to spring free. "Let's reserve judgement, shall we? Tom and I were linked because of my blood. Because of that link, Tom understands things about my time in captivity that I can hardly bring myself to remember. When the opportune moment came, we destroyed a Death Eater to allow Tom to fully regenerate."
There is so much more beneath her words. Acres of brambles and agony. But Harry Potter is not someone she knows, even if she ought to. He does not get to see her fetid scars.
Tom presses his lips to her temple and she closes her eyes. She thinks only of the steady rise and fall of her chest, of the warmth of both Tom and Draco beside her. She is here and now. Not then. She will never be then again.
When she opens her eyes, she sees dull green eyes limned with moisture. She wishes she could understand why.
Harry doesn't look away as he asks, "so what else haven't you told me, Malfoy?"