I don't own Harry Potter
"Hello"
Perhaps it is the calm deliverance of the greeting that has Tom intrigued first.
It's a dark night, the moon barely a sliver, light swallowed by the heavy gray clouds greedily crawling across the sky. The rain stopped a few hours ago but the streets remain slick and dangerous, pools reflecting silver even in the dim illumination. It may be partly why there are few about at this time, though he supposes it is also partially contributed to the late hour. But no matter, there is always a hush when he is on the hunt and afterwards too. It's a wonder he didn't hear her earlier.
Tom is covered in blood, palms coated like he simply dipped them in fresh paint. There is also a body, broken and twisted at all the wrong angles, before him. She's a glorious sight, carved open and glassy eyed and mangled. Her name was Amy Benson and he should know. Tom takes care to know each and every one of his victims before taking their lives. It's part of the thrill of it, he supposes, and perhaps it is this which makes him more a monster than he already is. In the end, he cares not.
To him, it is artwork. He wonders, briefly and without care, what Amy saw when she was laid upon her final resting place, hard cobblestone digging in her back and frothing at the mouth like some pitiful animal.
Then, much more attentively, with much more fascination, he wonders what the other girl thinks when she sees such sin and remains serene. He finds he really wants to know.
The girl steps over the body, daintily, and without nary a glance down. There is arsenic rotting her eyes and her hair carries a deep copper sheen, the sort of colors that can not be compared to another. His first impression is that her floor length dress, gathered in elegant ruffles and cinched at the waist from a corset, is black. It's a notion quickly countered at the juxtaposition of the pitch material of the toe of her boot peeking out from under the heavy fabric, the ebony silk of her gloves and the vibrant red lace of her parasol. No, her gown is so dark it looks back, especially in the shadows of the dank alley where they both stand, but it's hue is a different type of sinister in its shade of coagulated blood.
She smiles and it's a lovely smile that sits wrong on her cheeks,
"Hello" she says again, angelic and girlish, "I'm Harry"
She offers one gloved hand delicately out to him.
He could kill her, he thinks, but he is much too curious to even consider it for longer than a fleeting moment. Tom carefully takes the proffered appendage and placed a lingering kiss on her knuckles with a short bow,
"Tom. It's a pleasure"
He doesn't even bother cleaning his fingers of blood, and instead drags a heavy lidded gaze over where red has smeared upon her skin- invisible on her glove but delectably bright on her flesh.
She smiles again, lashes fluttering, all socialite mannerisms, but this time there's a familiar, cruel glint in her eyes that fits better than anything sweetly innocent would have. He can recognize such a look anywhere, knows it intimately with how much he's seen it reflected in the mirror.
It takes an embarrassingly long time to realize that she must be from the Gryffindor Court, considering the colors she wears- the Heiress Harriette. He, being Heir Slytherin, should consider her an enemy.
But how could he? They were much alike, she and he. Such an intoxicating thought. And he cannot help but decide that this- this is much more fun.
After all, looking over her once more, he thinks she looks stunning in red.
He also thinks she would look even more exquisite in green.
"Fancy yourself a god, Tom?" Harry asks after a beat of silence, eyes openly, morbidly curious,
"Perhaps not yet" he replies slowly, and deliberately lets his gaze fall onto the body sprawled, undignified, behind her, "but to them? Yes. For who decides their fates but I?"
She follows his eyes, taking in the corpse for the first time. Her own are detached and clinical, but then she wrinkles her nose,
"I do hope the stench will wash from my clothing"
"Should you find the results not to your utmost satisfaction, I would be delighted in your company whilst I obtain you recompense for such a crime"
She looks immensely pleased, "such a gentleman" she murmurs, "I wonder if you may deign to join me in a turn outside the marketplace"
Tom smirks, enraptured, "I would have offered already if it was not considered crass"
"How lovely" she obligingly grips her hand gracefully on his extended forearm and they set a pace away from the alley, polished shoes clicking in tandem on the ground.