Year 6: Chapter Three

In the end, Amelia and Susan stayed at Grimmauld Place for another three days while the investigation continued, and even when Amelia left, Susan remained behind. She said that she wanted to be there for Neville whenever he got out of Saint Mungo's. That took another two days.

Tom didn't pay much attention to any of this, because once Hermione arrived, he was busy sketching out the beginnings of a series of law reforms.

She, after having read all manner of books, both those on the subject of pureblood traditions and those only tangentially related, agreed that muggleborns needed to be taught about Magical Britain much, much sooner. (Or, at the very least, at all, because certainly no one in a position of authority had ever made an attempt to explain it to her.) She also agreed with Tom that merely attending a school on weekends or over the summer wouldn't be effective enough, so having vetted pureblood families sponsor muggleborn students was a good idea. She disagreed, however, on the form that sponsorship should take.

"You can't just steal children from their families," Hermione said, giving Tom a dirty look.

Tom frowned at her. "I think I very well could," he replied. "But even going along with your objection, I fail to see how it could possibly be wrong to give these children better lives."

Hermione threw her hands up in the air and flopped back on his bed. "Because, Tom, what about their parents? You know, the people who love them? The child might never remember them, depending how young you took them, but you'd be destroying the rest of the family."

Tom snorted. "Parents who would eventually grow to hate and fear their child. It'd be better for them to mourn the child they thought they'd love than the child they failed to love." He'd seen it time and again: muggleborn children who spent every break at Hogwarts, who showed up each year with bruises, who failed to return after summer break, who escaped into the magical world with all its prejudices because there was nowhere else for them to go. That didn't even count the number of children who died before ever receiving their Hogwarts letter.

"My parents don't hate or fear me," Hermione retorted.

"Don't they?" Tom asked. He knew it was a mistake the moment he said it, but he couldn't turn back time. Instead, at her affronted look, he narrowed his eyes and crossed his arms. "You spend nine months or so of the year away from them, yet they don't protest you leaving after only a few weeks with them. The entire time you were there, I could feel nothing but anxiety and stress and impatience from you. Perhaps your parents aren't the type to abuse or even kill a child in their care for the high crime of possessing magic, but don't try to tell me your relationship is close or loving."

Hermione sat up, trembling. "Sometimes I forget what you really are," she hissed, "so thank you so much for reminding me."

Tom watched as Hermione stalked out and rubbed his forehead. That could have gone better. Hermione was usually so logical, he forgot sometimes that she was still just a teenager prone to irrational emotional outbursts.

Ginny entered a few minutes later wearing a look of exasperation. "She's furious with you right now," she commented. "What did you say to her?"

"I pointed out that her parents don't love her the way she likes to think they do," he said without looking up from his book. "She's only angry because she can't refute it."

Ginny sighed heavily. "Tom, you don't tell people that their family doesn't love them. It's just… It's a horrible thing to say, even if it's true and even if you're certain they already know it." She sat down next to him on the bed and regarded him silently for a while before sighing again. "Did telling her help you at all? Did it help her at all?"

Tom hesitated in the process of turning a page. At last, he snapped the book closed and turned to face Ginny. "She needs to understand that muggles shouldn't be allowed to raise magical children. At best, they end up distant. At worst, the parents kill the child. There's no happy ending for either party."

After considering that for a few minutes, Ginny shrugged and stood. "Even if you're right, you went about it in the wrong way. Normally, I'd suggest apologizing, but unless you actually feel sorry, I suppose there's no point." Tom scowled at her assumption that he hadn't already realized these things. She ignored him, crossed the room, and settled down at the desk. "For the ring, what if we placed another compulsion on you to destroy it before putting it on? And I think you should wear gloves anyway, even if the curse would go through them. It can't hurt, and if they offer even a miniscule amount of protection, that's still better than nothing."

Tom accepted the shift in conversation easily and switched from law reform to horcrux retrieval. He'd wait it out. Hermione would realize he was right eventually.

Or, he thought a few days later, as he led Neville downstairs to see Bella, perhaps she wouldn't. He grimaced at the thought of an apology and forced his mind away from the topic and back to Neville. Their unexpected guests had all left, so it was just the Weasleys, Hermione, and Neville at Headquarters most days. Black hated the place and spent most of his time out in muggle London, while Lupin was busy avoiding the place to reduce the risk of running into Tonks. Severus hadn't been by even once, and neither had Dumbledore.

Neville stopped in front of Bella's cell and had Tom remove the Silencing ward. He was trembling noticeably, something the witch didn't fail to comment on. "Awww, is the baby Longbottom scared of wittle old Bella?" she cooed, lips turning down into a pout even as her eyes remained alight with malicious intent.

Neville's expression hardened, and the shaking stopped. "I'm not afraid of you," he said quietly. "I'm afraid of what I might do to you." He looked to Tom. "Do you need anything in return?" he asked. "Since she's… well, since she was yours?"

Tom shook his head. "Nothing like that, but for the sake of taking down Voldemort, I'd appreciate it if you avoided killing her."

After a second's thought, Neville's eyes widened. Tom wasn't surprised. The boy might not be a genius like Tom and Hermione, but he was on the team researching Gringotts, and it wasn't hard to connect the dots. Neville nodded seriously. "I won't do anything to prevent you from making full use of her then," he said.

"Have fun," Tom said. "The wards will let spells in, but you won't be able to physically reach her. If you need to give her something, call Kreacher and ask for his help. I've already told him to obey you while you're working on her."

Neville's eyebrows lifted. "He agreed?"

Tom shrugged. "She's not the Bellatrix he knew and loved. Of course, he still likes her more than Sirius but, well, that's not difficult." Out of the corner of his eye, he caught a flinch from Bella and smirked. She'd hidden it well - so well that Voldemort had never realized it - but some part of her former self remained. Whether Neville would destroy that last vestige of Bellatrix Black or draw it out remained to be seen, but either way should prove interesting to watch. "Call me if you need me," he said and climbed the stairs again, leaving Neville to it.

He'd debated this with Black, who didn't think anyone should spend time alone with his cousin for any reason. Tom, however, thought revenge should be private unless the person wished otherwise, and Neville had said nothing about wanting this process to be open for public consumption. Faced with that logic, Black reluctantly backed down after getting a verbal promise that Tom would remain nearby in case his friend needed him.

Hermione awaited him at the top of the stairs, arms crossed. It was not the stance of someone about to admit they'd overreacted. Tom sighed. "Yes?"

"Luna wants to come over," she said shortly, handing him a letter. She looked past him at the door leading down to the cells. "You're just going to leave Neville alone with her?"

"Unless he asks me to stay," Tom agreed.

The brunette shot him a scathing glare, then… Tom hesitated to say she 'flounced' down the stairs, because it wasn't quite correct, but her movements definitely had the indignant flair to them the phrase suggested. He watched her go, then turned and left to find Hedwig. He needed to let Luna know when she could come visit. He thought as soon as humanly possible was a good time. If anyone would side with him morally, it would be Luna.

Neville returned after barely an hour without Hermione. The teen gave Tom an awkward smile. "I don't think Hermione approves," he said quietly as they walked up the stairs.

No, she probably wouldn't, Tom reflected. "I'll keep her away in the future," he said. "How did it go otherwise?"

The boy grimaced. "I… I don't know that I'm going to be able to do it. She deserves it, I know she does, but I still… just… I feel like it's not right to totally change her. Even though she wouldn't hesitate to do the same to me if our positions were reversed."

Tom hesitated, then sighed. "It's already been done to her once," he admitted. "Rookwood created the spell, and… well, the LeStrange brothers didn't like Bella." He wouldn't lie about it, but Tom felt it best not to directly implicate himself in the process. "The person in there isn't Bellatrix Black, who really doesn't deserve it. She's Bellatrix LeStrange, who isn't even a real person. She's just Black's broken remains left by someone who didn't care what happened to her."

He left Neville at the room the boy was staying in, then returned downstairs to the kitchen. Hermione sat at the table with her fingers clenched together so tightly they looked ready to break. Tom sat across from her and waited.

At last the girl looked up at him. "Neville's a good person," she said, sounding as though he'd suggested otherwise.

Tom waited for some manner of exposition from her but at last gave in. "Your point being?"

"How could he do that to her?" Hermione's face crumpled. "How could he even think about doing that to her?"

"What did he do?" Tom asked curiously. He had some vague idea of what the boy intended, but that wasn't the same as knowing the specifics. There were many different routes a person could take with the same basic initial idea after all.

Hermione shuddered. "He started out just casting that spell every other minute and holding it for just a few seconds. Then he stopped and ignored her. He started again after a while and just repeated that the whole time, except each time he waited longer before casting it again." She bit her lip. "She was begging him to use it again when he left." Frustrated tears spilled over, her face twisting in incomprehension. "It was like he was purposely making her a - an addict or something!"

"He was," Tom said simply.

"But why? Wouldn't it be enough to kill her? Or even to just torture her normally? Why does he need to - to –" She shook her head, unable to fully articulate the cause of her upset.

In the face of this overwhelming emotion, Tom sighed and leaned back in his chair, staring up at the ceiling as he split his attention between his burgeoning headache and the girl before him. "For me? Yes. I've experimented with all manner of tortures, and I've found that I lack the patience for anything particularly involved. Against someone like Bellatrix, to whom I bear no ill will, I would prefer simply killing her. However, this is the witch who destroyed Neville's parents' minds and loved every second of it. What he is doing to her is far less than I would have done to Umbridge." Tom shrugged half-heartedly. "If Neville thinks that this is the appropriate revenge for her actions, then he has a right to take that revenge."

"And what if she were to get free and turn the tables? If she brainwashed him into serving her? Would that be her right?" Hermione sneered, expression ugly in a way he'd never yet seen from her.

Tom raised an eyebrow, unimpressed. "Yes." He understood his own moral code, what little of it there was, perfectly well.

Hermione, on the other hand, appeared not to have yet come to grips with her own set of morals and where her lines actually lay versus where she thought they should lay. Whatever it was she was looking for, she didn't find it in his answer. She made a frustrated sort of inarticulate scream and pushed away from the table. "Let Dobby know I won't be here for dinner," she bit out. "I've lost my appetite."

Despite all that, Hermione showed up the next day while Neville was working on Bellatrix. When Tom refused to let her through the door, she sat down with him in the kitchen and waited silently for Neville to finish. When at last he did, Hermione did a miserable job of pretending not to pay attention as the boy gave Tom a brief update. He had apparently not done anything differently this time. "I plan on working on her for another few days," he said, "before I start letting her actions affect what I do. She's not desperate enough yet."

Tom cocked his head, studying the boy. "You're shaking," he observed.

Neville averted his gaze.

With a sigh, Tom nodded in understanding. "Would you rather I take over?"

"No!" The vehemence in Neville's voice made Tom's eyebrows shoot up and Hermione jump. The teen flushed, but he caught Tom's eye and held it. "No. This was my plan, and my decision, and I'm going to see it through to the end."

Merlin, Gryffindors were easy. So eager to prove themselves, so worried they'd be seen as unworthy if they couldn't do something because of their own discomfort. Tom gave the boy a searching look. At last, he nodded. "Alright, but if you change your mind, all you have to do is say the word," he said, ensuring Neville would do no such thing.

Over the coming weeks, Hermione continued to monitor Neville, though she respected his preference that she not be with him when he was working on Bellatrix. Tom wasn't sure what, exactly, she was hoping to gain from it. Her emotions recently were all over the place, making Tom close off the bond for the sake of his sanity, but he still checked on her from time to time, frustrated with her continued absence. Guilt, anger, sadness, depression, frustration, uncertainty… He understood those well enough. There were a handful of other emotions that he'd yet to figure out, and it left him unsure of the girl's mental state.

His own mental state was faring rather poorly as well. For one, he still didn't know who had Obliviated him or why. For another, he was beginning to feel symptoms he recognized from Halloween. Perhaps she could tell, because Ginny was being especially attentive to him, and Ron seemed to be aware of something, given that he'd taken the initiative to start organizing their research as Tom's ability to focus waned. He couldn't sleep at all lately, and even he couldn't subsist on no sleep.

Though it was as likely as not his imagination, Tom felt as though he could feel his soul untethering from Potter's body more with each passing day. If there was any good to be had, it was that the process seemed to be taking longer than it had the first time he'd experienced it. Unfortunately, Tom wasn't sure if that was a matter of recognizing the symptoms sooner or an actually slower progression.

For that reason, Tom decided it was imperative that Luna come spend the rest of the summer with him. With Grimmauld Place being under the Fidelius, it took a while to arrange. Making the process even more problematic was Dumbledore's unavailability. He was, apparently, traveling. Still, by Neville's birthday, Luna had permission and the Secret, so she stepped through the door just after breakfast, accompanied by Tonks.

Tom immediately grabbed Luna by the wrist and dragged her back to his room. Ginny laid there on his bed, reading, but Hermione was still nowhere to be seen. "Sit," Tom ordered the blonde. Once she'd complied, he collapsed onto the bed between her and Ginny. After a moment, he closed his eyes and sighed. "Better," he mumbled. "Barely."

Luna shifted closer and moved his head onto her lap. She stroked his hair gently, humming, until finally he fell asleep.

When he awoke, feeling only slightly more rested, Luna smiled and kissed his forehead. "You need to perform the next part soon, Tom Riddle," she said quietly. "You are beginning to fray."

Tom clenched his jaw and turned his head away from her. "I know," he said.

Luna nodded. "Do you know why? I didn't expect it to happen so soon."

"Because he and Hermione are fighting," Ginny said crossly.

"Tom Riddle," Luna chided.

"Luna Lovegood," he replied. The blonde just stared down at him, her long hair tickling his face. He sighed and sat up. "Fine. Would you give her this?" he asked Ginny, pulling out a paper from under the mattress. He looked away, face burning, as Ginny skimmed through it.

At last, she rolled her eyes, nodded, and climbed off the bed. Once she'd left, Tom turned to Luna, who was examining him curiously. "Yes?"

She shook her head and smiled, then placed a gentle kiss on his temple. "I'd like to go wish Neville a happy birthday now," she said.

They found Neville sitting in the kitchen, head resting on his arms, which were folded on the table. His eyes were closed, and from the steady puffs of air from his lips, it was clear he'd fallen asleep. Hermione sat across from him, staring at the paper Ginny had delivered, and Ginny stood at the kitchen counter with Dobby, working on creating what appeared to be a birthday cake.

"Tom," Hermione said as they entered, a note of exhaustion in her voice. Her lips quirked up into the barest hint of a smile. "You're…" She shook her head. "You're awful at apologies," she said, but the fondness coming through the bond said she didn't mind that. She reached into her back pocket and withdrew a folded up piece of lined paper. "I'm not very good at them either," she said, blushing, and handed over the paper.

Tom took the offered sheet and opened it, eyes scanning through the contents quickly, and smirked. It was very much the same idea as his - present a conciliatory offering by way of amending another proposed bit of legislation they'd disagreed about. His had been regarding the rights of nonhuman beings, while hers regarded the balance between muggle and traditional holidays and religious leanings. "Indeed," he said with a smile. He refolded the sheet and placed it within his own pocket. "We'll discuss it later?" he asked.

"Yeah," Hermione agreed.

"Great," said Ginny. "Now can the two of you finally be useful again? In case you haven't noticed, it's Neville's birthday. I know we can't really invite a lot of people, but we can at least do our best with who we've got."

Luna pouted. "You make it sound as though we're not perfectly good invitees."

Ginny gave the blonde a flat stare before turning apologetically to Neville, whose eyes had opened at some point. "I'd like to have gotten Hannah and Susan back for the day, but neither one is available."

"You're fine," said Neville. He sat up, swatting his hair out of his face, and looked around. "Sorry, I fell asleep, huh?" He sighed and put his head back down. "You don't need to do anything for my birthday, really."

Tom sat down next to him. "Are you alright?" he asked.

Neville turned his head away. "I'm fine."

"He's not sleeping," Hermione said disapprovingly. "Probably because he has a conscience." Her ability to direct an unspoken 'unlike some people' at Tom without so much as glancing his way was impressive.

Luna nodded sagely. "Those are troublesome things," she agreed. "Do you require assistance in removing it?"

While Hermione spluttered indignantly, Neville snorted. "No, thank you Luna."

"How are things going with her?" Tom asked curiously.

Neville ran a hand through his hair nervously. "Well? I think? She's stopped threatening to kill me anyway, and she's also stopped promising…" He turned, honestly, a bit green, something Tom had always thought was merely an expression. "She kept offering favors, in return for the spell, but I think now she understands that that's not what I'm looking for. I don't think she'd betray Voldemort yet, but I don't think she'd kill me right away if she got free either?"

"So she'd still kill you, just later?" Tom asked drily.

"A-hem," Black interrupted loudly from the door. "We'd like to celebrate Neville's birthday, if you don't mind finishing up your illegal talk." Tonks poked her head out from behind him, and Lupin appeared at Black's other side with a wan smile.

It wasn't a bad birthday, Tom thought. Well, it was the first birthday he'd celebrated in… He paused, thinking back. Had he ever celebrated someone's birthday before? He couldn't recall doing so in any event. Not even his own.

In any event, he might be setting the bar rather low, but he thought that having a nice dinner and a cake with a few people you found tolerable made for a rather good birthday overall. Black had even gotten the boy a present, though Tom couldn't decide if it was in poor taste or not. It was a collar with the constellation Orion, with all but one star being made of blue gems. That one, of course, was Bellatrix, and it was made out of a red gem instead. Neville's reaction to it had been to stare at it for several moments before closing the box and setting the whole thing aside, but Tom noticed that the box still went upstairs with him when he took his gifts up.

(Tom informed Black that if he had any similar presents planned for him for tomorrow, Tom would be happy to introduce Black to a few of his more inventive curses. The dog animagus had winced and backed up before giving a patently false smile and assuring Tom that he'd never even think of doing such a heinous thing to his beloved godson.)

If there was one point of discontent, it was that throughout the entire evening, Molly Weasley never once appeared. Tom didn't particularly care, but as the evening wore on, he caught Ginny glancing upstairs and felt her concern. He sighed. He was going to have to fix her, he supposed, even though he'd gotten the house elf cleaning problem solved. How did one go about repairing a broken housewife?

Though they'd apologized, more or less, Hermione stayed in her own room that night, leaving Tom feeling annoyingly anxious. Worse, Ginny decided to stay with Hermione, saying she wanted to speak with the other girl. He'd not realized it when he was Voldemort, but lately he'd been coming to the conclusion that he was the sort of person who needed their routine and disliked unexpected changes.

It wasn't entirely awful though. Luna spent the night in his room, sleeping curled up at Tom's feet for whatever reason. As a result, when he shot up, clutching his head, at an ungodly hour of the morning, Luna was the only one present. She sat up, rubbing her eyes, and cocked her head to the side curiously. "What happened?" she asked, but she seemed distracted, brows furrowed as though something about the air around him was far more interesting.

Tom shook the fog from his mind. He grimaced and rubbed his temple. "I'm not sure. Severus was… exceedingly upset for a moment." Tom's lips turned down, and he concentrated, sending a feeling of What happened? to his servant.

The terse Nothing he received in return sounded entirely false. It also, however, sounded mostly annoyed, so Tom decided that it would keep, whatever it was.

"Did he just destroy a horcrux?" Luna asked abruptly.

Blinking, Tom directed the question toward Severus, but only got an even more annoyed No, I did not in response. "No," Tom told her.

Luna frowned. "Perhaps that wasn't the answer then," she said slowly, sounding doubtful of her own words. "Or perhaps something happened to one of them overnight. Either way, you're ready for the next ingredient."

Tom took all of one second to absorb that before his mind raced ahead onto the practicalities of that statement. "You said the best person to use next would be Astoria Greengrass," he mused. "I've still yet to even meet her, let alone become close enough to propose performing a ritual. It needs to be someone else."

Luna hummed thoughtfully. "I'll think on it. Of the people here, I think… Hmm… Mister Black is no good…."

"I wouldn't use him even if I could," Tom said flatly. He didn't want to guess at what sort of comments the man would make if he proposed such a thing.

"Neville would work, but Professor Snape said you couldn't have anymore Gryffindors, right?"

Tom nodded.

Luna swayed from side to side as she thought. At last, she clasped her hands together. "Well, I'd like to see Miss LeStrange then. I'd like to make sure she's not better than your other option."

"I hope not," Tom muttered. It wasn't that he thought it'd be difficult to convince her, but he absolutely did not want that amount of insanity connected to him. "Who's the other option?"

"Tonks."

AN: As it turns out, the word flounced stops being a word after relatively few repetitions.

Also, holy crap, I didn't realize how much of my writing happened while my daughter was in school until school went on break and like suddenly the release rate of this went waaaay down. So… sorry? But school started back up again today, so that's good at least.