It was him. She had committed the rich timbre of his voice to memory the first time she'd heard it, the way it swooped melodically over the highs and lows of the syllables. She heard it, behind the opulent gilded door from which she now stood behind, her ear pressed to the wooden frame. The cream-coloured paint was smooth and cool against her hot cheek. It dripped, honey-sweet and coaxing through the door.
A coil of white hot panic took root in her stomach. It guided her feet, bare against the rich burgundy carpet out of the drawing room and through another door, and then another. Quicker than she'd thought possible, she slammed the door shut, locking it with a key and then her wand. It wouldn't do, wouldn't hold for long. He was too powerful to be stopped by a mere door.
She was in a dead-end now, this room was her bedroom. Foolishly, she'd wanted the corner of the brown stone mansion because she'd get two windows instead of one. Hermione wracked her brains. She couldn't apparate, the wards were specifically designed for anti-apparition. It was one of the reasons she'd found it so attractive in the first place. No fireplace - no Floo. There was always the window, but she didn't feel safe separated by walls or air or metres. Of course, there was another solution.
Shaking hands delved into the neck of her blouse. A thin gold chain supported a shimmering hourglass - her Time Turner - her salvation. He hadn't found her in three years, hidden beyond time and space. She'd picked a deliberately innocuous time, a deliberately innocuous place. Who would've suspected a Muggle stately home only 26 years previously? Still, it had been inevitable he would find her.
There was no banging at the door, but she watched the shadows of his feet underneath the doorjamb. She felt him, his smooth silky presence.
She hoped the next place would give her as much time, maybe longer. She liked the people who lived here. They liked her. They were likely all dead now. Hot, angry tears sprang to her eyes. It was so unfair, so unjust. She hated him. She was afraid.
Her fingers trembled as she slowly turned the dial. Forward, or backward? She was still in her nightgown, no shoes on, hair unbound. There had been no time to pack.
She heard a click in the lock as it turned of its own accord. Felt herself stop breathing, her face drained of colour. A pale, unblemished hand became visible. And then, all of a sudden, him. She had the Time Turner in her hand, she could leave, leave now, and yet she stood frozen still - her bare feet rooted into the Turkish carpet.
He was as she had remembered. Tall and lean - reedy, like a willow branch; dark-haired, clad in the elegant, tailored style he had favoured in the fifties. His crowing glory however, were two cruel eyes set into his head in luminous, forget-me-not blue. He was beautiful and terrible, Tom Riddle.
He strode into the room, stopping a few paces away from Hermione. He smirked.
"Darling. It's been such a long time." He said in his lily-sweet voice of his.
It had been so long since Hermione had moved, those few crucial seconds had felt like an age, her hands still clasped around the Time Turner, her wand carefully strapped at her side. It was only now she realised, as she longed to reach for it, that Tom had cursed her with a Full-Body Bind, as silent as the devil, the minute he'd walked into the room. She burned with indignant rage.
He twirled his own wand between pale fingertips. Hermione knew it well - bone-coloured yew carved with wildflowers. She trembled.
"Oh, don't fret darling. Just a little Full-Body Bind, nothing particularly lethal." He had begun to wander closer. She could smell him from this distance, lemon leaves and mint and death, caught with the scent of the hyacinths on her desk. It nauseated her.
He was close now, too close. He'd bent his knees to sit on eye level with her, his expression catlike and strangely gleeful. He was lovelier from up closer, Hermione knew this. She'd once memorised every inch of Tom Riddle's face, committed his every eyelash to her memory. It was still there, somewhere in the dank, shameful part of her brain.
"I've found you." He whispered in her ear. If Hermione could've moved she would've shuddered. "I've found you, little bird." His fingers traced a cool path along her burning cheeks. To her shame, Hermione wanted to close her eyes and relish the feeling. It was him, he had found her. Her Tom. He was here and now everything would be alright again.
The pit of her stomach dropped out and she wanted to scream, scream fire and smoke and incandescent rage. She knew that little probing feeling in her brain. He had wormed his way into her brain, it was him whispering sweet nothings into the recesses of her brain - Legilimancy. How dare he peer into her private thoughts? How dare he presume to control her? She conjured a threatening image in her mind and then snapped up her mental walls. Mentally, at least, he was blocked out.
Tom only chuckled, his hands brushing deliberately past the lace of her nightgown to where her wand lay holstered. He took it, then delicately removed the Time Turner from her neck and her fingers. The brush of his fingers against the nape of her neck made her feel hot and cold and sick. She could count the individual fibres on his fine, plum-coloured woollen jumper. Waves of lemon leaves and peppermint roiled across her vision.
He murmured. "Sweet little bird, now that I've removed your talons, I can let you go." He feathered a curl of hair behind Hermione's ear and she felt as if she were on a knife's edge. He could've chosen to cast nonverbally, but instead, whispered richly, obscenely into her ear. "Finite."
The thread that had been keeping Hermione coiled so tight had snapped. The moment was broken and she reared her arm back to punch him in the face. Riddle may have taken her wand and her escape route, but she still had other ways of defending herself.
He caught her wrist, long fingers clasping like a vice. She moved to shake him free but he was steadfast and much stronger than she - five years older and a head and a half taller. She howled in frustration, punching with her left hand now. He caught this one too. She growled, attacking now with knees, kicks, even a headbutt or two. He pulled her closer which made it much harder. She tried anyways. She felt consumed by fury, desperately pulling to get free. She had to get free. His fingers were hard and cruel against her skin.
She screamed. "Get off! Get off me!" She felt like a wild thing.
Tom shook her violently. Hermione's jaw clacked together painfully.
"Enough." He whispered angrily.
She caught gaze of his face, for a moment, just for a moment, he looked as wild and as crazed as she did. It fell from his face as quickly as it had arrived, a porcelain mask of calm taking over. Abruptly, she fell silent. She had rarely seen Tom lose control.
"Tut tut, Hermione." He said her name like a prayer. It made her feel sick. "After all this time, I would've expected you to play a little nicer." His lip curled. "Nevertheless."
She felt his wand against her temple and she went from consciousness slowly, begging.
