Inception: Rise of the Heir
After the murder of Hepzibah Smith, Tom Riddle disappeared for ten long years. He sank deeper into the Dark Arts & pursued knowledge that others could only dream of, consorting with the darkest members of wizarding society. With his eyes set on North America, he has no idea that the magic he so desperately seeks will shape his life & his inevitable future for years to come. TomxOC
DISCLAIMER: I own nothing except for my o/c's and my own storyline.
The world around her was hazy, the air was thick and seemed to be made up of smoke and dust. She moaned as she propped herself up from what appeared to be a forest floor, rubbing her eyes as she observed her surroundings, the dry and dead leaves falling from her hands. She had woken up in a small glade, the foliage and shrubbery around her looked dismal and bleak as a thick blanket of fog lay across the ground and above the tops the trees. The woods around her were unnaturally silent as she stood shakily on her feet. Lyra looked downwards as she raised her hands up from her sides. Dirt lay under her fingernails and her hands were covered in dirt, including the rest of her body and nightdress.
Lyra pressed a hand to her cheek as she looked around slowly. "Where am I? …."
She felt the warmth of her face on her hand and walked over to a nearby tree, the branches and leaves under her feet snapping and rustling with every step. "Am I dreaming?" As she traced her fingertips along the bark her mouth opened slightly in surprise, it felt rough, scaly and real. "If this is a dream it's a damned good one….Still, everything feels so real…."
Her head jerked around as she heard a faint familiar voice in the distance, a soft whisper dancing through the forest around her.
"Lyra…"
"Who's there?" she said, peering curiously into the fog around her. She could see nothing, yet she knew that voice, one she thought she had forgotten. "Hello?"
She heard a child's voice now, small and anxious. "Don't leave me, I'm afraid."
A tear rolled down Lyra's cheek as she closed her mouth that had been poised to speak, knowing that the voices she heard would not reply. They did not belong to anyone in the present and she knew immediately that she was very much alone in the forest.
"My darling...never be afraid..I will always be with you."
"You can't die. Please, what will I-"
"We all die little one. Some of us just get to live a little longer…But you must never fear death Lyra. Promise me something…."
Lyra heard her adolescent self choke back a sob and make a small noise. It echoed through the woods around her.
The familiar voice spoke again, this time its voice labored and slow. "Live your life with passion...and do everything in your power to follow your heart... when death comes for you, do not be like others and fill your heart with fear...because if you have lived life true to yourself...death will greet you like a hero coming home from war. Never grovel at its feet."
"But I-"
"Promise me."
"I promise mother."
"I'm so proud of you my little one, always remember that…and when I'm finally gone from this world just know you will never be alone...When the thunder roars and the darkness scares you I will always be there inside you heart."
Lyra wiped a tear from under her eye as the voices silently disappeared, leaving her in silence. She wrapped her arms around her as she leaned her back up against the nearest tree and slowly slid down to the ground.
"Mother..." she thought sadly as she wiped another tear from her cheek. "If only you were here now. I feel so lost..."
She stared ahead absentmindedly, gazing at a nearby bush while watching the fog roll across her feet. As she reached out towards the dirt she sat upon to push her body upwards, she felt an immediate warmth hit her face and an orange glow catch the corner of her eye. The bush, which had just been laying silent and green moments before, had suddenly erupted into a giant blaze, crackling and spewing ash from its core. Lyra remained mesmerized by the spectacle as she slowly watched a snake slither out from below its fiery branches. Her focus turned towards the creature as it slinked towards her, its scales as black as night. It eyed her curiously as its tongue flicked back and forth and stopped as it reached her feet, raising its head strangely. She stared into the ruby eyes of the serpent transfixed while a strange voice filled her head, speaking in a language she had never heard before. Her body tensed slightly as the snake slithered up her leg, inching closer and closer to her face, not knowing what would happen next. The reptile paused as it reached her chest, looking her in the eyes calmly and knowingly.
The serpent spoke to her once more, this time in english, its voice soft and quiet. "Wherever you go, I will follow and when you are dead, I shall die."
Her brow furrowed in confusion at the words, but before she could even think about what the snake had meant, it lunged at her suddenly and bit her in the chest. Her vision blurred as she felt its fangs pierce her again, the world around her once more turned black.
"What happened…?" Lyra groaned as she opened her eyes slowly, her surroundings still blurry and unsteady. Her head was pounding as she tried to lift herself up from the hard wooden floor she was sprawled onto. She winced as a trickle of sunlight peeked through the thick dark curtains she always kept shut against the small iron window and hit her eyes. Suddenly Lyra remembered as to why she was waking up on a cold unfeeling floor and it hit her like a ton of bricks. She sat up against the bed and pulled her knees to her chest, cradling her throbbing head in her hands.
"How long have I been laying here?" She knew it had to at least have been a few hours, due to the rays of light pouring into her room from the window overhead. "I brewed everything correctly, I followed every direction, I acquired EVERY ingredient….it should have worked…I don't understand…."
She shuddered as she thought back to what she had done to attain the last and final potion ingredient once more and held her hand up to her eyes, shaking silently as tears rolled down her face. As the first drop rolled over her chin and fell silently into her lap, she shook her head defiantly and wiped the tears angrily off her cheeks.
"No." Lyra thought angrily to herself as she slowly lifted herself up from the floor and made her way shakily to the mirror. "You can't start to feel regret. Hesitation and weakness will only prevent you from what you need to do. If people die along the way...then so be it. It's for the greater good."
She lifted her head up towards the mirror and felt her eyes welling up in a mixture of emotions at what she saw looking back at her. Her eyes were back to how they had been before the draught, mismatched and unnatural, staring back at Lyra as if to taunt her. She peered closer at her reflection as she noticed two faint burn scars running down either side of her face. The potion had not only proved unsuccessful, it had left her scarred. It was a risk she had been willing to take and she knew the consequences of dealing with forbidden and dark magic.
"Everything has a price. You knew that Lyra.."
Raising her hand slowly to her face, she ran her finger tips softly against her left cheek, tracing the faint scar that now ran from under her eyes to her mouth. She had never considered her beauty to be one of her most important attributes, she had always valued her intelligence and magical abilities far above anything else. Still, the new additions to her face were going to take some getting used to. Lyra shook her head with a strong resolve and pushed the melancholy thoughts from her mind.
"I won't stop trying to find a solution to this, even if my efforts kill me first. It's still a better alternative than this life…"
She dressed herself as quickly as she could and reached down towards the floor to where her cloak was laying. Wrapping it around herself, she fastened it tightly against her neck and pulled the hood over her face, hiding it from the world.
"I need to go back to the Atheneum and look over some more books...if a potion won't do the trick, there must be something else that will…"
As she left her room closing the door silently behind her, she paused as she looked towards Tom's room, silent and still next to hers. Moving quickly down the slated steps and through the patrons already assembling in the pub, she pushed her way into the street and thought back to what had transpired before she had drank the potion.
"Tom.." she thought suddenly, a chill running up her spine. He had gone to bed after her, what if he had seen something he shouldn't have?
Lyra tried to calm herself down as she suddenly remembered her strange dream. She had almost forgotten completely about it after she had found out what she had awoken to. She thought back to what the serpent had said as she exited the inn "Wherever you go, I will follow and when you are dead, I shall die...What does it mean?"
She retraced every detail of the dream until she had reached the steps of the Atheneum, pulling her hood down to block her scarred face from prying eyes. Lyra shook her head angrily. "It was just a dream, a side effect of that useless draught. Don't distract yourself with nonsense. You have work to do."
Once more she tried to ignore the strange feeling in her stomach as she descended deep into the basements of the library, in her current situation there was no time for any interferences.
"Damn it." Lyra said as she closed another book and released it, letting it float back to the top shelf of the bookcase on its own, nestling snuggly back in the gap between two neighboring books where it belonged. "I've read almost every book I could think of and I still can't find anything close to what I need."
A sharp pain hit her in the side of her head as she flexed her neck and rubbed her temples. "I'm running out of time. Who knows how much longer I have until I lose myself once more…I can't control it any longer."
As she opened her eyes, a small dark book caught her attention, the soft candlelight danced across silver gilded letters on its spine. She inched forward and bent down to take a closer look at its title, her expression of curiosity turning hopeful as she reached for it. Lyra leaned against the shelves as she blew dust off the cover of the book, it hadn't been read in a long time. "Intimo Gratus Sacris Ritibus...that would be latin for Darkest Rites and RItuals..." She flipped through the book quickly, trying to see if any of the book was written in english, it wasn't. Books written in Ancient Latin were uncommon, they were either too old to still be available to the public or mostly hidden away in personal collections. Their value was inestimable and due to most people's inability to read an outdated language...completely useless.
Lyra smiled to herself as she opened the book, her fingers gently hovering over its aged, yellow pages. Although she was slightly out of practice with the language, she had been taught to read and write in latin and other languages at a young age; a skill her mother had deemed necessary and important.
"In order to wield magic properly, you have to learn the language and its origins first." Her mother would say as Lyra, only a child at the time, would complain about the amount of reading forced upon her, instead of being able to do things a normal child would have wanted to do. A grin tugged at her mouth as she thought back to her mother nostalgically, her thoughts wandering back to her strange dream. It disappeared when her attention strayed back to the book and the reason as to why she was holding it in her hands.
"If only you could see me now mother...how proud you would be of me." She thought bitterly as she buried herself into the texts.
Tom started making his way through the library, deep in thought over what he had just discovered. It had taken him hours to read and transcribe the book, but he was certain he had found the potion that Lyra had been brewing. But for what reason?
"A remedy for those whose bodies are inhabited by malevolent forces…." The book had described the nature and purpose of the draught but why had she needed it?
"She does not seem possessed or under the influence of an outside force in any way…" He thought back to books he had read in the past, trying to remember the tell tale symptoms of those who had been forced to surrender their bodies to another. He had been curious after the creation of his first horcrux, what options would be open to him should he ever lose his body. He recalled the symptoms of those who who had been found to be possessed. "Aggression, sickness, self-mutilation, strange behavior…" Lyra had not exhibited any of the following qualities. Strange behavior was difficult to discern when he himself didn't know her very well. True, he had been in her company for little over a month, but their interactions were scattered. She appeared very little after they had first arrived in Salem and preferred her solitude, to which he had been grateful. "I'm going to have to keep a close eye on her if I'm to learn anything else, next time she disappears into the night, I'll need to be ready."
He thoughts were disrupted as he passed an aisle and caught a glimpse of Lyra out of the corner of his eye. Her hood was pulled over her face to mask her identity, but he recognized her cape and the long black locks of hair that spilled out from under it. Tom slipped quietly into the aisle next to hers, watching her hungrily, through the gaps in the wood. He pulled a book at random from the shelf to appear engrossed in while he watched her, he didn't want to raise any suspicion from outside eyes.
He watched as he saw her back stiffen, alert and excited as she held the book closer to her face, her delicate finger trailing the words she so eagerly seemed to devour. Tom felt a small burn in his stomach and a heat in his cheeks as he continued to watch her read. He moved out of sight abruptly as he saw Lyra quickly shut the book and placed it back into the shelf, pausing momentarily as she raised her head, almost as if she had felt him watching her. He watched as she quickly exited the aisle and made her way back towards the lift, whatever Lyra had been searching for so desperately she had found. And now it was his turn.
Tom walked silently around to where she had been standing and searched for the small black book with silver lettering she had been so engrossed in. He found it effortlessly and smiled at the ancient language scrawled across it's cover.
"Fluent in Ancient Runes and Latin. Impressive. What else about you don't I know?" He smirked as he opened the book and held the tip of his wand against it. He himself, of course, could read Latin, but why read a whole book when it was so much easier to see where someone else had left off?
"Novis"
Tom watched as the pages of the book started to flip over faster and faster until they finally stopped abruptly. He held the book up as he read the text she had quickly studied before leaving the Atheneum in a hurry. His eyes remained expressionless as he read the pages he had been so eager to unveil, a small smile pulling at the corner of his mouth as he closed the book and placed it nonchalantly amongst the books it belonged with.
A devilish grin appeared across his face as left the Atheneum, he combed his hair back lazily with his fingers as he thought back to what he had just read. He had not assumed to find anything less from a book entitled "Darkest Rituals and Rites", but he had also not anticipated her being capable or willing to perform such a task, especially out of free will. He was very interested to see exactly how far her ambitions would take her.
"Well then Lyra...show me who you really are."
So sorry it took so long to update, its not as long of a chapter as i would have liked BUT I had to cut it off somewhere. Cliffhanger for next one! Things have been rough on the home front here, BUT I finally got through this it. Not an easy one to write mind you LOL. Can't wait to write the next one and keep making progress with the story and more character development.
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