Chapter 13
Tom bends down and run his fingers over the dry green scales.
He had always found it detestable when the basilisk shed her skin. It was a natural, biological occurrence, and yet, instead of presaging renewal, to him it echoed decay.
Now, the sight makes him feel a strange kinship with the beast.
He sits next to the calcified bones of the smaller creatures the basilisk has consumed and thinks about bodies, the way they bloom and burst, the way they transform, the way they tremble when provoked. How ghastly and wondrous they are in their weakness and greed. He stares at his long, elegant fingers and he thinks about shedding skin. He thinks about tearing his flesh apart with a poisoned quill. He has used these fingers to clean floors and bleed and fuck himself for her. He still has the faint scars.
He thought he would hate it. But it is hatred very different from hate. It is a hatred lured out of its skin. It's like an Unforgivable Curse which, in its cruelty, is always tender.
When, as a child, the nuns made him scrub the floors at the orphanage he plotted revenge, picturing them howling in pain and at his mercy. He never thought he would enjoy being at someone else's mercy. With Madam Granger, everything is different. Submission is immersion. He wants more - more agony, more ecstasy. He is greedy for it, waiting – yearning – for what she will tell him to do next.
There is shame in this. There is self-recrimination. He's not being rational. He's blinded. He's starved. He ought to be stronger.
But there is a strange sense of power in submission too. He feels himself unshackled, unburdened finally, like his favourite pet, shedding scales. For so long he has pretended and played at being Tom Riddle, the well-mannered, sophisticated, inaccessible, sang-froid, promising young man. The truth of him is far more abject. It lies here, below.
After all, she was the one that led him to the Chamber, and now she is guiding him towards another chamber, lower and deeper within himself.
He has always thought of fate in relation with her return to Hogwarts, but he never imagined their paths would align in such a thoroughly unorthodox fashion. Instead of improvement or moral edification, she is offering corruption, debasement.
Tom lowers his head and touches the rotten green scales with his lips.
He shudders when he remembers her stern commands, the silky intimacy of her formality. She had been in control, but she had lusted too, she had gone beyond herself, she had wanted him.
Tom groans with delicious emptiness. He finds he cannot touch himself anymore unless she tells him to. But maybe there is strength in that too, the strength of discipline and abstinence.
If there must be weakness, if he must – wants to – be weak, let it be her. Let it be only this. Madam Granger will tell him what to do, will allow him, her pupil, her novitiate, to debase himself. In return, he will feed from her, he will take everything she gives. Until there is nothing. Until there is only the husk of shed skin.
He contemplates her body lying on the cold Chamber floor and he shudders with fury and delight. Anyone who harms her will pay a steep price. And yet, her death at his hand has poetry in it - killing his mistress as part of his worship.
He wants her dead. He wants her alive. He wants her in all states.
Tom lies very still among the offal and the bones and the scales and he thinks about the way she locked her ankles when she was watching him stroke his cock.
He closes his eyes, revisiting the sweet, depraved motion.
I know you can be an effective leader, Tom.
Tom wasn't born yesterday. He knows manipulation when he hears it; he has been weaned on it, after all.
But manipulators are susceptible to their own poison from time to time, especially when that poison comes in the shape of someone like her. If she does not really believe he is an effective leader yet, she will. He will make sure of that.
And there is the fact that, for all her mastery of him, she has entrusted him with this dangerous task which could, potentially, lead to her arrest. She has placed herself in his hands. It gives him a heady rush of satisfaction. Is it recklessness on her part or is it the confidence of the mistress who knows that he cannot resist her? He has made it plain enough that he is willing to do many things, simply for the pleasure of doing them for her. But does she know the extent of his willingness? The uncertainty of such a delicate balance of power is thrilling.
Tom has never been more eager to exercise his own power over his adolescent underlings. Getting Mulciber to "see reason" is a fairly easy task. It doesn't take a threat. Not even the appearance of a wand. Tom does it gently, like a curse that needs no magic. He makes Mulciber believe he's doing him a favour, really. Why not get it over and done with?
He watches from a nearby table as his feeble-minded underling reluctantly approaches the desk of Minerva 'Minnie' McGonagall. Minnie's friend who is sitting beside her goes eerily quiet, as does half of the library watching.
Minerva looks up disdainfully at the Slytherin boy standing before her, although even from a distance, Tom can see she is a little anxious. Perhaps she expects him to start threatening her. Mulciber does not have the best poker face, after all. But the boy knows what he has to do.
With a lot of hemming and hawing, he spits out the apology. He is sorry. He did not mean to set her books on fire. He was wrong. He won't do it again. He will write the essay she lost for her.
Minerva's mouth falls open. It's the last bit that really shocks her. Not that Mulciber is capable of such an intellectual feat, but the gesture itself is astonishing. When has a Slytherin ever volunteered a thing like that?
Without meaning to, Minerva looks in Tom's direction. He has made himself plainly visible, sitting where everyone can see him. They all know it's him pulling the strings.
Tom meets her gaze with a cool, friendly smile.
Minerva quickly looks down, trying to fight an angry blush. She mumbles something inaudible to Mulciber that releases him from his embarrassing duty. He's "forgiven". Tom gives him casual nod and the boy is free to leave the library. It's not his sort of haunt, anyway. The books give him a headache.
Madam Granger is at her front desk. She has not looked up once from her reading, but Tom knows she saw everything.
Near closing time, Tom picks up his book bag and walks out of the library without a word or a glance at his mistress.
He does not go too far. He finds a tapestry further down the corridor and slips behind it into a drafty alcove. Small arrow shafts have been cut into the masonry. Through them he sees little slivers of the night sky. The Founders did not ignore a possible Muggle threat. When was the last arrow flung? Had there ever been anyone foolhardy enough to try?
Tom leans against the wall and dreams of a distant, blood-spattered past.
Soon enough, Madam Granger leaves the library too. He hears her footsteps. He can recognize their distinct pattern by now.
As always when retiring to her quarters, she has taken with her a small handful of books. It is a habit he finds quite endearing. She is, in some ways, quite predictable, until she isn't.
Tom times his entrance perfectly. He parts the tapestry and falls into step with her as she passes by.
Madam Granger shows only a moderate amount of surprise. She raises her eyebrows questioningly, but keeps walking. By now, she must not be very shocked by his bold interceptions.
No, actually, she looks a little embarrassed. She steadily avoids meeting his eye as she speaks to him.
"Good evening, Mr. Riddle. You should be heading back to your dormitory, shouldn't you?"
"Why, yes, Madam Granger. Unless you have need of me for any particular task."
To her credit, she does not blush, but he can tell she is quite rattled by his comment.
"Not tonight, thank you."
Not tonight, which does not exclude other nights, he thinks happily.
"May I carry your books? They look heavy."
"I can manage just fine. How are your hands?"
Always a little unpredictable, her.
Tom coughs, hiding a nervous swallow. "All better."
"I'm glad." She sounds almost apologetic.
Tom shoves his hands in his pockets, putting them out of sight. He takes a step closer to her, speaking low.
"Mulciber turned out all right, didn't he? It was nice of him to apologize in front of everyone."
"Yes. Quite the little performance," she replies wryly.
"Was it to your liking?"
"Was it to his liking?" she asks instead.
Tom shrugs. "I made him believe the apology was in his best interest, if that's what you're asking."
"Hmm." He can see she is not really listening. Her head is cocked in a pensive pose. She glances quickly at his profile. "I have been thinking about our …project and what shape it should take."
"Have you?" he asks, a teasing note in his voice, but she barrels on.
"Obviously, many of your Slytherin friends would not look kindly on joining a group of dissenters. No, what I think would be best is to start a duelling club. They used to be popular when I was a student, but they seem to have gone out of fashion due to the current political climate. There is no by-law in the Hogwarts charter to forbid the forming of a duelling club with the help of teachers."
Tom's shoulders sag a little. A duelling club, of all things. How pedestrian and unexciting.
"Yes, I can see what you're thinking," she pursues quickly, "but there must be a legitimate front to our other activities. It's important that we appear to be doing nothing too out of the ordinary and that I appear to be nothing more than one of the teachers involved. Besides, even beyond our goals, such a club would be useful to everyone."
Her words, though sensible and matter-of-fact, seem to him filled with meaningful allusions to their own recent and decidedly unordinary activities. Still, she won't acknowledge them in public. Of course not.
"For those who are interested in something a bit more challenging," she continues in the same manner, "we will organize private duelling sessions in the Room of Requirement. That is where our active recruitment begins. Could you talk your Slytherins into something like that?"
Tom walks beside her in silence. He takes his time responding.
"I could…" he drawls, "if you promised to train us in the Dark Arts. That would guarantee everyone's eager participation and discretion." He hastens to add, noticing her taken back expression, "Everyone knows this school is a gilded cage. We aren't being prepared for the real world. I imagine we will need as much knowledge as is available to us against He Who Must Not Be Named."
Hermione can't help a small smile. "He Who Must Not Be Named. That's clever. Hopefully, one day we will not even remember his name."
Tom nods, but he feels a strange inkling of dread under his skin, like a whisper from the future. He does not have time to examine it. As with all feelings that she summons, he can never quite categorize them.
"Do you agree to it, then?" he asks.
"I suppose I must," she murmurs, stopping in front of a short-cut portrait. "Mind you, I will teach you as much as I see fit."
"Of course," he defers. But he is a little frustrated with their correct and proper conversation. He doesn't want her to go yet. It's not fair. She does not belong to all of them. She belongs to him.
"If you are feeling unsure, however," he adds, obliquely, "we could do a little simulation in the Room of Requirement. You did promise to teach me that evisceration spell, among other things."
"Did I?"
"Yes. You assured me you would, right before I carried out my detention. Don't you recall?"
He gives her a guileless smile.
Her jaw tenses. He can see the conflict written on her face. He does not have to read her well-guarded thoughts. She feels guilty about his "detention". She must offer him something more substantial.
"I remember. Very well. This Friday, after nine. Meet me there, Mr. Riddle."
She sounds reluctant, almost cross. And yet, she is unable to resist the opportunity for another confrontation.
Tom bows and watches her vanish through the portrait. A rush of air fills his ears. The silencing charm she'd cast over their heads vanishes with her. It leaves him feeling cold.
The Room of Requirement has always been Hogwarts' worst kept secret. And yet it still remains secretive, in many ways, simply because the room changes so often. Its fickle nature ensures that whatever business you conduct inside it will be hard to trace for any outsider.
However, standing before the Troll Tapestry, watching Barnabas the Barmy attempt to teach trolls ballet, Tom can't help but think that this is an equally errant endeavour.
A much safer place for any interesting and illegal activity would be found below the school, in his beloved Chamber. Madam Granger wouldn't have to recruit. The basilisk's lair is a discerning place; only the worthy could enter.
But she does not know that he was the one who opened the Chamber. She knows nothing of his Slytherin inheritance. She'd led him to it, and that had been fate, but she was still in the dark as to her part in it. How would he begin to tell her? At which point does intimacy become understanding? Is what they do now different from what he's done in the past?
He checks his pocket watch. She's late, or perhaps he's early. Perhaps she's changed her mind, or regrets having continued these encounters to begin with–
There's a red glimmer, as if the opposite wall were winking at him. A red door appears. It parts a few inches. Madam Granger stands in the doorway.
For a moment, he simply stares at her. She's wearing that lovely black dress she donned for their first Transfiguration exam. Its primness does nothing to dispel the way it wraps around her body.
"Well? Coming in or just gawking?" she asks impatiently.
Tom leans back against the wall casually. "If it's all the same to you, Madam Granger, I'd like to keep gawking."
Her scowl is quite ferocious. And pretty. He knows he will pay for that cheek later. And though he would have never guessed this of him, he is looking forward to it.
Chocolate frogs. He's trying to eviscerate chocolate frogs. This is, all things considered, a new low for him.
Madam Granger disagrees. "You may call it ridiculous after you have succeeded. Let's see how you do against such a fast-moving target."
Riddle wipes a solitary bead of sweat from his brow. He's not allowed to immobilize the frog. She's made that quite clear. All he can do to vent his hatred for this stupid task is to eviscerate everything else that comes in his path; cushions, chairs, cupboards. The problem is, he hasn't yet mastered the clean cut, and the recoil makes it even harder to get it right. The cushions blind him with their burst feathers and the chairs and cupboards tend to break against his head and arms. The room has become inhospitable with his hopeless rage.
"Any spell can become dark," she'd told him serenely as she cut a chocolate frog in half. "It is all about intensity, intent, and precision."
At first, he thought there was no way to summon such intensity and intent for a bloody chocolate treat, but he feels quite homicidal now.
Tom pursues his carnage of chocolate, determined to get it right. It's precision that haunts him.
He sucks his thumb, staring up at his mistress.
Madam Granger is sitting on a flight of steps above him, the skirt of her dress spilling around her like the waters of a dark lake. She is following his movements intently. Though she refrains from smiling, she is clearly amused by his predicament. She is enjoying his humiliation. She's not even trying to hide it.
When the chocolate frog jumps in his line of vision, he does not hesitate. He launches the cut with fury and murderous intent.
It rips clean through the little brown body and its rippling echo cuts through air and the bodice of her dress too.
It almost doesn't make a sound.
Tom lowers his wand slowly.
Hermione looks down at herself in disbelief. The incision starts somewhere below the neck and ends at her waist. She is not wearing a brassiere underneath, only a thin camisole which has been torn too. He can the see bare skin of her chest. It would take only a sudden movement from her to reveal her breasts.
There is a faint pink mark on that perfect stretch of skin. He thinks he can see a droplet of blood.
Riddle swallows. "I – I apologize – I did not mean to –"
His neglected wand instantly flies out of his hand into hers.
Madam Granger does not look angry exactly. But it is the quiet before the storm, judging from the way her pinned curls seem to crack with static.
Riddle feels delicious, agonizing anticipation.
"That was not very nice, Mr. Riddle," she says quietly.
"I'm very sorry, it was not at all my intention –"
"I rather think it was. In fact, you could have done me far more harm."
"I would never –"
"Do be silent. I have seen what you can do. I see that every lesson with you must be followed by a punishment." Her dark eyes flash with rage, but it is a sort of triumphant rage. As if she was hoping she might have occasion to inflict this upon him.
Yes, he thinks hungrily. Yes.
He should resist this impulse. But nothing has ever been so sweet.
He finds himself kneeling under her heavy gaze.
"I am terribly sorry. I should have been more careful," he says, because that is his assigned role.
She leans back a little, resting her elbows on the step above her. "Yes, you should have."
Tom's breath catches. Though she has not revealed more of herself, she has not tried to cover herself either. There is a sort of dizzying promise in that gesture.
He wants to get closer to her. He brushes his knees against the wooden boards, trying to draw nearer. "Madam Granger, please –"
"Lower, if you will," she says, staring at him expectantly.
Tom grits his jaw. He bends his spine until his elbows touch the floor.
"Lower," she repeats coolly.
Tom lets his legs slide away from him. His chin nearly touches the floor.
Hermione cocks her head, staring at his prone frame. "That's mildly better."
Tom feels the dust of this ancient place fill the roof of his mouth.
He doesn't care. If he must crawl to her, he will.
He does. He becomes a basilisk, crawling through the scales of his former skin.
She watches him creep and slither towards her.
"Please..." he hisses as his fingers reach the soft folds of her dress.
"Please what?"
"Please, let me…"
Her voice sounds far away. "Let you do what?"
"Let me fix your dress, Madam Granger," he says, obsequious and absolutely starving. His hands tentatively brush against her hips over the silky garment. He can feel the warmth between her thighs, the thin fabric of her dress, the way he could tear it apart with his fingers alone. His mouth waters at the prospect.
His mistress narrows her eyes at him, though she can see the quick rise and fall of her chest, the way her breasts strain against the fabric.
"You don't look like you want to fix my dress."
You look like you want to destroy it.
Tom licks his lips. "It's all a matter of semantics."
Madam Granger suddenly leans forward and he is lost.
Her naked flesh is right there for the taking. He can smell her light perfume. He wants to put his mouth on her, on the hidden curve of a breast – he wants to bite into them, lick and tear her flesh apart –
"Most girls know how to fix a dress," she says softly, and she takes one of his hands in hers, pressing his wand against his fingers. "It is a skill worth learning."
Her touch is a different kind of cut. It makes him feel invincible; it makes him feel small. She guides his wand to her chest. His fingers twitch against hers, unable to control himself. His knuckles almost brush against her pale nakedness. It is evisceration.
She does the spell for him. She takes him through the movements. He watches in agony as the bare skin disappears and the fabric is sewn back into place.
For a moment, they sit like that, breathless and unfinished, caught under a bell jar.
Then Hermione gently pushes him off her.
"That's enough lessons for tonight."
He opens his mouth to speak, but she grabs his chin, stilling his words. She sinks her nails in his cheek and she pecks him quickly, almost as an afterthought, rendering him silent. Her lips are a whip. He hardly gets a taste.
Tom lies on the steps, half-ruined, as Madam Granger makes her descent.
He clenches his fists. This is the last time he lets her escape. She can't keep doing this to him.
But I hope she does. I hope she never stops.
Debasement is the only thing that matters in the moment.
"Madam Granger – can I – may I –" he stammers after her, just as she is about to open the door.
Hermione is quick to understand.
"You may." She closes the door behind her.
Around him there is goose down and broken furniture and chocolate frogs, jumping in disarray. He doesn't care. Tom Riddle takes out his cock and strokes himself fast, picturing the things he would do to her stubborn flesh, muttering curses under his breath, spilling all over the stairs, where her dress used to be.
A/N: thank you for your reviews! I hope this was indulgent fun!