Friends, ficcers, reviewmen, lend me your ears...
(Generally this sort of statement, plagiarized and cliche though it may be, is followed by some sort of important announcement. But not today. All I have to say is the usual: a hearty thanks to all who reviewed, and enjoy...)
Chapter Thirty: Malcontents
Harry paced the dormitory anxiously. He had to do something, he knew, before the other fifth-years returned from the Great Hall (or, in Malfoy's case, from just outside the door). But what was he going to do? Rage at Tom in a furious scribble? No, he needed some way to confront Tom face to face: where he could hit him, strike that shy, charming smile off his face.
But he didn't know how to find Tom in his mind. The last time, it'd been Tom who'd come to Harry, and for all Harry knew he wouldn't be able to go back to that imaginary wood without being called.
He was interrupted from his indecision by the entrance of Malfoy, Blaise Zabini, and Crabbe-and-Goyle. "What a day," Zabini said mockingly. "Thought Dumbledore'd never let us out of there. Lucky of you, Malfoy, giving everyone the slip like that."
"I am a man of extraordinary talents," Malfoy conceded.
Harry snorted. "Extraordinary invisibility cloak that belongs to your best mate, you mean," he said with his hand outstretched.
Malfoy laughed and took the scrunched up cloak out of his pocket, depositing it in Harry's hand. "That too, Potter."
Harry sat down on the floor, leaning against the foot of his bed as the others did likewise (except for Blaise, who perched primly on his blankets). "So what did Dumbledore do after he rounded you lot up?" Harry asked, trying to sound nonchalant.
"Oh, he explained the whole 'serpent invasion' bit and asked everyone to be calm. Rest of the staff looked rather grim to me, though," Blaise answered, looking disdainful.
"Well, of course he looked worried, Zabini," Malfoy said scathingly. "No need to sound like you were feeling very jumped up at the thought of a giant herd of snakes. Who'd be expecting that?" Zabini glared and looked away.
"What I'm interested in is how they got here. I mean, look, it's the middle of winter—aren't snakes cold-blooded? Aren't they all asleep or something?" Malfoy leaned forward, an excited gleam in his eyes. "Someone magicked them here, I know it. Wish we could find out who—wish we could know what he was up to."
"You're assuming it's a he?" Zabini asked, raising an eyebrow.
Malfoy shrugged. "You're right, it might be that banshee Parkinson. She might be trying to kill off competition for me," he said foppishly.
"Don't flatter yourself, ferret boy," Harry sneered. Pansy Parkinson indeed! As if anyone but Tom—but Harry—would dare to fill the school with snakes.
"Whoever did it, I want to know why, anyway," Malfoy continued his tirade with zeal. "It doesn't happen every day, does it?"
As the boys went on exchanging ideas, Harry's mind was turned away from them and back to Tom. Where before Tom had seemed a shade of the real world, he was now somehow more real, more vivid and colorful than anything around Harry. A fifty-year-old memory, long dead but somehow so much more alive than the rest of them, and at the same time—a flitting shade, the crinkled sound the yellowed paper made as Harry opened the diary, a boyish Hogwarts uniform twined in a scarf bright red like a startling bird.
Harry felt his anger ebbing away and a fondness taking its place; hastily he tried to bring back the rage he felt at Tom Riddle for unleashing such a horror upon the school, for giving Harry such a fearsome gift. Subconsciously, Harry fingered the spot at the base of his thumb where the little tinny snake had bitten him; it had hardened into a small scar like a vampire bite. Luckily, it hadn't swollen or become discolored—what exactly did that thing do to me? Harry wondered.
He'd been able to talk to the other snakes, he remembered, still in awe. But that had probably been a temporary part of Tom's magic. And come to think of it, they were not even snakes at all: merely shadows woven and twisted and given physical form. Such a thing seemed to go against every conservation law that existed in the physical world. Why, the transfiguration of nothing into something even broke several magic laws.
It seemed to Harry to be the deepest form of magic on earth, a magic that went against science and physics and everything else that magic had some sort of root in. And Tom had done it from within a book.
Something in Harry's mind told him, in a very familiar amused tone, that this was impossible. Tom didn't unleash it, Harry thought. I did.
He was interrupted from this fearful revelation by a voice. "You there, mate?" Malfoy was asking. Harry glanced at him.
"Yeah, I'm here." Harry glanced around the dormitory. "Where are the others?"
"They left ten minutes ago. What's the matter with you?" Malfoy asked shrewdly.
Harry shook his head. "Nothing," he assured.
Malfoy swore. "Potter, don't give me that rubbish; you've been all wonky since you got back. What happened? Snakes scare you?"
Harry snorted. "Yes. Oh, yes, scared my bloody pants off. You don't know the half of it," he said with more contempt than even he'd expected.
Malfoy glanced at him, looking slightly wounded. Hastily he switched his gaze to an angry glare and said snippily, "I might know, if you chose to tell me anything these days," before he snatched the map and the cloak out of Harry's trunk and walked out the dorm.
"Draco, wait—" Harry called.
"Don't bother, Potter. I've got things to do." The door shut smoothly.
Harry sighed and checked his watch. Already nine o'clock. Might as well nod off, he decided, clambering into bed in the empty room. The last thing he remembered was the feel of the pillowcase wrinkled against his cheek.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
The woods were much the same as the last time he'd been here. Once again the forest was unnaturally bright and gleaming, and Harry froze as he heard footsteps.
Tom was walking towards him again through the avenue of trees that bowed curved white branches to him. Once he got close enough, Harry smashed his fist across the other boy's face.
Tom staggered a little and then caught himself. Straightening, he wiped a trickle of bright red blood of the corner of his mouth and smiled at Harry. "Is that any way to greet a friend?"
Harry bristled at the sound of his voice and faced him angrily. "No friend would give you a thousand snakes for Christmas," he spat.
Tom grew somber. The tails of his scarf fluttered around like robins in the slight wind. "You promised me you wouldn't be angry, Harry."
"Well, I reconsidered." Harry fumed, wanting to hit Tom again, wanting to watch those gleaming white teeth join the snow on the ground.
"You did not like it," Tom said slowly.
"You gave me sodding snakes," Harry cried in disbelief. "Where'd you get the idea that I would like them!"
"I gave you power, Harry. I gave you the power I was born with."
Harry stared. "What are you talking about?"
Tom smiled puzzlingly. "I'm a Parselmouth."
That word again. "Parselmouth?"
"It's very rare—someone who can talk to snakes. It's been very useful." Tom sighed and shook his head. "Don't be angry with me. I just wanted to share with you."
Harry didn't believe it. "Are you saying…are you saying I truly did it? I really did tell those snakes to stop, and me—and Weasley and Granger—we didn't just imagine it all?"
Tom nodded. His eyes were bright in his face now, excited. "You'll love it, Harry. Don't you understand how precious and vital it is, to be able to converse with an animal? Do you realize how useful it will be in the future?"
Harry looked away, at the slowly melting snow, at the shining birch branches, anywhere but Tom's charming face. "I don't envision myself living in snake-holes, sorry," he muttered.
Tom laughed good-naturedly and said, "Oh, fine, you don't have to like it," but Harry noticed he didn't offer to make him normal again. Well, what could it hurt, the younger boy supposed.
"You haven't been writing to me lately," Tom suddenly accused. "I missed you. It's a lonely life, being in a book. Not even a life." He was no longer jovial, and again Harry saw wistfulness in his face. "I miss it, Harry. Touching, and seeing, hearing, smelling. But most of all, I miss the magic…being able to do real magic."
His voice was so sad and grave Harry couldn't help feeling twinges of pity through his anger. "If it helps, you've probably outlived your real self," he offered, snapping an icicle off a tree branch and having a chew.
Tom was merry again. "Yes, and I'll be glad for that, for now at least. Look at me, talking about myself the entire time." He looked at Harry expectantly.
The boy sighed. He watched Tom for a moment, pondered at the way the black and red of his clothing contrasted with this gleaming white world before he began to talk. "Well, Malfoy's mad at me, for starters. I was a little sharp with him, and he left. I—I can't seem to help it nowadays. It's just, you, and—and—this," he waved his arms to indicate the wood, "this place seems so much more…alive and here with me than Hogwarts right now. And anything Malfoy does seems so petty nowadays."
Tom smiled. "You flatter me, Harry, and you place a lot of stock in your imagination. But you're right," he said gravely. "People like you and me, we're never satisfied with what we have, with the trivialness of routine life. We're malcontents. Some people call it greed—I think it's more of an ambition, really. It's why the Sorting Hat put us in Slytherin, after all, and it's why you return to me even when you want to kill me."
Harry was startled. "How'd you know—"
"When that snake bit you," Tom said, picking up Harry's hand and tracing the scar of the bite, "it gave me some of you at the same time that you received my power. Don't be startled; I'm merely a little more empathetic to you."
Harry swallowed and let his hand drop out of Tom's grip. "All right. As—as long as it's just that."
Tom's eyes brightened with cheer. "Yes, Harry, we're very much alike. You'll see that soon, if you don't already. And now, you probably ought to get some rest."
"But—" Harry could hardly protest, because the next moment the woods and Tom were gone, and so was he.
------------------------------------------