Disclaimer : I do not own Harry Potter or any of JK Rowling's creations.
AUTHOR'S NOTE - Please read notes at the end of this chapter.
THE CEREMONY
The Red and the Grey
The crafte of the Horrcruxe numbers amongst the moste powerfull and dangerous of all ancient artes.
It cannote be crafted by a simple movement of one's staffe or a casual incantation.
Tom spread out his instruments across the table. He was bent on his knees in the stone floor, his hands bent on a small tablet containing pieces of parchment and other articles. The room took the shape of his own choosing. It would usually assemble itself as the room of his orphanage but now it resembled the chamber of Salazar Slytherin deep within the bowels of the school. No other decoration befitted the ritual to be enacted herein.
Spread on the tablet were instruments that he had selected and sculpted with care and attention. A knife, small, thin and sharp, encrusted on it's hilt with a snake protruding out of a skeletal visage. Tom had crafted it himself, it was charmed to be clean and to repel dirt and it was precious for his needs today. Next to the knife was a needle almost as long as the blade. It was made of iron and was already rusted brown. It was harsh to touch and it's nib was blunt and scarred. But a better sharpened needle would not produce the effect. The long syringe next to the needle however had a sharp tin nib that would softly and smoothly press through the skin, softer than a pillow and extract any amount of blood out of a tissue. It could also inject substances just as smoothly into the bloodstream and allow it to congeal with the corpuscles as effectively as any natural made cell. Three encased and sealed test tubes were stood on a tiny stock, each liquid coloured differently. One liquid was black as obsidian and yet glittered strangely in the pale green afterglow of the room. The middle liquid was filled with a lime green substance that glittered naturally in the room. The third test tube was filled with a silvery solid substance that none the less flowed naturally in the tube, it resembled blood in the manner in which it failed to gel with the surface of the liquid though the colour was not a human's nor any natural animal.
Tom of course knew that the blood belonged to an unicorn. An unicorn he slew with great difficult in the depths of the Forest the week before the Christmas holidays. He remembered how fast the beast was, how he had to follow it stealthily and the powerful enchantments he had to use it to slow down the beast and slaughter it; the pool of silver had glittered into his pale gray eyes with a decayed beauty. For the dead creature was at greater peace than Tom Riddle would ever be.
He knew of course that by going down the road, there would be no other way but success. If he failed he would be less than dead. Slughorn had told him that death would be preferable...
But then Death is preferable to living with the self satisfied hypocrites who refuse to seek power, tormenting themselves with delusions about good or evil.
He stared at the ring on his finger and then put a hand in his robe pocket and removed a thin diary. He placed the diary on his left side and then carefully placed the ring on top of the book. Wizards over the centuries killed themselves in creating one Horcrux. Today Tom Riddle would concieve of Horcruxes, in the plural and moreover craft them both with the same spell.
The ring would bear the first outpour and the rest would trickle into the book.
The crafter of the Horrcruxe is evere at risk with using objects that have attachments and attractions to the commone wizarde or the inquisitive warlocke. The objecte is itself of no magical importance and has little bearing with the power of the magick and the defense provided to the object by the crafter. But the more innocuous the easier to safeguarde.
The diary, Tom knew, would eventually serve as an easy tool into infiltrating Hogwarts and re-opening the Chamber, presumably when he, the most powerful of all wizards returned to claim his kingdom. The ring was lost and forgotten and searched by no man. These objects would be ideal for completing the first trilogy of his soul.
The crafter of the Horrcruxe must need to arrive with a soul already splintered. The effective manner to attain this sole requisite is to slay a fellow human life. It is recommended that the killing be done in the coldeste blood, so that deede provoke little remorse than the killings initiated by the stirrings of passion, the force of soldierly duty or the defence of one's life. Killing oftene consequences in the wizard the stirrings of guilt and anguishe. A Horrcuxe crafter is preternaturally damned and destroyed if the acte of creation be stirred by guiltie wand and hypocrite conscience.
To crafte the Horrcruxe, one must finde the splinters and make them corporeal. The magicke needed to perform this has no fixed patterne and effective yield of success. Few are the magicians that have survived this far. Among the ones who have continued further, even fewer are sane, magickal and able to performe human speeche.
Faustus, the warlocke of venerable Durmstrang lived beyond the age of three hundrede after crafting a Horrcruxe out of a crucifix belonging to the young maidene he was betrothede to, the maidene he sacrificed for his pursuit of the Dark Arts. Faustus destroyed his own Horrcruxe on feeling deep losse and remorse for his act of creation. His apprentice Mephys Philosteles, the Greek Arithmancer, charted down the act of his master's creation.
Fool thought Tom. How silly it seemed to him to feel remorse for a murder commited nearly three hundred years in one's past, especially if the time was devoted to debauchery and violating every standard of moral respectability between the crime committed and the remorse one supposedly felt.
There will be no remorse for Lord Voldemort, who will not stop until he commands all that are opposed to him. In the long run, he thought, the only thing that really matters is mastering death and commanding one's fate. Morality, remorse, love, compassion those are for fools and deluded imbeciles.
Tom raised his wand and turned the page of the parchment towards the section transcribing Mephys Philosteles' annotations. The book was written in the 18th Century by an anonymous author of British origin, although Tom supposed it was written in the period before Dexter Fortescue's tenure at Hogwarts, presumably by the groups of students who worked with the Ministry on Dark Arts research, as Florean had told him. Presumably the author(or authors) had travelled to many obscure parts of Europe to collect the documents
The most detailed and most important was the recovery of Philosteles' scrolls...the single most detailed exploration on a successful creation of a Horcrux. It was thought lost until its discovery in the late 17th Century.
Master Faustus observed that upon murdering Miss Gretchen, he felt waves of grief and loss, that his senses lost some of their former clarity that his magick decreased in dexterity. He was led to conclude that the whole form of the single, undivided soul weakened upon acts committed against the natural order of things as experienced on an emotional level. Master chose to murder Gretchen who he loved above all people so as to intensify the force of the splinter, the cutting up of the soul. In my personal experiments in killing fellow witches and wizards I found that emotional connections between victims and killers have ill effects on one's command of magic. The lesser the connection felt, the easier to retain one's magic in complete command. Master will live for many years but with reduced magick due to his love for his murdered muse. He commanded me to obliviate him of the love he felt for Gretchen so as not to be tempted by remorse. Master need never fear death but he shall never wield the great power he once held.
Of course this was written when Philosteles was still alive, noted Tom idly. Faustus outlived him and at a great age, reclaimed the lost memories of his love for the woman he killed and eventually felt a sufficently deep pang of remorse for the Horcrux to shatter and the splintered soul to rejoin it's mother, the action resulting in the stupid wizard's death.
Immortality wasted on a lecher and a fool thought Tom supercilously. But he was great to have gone that far. He would go further. Further than anyone.
The soul derives strength from one's emotional experience. It is strongest when it is able to command experiences that the wizard can subjectively derive power from, strength is generally found to be derived from the positive memories of one's being. Not unlike the craft of the Patronus magic. The splinter of one's soul is achieved by the act of killing which in successful instances is committed by a strong will for dominance, for power, the triumph of one life by the destruction of another. Faustus then crafted a manner in which one extracted the splinter. The soul is the incorporeal essence of humanity and carving it out of it's physical organic shell is a most arduous task and until Faustus, no other wizard has succeeded in the extraction without retaining one's sanity and physical being. The impact on his magic was more out of connection with master's beloved than anything to do with the magic itself.
Tom took the knife in his hand and then slowly traced it along his palm stopping before the wrist of his right hand. His wand was kept on the table.
To render the splinter corporeal, it is necessary to willingly poison the body. This is best done by a deliberate sizable injury and the careful poisoning of one's blood. Master chose the wrist of his wand hand for his effort and it has yielded better results than prior atttempts which chose one's knees, thighs, necks, breasts, ears and eyes.
Tom sliced his wrist in a single stroke. The pain was hot and fierce and he let out a cry as blood splashed across the tablet. A hastily muttered charm from the wand in his left hand halted the blood from dripping further. Instead it gathered in hot bubbles arounded the wound of his wrist. The pain however was fresh and intense and the flaming ignited wound sent shivers into his spine as the did the grotesque sight of the scarlet bubbles of blood around his wrist.
He tapped the rusted iron nail with his wand and it burnt red hot at once. Yet more pain he thought heatedly, the pain from his flaming wrist making him intense and sweaty. But it will be worth it.
Tom kept silent through the placement of the hot iron tip of the nail on his wound, through the careful magical injection of the rusted iron dust extracted from the metal with his wand and into the wounded wrist and the moulding of the melted rust into a salve that cauteurized around his hand. When this was finished, he let out a long shriek of agony and pain that sounded through the room and would sound across Scotland had he not requested silence from the Room of Requirement.
Now for the dragon blood. The test-tube with the black liquid slowly began draining it's contents, the same contents then began filling the syringe, leaving a small amount of black liquid in the tube. Tom Riddle knew that the 5th use of Dragon Blood allowed the imbibing of external matter into the human body. This was generally used in complex healing surgeries at St. Mungo's but it suited Tom Riddle fine. With a wave of his wand, the syringe rose towards his forearm and injected the black blood of an Ukrainian Ironbelly into his bloodstream. The pain in his body gradually lessened and Tom muttered some healing charms and the wounds on his hand immediately disappeared looking as unviolated as ever to the untrained eye.
Inside his body, all kinds of chemical reactions were taking place due to the delirious interactions between his blood and the newly enforced chemical agents. But Tom felt little of this on the outside. He had to proceed. The next thing was to use the dragon blood left to inject the snake venom into his body. The test-tubes unsealed themselves and Tom conjured a ladle and a candle. He mixed the black blood with the snake venom and carefully heated the mixture with the candle. It had to be the right heat, not enough to place a cauldron above. He injected the mixture into his hand, choosing the same spot through which he injected the blood the first time. The unicorn blood was the only thing left and that would be needed later.
Tom rose to his feet and stood erect. He twirled his wand around his body carefully. His eyes glazed slightly as he continued his wand movements. The moment of reckoning was at hand.
His mind's eye went over the incantation. The enchantments around the Horcrux had no specific incantation, but required a force of magic and will. The basic incantation used by Faustus could be done in the language of the crafter's choice. Faustus used German, Tom would use Parseltongue.
In hissing tones, he chanted loudly - "I wield my mind, my power and command my soul to reveal it's droplets, unchain them from itself and bathe in my own blood.
No sooner that he said this, an intense cold pain shot through his body and Tom fell to the floor. He began shaking and writhing on the floor, his body reacting to any tactile sensation with the cry of a wounded and pricked squirrel. Tom shrieked and howled into the empty room as his body went white as bone and all colour from his skin drained itself out, dying in the spreading whiteness of his skin.
The pain stopped suddenly and Tom jumped to his feet at once and began running around the room in a furious circle and a strong pace. His shirt was wet with his sweat and his hair was shaggy with the pain that he had put himself through. His wand in his hand he returned himself to the tablet and turned towards the text. It took all the strength in the world to force his mind to continue with the task he had chosen for himself.
As much to calm and steady himself, he read over the next portions of Philosteles' notes...
The sensation of the soul swimming in the blood stream saps the body of it's heat, the skin of it's colour and dampens the senses. Existence in this state eventually leads to the destruction of these soul particles and leaves the body in the same permanent state of the first effect until it dies. The lack of consistent body heat and the dampening of the senses shortens the lifespan. The way forward is to extract these objects out of the body. Once extracted, they must needs be hexed at once so as to exist physically before they are again encased into the Horcrux.
The spell involved in this act is complex and most unbalanced. A badly timed spell or an imperfect incantation will lead to consequences most disastrous. The spell diagram below corresponds closely to Master Faustus' directions and actions.
The incantation used by master is Anima Metempsych Corporare.
Tom stared at the complex spell diagram on the book and began twirling his wand in the right arrangement as he whispered authoratively, "Anima Metempsych Corporare"
His wand completed the movement pointing directly at his throat. Time to go one step further, if I don't choke to death first. His body lit up in pain and his stomach contracted painfully as if he was about to regurgitate bile but what would come out of his body moved slowly and painfully out of his throat and piled towards his mouth, rather than the slushy bubbling extraction of vomit out of his body. Tom's jaw was locked open, his eyes wide and staring. Yet if he had seen a mirror he would know how far he had gone for his gray eyes were tinted with red from the pain of the magic performed. He felt a bubble like substance at the apex of his oesophagus and slowly it bubbled out of his mouth. Blood began to drool out of his tongue, slowly and then rapidly as he cupped his hand around his lips to collect the splintered soul.
It was a moving red substance. A brighter shade of red than the red blood dripping from his mouth. It was loosely spherical, except it's edges tended to shift and swivel tiny tendrils on the tips of Tom's fingers. Tom thought oddly of the Snitch caught by Seekers on a Quidditch pitch. This soul fragment was of nearly the same size. He pointed his wand again towards it and muttered the incantation to make it into the proper physical state.
"Ars Cordus Artis"
The soul particles became more spherical, it's tendrils stopped waving and it hardened into a ball with a flesh like reddish black surface. When Tom pressed his hand around the sphere, he felt a soft drumming sound within it, the substance had it's own vital signs, it's own tiny heart beat though Tom knew that the heart recorded was the one in his body. After clearing the bloodiness of his body, he pointed his wand towards the substance and searched out the substance for it's properties. It contained the iron, the venom and the dragon blood as he intended it to. He searched deeper to reverse the splinter to it's point of origin. His wand traced the circumference. The splinter was of the most recent make. The murder of his false Muggle parents. He felt the ugly flesh in his arm and resolved and kneaded it gently. His left hand picked the ring on top of the book and he inserted it on his index finger and he gently placed the ball of the soul particles into the same hand. It would now be necessary to insert the splinter into the ring, the act would benefit both objects. The soul ball would be permanently grafted rather than persist in it's temporary state and the ring would be as indestructible as any object could ever hope to be.
Philosteles' instructions continued, "The Horcrux is crafted by the most delicate of metallurgical spells. It needs to incorporate a fragment of the life essence into an object. Animals are most impractical for they think, eat, feed and regulate and excrete. A non-living object, especially a small object is better suited. The size of the object has no bearing on it's soul containing powers. There is no such thing as an object too small to contain a soul. The Dark Lord Koschei contained his soul in a needle. A big object is harder to protect and even harder to hide. To place the soul into the object of choice, there is the incantation but more than that is a force of will and a show of dominion and also the memory and circumstance of the act of murder which led to the existence of the splinter."
Tom placed his wand on his temple and concentrated on the memory of the day when he killed his despicable Muggle relatives. A thin silver thread attached itself to his wand and he placed it into the small particle of soul on the palm of his left hand. At once the ball glowed bright red like a flaming ember.
No wizard who has come this far can turn back.
Tom laughed coldly. Why would he even consider turning back?
The encasement of a soul within a Horcrux is permanent on the condition of remorselessness on the part of the crafter. Desire and actions for remorse have in the past allowed for the sentinel soul to rejoin it's fount of origin, thereby stripping the Horcrux of it's purpose and creating great life threatening pain on the body and mind of the individual. It is also permanent on the condition that it is able to protect itself. An object grafted with soul particles is protected by regenerative abilities that protect itself from almost all forms of magical attacks and every single non-magical form of penetration yet this is true only on the condition that the object is not attacked so powerfully that it's regenerative abilities are compromised and destroyed and it cannot heal itself in time. In this case, a Horcrux can be successfully destroyed and the soul particles encased within be lost for good leaving the mother soul permanently mutilated. It is recommended that the Horcrux be sealed and protected by sufficiently powerful magic and be protected from enemies and thieves.
The incantation for grafting a soul particle on to a Horcrux is "Anima Horcruxum Artis". The spell diagram is as follows. It is extremely important that one holds the soul particles in the palm of one's non-wand hand and the intended Horcrux within it's immediate reach. The smaller the distance, the lesser the chance for compromise. Once crafted, the mother soul exists in two spaces. One organic shell from which it originates, the other a non-organic tether placed somewhere else. A Horcrux can keep as far a distance as concievable from the crafter. Crafting a Horcrux, by necessity, makes the soul unstable. Lack of sleep, loss of taste of favourite foods and inability to dream are some of the milder symptoms. More extreme forms have included insanity, irreparable physical deformities and unstable command of one's magic. It is not fully known to what extreme end this unstability can take. This magic is therefore not for the faint hearted, the easily bewildered and those who refuse to take sacrifices.
Tom smirked wildly. He was fearless of anyone and anything but he had more courage and power than this book would allow.
"Anima Horcruxum Artis" The tiny red ball burnt bright again and it's spherical surface coarsened and became fluidlike yet again, it pooled across his left palm and moved towards the ring on the index finger. The tendrils encased the ring in a thick red solvent and Tom looked ominous and dangerous with the particles of his own soul twisting around his index finger. The sense of power he derived from dangling a portion of his own soul as if it was a beady cobweb was making him delirious with happiness. The gold band of the ring could not be seen amidst the horrid scarlet tendrils in which the human soul coloured itself. Redder than blood, brighter than the white snow outside the castle, it was the single most beautiful thing Tom Riddle would ever see. Then Tom saw the tendrils shorten and recede and twist around the ring and finally he saw his ring on his finger looking as it did when he first saw it on his Uncle Morfin's hand, the mark of his Peverell forbears - A triangle containing a circle divided by a diameter - staring ominously into his eye. Tom then removed the ring and held it in the palm of his hand at the exact same spot, his soul had been cupped. The soul had felt like a cool fluid, yet it touched his hand as if it was a part of the air. The ring felt as light as ever but as Tom ran his fingers along the band, he felt a tiny vibration from within. The beating of his own heart, the ring was serving sentinel to his own life.
Tom placed the ring on the tablet and savouring only a moment for his astounding success at crafting a Horcrux at the age of 16, proceeded to topping this achievement. He pulled the diary into which he had put disorganized entries of notes for the Horcrux, drawings of possible dark symbols for future use, doodles and sketches on the image of Slytherin's locket he had seen in Morfin's mind, and lately he had used a Parseltongue script to write out instructions on the opening and use of Salazar Slytherin's chamber.
It had occured to Tom that he would graduate from Hogwarts the next year. It pained him that he would be parted from this most ancient and powerful of all wizard dwellings but there was so much still to be learnt from it. Tom wanted to return as a teacher and planned to apply to Dippet after his NEWTs but he knew that he would be too young to accept. So he planned to send in a portion of himself, hidden in the mind of an unsuspecting student to take over the school in later years. To do so, he would experiment even further than anyone ever dreamed to do so with the Horcrux. Tom would extract a portion of his soul by attaching it to his memory of his sixteen year self and then preserve it into a diary. The diary which contained the evidence of the Chamber of Secrets and which was filled with the paper that contained his future vision for the wizard world. And of course to do this he would create a second Horcrux. The first of it's kind in the history of the world. It was also the greatest risk he would ever take.
Tom first filled the syringe with the Unicorn blood from the test tube. And injected a sliver of it into the same place where he had placed the dragon blood and the snake venom. The silver substance made Tom feel ticklish as it trickled into his bloodstream. Unicorn blood was extremely powerful yet volatile substance but injecting it into his bloodstream would keep him alive in case his current experiment backfired. The volatility of the blood would be curbed once the second Horcrux was made.
It made the best sense to do it at once. He placed the wand to his temple and extracted slowly the memory and image of the sole murder committed by the Basilisk and then slowly he began muttering under his breath as he added memories pertaining to his life in the Muggle orphanage, the resentment he felt towards Dumbledore, his pride in his popularity in school, his search for his ancestry and the discovery of the Basilisk in the Chamber and the reasons why he opened and closed it, a single tendril flowed out of his temple and several smaller tendriles curled around it, in a set of tight intertwined patters as if it was a powerful rope of silver and blue.
Then Tom muttered with a sense of purpose and command as well as a reckless zest, "Anima Corporare Memento Mens" The same powerful cold pain that filled him earlier returned in full command. The incantation he had just used was one of his own invention, patterned and designed after months of work and research in the Room for Requirement. He watched from the corner of his eye as a stream of bright red airy tendrils swivelled around the tendril of his sixteen year old's memory blackening the silver and blue into colours of bright red and dark black. Tom breathed out faintly, "Ars Cordus Artis" and the rope of red and black hardened into a fleshlike surface as it floated in the air.
A searing numbness swam across his body. Tom did not feel his knees stumbling on the floor, nor did he feel his wand in his arm. The second soul particle, grafted at it's moment of extraction into his memory had sapped him of tactile feeling. He could feel neither his tongue, nor his lips, nor the sweat pouring out of his white shirt, making it transparent and wet. He could no longer smell, yet his eyes peered down the bridge of his nose, remaining unaffected as did his ears which listened to the noisy silence around the room with ominous feeling. It was very hard for Tom to force his left hand, which had held a portion of his own soul mere minutes ago, yet was now palmed with sticky sweat. By a sense of will and the direction of his eye, he forced it towards the syringe containing the Unicorn blood and forced his long fingers to position it properly against his right hand which still held his wand. He watched with panic and dread as the silver blood injected itself again into his body, this time a greater dose entered within.
The shock of the relief sent him crumbling to the floor as his muscles once again gasped the tactility it had been denied when it was drowned with the corporeal soul essences. Tom thrashed and writhed around the floor for a whole minute before gathering himself again. The discomfiture and the pain involved in the second extraction slowly subsided yet the new relief was just as painful. He looked at his skin and noticed that portions of colour again entered within, that his nose detected the intense body odour around his body. He placed his hands on his hair and found it was wet and haggard. One would not see handsome Tommy Riddle in this stage but a wild creature of will and power, his body was tense and tight and his wand was emitting a trail of sparks on the floor. His gray eyes peered towards the red and black floating rope of tendrills. He walked towards it and sat once again on the floor. He placed the diary underneath the floating tendril.
he then waved his wand in the same former movement as before and muttered in a high cold voice, "Anima Horcruxum Artis". The red and black rained into the tiny pages. The pages which had been written in black ink accepted the new matter and transformed it into the same shade of black as itself. The tendrils retained a reddish tinge as it glued around the book and slowly seeped itself into the blank parchment in the colour of black. Tom held the diary and watched anxiously as the pages in the diary, the myriad diagrams, the Parseltongue script and the many symbols and scribblings disappeared into the parchment upon impact with the memory soul particle mixture. The diary looked like any common book save that it looked older and weathered by use which was odd since all it's pages was blank. Tom conjured a quill and an inkpot. One small test.
He dipped the quill in the ink and turned the pages slowly and then dropped a blot of ink into the parchment and watched it filter into the nothingness of the parchment. He then dipped his quill into the pot and began writing "I am Lord Voldemort". He watched with satisfaction as independent of any will of his wand, the letters began re-arranging itself in the reverse order of when he first crafted the anagram at the age of 12. Tom Marvolo Riddle appeared on the blank pages and slowly it shortened it's initials into T. M. Riddle.
Then a new script appeared on the diary, independent of it's own accord, We have succeeded, this far and no one is the wiser of how far we have travelled in a mere hour we have kept ourselves in this chamber. I, T. M. Riddle shall reside in this diary until I find a willing vessel whose mind I might bend into our plan. I shall grow no older and I shall be a monument and a record to our precocious days in Hogwarts, plotting victory and triumph, rewriting history before we have come of age. I shall recieve word one day of my older self's triumph as the greatest sorceror of the world. The future that we have made for ourselves which I must play only a distant, hidden part is the one that you will tread and fulfill. And soon you will return to Hogwarts, make it bow before your knees, reclaim it in the name of Salazar Slytherin, purge out the Mudbloods, the Half-Breeds, the Muggle lovers, the House Elves, the Centaurs, the Merpeople. You will rid away of all traces of unworthy Gryffindor, Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff and install Great Slytherin above them all. The Chamber will burrow to the surface and the Basilisk roam in the Great Lake, feasting on the Squid. All this lies before us.
Tom had to keep himself on Blood Replenishing Potion and many other handmade mixtures upto the middle of the month of January in order to heal his body thoroughly off the craft of two Horcruxes. He had convinced Slughorn and his fellow peers that he was feeling ill and they had let them be. To the outside world, there was no hint that Tom Riddle walked amongst themselves not as a person but merely a corporeal organic container of the main part of his soul while two of it's offshoots resided in a diary and a ring he had hidden deep inside Hogwarts. It was a room inside the Room for Requirement. A Room containing centuries of articles and artefacts, revealing itself to no one other than someone who wished to hide something inside and appearing to no one else who did not have anything to hide into. It was a room only a student like him could ever enter. No annointed Muggle-lover like Dumbledore would find it. One had to have the curiosity and the thirst for adventure to find it. And he was certain that no other student before him had ever come as far as he did and he had set the bar so high that no one would follow him that far. Yet he did not plan to keep them there permanently. The Diary would need to be smuggled from outside inside. Preferably a good time after he finished Hogwarts and the Ring would be best protected in Little Hangleton. Tom did not feel that Horcruxes were safe if they were hidden in pairs. Each had to be kept seperately and far from its brother splinters. That made it more challenging for any hypothetical hunter for his Horcruxes.
He turned 17 at the turn of the new year and was legally an adult wizard for the last months of his sixth year. His apparition tests were cakewalk and after a few tries in Hogsmeade he was able to disapparate without making a noise. Being of age meant that he was allowed to use magic outside school, it meant that he was of age to work in the wizard world and it also meant that he could live where he liked. But Tom would go to the Orphanage for one final time this summer and then not return. He would be Tom Riddle, poor Oprhan boy for as long as he studied here.
Tom finished his sixth year with high marks in all his tests and essays and began his seventh year as Head Boy, for which he was the almost unanimous choice. Tom knew very well who the lone voice of dissent was but Dumbledore was pre-occupied with almost daily castle visits by Aurors from Europe and friends from the Wizengamot and the Ministry. The escalation of the Second World War in it's final years and Grindelwald's refusal to back down had had it's effect on the auburn haired warlock. And Tom knew that Dumbledore would soon go to Central and Eastern Europe and track Grindelwald. It happened in the second part of the seventh year, Dumbledore's classes were taken over by his friend and assistant Elphias Doge who steadied the students towards their NEWTs. Dumbledore who was deeply admired and respected by his Gryffindors and by many students in other houses was a deeply missed presence within the castle. Tom of course played his role as a sombre responsible Head Boy who younger students looked up to in the wake of their shepherd's absence, yet his cheerful mood at the idea of a Dumbledore-less castle was caught on by his friends in Slytherin. He took advantage to dwelve even further into his researches and his exploration of the castle. He even considered re-opening the Chamber but felt it would risk exposure and discovery.
He had considered the idea of a seven part soul. The number 7 was the most powerful of magical numbers. It was the most ideal combination for ensuring that his magical power remain unchanged and everlasting and permanent. He would be truly immortal and even if a soul particle was destroyed or withered away by accident or mistake or even latter-day remorse, he still had enough to tether his life to the earth. It would be impossible for anyone to consider how many he made, what he made them with and where he had hidden them. It would take one years and years to find just one. The other five was practically a lost cause. No one would guess. Even then they would have to kill me and that was inconcievable.
He was in no hurry to make more Horcruxes. He had used all the available soul splinters created from his body count and he was not yet comfortable to brazenly kill in public and even if he chose victims for his experiment, it would attract attention from Dumbledore who knew that Tom opened the Chamber and who saw through the sham of Morfin's capture and who suspected Tom but who had no evidence. One more surreptitious murder and Dumbledore would force his attention to him, and Tom did not want that especially now that he had precious valuables to hide. He would not kill again, at least in this country until he was ready to go underground and chart out on his own. He would do what Grindelwald promised to do, yet deliver on this promise. He would build an army of wizards, werewolves, giants, hags, goblins and dementors but he would bring the threat home to Wizarding England, a land that prided itself on merry hypocrisy and pompous self-absorbed social climbing. But he would not do so at once. It would be ceremonious and ritualized. Tom having now crafted his Horcruxes, knew that he would live forever and had all the time in the world.
If he desired, he could craft the other four Horcruxes at once. He could use potion bottles, a cauldron or textbooks but Tom had no interest in something so dreadfully common. It would need a history or a significance to it. And Tom decided on the four objects of choice one spring morning in the last month of his seventh year at Hogwarts.
The House Ghost of Gryffindor had told him years earlier that of the four house ghosts, he was the youngest and the oldest was the Grey Lady of Ravenclaw House. She was the oldest not on account of the age of her time of death, a slender 24 years of age at the time of her death, younger than the four in fact, but because she was the first among them to die. When Tom had asked the Gryffindor Ghost who she was, he had told Tom that she was the daughter of Rowena Ravenclaw, Helena. Tom had befriended the ghost since his fifth year, a rare feat because she talked to no one else. From the way she composed herself and the silences with which she had talked to him about her mother and her older friends, he knew that she had a secret to tell. Tom suspected it but he needed to hear it from her to make sure. She of course did not know that Tom was using her like he did every one he met and talked to. To her, Tom was a curious handsome boy who was obsessed with her personal first hand account of the time of the Founders.
Tom chose to ask her about Slytherin that day.
"I remember Salazar when I was young," she said softly. "He was very humble. Always insited on being called Salazar. Even by his students. From what I gathered, the first students of Hogwarts were adults who apprenticed under each founder. They were personally chosen by them as embodiments of the qualities they sought in their students and they in turn helped them to teach the younger students who got selected by Godric's sorting hat." She shook her head. "The house rivalry we have nowadays would have kept them chuckling for days on end. They didn't expect people to take ideas such as "bravest of heart" or "cunning and sly" so literally. Salazar often joked that his least favourite Hogwarts students were the Slytherins and he chose them because he believed they needed his personal attention."
"How did he get along with your mother?" asked Tom earnestly.
"They got along," she said pensively. "I think Salazar was attracted to Rowena. But he was married and so was she so nothing came of that. But he was a gentleman with her. And she was very sad when he had to leave Hogwarts."
"Did you remember that?" asked Tom curiously.
"No," she shook her head. "There was a lot of conflict inside Hogwarts around the time Salazar left. His students attacked several of their fellow students and one of them hurt Gryffindor's brother. He didn't like the Muggleborn and Half-Blood students, though he made a great show of making exceptions, maybe he was sincere I don't know. Mother did not think that Salazar asked them to attack or commanded them to do so but she also felt that Gryffindor was right to call Slytherin a coward for not doing enough to stop them and for hoping to profit from their attempts to purge Hogwarts."
Tom went pale at this accusation of his great forbear, "Do you think Salazar was a coward?" He didn't hide the fury he felt towards Rowena Ravenclaw's criticism towards Slytherin.
"I don't know," she said coolly, "and I don't care. When I was twenty I wanted to be done with Hogwarts and this land. Mother and Father kept me locked in this land and everybody expected me to be - j-just as great as her, they all said I looked like her and was beautiful." She smiled, "But I was plain and mediocre. All the other Ravenclaws were better than me. Mother tried to tell me that she loved me no matter what but she never had time for me, always with her favourites and she was never the same when Father died. She was quite alone..."
Tom stated at the Grey Lady's pearly white eyes which glistened with pearly misty tears. He saw clear as day the expression of guilt on her face and he moved towards her steadily. Legilimency was useless against ghosts but Tom knew enough about human behaviour to know how vulnerable people were when they lived with guilt and for a ghost their entire existence was spent in penitential guilt for their wasted earthly lives.
"Did you remember a locket that Slytherin wore?" he asked carefully.
"Locket?" asked Helena frowning. "Why yes? He wore it often, it was a gift from his wife. It was silver and it had a snake...but how do you know about it?"
"I'll let you in on a secret," he whispered with a smile. He looked around the deserted Transfiguration department with a deliberate theatricality that intrigued his departed audience. "You see I'm half blood. My father was a Muggle but my Mum was a witch. I was looking up her family. They're both dead." he added on seeing her concerned expression. "I found out that they were related to an old pureblood family that lost all the money and were living outside society. She left home, Mum did. But she didn't have money," he added quickly, his eyes glinted with a red tinge as he slowly seduced the Grey Lady to his will, "so she took with her...she stole one thing from her father's house."
"Your mother ran away from home stealing something from her parents," she said strangely, her beautiful robes fluttering uncomfortably.
"Yes," he said shrugging his shoulders. "But don't blame her, she was poor and she was alone and Mum and Dad didn't treat her right and she wanted to be herself and why not take something that belonged to her anyway?" The Grey Lady watched the young man with rapt attention drinking his every word. "It was her birthright. It was Slytherin's Locket."
"What?" she said suddenly. "Are you saying you're related to Slytherin?"
Tom shrugged his shoulders, "He lived so long ago that everybody walking the earth today is probably related to him. And I don't know if it's real. That's why I asked...I didn't know who else could take me seriously. You go to anyone today and say you have something of Merlin's or Ravenclaw's they'd probably laugh at you."
"Yes, laugh at you," she repeated steadily, biting her lip.
Tom added carefully, "I'm not sure if it's a real locket but my grandfather believed it was real. And Mum didn't have it with her when she died in the orphanage just after giving birth to me. Don't bother," he added quickly, waving away her sympathetic smile towards the poor orphan boy, "I never knew her and I won't ever know if it's real or not or if it exists anymore." The gracious expression at Tom's refusal of sympathy of course meant that she had greater sympathy for him now. "For all I know she was robbed of it. If she succeeded to sell it, she'd have enough to take care of us. How many other chances are there of owning Founders' objects? It would make a fortune."
The Grey Lady stared at him with a pensive and anxious glance and then as if she was finally making her decision she answered, "Oh I think there might be a better chance than you think." At Tom's frowning expression of curiosity, she continued, "The Founders possessed objects which were famous in their day and objects which had a mystique and intrigue around them. Over the years it spread through their students and teachers. Gryffindor was the simplest of the four, he dressed like he never left a tavern or took a bath," she added haughtily. "Mother always urged Godric to be better groomed but he liked his rough hardy ways and enjoyed fishing in the Great Lake with his students. He was a great wizard but a complete commoner so he didn't have much in the way of treasure. Take a look at that ugly Sorting Hat, it was ugly even when it was new whatever it sings. But his one luxury was his sword."
"A sword?" asked Tom interestedly.
"Yes," she nodded towards him. "Made out of Goblin silver. He loved swordplay and he wanted the strongest sword in his possession. He paid a Gobin to make one for him and he studded it with rubies and jewels and no Troll or Giant or Dragon could defeat Godric when he wielded his wand in one hand and that sword in the other. Salazar had no chance against him. When he died, the sword disappeared and hasn't been seen since, though there are rumours and stories. He didn't have children so it didn't pass down the line. Helga Hufflepuff had a small Golden cup that is actually widely seen and probably still in the hands of whoever has the gold and the bloodline for it. Salazar was the wealthiest of the Four and he had a lot of Gold, but the Locket which you mention is maybe all that he has left. He wore it all the time in those days."
"What about Ravenclaw?" asked Tom.
"She had a diadem," she said gravely. "It had the power to grant it's wearer wisdom. She made it herself."
"Is it the same one on her statue in the Common Room," asked Tom. "Er...one of my Ravenclaw friends showed it to me?" he added on seeing her questioning stare.
"Yes," she said seriously, "that statue was made by her students as a monument to her when she died. They made it as they remembered her. Young, intelligent and beautiful...oh mother..." Helena cried her pearly misty tears and then she stared at Tom and said, "I know very well how your mother felt when she ran away from home. You see - the last four years of my life was spent in hiding from my mother. I wanted to be away from her and her shadow. I wanted to be better than her," she cried bitterly. "So I walked up to her room and while she was sleeping I stole her diadem and left Hogwarts. Many still search for it but nobody knows where it is except me."
"Are you sure it's still where you kept it?" asked Tom carefully. "You died...a thousand years ago. Things change in that time."
"Mother would have liked you," cried Helena with a bitter laugh. She added in a sing-song voice, "'Wit beyond measure is man's greatest treasure', that was her motto. The wisdom powers of the diadem actually allowed you to be witty and gave you a command of language. Of course command of language allows you to command thought and then command magic. It's one of Mother's favourite riddles. No pun intended." She added courteously. "It didn't help me. She sent someone to find me and he killed me when he saw me. I only found out when I became a ghost...you see mother didn't want me to be found because she wanted her diadem back, she wanted to see me before she died. I visited her as a ghost and she cried herself to death on seeing me like that. I wished I died all over again...but I was already dead." She gasped painfully. "I've wanted to say that for so long but who would understand? Nobody except you." Tom nodded sympathetically.
"I don't know if it's still there but I think if anyone can find it, you should. Unless somebody found it already. I was living in Albania in the forest there. I found an old yew tree. Yew trees last for centuries, you know. I kept it in a tree there safely. You see the diadem was useless to someone who lived alone in the woods. You needed to converse with people, to share with them your gift for the powers to be really useful. So I kept it there."
"Albania," said Tom wonderingly. "It might be years before I have the money to go there. And it might not even be there."
"Well if you find out that it's not there, can you find a way to tell me that it's gone," she asked hopefully. "If you find it, then you have earned it. Mother had no other child and no one can pretend to be Ravenclaw's heir." She began to glide away and then she turned back, "Oh and Tom good luck in finding Salazar's locket."
Tom knew that it was imperative that he gather those four objects - Gryffindor's Sword, Hufflepuff's Cup, Ravenclaw's Diadem and his birth right, Slytherin's Locket. How great it would be to possess and unite the Four objects of the Four Founders and the grandeur of each object encasing a part of his soul appealed to his imagination. He would find each one and make it a Horcrux.
With this in mind, Tom planned his career options upon leaving Hogwarts. Slughorn, who had forgotten for both their sakes the troubling conversation they had in Tom's sixth year, had relished himself in offering Tom career opportunities at the Ministry or Gringotts(which intrigued him although he disliked the possibility of working under Goblin scrutiny, far less susceptible to his charm and charisma than wizard intelligence) or even at the Daily Prophet("Journalism is always a good career to build a platform into any field of pursuit, be it academic or political") or at St. Mungo's. Tom however wanted to know more about witches and wizards lived, the values they carried into their daily lives and the possessions that they treasured. He also wanted to find out for himself if the lost Founders artefacts were still in the country. For that reason he considered working at Borgin and Burkes, the richest and best shop in Knocturn Alley, more attractive and meaningful in terms of life experiences than working in public institutions. He had been in touch with Borgin and while he felt the pay wasn't to his satisfaction, it was a definite vacancy that Borgin would keep aside for Tom Riddle. Of course, this was only his second choice.
His preference was to work at Hogwarts, as a teacher. Old Galatea Merrythought was considering retirement though Dumbledore and the Herbology Professor Beery convinced her to continue. Tom proposed to Dippet his desire to continue at Hogwarts as a teacher and he promised him that he would consider it. Tom did not think he had a real chance to get the job. It was rare for someone so young to be offered a position in the staff. One had to be in their 20s at the very least. It pained him to leave the castle, it was his kingdom and as far as he was concerned he owned it having gone deeper into it's history and it's mysteries than anyone else. He thought about how much he had still not learnt and discovered about the school and it's magic. Of course, being a teacher was an excellent platform for gathering followers; much like Slughorn in his harmless manner did so himself. But then it would draw attention to build platform at a school like Grindelwald did at Durmstrang. Especially with the public hoopla over Dumbledore's defeat of the fool.
It happened in the week after his NEWTs. The Daily Prophet devoted an entire issue to it and the Hogwarts' staff brought in a large Wireless to bleat out the news for all to hear. Grindelwald's forces which had been thinning out, little by little by the special group led by Dumbledore, put in a deadly final stand in a castle at Austria where Dumbledore defeated him in a ferocious duel that lasted four hours. Dumbledore was injured by the ordeal but he was healing fast and the conquering hero would be coming to Hogwarts in time for his graduation ceremony.
There were a few journalists among the crowd that gathered around the duel and they had taken pictures. The Prophet managed to get rights for these and splattered the pages with large poster size tableaus of two wizards engaged in fierce combat. Some of the pictures were in colour and Tom looked at the moving image of an auburn haired wizard robed in deep red dueling against a blonde wizard robed in grey. The agility with which Dumbledore moved, the force and movement of his wand and that of Grindelwald's had impressed Tom. After a certain point these two weren't even figures so much so as red and grey blurs. The force of their spells and the light from them often created blinding flashes in the Prophet pages that occassionally left some of the many students who read it with glazed looks, even if they were merely looking up advertisements below the images. Dumbledore would return to the castle at night, quietly and silently not wishing to parade into the Great Hall. Dippet however insisted on a guard of honour for someone who had brought prestige to Hogwarts and Tom as Head Boy was part of this guard alongside Head Girl Beatrice Bennett, the Quidditch Captains and the seventh year prefects. Dumbledore's closest friend amongst the staff - Herbert Beery, Horace Slughorn, Galatea Merrythought, Silvanus Kettleburn - waited in a small chamber by the Entrance Hall alongside Dippet and the selected students for Dumbledore's arrival to the castle.
"He's really taking long isn't he?!" asked Slughorn heavily. "I mean here we are all waiting to invite the man who defeated the most powerful of all Dark Wizards back to the castle, and Albus decides to be late for his own homecoming."
"Shut up, Horace," rasped Professor Merrythought, clad in bronze and blue robes, as befitted the Head of Ravenclaw House. "First of all, this is a surprise, second of all, after what he's been through do you really think Albus would like all the attention around him."
"Why wouldn't he like the attention?" cried Slughorn, shocked to his bone. "If it had been me, I'd have come back on the finest luxury carriage festooned by the most well bred Abraxans in France. There would be purple plumage on the head of every horse and gold trimmings..."
"Dumbledore told me," interrupted Merrythought haughtily, "that he'd be coming here on a Thestral!" She inhaled a draft of tobacco from her pipe as she gazed at the curious glances gathered around her with satisfaction. "Albus sent me and Herbie here a message in the morning." She added, removing a single golden feather from her robe.
"Typical Albus!" exclaimed Slughorn theatrically, "He won't return my owls but he sends you two a secret message from his phoenix!"
"He said that he brought you an old bottle of champagne from the finest basement in Bordeaux," retorted Merrythought dryly.
"What a sweet, considerate man," sighed Slughorn pompously. "Always thinking about others in need." There was a hearty laugh from the rest of the teachers and after an awkward sideways glance, a couple of the students joined in.
Tom's thoughts however were drawn to Slughorn's casual mention of Dumbledore's phoenix. "I didn't know that Professor Dumbledore had a phoenix?"
At this the Gryffindor prefect Emmeline Vance turned to face him, "You've never heard of Fawkes?"
"Fawkes?" asked Tom.
"That's the phoenix's name," answered Emmeline kindly. "Dumbledore showed it to us in one of our post Quidditch parties. We needed some decoration and Dumbledore called in Fawkes and the phoenix supplied, festooned the common room with scarlet and gold. It stayed that way for weeks."
"Fawkes was part of NEWT Care of Magical Creatures," piped in Professor Kettleburn wheezily. "You didn't take the class though, so you missed your chance." He added in a stern tone. "Dumbledore was kind to lend it to me. Not many chances you get to teach Phoenixes with an actual bird as a subject, usually you do it by telling them about the properties of the feathers. He found it in Palestine years ago. Before he started at Hogwarts. He was in a bad place in that time, just a few years after his mother died and they were close and it hurt him a great deal. Fawkes, Albus said, came to him in his time of need and he gave him the strength to continue and to come here to Hogwarts."
"How old was he when he started here?" asked Tom curiously.
Professor Dippet gave Tom with a shrewd smile of understanding before answering, "He was twenty three, Tom. I was the Arithmancy teacher at that time and Head of Gryffindor House when Albus took the post of Charms teacher, though he believed he was better suited to his present post as the Head of Transfiguration Studies and he was right of course."
"Of course," said Herbert Beery knowingly. "None of us thought that Albus would stay for the long haul. We always thought he would become Minister of Magic."
"I am not sure we should be trading gossip in front of the students," said Dippet reprovingly.
"Oh calm down, Armando," exclaimed Slughorn heartily. "They've given their NEWTs and they're all of age, aren't they? Besides they've known it for as long as we have that Dumbledore was holding himself back staying at Hogwarts for all these years."
Professor Dippet glared at him, "So you think the calling of the teaching profession is only an acceptable second choice..."
Slughorn shifted uncomfortably before recovering with a toothy grin, "Oh come on, Armando, I didn't mean that. For wizards such as me and you," he wavered under Dippet's withering glare, "I mean that for some exceptional wizards like Dumbledore, the only thing to do is to take the mantle of the leader. He was born for it. He's on the Wizengamot, he gives regular opinions to the Daily Prophet and he's a personal friend of the Minister and has his hands on many of the wizard legislation anyway. I'm just saying why not make it official."
Tom sat silently in his chair going over those words. Here for the very first time he got an inkling into the mystery of Dumbledore. Dumbledore who refused the post of Minister of Magic, which every witch or wizard in the land desired for themselves but confined himself to achieving what Tom had wanted for himself. Becoming a household name with respect and adulation and an influence that spanned across the entire country and stretched around the world. Was Dumbledore doing what Tom planned to do when he took the post of Defence Against the Dark Arts. Gather a platform to eventually take power. Tom wondered if Dumbledore would stay at Hogwarts now. The entire community had a hero in their midst and they would clamour to install him above them all as their leader and guide. Or was he planning to topple the existing order, build his own army. Dumbledore was a powerful wizard, full of rare gifts and weapons. He had succeeded in domesticating a phoenix which was considered a near impossibility by most magizoologists. And he had defeated a wizard without conscience but full of deadly skill and murderous intent all on his own. And he was clearly in prime physical shape from the manner in which he moved in those images in the Prophet. But more than that, he saw through the lies and the bad faith as well as he did. He saw Tom for what he was and wasn't fooled with the delusions that other witches and wizards were.
The door of the chamber opened and a tall, thin man in blue travelling robes stepped in to the room. His sharp blue eyes gazed around the room solemnly before he pulled out his wand and waved it with a tiny twitch of his fingers. At once the room in the chamber recieved brighter lighting than was possible from the fireplace. Where the dim light of the fireplace casted shadows around the old faces of the professors, now there was light that made them look somewhat younger and fresher than before.
"I hope you don't mind, I was hoping to test my new wand," said Dumbledore plesantly, twirling the wooden object in his fingers.
At once cheers and claps broke out in the room. Merrythought and Beery hugged him while he shook hands with Dippet, Slughorn and Beery.
"Horace, I have something for you!" Dumbledore pulled out an emerald green bottle with a red ribbon wrapped around it's neck.
The students laughed as they watched Slughorn shamelessly kissing Dumbledore's cheek in gratitude and hastily hide the bottle in his robes, not even considering opening it and sharing it with his party. Dumbledore rubbed the spot on his cheek where he recieved the kiss and turned to face the students.
"So how did your NEWTs go?"
There was a cry of incredulity. The students didn't stay up late wanting to talk NEWTs with the hero who conquered the evil Grindelwald. Sturgis Podmore from Hufflepuff shamelessly asked for details.
"Is it true that he's mad, that he has two Giants in his castle?"
Dumbledore paused, "Mad? I would say he's eccentric, remorseless and has very poor taste in music. He was however most lucid in his trial and quite rational in talking about his self-justifications for his many crimes...What interests me is that he's safely bound in Nurmengard prison, the magic in the prison is powerful and strong and he will languish there for the rest of his life."
"Wasn't Nurmengard the prison he built for his enemies?" asked Tom. Dumbledore's blue eyes fixed at Tom's grey ones for the first time and Tom, gifted in Occlumency though he was, still felt that Dumbledore saw through him.
"Yes, Tom," answered Dumbledore calmly, "that's how I am sure that he will be safely locked there. The magic he used to construct it is very strong and he won't be able to escape from that prison. Besides that, he is severely weakened by our confrontation and it will be hard for him to muster strength to even attempt to escape."
Professor Merrythought fixed her attention to Dumbledore's wand, "That's not an Ollivander's creation is it?"
"No, Galatea, it is not," answered Dumbledore seriously. "I recieved this from Gregorovitch...I always wondered about Gregorovitch's creations." He added in a strange tone. "Although I must say I miss my old wand."
"Did it burn out?" asked Dippet curiously. "It often happens in a duel that lasts as long as the one that you had with Grindelwald."
"All I know is that it became clear to me that my old wand would no longer be of use after I defeated Gellert," answered Dumbledore calmly. "It no longer performed basic spells and conjured a poor armchair with a spring sticking out. This one on the other hand serves me well. For now at least. So why did all of you stay up so late for me?"
"The guard of honour," exclaimed Dippet quickly. Immediately the students and the teachers arranged themselves against the fireplace, their wands held aloft as they faced Dumbledore. Tom, the tallest in the room aside from Dumbledore, stood in the back.
Armando Dippet cleared his throat, "We wanted this to be a small homecoming surprise for you Albus...so a one, and a two and a three..."
As one, they launched into a rendition of the school song. Tom who stood in the back, merely mouthed along with the chorus of "Hogwarts, Hogwarts, Hoggy Warty Hogwarts" as Dumbledore's eyes were filled with tears. When he was finished, he pulled out his handkerchief and blew into it.
"And that is the reason why I will never leave this school," he said heavily. Podmore and Vance cheered along with Beery, Merrythought and forgoing propreity, Armando Dippet who doffed his hat to Dumbledore.
He conversed with the teachers and students for another hour, forestalling discussions on his great duel but talking about the efforts of reconstruction in wartorn Europe and the trials of the many war criminals in the region. Dumbledore seemed far more curious about the goings on of the castle and the career preparations of the students than they were in his vanquish of a powerful, murderous dark wizard.
"What took you so long Albus?" asked Slughorn seriously.
"Oh I returned to Britain some time earlier this evening," answered Dumbledore. "But first I stopped over to meet my brother Aberforth."
"Ah yes, the goat herder," said Slughorn distastefully. "How is he?"
"He was in a good mood today, one of his goats gave birth to a kid," replied Dumbledore wearily. "We talked for some time and then I went to Godric's Hollow to talk to Bathilda Bagshot," At Emmeline Vance's inquisitive stare, "She was an friend of my mother's. Then I went to the Forest to return Hagrid and Ogg the Thestral they allowed me to borrow. And then I came here."
Tom kept a blank calm face throughout the gathering until at last they began to disperse back to their rooms.
Tom trailed a good distance away from the other students, wondering again about what he would do after leaving the castle in a few weeks. He considered staying at the Inn in the village where he would wait until he recieved his NEWTs. He would then visit the houses of his Slytherin friends for a brief while before they began their Post-Hogwarts' career and wait until Professor Dippet replied to his request for a teaching post at Hogwarts.
"Professor Dippet has told me that you want to teach here at Hogwarts?" asked a familiarly pleasant though totally unwelcome voice.
"Yes sir," said Tom without turning around to face the man who was walking beside him. Tom was almost the same height as he.
"Curious choice of career wouldn't you say, Tom?" asked Dumbledore calmly. "I never considered teaching at your age. It only occurred to me after a few years of...hard earned lessons. It's something that requires life experience, Tom. Experience beyond the confines of getting the best scores at school and placing first at all your tests, or becoming Head Boy...or winning a Special Services Award."
Tom still didn't turn around as they walked along the hallway. "I don't have a Dark Wizard to defeat to provide me the needed life experience, sir?"
Dumbledore chuckled, "That's not life experience, Tom. I spent my time in Europe eating excellent food made by gracious house elves who travelled with my group, we drank the best oak matured mead and carried a bottle of Ogden's Best Firewhiskey and sang and danced in our spare time. It was almost a vacation until we came across the dark wizards who were outnumbered and outspelled...Of course, Grindelwald was a challenge...When one talks of life experiences, Tom, one talks about experiences pertaining to the strength of someone's character."
"And you don't believe I have that strength?" whispered Tom in a challenging tone.
"No, Tom, I don't think you do," said Dumbledore calmly. "I say this because you percieve this strength as a weakness, like many young witches and wizards of your age. You have little interest in the most powerful magic of all..." Tom turned around to face Dumbledore, the grey eyes meeting the piercing blue. "The most terrible and most beautiful of all forces in the world...that derives from the love we humans share and experience with others...You on the other hand, divide all who you meet by the services they can render towards you and barter kindnesses in exchange. For all your charm and your popularity, you remain as alone as you were in that orphanage." Tom did not hide the look of cold fury on his face and the flash of red speckled through his grey eyes. If Dumbledore had seen it, then he had pretended not to notice it.
"Only now, you have reached a stage where you have chosen to impose this loneliness on your self...You will learn one day, Tom, that it is not our abilities that define us, but our choices! And until you learn this, you remain bereft of the strength needed for being a teacher."
NOTES
This chapter is by far my favourite to write and I think it's the best one I've written so far. I considered ending the story after the third one, since I had so few readers but luckily I got three good reviews, including one from Niger Aquila who likes Tom Riddle more than any other writer on FFnet and whose works served as an inspiration for this story. He asked me about the plot of the story and why the summary feels confusing. The reason was I can't write a good summary to a story with a ridiculous word limit. The other reason is that I had no clear idea what direction the story was going. I initially wanted to do a one-shot about how Voldemort created the Horcruxes. I wondered how sick and disgusting the process might be. I hope I have given it enough justice in the beginning of this chapter. I imagine that if a soul exists, it should have the colour red. The third film of the HP series made it purple with music notes but for me it should be red, bright red. Not as red as blood, but red like a rose or a chrysanthemum. The use of Unicorn blood and snake venom comes from Voldemort's long sermon at the end of Goblet of Fire where he briefly explains how Pettigrew put him in a rudimentary body - "A spell or two of my own creation...blah blah blah...unicorn blood..."
The actual process is based more on heroin addiction than on any dark rite. I figured that to get the soul out of your body was a great violation and it should be something self-mutilating but felt viscerally just like a junkie looking for a fix. Slughorn in the scene in the book only mentions a spell needed to make a Horcrux but JKR says that she saw it as a series of things one had to do. And I think Slughorn only knows of the Horcrux but wouldn't know how to make one. Tom only asked Slughorn on the possibility of making more than one. I stretched the process further. Though never having taken heroin, I can't vouch for accuracy of details beyond seeing some movies and reading medical papers. I hope the details are disgusting(of course I also hope it's well written). As for the references to Faust, I thought it was ridiculous to not mention him when you are dealing with a man who barters his soul in exchange for power and immortality. There was a figure called Johann Faust who actually existed around whom myths and legends came up. I made him into an actual wizard who lived very wrong but who actually spent his time living in debauchery rather than taking over the world.
As for the direction of the story, there's no plot or drive to it. There is no plans for a hidden secret in Tom Riddle's past to "explain" why he is evil. He is what he is and he will stay that way. Sometimes he can be charming and witty other times a total monster. What I want to do was to create a series around the fascination of Tom Riddle's rise to power. Why the idea of a poor orphan becoming the most feared of Dark wizards is fascinating. How a total outsider reverses and twists the foundations of a parochial society for his own ends. The twisted evil twin of the Oliver Twist story. Someone like Harry wants to be himself and be left alone, someone like Tom wants to revenge himself on that society by making it bend to his knees. So I got the idea to pick out certain moments which are mentioned in the books(the amount of information on Tom Riddle's backstory at school is actually more than the information on the MWPP generation). It's not a long series. In fact, I plan to end the whole thing in the next three chapters if possible.
I have no intention to repeat the scenes that are already there in the canon(with the exception of filling out scenes referred to and mentioned but not depicted) nor do I plan to do novel length step by step, killing by killing vis a vis Voldemort. I'd find doing that story depressing and a waste of time. Just moments and flashes of insight into Voldemort and his fascination with his quest to power and why it is attractive. The next chapter would be set in the first reign of terror of Voldemort's, it'll be between his rejection for the job by Dumbledore and the night he decides to attack the Potters. It'll be fun to write I think because you'll see a lot of the main canon cast in that. Then the one after that is the period when Pettigrew finds him and his attack on the Ministry of Magic at the end of Book Five and at the beginning of Book Six when he recruits Draco Malfoy. It'll be about the great hidden moments in the canon, the schism between Voldemort and the Malfoys, and his relationships with his Death Eaters. The last is actually during the nineteen years of the epilogue, dealing with how the Wizard World looks at Voldemort's legacy.
The next chapter would be about what Voldemort planned to do in his first period and also if there were moments when he regretted the path he chose, I won't say more.
