Chapter 7: The Encounter
A lamp swaying with a metallic creak as it hung from the side of the bed illumined Mrs. Emerson's pallor features. The candle within crackled and flickered its burning flames, and Mrs. Emerson continued to rub the healing cream over the swelling knee of a whimpering six year old Elizabeth. The clawing pain of the snakebite left her rewinding the events of that afternoon. It was rather odd how the secession of happenings that led up to that moment were a haze. She could only vaguely remember herself twirling in the path of the copperhead snake. A crown of wildflowers graced her head as she spun about herself with her arms outstretched ; the breeze billowing the hems of her dress into a wide circle.
Her audience being the snake huddled at the bottom of an assemblage of tall weeds nearby, it watched her warily. No, it watched her with an era of anticipation as if praying her to draw close by. Elizabeth's feet in dainty slippers entangled and she tripped and fell right before the copperhead. There was the moment that emboldened into her head for a dozen of sleepless nights to come ; it seemed to glower with its beady fathomless eyes at her, flicked its split tongue, and it charged.
The pain, as if called upon by her memories, streaked through her once more. And it receded. That seemed to had been its last visit. Elizabeth's whimpering hushed down, was followed by several low moans, and then nothing at all. The tears rolling down her face had long dried, leaving nothing but lines creasing the middle of her cheeks where they ran to glow in the lamplight.
She seemed to had been awestruck by her mother and what a strange thought had captivated her. For years of her childhood, she took her mother's beauty for something of a rose. The blood that often rushed through her cheekbones made it seem as if the petals of a pink flower had blossomed beneath her flesh. Elizabeth continued to stare down the woman before her.
The woman who had lost such resemblance. Her skin was pale and a prominent frown creased her face. Her eyes were void of the motherly love she was so well-acquainted to. They were beady, fathomless, and the mental picture of the copperhead's eyes flashed to momentarily morph into her mother's. A perfect match.
Fear took ahold of her racing heart then surged through her veins to paralyze the rest of her. She decided that she wasn't safe with this replica of a mother and that she'd better make a swift run for it, but it was too late. Once Elizabeth had slid her left leg off the mattress, her mother's doppelgänger caught onto her plan. She snarled distastefully and lifted her leg back up. Elizabeth's bottom lip trembled and a bead of sweat rolled down the side of her chin. "Who are you ?" She voiced cluelessly. The lamplight's fluorescent glow swirled inside Mrs. Emerson's lifeless pupils as they examined Elizabeth's flushed little face and only then could Elizabeth tell how unlike her mother's these eyes were.
Elizabeth pressed her back against the mattress, hoping it would swallow her, as her mother leaned in. "You're awake at last," she hissed. Her breath was cold upon Elizabeth's neck ; so cold it held a resemblance to a Dementor's kiss in the way it disturbed the soul. Her scent was sweet ; sweeter than every fragrance of a spring rose there was. It was so sweet that it was assaulting to her senses. Such characteristics were oddly familiar but they did not belong to her mother. Never.
Elizabeth watched as her bedroom morphed into a different reality ; her back hurt as it rubbed against the coarse stone she lied upon, the wooden boards of a ceiling arched into a high bricked one supported by voluminous swirling snake columns, and the walls were far off. Elizabeth was no longer six but a fully developed fifteen year old.
What had been her mother's face dissolved into Riddle's, and Elizabeth was in the wake of his chamber. The attributes of pallor, cold gazes, and redolent scent that were anomalous on her mother were a perfect fit on him. When the realization of her current whereabout and the fix which she was in had finally settled, fear had surfaced within her and Elizabeth couldn't help but to pant. Tom smiled ; a grin that in no way in enhanced his handsome features but deteriorated them greatly. He looked somewhat of a beast. "I worried such tremendous blood loss might've finished you but you're alive... for the time being at least," he threatened, his hands penning Elizabeth's fists down to her sides. His grip loosened and he withheld his hands," I will be back."
Elizabeth watched him prowl off, his robes wiping after him. She watched till she could no longer tilt her neck to watch him some more. Her first instinct was to get to her feet but the moment she lifted her chest something of a force field knocked her back down. She was lain upon the stoney ground ; the head of Salazar and the pond of crystal clear water encompassing it close by. The water lapped at her feet, wetting her flats. It was all very beautiful -too beautiful- for a place so deadly.
Her eyes swiveled back to the statue of Salazar's head. His beard lay about the surface of the water like the roots of some ancient oak. The mouth of the sculpture was thankfully closed, for she knew deep down that throat lay a basilisk famished for Muggleborn blood and fast asleep. Elizabeth continued to look about her surroundings. For as far as she could see, serpentine columns towered on. Looking to her behind - that was when she caught sight of him. Curled up between two columns with his attire ripped, Lestrange lay -in what could be a first glance evaluation - a motionless corpse if not for the regular moaning that escaped him. Elizabeth refused to attain the slightest pleasure from the look of him so battered. How could she ?
Was it because he had brought her in so badly wounded ? Or was it because he had caused such a mess by dragging her over with a winding trace of blood after them ? The distaste she felt crawled beneath her skin. A flashback of only a numerable hours ago played like a rolled film in her head ; she, squirming in a pool of her blood and Lestrange, snarling before her, telling her that she was going to die. She really was going to die. It had been written in the stars the moment she set afoot - or shall one say hauled - into the chamber.
In the midst of such desperate contemplation, a name clicked like a light switch in her head ; Harry. Yes, yes, Harry, she thought, clinging to hope at last. He was hiding here and still is hiding. But where ? Elizabeth tried with all her might to look further into the vast reign of the chamber in hopes that she could catch a wisp of his unborn soul. When her eyes failed to trace him, she looked a little more but this time in Riddle's direction. After she had ascertained that he wasn't back from whatever dreadful thing he went off to fetch, she cleared her throat and voiced firmly," Harry." But there came nothing.
It was as if he stood wherever he did simply to observe what Tom intended to do with her. Elizabeth was seething, but no. Hadn't he watched helplessly the same individual slaughter friends and family ? Would he stomach it after all this time ? No. No, he wouldn't. If anything, he was waiting for the right moment to move. Yes, yes, that would be it.
The beating of Riddle's returning footsteps against the stone snapped her back to reality. Elizabeth surveyed him as he strolled nearer. One hand in his pocket, the glint of Elizabeth's locket dangling from his forearm caught her eyes. The other hand supported what captivated her hearing ; in a cage he held from an attached chain, slimy skins of serpents squirmed, snapped, and hissed within. The slime glistening off shiny reddish scales, there was no telling of which kind those snakes were ; copperheads alright.
Elizabeth stared dumbstruck at the cage, and Riddle stared at her, conveying no expression. The jingling of all the chains ceased at last once he had settled the hissing cage a few inches afar from Elizabeth's feet. She flinched only for the force field to knock her back down. She wanted to say something but what she didn't know. A portion of her was still in disbelief that any of this was happening.
"Familiar with the copperheads, Elizabeth ?" He voiced, pacing about her defeated body and rubbing his hands as if to clean them of the rust. Elizabeth had yet to be released from the trance she was in for she continued to gawp at the cage. "Ha," she feigned mockery," Honestly, Riddle ? A dozen of nonfatal worms ? Is that the master weapon ? I must admit you had me anticipating. I'd say that this is a joke but it's all too sad." No amount of sarcasm could mask the terror she felt ; the terror that seeped into the tone of her voice. The terror that Tom could so easily recognize that he allowed himself an-ear-to-ear grin.
"These nonfatal worms, as you'd say, Emerson, they are quite noxious." Elizabeth watched his pale hand slip over the cage, unlatching it to seize one of the copperheads around the middle. It hissed as if in recognition to his touch and twirled its slender reddish figure around his fingers, and he held it before her.
And that's when it caught her eye. A blue marking over each one of its blood red eyes. These weren't copperheads.
"Evoras," he named. The Evora moved its head in a mesmerizing dance and kept a steady glare in Elizabeth's direction. Elizabeth was overwhelmed with a sudden urge to vomit. Those red slits triggered something deep down in her.
"Is this how you intend to finish me off ? A snakebite ?" Dropping all dauntless pretense, Elizabeth addressed him in a steady low whisper. She kept an eye on the dancing Evora, averting Riddle's fixated gaze. Those eyes of his, they were much more threatening than the bloodied slits of the serpent. And she met his eyes, blinked up at him irresistibly. Surfacing from the depths of her mind, a memory of a past and forgotten nightmare swarmed her ; the snake man prowling the pillaged grounds of Hogwarts...
Harry's voice a ringing bell in her ear," Voldemort, that's what he calls himself." Would he ? Would he eventually destroy what was his home ? She pondered away as she took in the handsome features of who could've been the most beautiful beast. "Oh no, Emerson. These aren't for you. They are your sister's take."
Her breath caught in her throat. The Evora hissed in agreement. "What ?!" Elizabeth snapped. "Of course, you could save her." He continued nonchalantly," that is if you wish to convey the nature of this locket."
He lifted his forearm for the chains to entangle and the locket to twinkle in the faded light of the chamber. "The way you promised Lestrange whatever in return of hauling me over here ? I can see how you reward the obedient, Riddle. I see."
Tom paced about her some more impatiently. "Dear, if you have a wish to meet Lestrange's fate, I shall not hesitate but not until you've told me what I would like to hear of you." Elizabeth stared off into the distance. She felt relatively calm for someone receiving death threats. Perhaps it was the settling realization that it was the end but her mind and soul were at an eerie peace. "And if I don't, you send off your pets to kill my sister." Elizabeth contemplated aloud. "Make up your mind. My patience is running rather thin." He warned in a hiss similar to that of his Evora. Elizabeth turned to him with a surprising grin. "Draw the locket nearer to me, will you ? Maybe I could speak to him and he would hear me, not that he hasn't heard all this already but who knows."
Tom eyed her skeptically, scrutinizing every detail of her face as if trying to decrypt her. Something allowed him her trust at last, and he pulled closer to her ; the locket dangling right below her lips. "You hear that ? He says he'd kill my sister. If that's interesting enough to you, maybe you'd have your word with him ?" Elizabeth voiced. She spoke in genuine bravery but in fear as well. The life of her twin, of the other half of her, of who she'd grown up to know as her shadow, was on the line. Elizabeth in secrecy and at that moment truly wished she were dead.
Very predictably, they had no response in return. The locket had not talked back, remaining as inanimate as ever. "See, I told you so," Elizabeth remarked and her voice broke off. What could guarantee no spilling tears from her at that moment ? Riddle held the locket eye level momentarily and nodded as if had come to the conclusion of something.
"So be it then," he said," I hope you had bidden your farewells, Emerson."
"What ? No ! Wait ! Please ! I showed you what's inside that locket ; a spirit ! No !" Elizabeth squirmed and jerked upwards a dozen of times only to be knocked off again. "You showed me nothing," he spat in response. "Oh, you fool !" Elizabeth yelped with tears flowing down her greying skin. "You think her death would convince him ?! Would convince me ?"
Tom wasn't listening ; he was hissing and rasping to the Evora serpent which listened intently. Releasing it from his grip, it slithered off with a speed of a bolt but it all occurred to Elizabeth in slow motion. "No, please," she whispered finally and felt her heart writhing in pain. Before the misery could take her to a state of unconsciousness, before she could slip off into a black out, a break out of a hissing that drew parallels to Riddle's caught her ear. The Evora ceased in its tracks, turning its head in confusion. Lastly, it curled up in a ball and the hissing receded. Turning about a column, the shadows seemed to leap out of his way, the pearly spirit of Harry Potter glided into the circle of light with a distinguishable fire in his eyes.
"No one will die tonight," he declared.