Notes: In this chapter, one ongoing question finally gets answered definitively, though it is not the biggest one. And there's another warning for Tom being creepy (though it is canon creepiness that "good guys" also do, as you'll see). I feel odd warning for everything creepy/possessive that he does in a relationship context, because I also think that is an implicit "caveat lector" for Riddlefic. I mean, he likes trophies. But I'll go ahead and say, this part of him is going to remain in-character throughout the story. He might become less obnoxious about expressing it, though.

Chapter Seventeen: A Fog of Grey

Before they reached the ward, Tom stood back and demanded that Hermione go on alone first. When he did show up, the cuts on his face and neck were gone, and he was wincing and out of breath. She supposed he must have used Dark healing on himself. Naturally, he wouldn't let himself be scarred in places people would see, she thought, not after seeing himself in my memories as something resembling an Inferius. Looks like all I did by showing him that was appeal to his vanity. She wondered briefly why he wouldn't have cast the spell on every Sectumsempra wound on his body, but if it was draining—as it appeared to be—he probably couldn't.

Healer Smythe was able to repair the curse damage that Hermione and Tom had inflicted upon each other. Scowling and shaking his head, he cast spells on them to lift the cuts and bruises, and then he followed with a round of potions.

"I hope I don't see either of you in here again," he scolded. "Immensely talented, both of you. Do try to resolve your personal issues in a more… productive manner next time."

"Personal issues" again, Hermione thought. They really think this is the same type of teen romantic conflict as—as what led to my casting a flock of conjured birds at Ron, or inviting Cormac McLaggen to the Christmas party. They have no idea. But of course no one in the school would know what Tom had actually been up to—and if she did tell anyone, the only person who would probably believe her was Dumbledore. And possibly Slughorn, given the talk that he'd had with Tom the previous year.

I do not want to tell Dumbledore.

A part of her conscience told her that the right thing to do was to turn in a murderer, no matter how morally repulsive the victim was, or what he had planned to do—or already done. Vigilante justice was no justice at all, a faint part of her mind whispered, and tearing apart one's soul was manifestly wrong. The funny thing was, she no longer believed her own whisperings about vigilante justice. The final four years of her magical education in the 1990s had gradually lifted that thought right out of her head. Sometimes vigilante justice was the only possible kind. Black had been intending to frame her as a foreign spy. Wasn't it just stupid to allow that to happen merely to avoid vigilantism?

Hermione was not sure what drove her to do it, but after being released from the infirmary that afternoon, she headed down the many flights of stairs and trudged heavily toward a certain girls' bathroom.

The first thing she noticed was that it was not out of order, but merely was not being used at the moment. There was no telltale sign of Myrtle, no ghostly weeping or complaining.

Maybe she's out haunting Olive Hornby, Hermione thought as she slipped into the bathroom stall that Myrtle had inhabited in her own time. Maybe the Ministry hasn't banished her to the school yet. It shouldn't have been by any rational consideration, but it was somehow a disappointment that the ghost was not here.

Maybe I just wanted to see someone who was definitely an innocent victim of Tom, Hermione thought. Maybe I just wanted someone else to push me into—

Hermione could not finish the thought in words, but she knew how she would have ended it. It would not have been "turning him in." It would have been "betraying him."

What did that mean?

She locked the bathroom door, closed the toilet lid, and sat down. She put her face in her hands and started to cry. I just wanted to be fair to him, but I built myself an unreal version of him and fell in love with that, she thought unhappily. Now I'm stuck with the reality. He won't let me go… and if I make myself an enemy of his, it won't end well for me.

Hermione suddenly heard the bathroom door creak open. She sniffled and tried to suppress the telltale signs of weeping, so that whoever this was would not know.

"Colloportus," said a voice—a male voice. A very familiar voice.

Oh my God, he is not doing this again. He is not.

Hermione's melancholy curdled into rage and betrayal. She was not sure whether Tom knew that she was in here, but the dark train of her thoughts had still led to a single conclusion about what he was doing in this girls' bathroom, and what his ultimate goal was. She stormed off the toilet seat, slammed open the stall door, and emerged.

Sure enough, Tom was standing by the door, wand in hand. He stared back at Hermione, clearly shocked at the degree of rage evident in her features. "Hermione, what on—"

"How dare you!" she shrieked. She drew her wand and directed it at him. "How dare you! Listen to me, Riddle, I don't care if you do have a Horcrux—"

Alarm spread over his features. He whipped his head back to the door. "Muffliato," he cast. "Do you want the teachers to hear you?" he shouted back.

"Maybe you can shrug off the Killing Curse, but it definitely won't help keep your body alive if I use a curse that shreds you to pieces, and I swear to you, I will do that before I let you set your Mudblood-killing basilisk on me!"

He was shocked. His eyes widened. "Hermione, I would never do that to you!"

"Don't lie!" she raged. "This is the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets. What else could you be doing in here?"

"I just wanted to try talking again! There are a lot of things I wanted to tell you that night that I never got to. I saw that you were in here for a long time—"

"Saw me walk in, did you?" she taunted. "Except that no, you didn't, because you were in the Hospital Wing when I left, and you didn't follow me."

He hesitated.

"How did you know I was in here?" she demanded.

"Do you really want to know?"

"I asked, didn't I?"

He paused for a moment, then reached into his robe pocket and withdrew a piece of parchment. He held it out to her with an impassive look on his face.

Gingerly Hermione stepped over and gazed at it. It was a two-column list. The first column contained people's names. She saw Dumbledore, Slughorn, the other teachers… then beneath that, the names of Roland Lestrange, Vincent Rosier, the remainder of his Knights of Walpurgis… and her own name. The second list was a description of a location in the castle. Most of the Knights' names were matched with the words "Slytherin common room" or "Slytherin boys' dormitory."

It was similar, she realized, to the Marauder's Map and the Weasley family clock. It used the same magical tracking spells, except that it did not have a map and focused on specific people whom the caster wished to—

"You're stalking me?"

He scowled. "I'm keeping track of where you are. There are still people who have it in for you."

"In other words, you're stalking me," she said. "I guess that's how you knew I was in the hall that day when you were impersonating Rosier. I'm—no, I'm not astonished at all, on second thought. You really do think you own me."

He put the parchment up and frowned. "I don't even know what you mean by that. You're not my house-elf—"

Hermione hissed.

"—but I do regard you as mine. Not my property, but mine. I'm sorry if you can't see the difference," he said snidely. "That is why I would never—God, Hermione, how could you even think I would set the basilisk on you? I just wish you would bloody let me talk."

Hermione's sense of betrayal was fading now that she knew he was not opening the Chamber of Secrets again, but she was still angry. "I really don't feel like talking to you at the moment, Riddle," she said. She headed to the door, removed the locking spell, and opened it. "Later. Obviously, you'll know exactly where to find me anytime."

He will not let me go, she thought again, pacing around the halls. Even if I found a way to get back to my own time, he would do it too and follow me. The only way I could get away from him is to betray him and make him want to—

She could not complete that thought.

He is going to challenge Grindelwald, she thought. He's going to fight for the Elder Wand, and he might win.

She wondered, for a moment, about that, and about what she had yelled at him in the bathroom. What would happen if Tom did take the Killing Curse? In her time, Voldemort lost his body when his own curse backfired on him as he attempted to kill baby Harry, but that had been a unique situation. The fact that his tattered soul had blown apart from being pushed to the limit could have also been a factor, as well as Lily Potter's sacrificial magic. In fact, that was probably the salient point. For Harry to survive the encounter, Voldemort couldn't have retained a body, or he would have just tried again. In normal circumstances, a Killing Curse left its victim pristine and undamaged—albeit dead.

No, Tom's soul—what was left of it, she thought darkly—might be briefly knocked out, but he had not pushed it to the point of pieces flying out of his body of their own accord, so if he took a Killing Curse in his duel, he could possess his body again and restart everything. It would be an immediate, instinctive action to take in that situation. He would be on his feet in no time.

Then there is no "might win" about it. Unless Grindelwald disables him physically, he will win. Tom will get the Elder Wand.

Was that bad or good? Hermione was not sure. It wasn't the same thing as Voldemort getting the Elder Wand, to be sure, and she could not say she was pleased with what Dumbledore would do—had done—with the prestige and power he gained from the duel in her timeline. But she was no longer sure what she really thought about Tom becoming politically powerful in a legitimate arena. It was better than becoming Voldemort, but was it what was best for the wizarding world?

Hermione decided that she had to give the original timeline one last chance. She gathered her courage and headed toward the Deputy Headmaster's office.

Dumbledore looked tired and unhappy when she came in, and she almost regretted the visit, but she was committed. She sat down opposite him and gazed at the desktop.

"Professor, there's something I need to tell you."

He looked up at her and waited.

She took a deep breath. "Last October, at the first Hogsmeade weekend—that day that I went missing…." She trailed off.

"Yes?" he said gently.

"I wasn't lying in the woods after a prank. I'm—I'm sorry, Professor. I was abducted by Grindelwald's henchmen," she burst out. "I met him in a castle somewhere. It might have been his private quarters at Nurmengard; I don't know. He said he knew I wasn't actually related to you. I told him nothing… but he did make me an offer to be his spy. I refused, of course… but it did happen." She glanced down at her lap.

Dumbledore did not look surprised. "I am glad that you told me this, Miss Green," he said quietly.

Hermione paused again. This jaundiced response was… surprising, and yet not. Because there was the possibility—

"Professor, did you know he would try that?"

Dumbledore understood what she was really asking. He removed his half-moon spectacles, closed his eyes, and sighed. "Yes, Miss Green, I did," he answered, opening his eyes again. "And yes, I also meant for him to."

She had suspected it, she had feared it, and in a way, she had known it for months, but tears still sprang to the corners of her eyes at the confirmation. "How could you do that?" she whispered. She would not look at his face.

He sighed again. "Gellert would not have harmed you. Indeed, he didn't harm you."

"How could you have known?" she exclaimed. "He's responsible for hundreds of deaths!"

"He is responsible for hundreds of deaths of people who fought him in a war. Yes, he started the war, but part of his message is that civilian wizards and witches aren't safe, so he has been careful not to undermine that with his own actions. And he has a certain soft spot, I believe, for young people. I think it must have come about from the terrible events that summer with my brother and sister. This is why, when you did not report the meeting to me, I feared that he had successfully enlisted you, and then why it crossed my mind that he might have been the one to send you back in time in the first place—even unbeknownst to you at the time, in fact. That Fawkes did it rules out any involvement from him, of course, but I did worry."

"I don't understand why you had to use me as bait at all, though," she said unhappily.

Sadness was in Dumbledore's eyes. He waited a moment before speaking, and when he did speak, his voice was full of weariness. "For months people have been asking me to duel Gellert Grindelwald," he said. "However, I know what will happen if I do. It will result in a degree of power and importance that I do not desire, and which I do not think I should have, considering my poor judgment that summer. In fact, I do believe that those best suited to power are those who do not want it."

I don't believe that at all, Hermione thought. It sounds nice, but it doesn't really make sense. I want some policy influence. I don't think that means I don't deserve it.

"These requests come mainly from people in the higher echelons of the Ministry, so they do not understand why I would think that way. However, I understand that Grindelwald must go, and it was my hope that if the inevitable duel with him occurred in defense of a student, there would be no such calls for accolades and power. I would have been acting as a teacher, not a political figure."

Hermione suddenly remembered something Tom had once said. "He'll do it only to save one of his students as his duty as Deputy Headmaster."

Another wave of tears hit. He was right. His assessment was absolutely right. The summer of 1899 had thoroughly shaken Dumbledore's faith in himself, and this was the result: a man who distrusted himself, and distrusted the idea of political ambition, so much that he would not even want the responsibility of rejection. Who, instead, would try to engineer a situation in which he did not even have the opportunity to accrue political power—at least, open political power, for she knew very well that he would accept behind-the-scenes influence. It was hypocritical. Tom was right about that too. She stood up from her chair, eyes wide, teary, and bloodshot.

"I'm sorry," Dumbledore said. "I truly am."

"I wish I hadn't asked," she whispered.

Dumbledore looked sad. "I wish I hadn't done it," he admitted. "It was wrong of me to separate Mr. Riddle from you that day. Does he know about the meeting?"

Hermione nodded.

He looked uncertain about what he was about to say, but he continued anyway. "I hesitate to mention this, and you have every right to tell me that it is none of my business, but… I cannot help but notice that you and he are no longer, ah, on the same terms as before."

Hermione snapped up her head, tears vanishing.

"Again, you have every right to tell me to stay out of it… but I confess myself somewhat… relieved. Mr. Riddle has been a source of concern to me for quite some time, and I think it a good thing for him not to have something that he wants."

Hermione's mouth opened in astonishment. This was incredibly inappropriate. Whatever Tom had already done, Dumbledore could not prove it, and he was still Tom's teacher.

"I am not telling you that you should never reconcile with him, of course. That is your personal decision. And of course, you indicated that you were not fond of him in your original timeline—"

"The timeline is different now," Hermione said quietly.

"Of course," Dumbledore agreed, "which is why I would like you to see something that is true in both the future you knew and the future that you are helping to make happen right now. It relates to Mr. Riddle." He got up from his desk, opened a cabinet, and fiddled with flasks on the shelves.

Memories, Hermione realized. She could see the edge of a Pensieve behind the open doors.

"And once more, you can yell at me afterward, or throw this at the floor if you wish," he said with a smile, selecting a single memory. "I won't deduct House points or do anything else, since this is not school business, strictly speaking." He emptied the memory into the basin as Hermione gingerly walked over.

It was a memory of a young Tom in a dingy, unwelcoming Muggle orphanage. He was sullen and bitter, and intensely distrustful of Dumbledore when the latter came to give him his Hogwarts letter and inform him that he was a wizard. By the end of the interview, Hermione observed that the distrust was mutual.

He was eleven years old, she thought dully. A child. So he bullied some of the kids—probably it was mutual; children were certainly horrible to me in Muggle school—and he stole their things. It was wrong, of course, but not uncommon. Children do that. In a place like that, he probably never had anything truly his own. He was still a child, and this was his first introduction to the wizarding world: being told, once again, that people did not trust him and would keep an eye on him.

When the memory was finished, Hermione withdrew from the Pensieve and found herself facing a grim-looking Albus Dumbledore.

"I did not show you this to prejudice you against him," he said heavily, "but merely to… inform you of some aspects of his personality that you should be aware of if you do reconcile with him. In particular, the fact that he was so eager, even at such a young age, to believe himself special and important."

Hermione stared back. This was not what she had expected Dumbledore to say.

"I have delivered letters to many Muggle-raised students as Deputy Headmaster," Dumbledore said. "All of them have been delighted to learn of the existence of magic, but most of them have disbelieved it until it is demonstrated to them. They have not been so determined as young Mr. Riddle was to believe that they, themselves, were different—and better—than the people around them, nor have they been able to consciously control their magical abilities."

"Are you saying it is wrong that he could control his abilities?" she asked, confused as to where he was going with this. Of course Tom would have been pleased to learn that he was a wizard and would consider himself special since he could do something that no one else he knew could do. It only seemed natural to her.

Dumbledore looked very weary. "The trouble is that in this political climate, it's… worrisome… whenever that mentality develops. The mentality, I should clarify, that having magic makes one special and separate. And it is also worrisome when an untrained wizard, as he was at the time, is already able to control magic and use it to dominate Muggles around him. I saw that mindset in young Gellert Grindelwald. I have not wished to believe that the mindset is instinctive to some people; I have hoped that it must be carefully taught, but for Mr. Riddle to have developed it without any influence from elements in the wizarding world that espouse it is unsettling to me."

"Professor," Hermione said, astonished and horrified, "if you remember, I myself am actually Muggle-born. When I received my letter, my reaction was… not unlike Tom's in that one way."

Dumbledore paused and regarded her curiously.

"I didn't know it was magic, of course—just as he didn't—but I knew that strange things happened to me, things that I could apparently do. I wasn't unobservant, Professor. I've always been extremely observant, if I may say so. I knew something was different—and it is different. It's a talent. I don't think it's wrong to take pride in one's talents." She felt tears in her eyes once again, to her dismay, but this was such a profoundly moving memory that she could not help it. "I was always 'strange' to my Muggle schoolmates. I knew I didn't fit in. And learning that there was a whole world for people like me—" She broke off.

Dumbledore looked intently at her for a while. Finally he answered, "I cannot pretend to know what it is like for a child raised exclusively in the Muggle world to learn for the first time about magic. You may be right."

"That orphanage looked appalling," she said. "You don't know how the other children treated him. I'm sure they were frightened of him, but my Muggle classmates were frightened of me too. It didn't stop them from saying awful things about me. People lash out when they are afraid." Just like the group of Muggle boys did to your sister, she thought.

"You may be right," Dumbledore repeated.

"Learning that he was a wizard was the most important event of Tom's life," Hermione said confidently. "He told me that himself. It meant a place for him. It meant a future for him as something other than a servant or mine worker. In the Muggle world, they wouldn't have cared how brilliant he was. He never would have received an invitation to an elite Muggle academy. He was different, he recognized that he was different, and since he didn't know any other wizards, he saw that difference as special and unique. Then when he entered the wizarding world, he learned that he was still exceptional even among wizards. It's not political. It's just the truth. And it's the truth that as long as wizarding children are born to—or raised among—Muggles, learning about magic will mean that to them."

Dumbledore sat down at his desk. He sighed, removed his spectacles again, and rubbed his forehead. Hermione stood on the other side, regarding him patiently, waiting to see what he would say.

"I apologize, Miss Green, for my interference. It is possible—nay, maybe even probable—that you are entirely correct, and this is simply the gut reaction of a man who got swept up in something that was definitely political, and was badly burned by a wizard who thought himself better than any Muggle. I confess that when I first met young Mr. Riddle and witnessed that response to being told about magic, it troubled me, but my reaction was emotional rather than rational. Then when he came to Hogwarts and proceeded to charm everyone… well, it reminded me of Gellert."

"There are similarities between them," Hermione admitted quietly. "But this—Professor, I am not saying that there is no reason to disapprove of anything Tom Riddle has ever said or done." Far from it, she thought wryly. "But this memory you showed me—I can't see it the way you do. I'm sorry, but I just can't."

Dumbledore nodded. "I understand. Good luck, Miss Green."

Hermione paced around the Room of Requirement, which was still sealed against Tom—although she knew he could probably see where she was, or deduce it, at least, if his "watch list" displayed a blank when she was in there. She thought about the conversation she had just had with Dumbledore.

It was very disappointing that his attitude to Tom had been tainted from literally the very first day by his mental associations with Gellert Grindelwald. If Dumbledore had not sent the message to Tom that he distrusted and disliked him, who knew what might have happened? Very little might have been different, of course; Tom still would have been placed in Slytherin, still would have been subjected to the prejudices and rejection of his classmates, and still might have felt that he had to resort to intimidation and the Dark Arts. But Hermione couldn't be certain of that last. Dumbledore had closed himself to Tom from the start and resolved to "watch him" rather than reach out to him.

And if he gets credit for defeating Grindelwald, he'll "watch" Tom for years as the wizarding world goes to hell, Hermione thought grimly. Except when he's promoting people like Septimus Weasley, suppressing information, and trying to fight blood purity ideology by portraying Muggles as helpless, which only plays right into their hands.

She slumped into her armchair and sighed. What was the alternative? Tom himself, her brain supplied oh-so-helpfully. Tom who still thinks he should rule over Muggles, who murders threats to himself—which may someday include political threats—and oh yes, who made a Horcrux right in front of me and thought I'd be honored to see it.

She rubbed her eyes.

Dumbledore set me up. He used me to try to get Grindelwald. He assumed, too, that it wouldn't cross my mind that he was involved with it, that of course I wouldn't figure it out. He concluded that I didn't tell him about the meeting because I had accepted Grindelwald's offer rather than because I suspected and distrusted him. Tom, however, has only wanted to protect me. Even if I disagreed with what he did.

Tom thinks he should rule over Muggles, she thought again. He isn't all that far removed from Grindelwald's ideology himself. The main difference seems to be that he doesn't want to abolish the Statute of Secrecy and wants to obtain power legitimately.

We do need to change. I've said before that we need to open up to the Muggle world more, rather than doing things like proscribing the use of magic on certain arbitrary objects and blinkering ourselves to Muggle culture so thoroughly that we don't even know how to dress in the outside world, let alone anything about how far they have advanced.

I was fortunate. My parents accepted magic. What happens to Muggle-born kids whose families would consider them demon-possessed, or otherwise some sort of freak—like the Dursleys thought of Harry? Harry had to be brought into the wizarding world, because Dumbledore needed his "hero" to solve his problem for him, but what about less important Muggle-raised wizard children whose families don't want them to go to Hogwarts? Would he lift a finger for any of them, or would his belief that familial love is paramount, no matter how dysfunctional and destructive that family may be—again the Dursleys, and his own mother's appalling treatment of his sister, denying her Healing—would that belief rule his actions?

Hermione had a nasty suspicion that she knew the answer.

Grindelwald doesn't like that, her brain supplied. He proposed a solution. He's going to lose, though. He couldn't have won anyway. He is violent, and he wants to overturn the Statute of Secrecy. We can't do that. We are hopelessly outnumbered. But we can amend it. And if Tom doesn't hate Muggle-borns….

She got up from the chair. All of a sudden she just wanted to take her bath and go to bed. This was too much for her. At the back of her mind she knew what she would decide—had already decided—but she was not prepared to face it.

The next day was a Saturday, but Hermione did not feel like going to Hogsmeade. She walked wearily down to the breakfast table and took her newspaper from the morning owl post with resignation.

"Ministry Inquiry Quickly Confirms Black's Death Caused by Cursed Objects," blared the lead headline.

Hermione hated herself for it, but the only emotion she felt was relief.

There was no point in reading the article text, she figured, since she knew it was wrong. She skimmed it. It was a summary of the investigation, which appeared to have been conducted perfunctorily, as a bureaucratic imperative, rather than as a serious matter. It appeared that DMLE flunkies had merely examined the necklace and spinning Dark instrument that Tom had placed near Pollux Black's body and determined that they carried, respectively, a lethal curse that would cause intense pain before death, and a curse that could shrivel his arm.

Then one paragraph in the article caught her eye.

.

Mr. Arcturus Black, the cousin of the late Pollux Black, has declared that he does not believe that his cousin's death was an accident, though he gives no reasons for disbelieving the results of the investigation. Mr. Septimus Weasley, a cousin by marriage of both Blacks, states that Mr. Black is grieving and should not be held accountable for statements made in shock.

.

"I'm sure that went over well," Hermione muttered to herself. "And wasn't she blasted off the tapestry for marrying him?" She was pretty sure that this was what Sirius had said, back in her old time. Claiming the connection likely irked Arcturus Black more than anything else. She really hoped that Arcturus would continue to rave, though, if it meant that he would be discredited as a legitimate political player.

"Replacement Candidates Named!" was the second headline. Hermione did read this article fully.

It turned out that there were three potential contenders to replace Black. As she had expected, Septimus Weasley was one. He was again posturing for his legislation to be passed, and he now claimed—or, at least, the Prophet said he claimed—the support of Dumbledore for the position.

.

Additionally, Mr. Black has declared his support for Faustus Yaxley of the Improper Use of Magic Office. Like Weasley, Yaxley is a five-year employee of the Ministry. Yaxley is known to oppose Weasley's legislation. The final candidate for the Head of Magical Law Enforcement is thirty-year Department veteran Robert "Bob" Ogden, currently Head of the Magical Law Enforcement Patrol.

.

Hermione was almost positive that she had heard the name of Bob Ogden before, from Harry, she was reasonably certain, but she could not say in what context. She opened the newspaper and glanced at page two.

"Nurmengard Prison Liberated! Grindelwald Retreats to Heavily Fortified Family Home!"

Hermione glanced down the Slytherin table. Tom was there, having his coffee and reading the newspaper himself.

She took a deep breath and stood up. He noticed and smirked as she made her way down.

End Notes: As this chapter probably makes clear, I really, really dislike Dumbledore's commentary in HBP about the memory of telling Tom that he is a wizard, and his ex post facto extrapolations of what dreadfully sinister things it supposedly implies that a very intelligent, observant child who has a great talent—and who is alone in the world—would know about the talent, take pride in it, and consider himself special and apart because of it. As I said in a previous chapter's notes, I'm not going for evil!Dumbledore, but I have been gradually building up to a Dumbledore that Hermione cannot throw her support to, and here we are.