Thank you for reading! I don't own any of Harry Potter! Please let me know if you enjoy! Updates every Saturday!

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Tom and Harriet opened their bedroom door the next morning to find both their sons standing in the hallway staring at them.

"...Good morning." Tom scowled, "Is there a way in which your mother and I may help the two of you or are you on some sort of special assignment to disrupt our peace?"

"Tom!" Harriet scowled as she elbowed her husband in the ribs. Her expression relaxed as she looked at her sons and nodded, "Good morning, James, Mark! Sleep well?"

Mark blinked.

James nodded, "Yeah, Mum, did you?"

"Very well. Your father and I both slept very well." Harriet smiled.

The awkwardness of the situation only increased as Hariet and Tom stood silently facing their sons in the hallway.

"...Shall we go to breakfast?" Tom finally spat.

James intended to use tact and skill in his approach to the situation, but in Mark's young mind, fear overpowered the necessity of strategy.

"Mae's going to kill Mum and the baby!" He blurted out.

Harriet's eyes widened.

Tom's hands tightened into fists at his sides.

"Mark!" James snapped, "What did I tell you? She can hear us from anywhere in the house!"

"What on earth are you two babbling about?!" Tom hissed.

"Please, everyone calm down!" Harriet cried over their voices, "Mark, darling, why don't you and James come in and tell your father and I what's going on?"

James' irritation soon melted into sympathy as his little brother burst into tears, painfully distraught at the mere idea of his mother and unborn sister meeting an untimely demise.

"Come in, you two, come in." Harriet cooed as she ushered the boys into the bedroom, much to Tom's dismay.

He followed his mate and sons back into the bedroom with a horrible grimace of abject disapproval on his handsome face.

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Downstairs, Merope and Tom senior enjoyed a heaping breakfast with Mae at the heavy, long table in Riddle Manor's dining room.

The house was large and grand enough that neither Tom senior nor Merope heard any of the commotion upstairs, yet Mae could barely hide her displeasure.

Her brothers were more daft than she could have ever imagined.

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Harriet sat on the bed with one arm over James's shoulders and Mark cuddled against her side while Tom paced in front of them.

His dark eyes had narrowed to slits as he contemplated what his sons had told him and his mate.

"What you're suggesting is ridiculous!" He growled as he glanced at James, then Mark.

"No, it's not! For once, Dad, see her for who she really is, not who she is to you!" James implored his father.

Mark whimpered as Harriet tightened her grip on him.

"You have no proof." Tom sniffed. There was a subtle hint of triumph in his tone, as if his boys' lack of hard evidence to back up their claims against Mae meant that he did not have to believe what he desperately did not want to acknowledge.

"You've no proof at all." He smirked at them both, "Why would your sister want to hurt your mother and the baby, eh? Care to explain that?"

"Because……" James began.

His voice faded away as a frown marred his face.

As he contemplated explaining the entire truth to his father, he realized that would force him to admit the Dark Magic he had already practiced.

"Well……." James said as he cleared his throat.

"I'm waiting." Tom replied as he crossed his long arms.

His tapered fingers tapped against the edge of his elbow while he glared at his son.

"She told me she's going to do it." James lied, "But of course, she'll tell you the opposite, Dad. Go on, believe her over me and Mark like you always do. When Mum ends up dead, we'll say we told you so."

"Don't you dare talk about a thing like that!" Tom roared as he lunged towards James, the veins on his forehead raised, his hand outstretched with a finger pointing accusingly towards his son.

The rage in his handsome face surprised even Harriet as she leaned back with Mark clutched protectively against her.

James didn't move a single centimeter as his scowl deepened while he boldly stared into his father's face.

"Tom, calm down!" Harriet snapped, "You're frightening Mark!"

"The boy's always frightened, Harriet!" Tom hissed as he glanced at her, "There isn't terribly much I can do about that!"

Harriet opened her mouth but Tom wasn't finished with James as he hissed, "How dare you suggest such a thing, such an unspeakable, unthinkable thing! We are the true descendants of Salazar Slytherin himself! A man who lived his life for his family! Family is the most important thing to all of us!...And how DARE you suggest that I could fail to protect your mother! I see everything, Thomas James Riddle! I see everything and everyone! I was at your mother's side years before you OR your brother OR your sister was ever conceived! Do you honestly believe that I COULD fail her now?!"

"You tell me, Dad." James smirked as he let out a bitter chuckle, "Are you going to believe me or not?"

"Tom, calm down!" Harriet commanded again.

As father and son exchanged hateful glares of pure rage, it bothered her to think that if she hadn't been there to force an end to their argument, Tom may very well have slapped James right across the face.

From her son's expression, however, Harriet couldn't help but wonder if James would have dared to strike his father in return.

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The four remaining members of the Riddle family eventually appeared in the dining room and ate their morning meal in tense silence.

Always eager to open an already festering wound, Mae blinked as she asked innocently, "Is everything alright, Daddy?"

"Everything's perfectly fine, princess." Tom snarled as his dark eyes flickered to his eldest child, "Your mother and brothers and I were just having a discussion, that's all."

Mae forced a pout of feigned concern on her beautiful face as she looked at Harriet.

Thrilled that her daughter actually cared what she thought for once, Harriet fell right into Mae's trap.

"It's alright, Mae." She nodded reassuringly, "There's nothing to worry about."

"No, Mother." Mae said as her pout slowly grew into a smug smile, "I suppose there's nothing to worry about at all, is there?"

James couldn't bear to lift his eyes and look at his sister.

After the previous evening's horrors and Tom's infuriating reaction, he worried that if he locked eyes with Mae in that moment, he would lose control of his temper and gouge hers from her head.

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On what was only the first week of winter recess, Mae was more than content to spend her days with her dragon and her nights with Polly, holed up in her lair, er, room, counting, dressing, and posing the hordes of dolls she owned.

One evening, Polly laid on her bed, propped against a pile of fluffy pillows while Mae sat on the floor, one of her favourite porcelain ladies in her hands as the full December moon shone through her bedroom window.

Mae narrowed her eyes as she mindlessly smoothed the doll's dress, her thoughts indirectly occupied.

How to do it?

Creep into her parents room while they slept?

Ambush Harriet alone?

That approach had not worked as easily as she had hoped before, Lily had proven that.

A sudden tapping at the window caused Mae to start violently.

She looked up with her emerald eyes wide, irritated that someone or something had dared to interrupt her while she spent those precious moments with her beloved dolls.

Mae slowly stood when she saw a large, gray owl fluttering against her window with a letter in its beak.

As she walked over and opened the window, the bird swooped forward and allowed her to take the parcel from its beak before it flew off into the night.

Mae slit the envelope without bothering to read the sender's name and address.

Her emerald eyes hurriedly scanned over the hastily scrawled lines:

My dearest Mae,

I'm not supposed to tell you this, but I simply can't wait any longer! Your father has agreed to a visit! A mere four nights from now, we'll be together again, won't that be lovely?

Yours,

Scorpius H. Malfoy

Mae grit her teeth as anger boiled in her veins.

Irritated by her father's betrayal, she closed her eyes and let out a deep breath.

Suddenly, in the corners of her dark mind, she saw the malicious opportunity that dreaded evening would present.

As Mae opened her eyes, the emerald glint in her gaze seemed unnaturally bright while she imagined the tragedy that would take place then.

If she was very careful, she could rid herself of two, maybe even three pests in a single hour.

"Don't worry, Daddy." She smiled as she painstakingly placed Scorpius's letter back in the envelope.

A wicked giggle left her perfect lips as she glanced over at Polly and smirked, "We'll be sure to be discreet, won't we?"