"Are you all right?" I call out to Harper, still in the garden, and she immediately confirms it. Her voice is carried to the Pensieve through pouring rain, the storm that gathered on our way here is finally unloading all its fury on us.

But wet clothes can't bother me.
Not now, I have no time to waste …

I'm losing my ground by immersing myself into Merope's next memory, and suddenly I find myself in the Gaunt shack on a summer day, it's hot and stuffy.

Up to that point, Merope's life has probably taken place mostly in here. With wood rotting under her every move, beneath a broken roof and dark trees. In either way confined, on every conceivable level.
It's not a place to blossom. It's a place to decay. No wonder that at times, in the face of her only company, Marvolo and Morfin, all magic has rebelled within her.

But here, in Memoria III, there is no more trace of her so called family. I find Merope lying on the floor of the hut, all alone, staring at the ceiling and completely calm. Almost content.
She's still alarmingly skinny, and the grey dress is not getting any prettier, but a sudden lightness is about her that comes as a surprise. For the first time ever …

And when she raises her hands slightly, using her wand to levitate and make her few belongings – two books, her memories and the locket – float through the main room of the shack, I'm puzzled.

Might she finally free because the two lunatics are currently being kissed by Dementors in Azkaban?

I keep looking at the flying objects, and as one of the vials moves past the entrance wall, right by a hung up shrub on a rusty, long nail, I freeze for a moment.

Peppermint …

Rose thorns and petals on the table as I look on.

She hums, again it's the Hogwarts mourning chorale, until she giggles. For the first time, she sounds almost as mad as her brother.

"Merope," she mimics her father's offended voice as the locket's chain floats in a circle above her, "make dinner, you lazy slacker! And why does this place look so messy?"

In her normal voice she says, "Father, haven't you noticed? It doesn't matter if this place is untidy. It is and always will be a rotting shack."

"Don't talk to me like that!" she hisses in Parsel, just as Marvolo probably would have. "The House of Gaunt is pure, we are nobility and heirs of Slytherin!"

She shakes her head bitterly, then sits up. "Slytherin would be ashamed of us." She mutters on in her grim monologue, "For generations, everyone's lost their minds. And no one wants to realize it. They'd just let Parsel die." She looks up the roof like it was an empty void again. "Shall the language be forgotten in which you sang lullabies to me, Mother? You knew it … You knew that one day I'd do what's necessary." The locket lands in her lap as she also lets the other objects fly back into place.

And the two books she wants in her hand.

I step closer, and when I can finally read the titles, my stomach turns.

The Tales of Beedle the Bard.
But also Moste Potent Potions …

The book Slughorn showed us, the book that teaches the world to brew Amortentia. The ingredients of which Merope has here.

"That I'd find your words in the book and brew until it smelt of wildflowers, you just knew that, Mother …"

At last I glance to the old charred cooker, and there's the steaming kettle already.

As I concentrate on my senses, I imagine I can smell it, too. It's as though Harper was standing right next to me. Cinnamon, amber …

"Merope," I all but sigh, like she could still hear me and change our history. "Don't … Why on earth curse your own child like that?"

Clattering hooves can be heard again, and the sound through the open window alarms her.

As if she needed to concentrate, she closes her eyes very briefly, then looks at her Amortentia and nods. And then, as she steps out into the forest, I have no more doubts.

I am what I am.
Conceived in despair and coercion, born to fury and raised without love.

I am who I am.
The alteration of fanaticism inherited in my veins and thoughts of revenge due to all the world's deceptions.

And though all my life I wished to finally feel something, anything, I now regret that longing.

Because I feel.
I feel all the revulsion of this world. I feel hatred. The madness of this family and my very own rage.

"Do you still remember me?" I hear Merope ask, and I can barely bring myself to follow her out into the open.

I don't want to see it. I don't want to know. And yet I can no longer close my eyes to it.

"Why would I?" he retorts, riding on a little slower towards her nevertheless. "Who are you?"

"The other day, in the flower shop," she says, looking all shy and sad. So harmless. So manipulative. "You were standing in front of me."

"I rarely ever look back," he dismissively replies, and never have I recognised myself more in a person.

"You should watch your step though," she recommends, "your horse is about to get upset."

"What?" He's irritated at once. "Why should –"

She prophesies to him what only she can know – because now, a snake just crosses his path because she wants it to.

"It's all right!" he tries to reassure his horse, but the viper bucks and twists in front the stallion that intuitively takes a step back.

Merope bends down to the snake on their path and allows the animal to coil around her hand.

Riddle's jaw literally drops at the sight. "Are you … not afraid of a bite? It's a poisonous kind!"

"It is," she replies, giving him a genuinely amused smile. "But I grew up here, I know their nature. Better than that of most people."

"Well, your brother …" Riddle groans as he unceremoniously gets off his horse after all.

His first mistake.

"He's got a thing for snakes, too, doesn't he?"

She nods.

"He's not quite right in the head, is he? Is it true what the girls in the village say about him?"

She doesn't answer that, she's only whispering, "He's gone now. And he may never come back."

Riddle eyes her in healthy skepticism. "And old Gaunt? Where is he?"

"He's gone with him. Only the snakes and I … we're left." She seems so innocent, and supposedly brave, and takes another step back to make her performance even more intense. "But please don't tell anyone in Little Hangleton. The nights get very lonely … Occasionally I hear something in the woods and it's quite scary."

"They just left you here all alone and unprotected? In this hell? Nice family …"

"I'm fine," she claims, leaving the viper on the ground to watch it hurry into the garden. Then Merope walks back towards the stallion. She strokes his dark brown mane and probably says to both herself and the animal, "See? No more snakes to hold you back. You no longer have to fear their venom, you're free …" The stallion even closes his eyes under her gentle touch, then Merope looks back at Riddle, who's clearly confused by now. "He's thirsty."

"It's a warm day," he says, shrugging it off. "We don't have far to go anymore."

"It's almost an hour to the cemetery," she corrects him, stroking the animal's neck. "Wouldn't you rather stop for a moment?"

"Not necessary, and not a good idea –"

"What, are you afraid?" Her lips curl into a ready smile. "Like I could harm you?"

"I beg of you," Riddle smirks, rolling his eyes – and yet he's hooked. "You probably weigh half as much as I do. Unless you throw a snake at me, I'm truly unconcerned."

"Good," she says. "In that case, I'll get you both some water. I'll be right back."

His second mistake. He actually waits.

She disappears into the shack and he doesn't watch her. He trusts her. Because she's a woman. And only half as heavy …

"Well, look at us," he murmurs to his horse. "Cecilia won't believe it … If that girl had her clothes, and if she were made up like her, she'd probably still not be a classical beauty, yet … interesting at least. Did you notice? She's good with animals …"

Yes, and you yourself are nothing but a handsome, healthy stallion to her, too.

I feel sick, I can hardly move. She returns, with a bucket of water for the animal, and a black cup for Riddle, and as they both drink, I truly doubt humanity.

Muggles and wizards are one and the same in the end. Stupid, flawed human beings who let their pride, arrogance, background and judgement lead them astray and blind them.

And when Riddle gives her back the cup, he just stares at her for a while. Very lost, for a reason only she and I can understand.

She gulps, unsure as to whether her potion is actually having any effect, but when he begins to smile at her, in utmost amazement, she literally breathes a sigh of relief.

"Fascinating," he soon whispers.

She tilts her head to look at him. She's not quite believing that it worked.

"You're fascinating," he repeats, circling her in admiration. "Your dress is so dirty and grey, just like where you live, your circumstances are more than adverse – and yet your determined gaze testifies to ice-cold rationality. I can see and admire it in you all at once. What is on your mind?"

She looks up at him all perplexed, and I know that look.

"What's on my mind?" she asks. And she lies, "What should be troubling me on a summer's day?"

I know exactly what.

Pride.

As unfounded as it seems, it's indomitable pride that drives her, as it has always driven me as an orphan with no means.

Human dignity is inviolable?
It actually is. Especially when you have nothing but that.

Merope's machiavellian ways are all she's managed to hold on to in life. Riddle is the means to be justified by the end.
She's intelligent, but her only value, from her family's point of view, has probably always been to give the Gaunt bloodline an heir. The indoctrination must have resembled profound brainwashing for years, and it's probably only thanks to her mother that she at least retained the minimum of common sense and claws to keep Morfin at bay.

She had nothing and no one and could only cling to the hope of a better life to fulfill her supposed destiny.

Meaning in life – isn't that what we're all looking for? Hers seems to be clear to her. And she no longer questions it, not after the sheer ordeal of her existence up to now.

And as horrible as that was, she's no longer just the mistreated yet sane girl she pretends to be. She's no longer a victim. And I am her flesh and blood. I see it, in every glance I witness. In her eyes …

Just as Dumbledore sees through my charade, I see through hers. Manipulation runs through my veins, passed down to me like Parsel. And no one knows it better than I do – when you play your role so well, hidden arrogance is not far, if only as a subconscious protective mechanism to compensate for a past as tragic as ours.

That a person feels inclined to the extreme in this way is probably the logical consequence. And what could be more extreme than the desperate and impoverished daughter of a pure-blooded magical dynasty together with the foolish heir of the wealthiest Muggle family of this place.

I don't need to see another second. I loathe her because I am so much like her. I loathe him because he was so incredibly stupid and I have to share a face with him – and I loathe myself most of all, as the product of this insane, abhorrent combination.

I am living proof of what should never have happened – made of everything that's detestable in this world.