7 August 1938
Eleven hours after lulling his sister to sleep with promises of a valleyside picnic, Edward Annett fetched her from the parlour where she was idly perusing Liszt's F. Chopin for the third or fourth time (Edward himself found Liszt's French tediously sentimental; Mary, comical and, though she did not admit it, touching), and ushered her into his Cadillac. Philipp Emmanuel sprang into the backseat.
Edward's hamper for the occasion was comprehensive: a baguette; slices of cured meat; jars of strawberry, apricot, and lemon confiture; a dozen oysters; a wedge of Camembert; grapes; and two bottles of ginger beer. The hamper was in Mary's lap; were it not for Philipp Emmanuel's covetousness, she would have stowed it in the backseat. For the occasion she wore a thin, green cotton frock with tiny golden flowers; its skirt fell slightly beneath her knees. Edward adored her in this dress; he wore cream-coloured shorts and a white linen shirt.
With one hand lightly upon the wheel and the other casually resting, elbow protruding, from the open window, Edward drove a leisurely circuit. They circled the cathedral not once, but twice, Edward exchanging pleasantries with every townsman and woman with whom he was remotely acquainted. The journey, seven minutes by the car's clock, traced a path that one might amble along on foot in ten. Their destination was a grassy hill from where the Avon valley stretched languidly below; a rather nostalgic place, where Mary had three years ago discovered she could speak to snakes while exploring the lower valley swamplands.
Mary watched Edward as he laid out the picnic mat, unlatched the hamper and arranged the food. His demeanour was so gentle, so graceful; his soft, golden hair, glowing under the afternoon sun, was tousled picturesquely by the wind; it was hard to believe that he was capable of inflicting the slightest bit of pain upon another being. It was rather evident that they were adoptive siblings; while Edward's complexion and hair colour were analogous in the Apollonian style, Mary was a dark, pale gitane of the highest order.
They picnicked in companionable silence, taking in the scenery and the sunlight. Edward produced a flask of cognac from his coat, pouring himself a glass; Mary, tempted as she was by the notion of loosening her tightly wound mind with that infamous adult substance, declined his offer to pour her one too. Philipp Emmanuel ungratefully devoured a slice of cured meat Mary proffered to him.
"Mary," Edward murmured, his gaze lingering on the horizon, "do you recall last Christmas Eve? When father stared vacantly while Mr. Wilson snapped his fingers before his face? Did you hear father's thoughts then?"
Mary remembered the incident vividly. Her father had been seated across from Mr. Wilson, an old acquaintance from Oxford, a stout man in his late fifties, on a plush velvet settee. After exchanging a firm handshake with the latter, who had just agreed to sponsor a new theatre honouring a mutual friend fallen in the war and posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross, Mary's father fell into a literal trance, staring blankly at the opposite wall, seeming to gaze through it rather than at it.
"Do you really want to know?"
"That is why I asked."
"Father was revisualising, as it were, a French soldier, a certain corporal Leblanc, who died in his arms at Verdun. He was remembering the war, Eddie, the trenches, and the mud, and the lice, and the bodies of fallen soldiers rotting in the sun, and the blood, and the stench Eddie – father remembers the stench of gangrene and burning flesh every single day. That was why he blanked out – not because he was 'hard of hearing' as mother claims – he hears perfectly well."
Edward blanched, whispering, "How do you know all this? Did father tell you?"
"No. He thinks about the war constantly; he cannot help it."
"Does father know that you know?"
"Don't be absurd."
Edward's hands palpitated as he replenished his glass anew with cognac, the amber liquid catching the afternoon sun. His expression was pensive; he thought of the Anschluss on the continent; of the Slovakian Republicans; of insurrection in Albania; could it all happen again – wie Wasser von Klippe – Zu Klippe geworfen – Hölderlin, who so perceptively unveiled the void where one might expect to find the human soul.
Mary reached for Edward's hand, intertwining her soft, slender fingers with taut, firm ones (hardened by the handling of cricket and tennis bats, among other boyish implements).
"Let's play a game; conjure a memory, and I shall guess it," she said.
"I'm not sure I like this game."
Mary laughed airily. "Pourquoi pas? If I guess correctly, you must kiss me."
"Mais quelle horreur, to kiss my lovely sister. Oh very well – have at it."
"You are recalling the day father took us to the London Zoo. 11 July, 1936. You are thinking of the Senegalese leopards, Eddie, and the way their spotted coats shone beneath the summer sun – how they reminded you of Aeschylus' lines on the metamorphosis of Phaethon. You realised then that Uncle Godfrey's platitude concerning your having inherited father's inclination towards poetry was true; and that father had lost such a sensibility in the war."
Edward's features changed from skepticism to horrified astonishment. "Mary, you astonish me. But this is uncanny!"
"The kiss, Eddie! The kiss!" Mary's voice rose as she pointed dramatically to her cheek.
Still wearing a look of one disturbed by an unwelcome yet amazing revelation, Edward nonetheless took Mary's face and kissed her on the right cheek, leaving upon it an electric, rose-coloured, jam-scented feeling.
Mary smiled broadly. Though in that moment Edward's mind was still a disordered flurry from all he had learned in the last twelve hours, Mary wanted to deepen her assault while he was weak; wanted him to know that all his sensations were her sensations. So she disclosed thoughts and memories of his that she had gleaned long ago, but had never revealed.
"Now you are recalling the time you kissed Barbara Stratley under the Japanese maple in her aunt's garden."
"No I am not – hold on – how do –"
Mary feigned contrition. "My apologies, Eddie – you are recalling the time you shagged Stratley in an abandoned stable in Abingdon."
Edward coughed sharply, the cognac catching in his throat, as Mary's evil laughter cascaded around him. "That's it! Out of my cranium!"
"And now you recalling the time Stratley cried your name as –"
Edward's right hand clamped over his sister's mouth. "Mary! All this time?" Though its firmness and warmth made Mary's face pleasantly ticklish, she removed her brother's hand to grin impishly at him. Edward, no longer able to contain himself, doubled over and joined her in unconscious, pagan laughter. While they continued convulsing mirthfully under noon sun, a small boy closed in on them from behind; eight-year-old Daniel Tedham, the son of the Annetts' gardener, and a rising prospect in the Salisbury & South Wilts Scouts. Mary was pelting Edward with grapes when she heard Daniel clear his throat.
"Hello Danny," Mary said, cheerily patting the child's head. "Care to join us?"
Daniel shook his head vigorously like a wet puppy. "Nope Mary, Mrs. Annett sent me to get you – says there's a guest for you. A professor or something."
"A professor?"
Daniel shrugged. "Dunno Mary. Some bloke."
Mary peered into the child's thoughts; all she discovered was her mother solemnly enclosing two coppers into his small fist and telling him to run to the valley and retrieve her. He also thought of his own mother's mashed potatoes with chives and bits of bacon, which she habitually made for dinner on Tuesdays.
"Best not keep mother waiting," said Mary, gathering the remnants of their scarcely touched lunch into the hamper. "Need a ride home, Danny?"
Daniel was glad to be offered a short Cadillac ride back to his cottage, after which a few minutes of pure quietness elapsed between Mary and Edward until they reached home.
Edward escorted Mary to the parlour, where their mother stood staring out the window forlornly. When strangers gazed upon Julia Annett, their impression was that of something between a marble statue and a queen ensullened by the loss of her husband and sons in some increasingly ancient war. Her blonde hair, though greying and stiffened with lacquer, was still somewhat lustrous; her wrinkling skin still retained some semblance of its youthful firmness; but her expression was unmistakably old. Mary tried not to brood on the dampening effect mother exercised upon all members of the household; she was typical of women of the generation who had come to adulthood during the war.
Julia Annett turned to greet her children; she did not smile, but her gaze softened. She was thinking, in that moment, of the guest's strange appearance – Mary gleaned an auburn beard, and a ridiculous turquoise suit. It reminded Julia Annett of the more daring, or perhaps vulgar ensembles frivolous young men wore to West End dances before the war; of how these men were crazy for her, how they would have walked through ten miles of snow just to kiss her hands; how, at the time, she did not mind garish costumes, while now she found them unspeakably irritating. It was one of the more colourful thoughts she had had in weeks. "The professor awaits in your bedroom, Mary."
"A 'professor', all for me?"
Mary's mother nodded. "It's a necessary visit, according to him. His reasons are... quite extraordinary. I shall accompany you."
Mary climbed the stairs and, entering her bedroom, found herself before a man of comically striking presence. Tall, with flowing, well-kept auburn hair both piliary and facial, he wore a lurid, vaudevillian turquoise suit that made Barbara Stratley's Bolero dress look positively Anglican.
"Good afternoon, Mary," the 'professor' warmly greeted. His accent was at least English, and educated. "I am Professor Dumbledore. Your mother and I were just conversing about you – a most fascinating young lady, if I may say so myself. I daresay you have already grasped my thoughts, have you not? But your mother insists that I vocalise my business here. Mary, I am a teacher at a school – Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, to be precise. Yes, witchcraft, Mary, magic. I have come to offer you a place at Hogwarts. I assume you are wondering what qualifications are required of you – none, for you have the gift, and that is all we require of our students."
Mary said nothing for a long moment. She wanted to laugh, at so convoluted and idiosyncratic a practical joke – perhaps Edward had organised it for her amusement – but the professor appeared perfectly sincere. It was too much for her to take in all at once; for months, nearly a year, she had been expecting to go to Headington in the autumn of 1938 – and for months, she had been unable to fully come to terms with this exile that fate was to impose on her; no other Godolphin girl was going to Headington. And now – to a school for people with Anomalies? Was it government funded, and government-rendered-confidential? A MI5 programme for cadets of the state crossed with an insane asylum? She didn't even know that there were others who were Anomalous. It was certain that Mary would know no one at 'Hogwarts' (and what an absurd name to confer upon such an institution). Nonetheless such a prospect was as immensely enticing as it was horrifying.
Mary looked from Professor Dumbledore to her mother, who sat tensely in the green velvet armchair. It was no secret to Mary that mother harboured some awareness of her Anomalies, yet she had always chosen to overlook them. Having mastered her more physical powers by the age of seven, Mary had since been meticulous in concealing them from the world; yet those living with her would have noticed certain discrepancies, and patterns thereof.
"Mary, Professor Dumbledore has made his case rather clear," Julia Annett started, "I suppose I always knew. I-I cannot explain why I never confronted you with this – perhaps it was my own denial of the unnatural. Of – of the ungodly. I suppose that it was easier to pretend that you were normal, Mary – to believe that you were normal – like – like Isobel."
Mary glared at her mother, seething with a daughter's unreciprocated love; and with this ferocity penetrated into her thoughts like a bélier crashing a mediaeval gate. Julia Annett's mind was perfectly cohesive in that moment. Despite her penitent voice and manner, Julia Annett wished desperately to be rid of her adoptive daughter, to have her gone from her sight, to be left alone in her grief; to be rid of this anomaly, this abomination; to be rid of Mary – Mary, who possessed powers that God would surely condemn – Mary, who had somehow even wrapped her tendrils around Edward; Mary, who was abnormal, unlike her beautiful dead Isobel. Mary, whose existence was a constant reminder of Julia Annett's inability to bear a living child.
Mary burst into tears; her mother at least had the grace to now avert her eyes.
Edward burst into the room and rushed to his little sister; he wrapped both of his arms protectively around Mary's frail shoulders and glared daggers at Professor Dumbledore. "Mary, what did he do?"
Mary said nothing, sobbing silently into Edward's chest, clutching him in a way she could never clutch her parents; Edward stroked Mary's scalp and snapped at Professor Dumbledore. "What did you do?!"
"Eddie, please – I'm fine," Mary said, releasing Edward, wiping tears from her eyes.
"Mary –"
"I am fine, Edward. Leave us."
Edward reluctantly lifted arms from his sister's shoulders. "I'll be just outside."
He kissed Mary's forehead, cast an acidic stare at Professor Dumbledore, then exited the room. Mrs. Annett wordlessly followed her son. Professor Dumbledore offered Mary a blue handkerchief with embroidered frogs that slowly flex and retract their legs.
Mary dabbed her tears and composed herself (the handkerchief, amazingly, absorbed liquid much more effectively than Mary's own handkerchiefs, while not remotely moistening). She wondered how Anomalies could create such miraculous objects, and how soon she would learn to make animated embroidery at Hogwarts. Nonetheless, wanting to forget that which she had just gleaned in her mother's mind above all else, Mary stared into the professor's eyes, which were unlike any other Mary had seen – a supernaturally iridescent shade of periwinkle. They contained a depth Mary found overwhelming. He was a man of greater spiritual depth than any she had ever beheld before. His mind, like a ridge of Himalayan mountains in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, atop which were palaces of unadulterated crystal. Yet beneath this structure, was an immense pain – then very suddenly nothing. Professor Dumbledore had pushed her out of his mind.
Mary's gaze quickly shifted to a framed Turner reproduction on her wall. The professor placed a hand on her shoulder.
"Do not fret, Mary. That you can read minds, I already knew. That you would try to read mine, I also knew. While it is very impressive that a young, completely uninitiated witch such as yourself is capable of wandless legilimency, I would advise against attempting it upon wizards – it is unwise to pry into the mind of a wizard, Mary; you may see things you wish you hadn't. Moreover, it is quite illegal; there are laws against it, and the punishments are severe."
"I am most sorry, professor."
Professor Dumbledore smiled reassuringly. "All is forgiven, Mary. Now, let us discuss the matter at hand – Hogwarts."
That Professor Dumbledore had so easily deflected Mary's telepathy suggested to her beyond a doubt that he, too, was Anomalous – a wizard – and an immensely powerful one at that. The idea of a magical school was still somewhat fantastical; but with Professor Dumbledore present, Mary did not doubt its existence. So when the professor drew what appeared to be a wand and pointed it at the piano, Mary knew that he only did so to lighten her mood, and not to prove anything.
The piano began playing itself; Mozart's Sonata in C Major danced through the air. Mary watched, entranced; the keys lifted and lowered of their own accord. It was interpreted soundly. Mr. Monorosi, Mary's piano master, would have mostly approved – though he would have still found something to reproach, omniscient as he was. Amazing possibilities occurred to Mary; would she not, as a sole pianist, be able to play a concerto all by herself, is she too had a wand and the adequate knowledge to anomalously quicken all the other instruments? What else could be autonomously spurred to live by anomalies – or rather, magic? Obviously pleased by Mary's reaction, Professor Dumbledore grinned. Mary smiled back. With another movement of his wand, Professor Dumbledore pushed the soft pedal down; the music was quietened so they could converse.
"Professor Dumbledore," Mary called, steadying her voice. "I would like to accept your offer."
A smile flickered across Dumbledore's face, as though Mary's acceptance was a foregone conclusion, a piece of the future he had already seen.
"Excellent, Mary; you have made a wise choice. It will be a pleasure for me to teach you; I can already see that you shall become an exceptional witch."
Mary wanted to read the professor's thoughts again to see if he was sincere (and to bask in the chilling profundity of his anguished soul), but merely expressed her gratitude.
The professor lectured at length to Mary about the magical world, of both its greatness and its wickedness; of the Statute of Secrecy; of the ICW – the magical League of Nations – and the British Wizengamot; the history of Hogwarts and its contemporary curricular structure; dragons, goblins, and centaurs; cursing and healing; schoolyard hexes and soul magic; of his own youthful joys and follies as a student of Gryffindor House. He warned Mary against using magic in the muggle world; she promised she wouldn't.
"There is one final matter I must touch on with you –" Professor Dumbledore said, assuming the solemnity with which he had reprimanded her for reading his mind. "A topic I have not even broached with your mother. I shall speak plainly – Mary, you have a twin brother."
"Excuse me?"
"A twin brother by birth – a certain Thomas Marvolo Riddle. Born six minutes earlier than you, he is still at the orphanage where you spent the first year of your existence. When I talked to him, he was quite aware of your existence, and rather eager to meet you."
Mary was utterly stupefied. Her mouth suddenly became dry. Her first thought, rather stupid, was to say that she already had a brother, Edward. her second, more sensible, was to wonder why her parents had never told her; or whether her mother had even known of this. Her third, was that Riddle was a queer surname, and one rather symbolically on the nose. Her fourth, to wonder what the eccentric qualities Thomas's middle name shared with her own – both starting with Ms, Latinate of an Italianish tone – signified.
"Why – why didn't my – I mean –"
Professor Dumbledore sighed, withdrew a small photograph from his breast pocket and handed it to Mary. A boy, aged eight or so, looked back at her. The age of Daniel Tedham. Thomas Marvolo Riddle bore a striking resemblance to his twin sister. Gypsy-black hair contrasting with the clearest pallor of skin; sunken, inquisitive eyes; an irreproachably symmetrical face; thin lips; a concise firmness about the nose. If Mary were seen with him, everyone would remark on their consanguinity. Yet he differed from her – Mary sensed he was not the type of boy that many people would like (Mary was adored by all); that he was not particularly friendly to others – a loner, perhaps (Mary was friendly even to those she abominated); his eyes had a cold firmness that Mary found hard to stare at, even in its static form. There was nothing in him of Edward's affability, of his easy nature; but Mary reasoned that Thomas and herself had to be similar in more ways than appearance. She knew from Uncle Godfrey – who was only a half-brother of father, yet shared so many mannerisms with him – that both strengths of character and pathologies can be inherited.
"Why didn't my father adopt Thomas as well?" Mary finally said.
Moreover, Mary thought to herself, how had she never gleaned the existence of this boy – whose likeness was so obviously her own – from her father's thoughts?
"I'm afraid I cannot shed further light upon that subject. It is not my place to divulge. What I can tell you, Mary, is that Thomas wishes to attend Hogwarts, and desires to be with you. The two of you have much to discuss – I do not expect you to embrace him as a sibling straightaway, but I urge you to at least give him a chance. I sense a darkness in Thomas Riddle – a powerful darkness that threatens to consume him – yet I also sense that this darkness may be his greatest strength. He has potential – potential to do great things – and he needs your help."
"My help?"
Professor Dumbledore nodded. "Yes, Mary. Your help. I sense that you are able to love unconditionally, Mary. I believe that this love could save Tom from his inner demons."
Mary paused. She felt strangely honoured to have been offered this absurd, Byronic task, yet also indignation at the presumption of this man, who had only met her fifteen minutes ago, for thrusting it upon him.
Professor Dumbledore rose to his feet. Mary could glean a resoluteness in his gaze, an insistence that she should heed his counsel; she also perceived a distinct sadness in his eyes. He strode towards Mary, and placed a hand on her shoulder. "Mary, I understand that this is a lot to take in; I shall take my leave now. I will return tomorrow morning to accompany you to Diagon Alley – there you will find the means to acquire everything you need for your journey to Hogwarts."
Mary nodded numbly, saying nothing. She looked at the photo again, at the eyes of that strange boy. There was something infinitely captivating about those eyes – about him, Mary supposed. Mary could not decide whether she longed to meet him, or to run from him.
1 September 1938
Tom's first impression of Platform 9¾ was that it was not in London. The sky above was a few shaders bluer, and there was no clamour of engines and horns. The place had a King's Cross look about it, but the tracks were different, older yet more well-maintained.
"Shut it, Pharaoh," Tom snapped. His kestrel, purchased for its air of predatoriness and its relative cheapness (Tom spent most of the fund Dumbledore gave him on spellbooks), was fussing again. Named after the archetypal Old Testament tyrant, the bird was making a ruckus at the sight of two tiny, elfish little creatures draped in faded red bath towels fast approaching. One tendered a skinny hand towards Pharaoh's cage.
"Back off!" Tom commanded the creature, all pale, gleaming eyes and wide nostrils. It was as scrawny as a mass of interlocking drumsticks, barely covered by its shabby excuse of a garment. "Don't you touch him."
Tom was ready to channel the Devil in him to put the thing in its place when it spoke up, its voice low and rather cheeky, "Mabblys ain't gonna hurt yer hawk, lad. Mabblys is a porter elf, that's what Mabblys is."
A passing boy in a handsomely priestly purplish-black robe, his height and bearing suggesting he was at least three years senior to Tom, interjected, "Give your parrot to the elf, mudblood. Do you know how long this train ride is going to be? Do you want the beast making a racket for hours?"
"It's a kestrel," Tom countered, an eyebrow raised at the strange insult, "not a parrot."
"Do I look like I care? Hand over the stupid thing."
Though the older boy's arguments were sound, Tom did not like taking orders from people he didn't know. So he stared back into his antagonist's haughty eyes with something hard in his own.
Once the boy contemptuously snorted and went his way, Tom let the elf take his luggage, cage included. One of them tugged at his magically extended leather satchel. "Hands off, this is for the train," Tom said.
Inside that satchel – whose extended interior enchantment Tom found sufficiently useful to spend a third of his 'Muggleborn Provisions Fund' on – was the £1000. £1000 for Mary Melusina Riddle, the only creature Tom cared about in the world. Tom glanced at the Garrard on his wrist (a prize nicked from a tipsy businessman in 1936). 12:33. Any second now, Mary would appear; she had to. Tom knew she would be searching for him just the same.
Tom went about the platform, looking about everywhere for a face like his own, but upon a beautiful girl. Unlike the other muggleborns he was unimpressed by the throngs of wizarding families, pompously shifting about in their colourful robes and making sentimental farewells; he had seen enough of them in Diagon Alley.
By 12:37, he had scoured the platform twice; still no sign of his mystical twin sister. Could she have boarded without him? Surely she would not. Nonetheless Tom embarked the train and traversed it with rapid strides looking left and right, out the windows and in the compartments with obsessive methodicality. No sign of her there either, until –
12:42.
Through the window of the second compartment on the fourth carriage from the back, Tom caught sight of her.
Under a large, sloping white panama hat tied with a black ribbon, there stood an angel. Mary Melusina Riddle, lithe and pale like the apparition of beautiful ghost (pale of complexion). She was utterly oblivious she was being observed by her long estranged twin brother as she haggled over a kitten with a pair of elves. Her face was a perfect feminine rendition of Tom's own: dark eyes, seductively sunken and slightly upturned, girded by prominent brows; a high, nascently intellectual forehead; clear, almost bloodlessly milky skin contrasting against orientally black hair (black of eye and hair); a small but elegantly ridged nose; and a thin, wide serpentine mouth to complete a long and beautifully symmetrical face. Her hair, slightly curling, cascaded to engulf a long, frail cygnine neck and fall upon thin, frail shoulders. No girls at Wool's had hair like that (or shoulders, or skin, or manners, for that matter). Her outfit was a lavishly layered ensemble of dark green and gold tailored to her idiosyncratically willowy form (she was not quite 6lbs8oz, but all the better; there was more of her to admire and explore). She carried herself with easy dignity; as Tom looked down at the plush espadrilles containing her well-formed feet, she handed her dainty little kitten to the pair of elves.
Tom bolted from the carriage, shoving a silly older girl doing her hair with her wand in front of a floating mirror out of his way, onto the platform. There Mary was, taller than him, better dressed than him, a great beauty at so tender an age, every inch the figure of someone raised among finer sorts. But still, unmistakably his; Mary Melusina Riddle bore his face, skin, blood, and name. Tom reached out and touched her soft, elegantly frail shoulder, letting his trembling hand linger for several moments longer than necessary.
"Mary."
Her dark eyes (black of eye), framed by lush lashes, flickered towards him, scrutinising him briefly before lighting up with jubilation.
"Thomas!" Mary cried, throwing her slender arms around him.
Mary Melusina Riddle's embrace was, for all intents and purposes, the embrace of the mother Tom had never known. He existed momentarily as a lily drinking the sun on the midday Thames. She was soft; she was warm; she was firm; she smelled distinctly of pears, fresh mint, and cinnamon; her growing bosom pressed against his skinny chest like the solving of a puzzle that had been scrambled for too long. She wanted nothing of him, but his return of affection. Tom held on fiercely; and soon Mary's lips were peppering his face with kisses – cheeks, forehead, ears, each brush of her lips like hot water caressing hypothermic skin.
Yet Tom was conscious they were surrounded by future classmates. "Let's find a spot on the train," he proposed, taking his twin sister's artistically sculpted hand. It had not a single callus or scar.
They found a vacant compartment near the middle of the train. Tom sealed the door behind them. Mary settled onto the cushioned seat like Princess Elizabeth upon a dining chair in Buckingham palace, placing her hat in her lap. Rather than sitting across her, Tom sat beside his twin sister and wrapped his covetous arms around her form once more, burying his face in her neck, revelling in her fragrance and pulsating flesh. She was alive; she was real; she was his. Mary stroked his head gently, and they remained like that for several minutes. By the time Tom raised his head, he found the train had already started and parted London.
This was a novelty for Tom, both the act of holding and being held with such tenderness. The warmth, the softness – this was precisely the substance of his dreams – no – it exceeded them. He did not want to let go – he did not want the dream to end. They had been apart for ten years; he wanted to hold her for ten years just to make up for this cruellest of separations. Mary eventually pulled away, only so that she could finally take a good, thorough look at him.
"We look rather alike, don't we?" she observed, smiling (even their smiles resembled – thin lips protruding to indicate serpentine surety in their own intelligence). "I would suppose our twinhood is monozygotic rather than fraternal."
Though Tom had no education in the natural sciences other than the most elementary, he inferred that that which is 'mono-anything' (monotheistic; monomaniacal) must be more closely intimate than that which is 'fraternal'. "That we must be," he agreed.
Mary laughed – a tinkling sound Tom liked very much – and pinched his right cheek with thumb and index finger. "Then you will share with me a predilection for sweets."
From her purse, Mary produced a small, dark blue box, revealing finely wrapped chocolates. Tom took one, fumbled momentarily with the complex wrapper, then took a bite. It was superior to everything he had ever pilfered from the Oaktun sweet shop – complex, subtle, yet fresh, like Mary. A subtle hint of alcohol – was it wine? – warmed his throat. "They're good," he managed.
"That they is. Father brings them from Paris. He travels a lot," said Mary, unwrapping another chocolate with a flourish. "Have you travelled much, Thomas?"
"The orphanage trips us off to Canterbury every spring," Tom replied easily, though he found the question somewhat pointless – the answer obvious. "There's a beach there."
"Canterbury? Never been, but they say it's divine. The nicest beach I've visited is one by the Lago di Garda in Italy. The Italians are so clever, they don't allow noisy boats with electric motors, you see, so it's perfectly tranquil. The colour is unlike any you would find in Britain. On temperate days it is the turquoise of stained glass during day; come sunrise you see a liquid marigold. It's magical – not in the Diagon Alley sense of course. Oh dear, I do tend to ramble on a bit, don't I, Thomas?"
Tom had never met anyone who had been to Italy, nor any girl with such rich elocution. The most well-travelled people he knew were middle-aged mutt-punters who had been to France between the years 1914 and 1918 – and not exactly to admire the architecture. Yet that his twin sister was so easily acquainted with such high living pleased Tom more than it roused his envy; she was a beautiful creature, with beautiful clothes and beautiful manners; a vessel for superior blood, deserving of superior things.
"It sounds lovely," said Tom, in a tone he hoped was neither too impressed nor too disinterested.
Mary beamed, leaning forward, resting her chin on her hand, studying him with great curiosity. The effect was almost unnerving; the last time Tom had been so intimately examined by someone, was Dr. Sig Gladman, of the British Psychological Society. "Tell me about yourself, Thomas. I want to know everything about you."
His twin's dark, lively eyes were hypnotising – it was like looking into a mirror, except his reflection was sentient, and a beautiful girl. So how could Tom not refrain from using the oldest of the powers of the Devil in him upon her? How could he not read her mind? He wanted to know what she really thought of his him – his drab clothes, his unpolished speech, that he had never travelled anywhere, his all-too-evident admiration of her.
At first there were the nebulous masses of colour that framed the entrance of every mind; then the shifting geometrical apparitions proper to the outer layers of thought; and finally, Tom beheld images – a grand cathedral towering over a quaint, but well-tended English village; several girls, all clad in matching blue uniforms, giggling and chatting merrily in a classroom filled with costly supplies, all reverential of Mary, the cleverest and most beautiful; a young man – perhaps seventeen or eighteen – with fair hair and a handsome, composed countenance, his eyes a colour Mary called 'aquamarine' (not quite the same as 'turquoise'), gazing at Mary with unwavering devotion; and lastly, Tom himself, as seen through Mary's eyes. There was no disdain, no wariness; she was utterly, wholly accepting of Tom, even adoring. That they resembled so strongly was a point of pride for her; and that Tom had what she considered a sanguinary temperament appealed to her. She was immensely glad to have two brothers –
Two brothers.
The blond boy.
Tom withdrew from Mary's mind. A brother. She had another brother. A brother who she idealised as, though she did not admit it, not merely a brother, but also a father figure – and even – surely Tom was wrong? – a lover. She was obsessed with him; she made rhubarb pie and folded Japanese paper cranes for him every summer; she used the perfumes he gave her; she played the piano more beautifully because of him.
"Thomas?" Mary touched his arm. "Are you reading my mind?"
Tom recoiled. For a moment he found the sight of her more reprehensible than that of Dr. Gladman. "How did you know?"
"I can read minds too – I suppose it runs in the family," she said. "More things than you know are hereditary. My father is a doctor, he once told me that one can foresee their life by reading the medical history of their parents and grandparents."
That Mary kept mentioning her 'father' grated on Tom's nerves. She spoke as though he really was her father – a doctor, like Gladman, who was only really the father of the blond boy.
"Your father – our father – isn't a doctor. We don't know what he is."
Mary went silent for a moment, her expression unreadable before she spoke with infinite gentleness, "Forgive me, Thomas, but I only have one father – the man who raised me. If we have a biological father, then he's no father of mine. Wouldn't you agree? A father is a title earned, not inherited."
"Yes, but –" Tom spluttered, suddenly uncertain of how to express his tumultuous feelings. "This doctor of yours – he's not your father. He's the other boy's father. He doesn't care for you like one. Why else would he be away most of the year?"
"Thomas –"
"I hate him," Tom spat. The idea that Mary, his Mary – who shared his face and skin, and was easily the most beautiful creature he had ever seen – could feel affection for anyone else than himself, was intolerable. That the man who had severed her from Tom was among these usurpers was infuriating. Tom's neck got hot. "He's nothing but a kidnapper, a bastard, a whoreson who stole you from me, from us."
"I beg your pardon?"
"One day I'll learn the spells wizards use to kill – I'll use them to destroy him. I swear it, Mary," Tom's voice rose, his words pouring out uncontrollably. "I won't rest until he –"
"Stop it! Stop it right now!" Mary cried, grabbing Tom's wrists.
Tom stared quizzically at his twin, taken aback by what he saw. Tears sparkled like dewdrops in her eyes, and her face twisted in dolly anguish. She seriously began to cry. He hadn't expected such a raw reaction – words are just words, after all. The girls back at the orphanage would have scoffed at Mary's sensitivity; they would have thrown apple cores at her and stolen her things. All her fineness would be stamped out into dust and mud. But Tom did not laugh. Mary released his wrists, turning away and covering her face with her hands. Her shoulders trembled beneath delicate green fabric; there was something tantalisingly vulnerable about her. Tom suppressed an urge to lick her tears off her cheeks.
Tom did not apologise. He wondered if he ought to reach out and comfort her, but how? Mary had been raised in a proper home – Tom was entirely unfamiliar with how power and affection flowed in such structures. Moreover, he could not think of what he had said that was wrong. It was clear as day to him that the man who stole Mary deserved nothing less than a painful death. He simply held her, stroking her hair as she wept, as he had seen the blond boy do in her memories.
But it would not do, to imitate the blond boy; Tom was the better brother. He released her trembling form, unstrapped his satchel, and placed it in his lap.
"What are you doing?" asked a sniffling Mary.
"Money." Tom pulled out a wad of notes in a rubber band, and then a sack of coins. "I've been saving. Got a thousand pounds here for you. That's more than double what your fancy dad gave Mrs. Cole."
Mary said nothing as he placed the money in her lap.
Tom continued, his tone flat, matter-of-fact, "If you need more, let me know. I can get it. I'm good at getting things. Always have been."
"A thousand pounds… where did you get this?"
"Does it matter?"
"Of course it matters!" Mary said incredulously. "This is so much! Thomas –"
"Take it." Tom forced the money back into Mary's hands, which remained limp. "Why not? It's ours. You're my twin. Everything I have is yours."
"I haven't done anything to deserve it! We've only just got back together, and –"
"Don't be stupid! You don't get to refuse it after what the doctor did. Ten years, Mary. Ten years I've lived without my sister. We shared our mum's womb – we came into this world together – and he took you away from me. He took everything from me. This money – it's nothing compared to what he owes us. So take it –" Tom tightly gripped her elegant, girl-pianist's hands, forcing them to close around the cash "– because that man owes us so much more."
Mary said nothing; she sat frozen, staring at Tom with wide eyes.
The minty scent of her perfume; the smooth, soft contours of her nascently womanly face; the silky green fabric draped over her shoulders; that she was both taller yet frailer than Tom – all of it only made her intractability more intolerable. "Say something!" Tom snapped.
"You need it more than I do, Thomas."
Her words struck Tom like a fist, or a bucket of cold water being splashed onto his face, waking him from a fever dream. Of course Mary would despise him; of course, the meagre fortune he amassed through mutt-nobbling, pickpocketing, watch-pilfering, and all manner of petty crime would be dirt to her. Rage coursed through his body and made all his muscles tight; for a moment he wished Mary dead for even considering refusing him. Then, with sudden clarity, Tom knew what to do; he shoved the heap of banknotes onto the floor and drew his wand – that beautiful thirteen-and-a-half instrument of yew, long and pale like a bone.
"Thomas, what are you doing?"
Tom pointed his wand at the money lying on the ground, and spat,
"Incendio!"
With that, the little fortune caught fire. Tom's flames, fed by a whirlwind of contradictory feelings – cold hatred mingled with boiling desire, despair alongside it – blazed fiercely. Thick, acrid smoke spiralled upwards, assaulting the compartment's ceiling. Tom kicked at the money, his eyes burning and watering, and watched Mary choke and splutter, her loveliness finally spoiled.
"Stop, stop, stop, stop!" Mary exclaimed, flailing her wand (shorter than Tom's, the wood of a deeper, warmer hue) violently at the conflagration. Tom was impressed by his twin's magic of pure formless will – no incantation, no predetermined wand movement – she was as talented as he was; yet this only wanted him to persecute her all the more.
"Well? Now what, princess?"
Mary shouted, in between coarse coughs, "You're insane! You're completely mad!"
Only a few banknotes were left; and the coins – no more than a hundred quid – were all charred black. Tom plucked a handful of burnt paper from the floor, and threw it in Mary's face. He watched with mad delight as the scorched fragments stuck to her face and dress, and snarled, "There – maybe now you'll accept it!"
Mary look like a child about to burst into tears; and then she did. This only roused Tom further; he scooped up another handful of charred money to throw at her. She tried to block it with her hands, but winced and withdrew those delicate, inexperienced organs as the half-disintegrated ashes burned her wrists. Her suffering made Tom feel like an alcoholic surfeiting on stolen, expensive liquor. How he loved to hurt her, to hurt the other, better twin.
"Accept it! Take it!" Tom flailed more money at Mary. "Take it! Take it! Take it!"
Tom thought of the doctor, his Victoria Cross, his nerve to play the part of a sullen, misunderstood savant while living in the lap of luxury, with servants waiting on him hand and foot – Tom would destroy him for taking Mary away from him. He thought of the blond boy, whose letters from Cambridge Mary always read a dozen times, and kept sealed in envelopes, whose picture was framed by Mary's bedside, and who Mary always greeted with a kiss far too near the mouth whenever he returned to Salisbury. He, too, would have to die a painful death. How Tom wished they both could witness Mary now, sobbing and covered in soot. It was only then that he noted the sharp pain in his own fingers, blistered from handling still-glowing embers. Tom paused to inspect his burns; he sneered as Mary lowered her arms, and saw what he had done to himself.
"Thomas, your hands -"
When Tom grabbed for the last of his burnt money, it disintegrated wholly in his hand. He sprinkled the ashes theatrically fall upon Mary's head.
"There. Now it's truly yours – all of it."
Mary blinked; there was an incongruity almost comical, like something out of a picture, between her beautiful form and the soot and burn marks all over her delicate person. Tom wondered if she would scream; he hoped she would.
"Now you accept it!" Tom continued. "You'll never say no to me again – not ever – because now you know what happens when you do. Do you understand? Say you understand!"
Mary slowly stood up, filthy, dishevelled, but no longer crying. She slowly approached Tom with a dazed expression in her eyes, her gait spectral, her right arm automatically extended as if she were not fully in control, as though she might reach out for him – Tom thought she might extend it to take his own hand, to kiss it, to worship him –
She slapped Tom across the face.
"How dare you!" Mary hissed. "How dare you?!"
"You hit me –"
"Of course I hit you! You're being a lunatic! Burning money – attacking me – screaming at me – what the hell was I supposed to do?!" Mary shrieked, her voice breaking. "God – I can't believe I looked forward to meeting you. I should've known – I should've known –"
Tom's self-hypnosis ended. The horror and stupidity of what he had just done sank in. Pale of complexion, black of eye and hair, a svelte eleven years of age, crying and covered in filth. He was suddenly exposed, naked, weak; all that he had said and done revealed to be childish and pathetic. His hands began to ache intensely; he gritted his teeth and tried not to make a stupid face. He stood rooted to the spot, unable to think of anything to do or say. Mary began sobbing anew – the sound cut Tom deeper than a penknife; he wanted to apologise, to embrace her, to comfort her, but he couldn't move. Mary wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, then turned away from Tom; she was preparing to leave.
Despite his aching hands Tom snatched Mary's wrist. "Wait! Wait! Where are you going?"
Mary turned back to him; there was something in her expression Tom had not seen before – pity, contempt, both, neither – Tom's insides knotted themselves again; Mary was looking down on him again, and he hated it. Hated, hated, hated it; he was made utterly inferior to her by the passage of time, when they should have been equals – and what, what did that stupid doctor know about life, and loneliness, and surviving anyway, to warrant her admiration and deference and – Tom's thoughts came crashing to a halt when Mary said, "Anywhere but here. Don't touch me!"
She tried to pull her arm from Tom, but he kept his grip firm. He was in that moment seized by a fanciful albeit debilitatingly horrifying notion; that if Mary left that compartment, she would never return again – the dream would end. All those dreams he had of heaven, terminated, once and for all. As if she were, all these years, but a magnificent mirage hallucinated by an increasingly pathological orphan.
"Let me go!"
"Never," Tom murmured. Something within him crumbled – he knew he should let Mary leave – what a pathetic creature he was; he should leave the train at once, and go and hang himself. She would never come back. What more was there to life? It was a simple matter to dispose of oneself and rejoin the universe whole. "Don't ever, ever leave me again."
"I'm not yours."
She said this in a maddeningly matter-of-fact way, like a person explaining that apples fell from trees. Before Tom could say or do anything else, the compartment's door slid open with a clunk, and his twin sister walked out without another word.