Summary of the last chapter:

Harry tells his friends about his out-of-body trip into 1943 and his encounter with the Riddle from the diary without revealing who he is. Hermione, as expected, is distrustful and wants to find out what became of the boy who created such a powerful magical item. Tom remains torn as well. He doesn't trust himself and feels something dark emanating from the planner. At the same time, he also feels a strange kind of yearning every time Harry holds the diary in his hands. Harry fails to understand why everybody is so prejudiced, including Tom, when Riddle is basically himself. He chats with Riddle some more, without learning anything of substance, but he bonds with Riddle about the things they have in common. Both Harry and Tom are rather protective of the diary and don't want anybody to take it from them.

The Potion Incident

"Look Harry! I found something!" Excited, Hermione put a copy of the Daily Prophet on the table before them. It was an old edition from 1945. She had shown Harry how to access the Prophet's Archive, but it wasn't as straightforward as Harry had thought it was when Hermione had told him about it. The search charm had to be adapted every time to what exactly you were looking for, meaning you had to define the parameters for the search and incorporate them into the wand movement. The numerical code appearing on the so charmed piece of parchment would then tell you what edition you might want to check out. This had to be done via Madam Pince. A copy of the relevant page would then magically be sent to a piece of empty newspaper.

His own first attempt had yielded no results – or rather no helpful ones. He obviously hadn't defined the search parameters correctly. What he had found were numerous pages with puzzles, jokes and RIDDLES.

"I only had this one hit – Riddle never appeared in any other article in the years following his graduation. But I found him in the announcement section: He got a job with Borgin and Burkes right after graduating Hogwarts. In September 1945, the shop owners gave notice that they had a new assistant. But nothing after that. I don't know how long he worked there or what happened to him afterwards."

"Borgin and Burkes? The dark arts supply store in Knockturn Alley?" asked Tom, sounding shocked. "With his incredible talent in charms, his chosen career path was to become a shop assistant in a shady business? Not very ambitious for a Slytherin."

Harry repeated Tom's thought out loud for his friends' benefit, thinking very much the same.

"Both wars – the Muggle one and the one against Grindelwald – had just ended," ventured Hermione. "I guess times were hard, and the economy in both worlds was in a bad state."

"Right," added Neville. "And Riddle was a half-blood with no connections. It might have been impossible for him to pursue a mastery under the current conditions. It's a bit sad, but getting an apprenticeship isn't that easy. You need money or a sponsor, he probably didn't have either. So he took a job to earn his living."

"Blood prejudice again," lamented Tom. "Wizards are every bit as bigoted as the Nazis were, and worse yet, I'm not sure they have changed all that much since."

"Not all wizards are prejudiced though," argued Harry. "Not even all purebloods."

"But the vast majority of them are," Tom countered. "I think it starts at Hogwarts. They really should teach wizards and Muggleborns about each other to promote cultural understanding. And discrimination against Muggleborns should be sanctioned."

"One thing's for sure," joked Harry good-naturedly, "at the rate you're going, you'll have a fundamental reform of the education system worked out before we even take our NEWTs! You have my full support though. I just hope you'll have your own body by then, because I don't really see myself as a teacher."

"Why are you grinning at that, Harry?" asked Hermione disapprovingly, who was oblivious to his internal conversation. "It's not funny. It's actually very sad."

"Sorry, I wasn't laughing about Riddle not finding a better job. My thoughts just started drifting, took a weird turn and ended up somewhere else entirely. I totally agree, and I feel sorry for Riddle. He was a really good student and it seems like a waste of talent. We'll have to keep moving against blood discrimination and prejudice wherever we can to make sure that it won't happen to us when we graduate."

"It's sad, but connections are really important in the wizarding world," said Neville. "It's all about who you know. Unfortunately, that doesn't always mean that the most competent people have influential positions, but those who have the biggest network."

"It's very much the same in the Muggle world," sighed Hermione, "and probably even harder to change there."

"Let's put 'reforming the wizarding world' right under 'reforming Hogwarts," suggested Tom. "We might even be able so squeeze in 'liberation of house-elves' if we make an effort."

*'*'*'*'*'*'*

"So how was coming to Hogwarts for you?" asked Riddle, when Harry had put his greeting in the diary again two days later.

"Exciting. Confusing. Amazing. Probably very much like it was for you."

"I was sorted into the noble house of Slytherin after having grown up with Muggles. It was difficult, lonely and a definitely a challenge. What house were you sorted into?"

"I'm a snake, too, and in a similar position. And in all honestly, I'm not sure about the 'noble'. Salazar seemed like a prejudiced blood supremacist, and I fail to see why he still has so many fans."

"Well, he lived in a time when Muggles burned witches and wizards at the stake. Many wizards shared his belief that nothing good ever came from the Muggle world. Grindelwald, who was convinced that the world would be much better if wizards ruled it, was at the height of his power and confirmed those who had always thought Muggles were dangerous in their feeling of superiority. It wasn't an easy time for a half-blood who seemed more Muggle than wizard to them."

"Yes, I know. I fail to understand the divide, though. We're all wizards or witches, no matter the blood-status."

"Well, I guess it's because those who grow up among Muggles have difficulties adapting to the wizarding world. They tend to question everything, and often do no understand or accept why wizards do things in a certain way."

"I know what you mean. I've only come to understand a short while ago why wizards insist on writing with a quill instead of a biro."

"Exactly. Muggleborns don't understand wizarding customs and often take offence with them."

"Well, some customs seem objectionable. Like house-elf slavery."

"A wizard would never call it slavery. It's a symbiotic relationship."

"Symbiotic?"

"Yes. Both sides profit from it."

"Well, wizards certainly do. But how do house-elves profit from being servants?" Harry remembered Neville saying that they didn't mind serving. But that could hardly be counted as 'profiting' – it sounded more like wizards making excuses.

"They don't have any magic of their own," Riddle explained, much to Harry's surprise. "They use the excess energy that wizards produce by wielding magic. A place inhabited by wizards gets imbued with magic over time – especially if it's made from stone. Elves can tap into it and use it for their own purposes. They wouldn't survive in the Muggle world."

"Oh! I didn't know that!"

"A lot of wizards sadly never think about these things, and they can't explain them to others. But then comes a Muggleborn and raises the idea of doing away with certain customs, not knowing what the consequences will be. With some of their ideas, they might be dire."

"How did you learn all this?"

"I educate myself, James! Knowledge is power!"

Harry almost had to grin at that. Here was the proof that Riddle really was Tom. He really sounded like him right now.

Riddle told him a few more interesting things about magical theory – about why Muggle items often were spell resistant or even dangerous to tamper with. It matched what Hermione had already found out. He also told Harry about rituals that especially Muggleborns often found disturbing or even dark, although they had been practiced for centuries and were perfectly benign.

"So many kinds of magic that are forbidden nowadays – or were forbidden in my days – are just so because with Muggleborns gaining influence in the Ministry, there were more and more people ignorant of the history and true nature behind them. And sadly, not all pure-blood wizards were educated enough to offer arguments and make them see their errors. Those purebloods who did see the development became hostile towards Muggleborns in general."

"But that's a fault that lies with Hogwarts!" protested Harry. "Misconceptions could be easily avoided: It's just a matter of explaining those things to everybody!"

"Hogwarts only offers Muggle Studies, not Wizarding studies, which is a mistake in my opinion. Since they encourage Muggleborns to come to Hogwarts, they should also help them assimilate."

Harry didn't disagree, though he wasn't sure if complete assimilation was the goal. Surely, not everything that Muggleborns could contribute had dangerous drawbacks. Fountain pens and paper notebooks seemed like a good compromise. And the wizarding world could definitely use more boardgames. Not to mention safer means of transport. Looking at things from a different perspective usually furthered progress.

"You've been remarkably silent the entire time," said Harry to Tom, after he had finally closed the diary. "What do you think? Riddle raised quite a few interesting points, didn't he?"

"Well, he definitely has a point complaining about Hogwarts' curriculum. But for someone who's a half-blood himself and who grew up in the Muggle world, he seems to have assimilated surprisingly well. He was very understanding of purebloods."

"I guess he had to adapt rather quickly to be accepted in Slytherin. And he had plenty of reasons not to like the Muggle world very much."

"True. He definitely doesn't have much to fondly look back on. He might hate all things Muggle, for all we know."

"No, I don't think so. You don't hate Muggles or Muggleborns, and he's basically you. He never said that he didn't like them, he just explained why so many pure-blood wizards have issues with them."

"Myrtle said Riddle wouldn't associate with 'the likes of her'."

Harry waved it off. "That could have meant anything. People of her age group. Slightly depressive and constantly complaining girls. People outside of his house. And even if it was because of her being a Muggleborn, it was probably due to peer pressure that he kept his distance. Draco was so wary of me for being friends with Hermione that he had to invent a wizarding ancestry for her, and you see how Slytherins took it hook, line and sinker. Besides, Riddle bought himself a diary in Muggle London. Quite obviously, he can't have hated all things Muggle."

"I still don't think he's overly fond of Muggles," insisted Tom. "Probably a childhood trauma."

"You've read too many psychology books. One thing you seem to have in common: He's obviously quite the bookworm, just like you. He even said the same thing you did, about knowledge being power.

"There might be similarities between him and me, but he's not me."

"I just fail to understand why you seem so hostile towards him," said Harry.

"Not hostile. Just wary. There's something about him that doesn't sit well with me. I think he's not being entirely honest with you – like he's putting on a show. And given that I'm at least partly him, I should know."

"We're not being entirely honest with him either, so we can hardly blame him for reciprocating. Maybe you'll feel differently about your past self once we get to know him better."

Tom refrained from pointing out that his diary self wasn't truly a person – just a memory conserved in a book. It would be a bit like throwing bricks while sitting in a glass house. If Riddle wasn't truly a person, then what was he?

*'*'*'*'*'*

Conversing with Tom became an almost nightly ritual over the next days. Riddle took Harry into his memories a few more times, giving him in insight into Hogwarts in the 1940s: dinner in the Great Hall, the teachers and some of their classes, the library. Not much had changed fundamentally, but the atmosphere was different.

Harry couldn't really put his finger on it. It was more quiet, as students were much better behaved, more respectful to teachers and more disciplined. There was no running or shouting in the corridors, and there were no students who had their ties askew or their shirts hanging out of their trousers. But it was altogether less cheerful and more oppressive, which was partly due to a huge rift going through the student body – of those in favour of Grindelwald and those who opposed him – and partly due to what Riddle called 'incidents'.

"What exactly were those incidents that befell some students?" Harry wanted to know. He had always wondered what could have caused such terror back in 1943, as no one had been petrified back then.

"One student was found wandering the corridors one night, completely out of his mind. Nobody knew what had befallen him, but he seemed to have experienced some kind of trauma. He was scared of his own shadow. I think that was what started the rumours that a monster was moving about in the castle. One girl had to be treated for poisoning of some kind, but didn't know what had happened to her. Then, there were two mysterious disappearances. Two Muggleborns were simply gone from one day to the next, with only a few weeks between their disappearances. Some assumed that they had left the castle for good, as it wasn't a friendly environment for people who refused to assimilate at the time. Others believed they were killed and eaten by the monster. With the war going on in the Muggle world, it was hard to keep track of people."

"Truly, it doesn't seem like Hogwarts was a nice place back in the forties…" remarked Harry.

"Well, I guess I was lucky to have been sorted and accepted into Slytherin. I finally had people around me whom I had much in common with and who shared many of my interests. Our head of house, Professor Slughorn, always said that the relationships we formed during our Hogwarts years would last for life."

Harry thought sadly that it hadn't helped Riddle much after graduation, but that might have been because the friends he had found had not yet been in any position yet to help him get an apprenticeship.

Riddle asked him how Hogwarts was in Harry's days, if he had made friends and what his interests were. When Harry said Quidditch, Riddle tried his best not to let his disdain show.

"It's okay to hate broom flying," Harry told him with mild amusement. Funny how some things obviously stayed with you even in your reincarnated form. "I have a good friend who hates it, too."

*'*'*'*'*'*'*

Tom didn't like Harry going into the diary. For one, he couldn't follow, and suddenly being left alone in Harry's body was disconcerting. He still couldn't move it, which made him feel trapped and helpless. There was always the irrational fear that Harry might not come back.

What also concerned him was the fact that diving into the diary or merely writing into it clearly exhausted Harry. He had dark rings under his eyes in the mornings, but every evening they had agreed he would not write into the diary, Harry had found one more thing he had to ask Riddle. And when Tom was cross with him because of it, Harry thought he might be jealous or regard Riddle as a kind of competitor for Harry's attention.

"Harry, don't you realize that writing into that diary does something to you? You're spending more and more time with it, and you get totally lost in it. While you're talking to him, it's like I don't even exist anymore. You are so focused that you don't even seem to hear me most of the time. It never happens in any other situation. Don't you find that alarming?"

"You're exaggerating. I haven't spent that much time with it."

"Harry, you write into that diary every damned evening! And you fall asleep every night totally exhausted. It's probably the charms on the book – they probably need energy to keep going, and I think they're taking that energy from you."

Harry had to admit that Tom had a point. He was feeling constantly tired, lately. So to appease Tom, who he didn't at all like quarrelling with, Harry agreed to cut down on the time he spent with the diary. He found that it was hard to follow through with his own promise though. There was always just the one question he hadn't asked yet, one more thing he'd like to see in person, one more tidbit of interesting information he thought Riddle would like to have. And mustn't he be lonely, all alone in that book?

Tom had to spend considerable effort to talk Harry away from the diary, reminding him of his promise.

"You do realize that the compulsion charms are fully working on you, don't you? You sound like you're addicted to that thing! Maybe that's what happened to whoever had it in their hands before: they realized what was happening to them and tried to get rid of it! It's not doing you any good!"

"But this is a source of information! Aren't you interested in learning about yourself? I thought you, above anyone else, must be thrilled!"

"We're actually not learning anything from it! Riddle doesn't really give out a lot of personal information. We don't even know who his friends were or what they were doing in their free time. You, on the other hand, have even told him your real name, although we agreed that you shouldn't!"

Harry felt a bit guilty for that. It had just slipped out one day. But honestly, it was TOM he was speaking to! What harm could it do?"

"We can trust him! He's you!"

"He's a memory of my past life recorded in a diary! And I don't trust him!"

"You don't trust anyone."

"That's because life's teaching me that people go back on their promises all the time – even you, Harry! What's next, will you end up telling him about me, too, although I asked you not to?"

"No!" said Harry, horrified. "I wouldn't do that! I'm sorry about the name. I really hadn't planned to tell him. It was just so weird that he kept calling me James, as if I were my own father."

Tom didn't say anything, but Harry felt his concern, anger and even fear. He didn't want his friend to feel this way, ever. Tom had been there long before the Riddle of the Diary, a constant friend he could chat with anytime, and who felt much more like a real person to him than the memory in the book. So why did it seem so important to him?

It must be the compulsion charm, Harry realized with dismay. He had totally fallen for it.

"You're right," he said to Tom, "about everything. I'm going to lock this into the depths of my trunk and not take it out again. I don't have need of another invisible friend – I already have one and I like him much better anyway." Harry stood up and did just as he had said. Funnily enough, he could already feel the urge to write into the diary lessen as soon as the trunk was closed.

"Thank you!" said Tom with relief.

And that, for a long time, was the last they saw of the diary.

*'*'*'*'*'*'*

February was coming to a close, but the last potion class of the month was a nightmare. Professor Snape had been even stricter and more unforgiving in lessons since Valentine's Day, but when he entered the classroom this day, he was in the worst mood his students had ever seen him. Considering who they were talking about, that was really saying something. He took points left and right, not even distinguishing between Gryffindors and Slytherins. He even took five points off Harry for sneezing. It was ridiculous.

Neville, who had been relatively relaxed in the last months, was thrown back to day one, when their Potions teacher had seemed the most frightful person he had ever encountered. Of course, with him so nervous, mistakes were practically a given, and so the potion was reacting in a strange way when Neville accidentally dropped in too much of the puffer-fish eyes, as his hands were shaking.

Their professor's ire hit them hard. "Go ahead, just explode the potion and kill everyone in this classroom, why don't you? It's not as if anyone gives a damn about other people's lives anyway." Neville blanched when Professor Snape lifted his wand threateningly at them. When all he did was vanish their potion, he sagged with relief, but Harry was annoyed.

"I don't believe the potion would have exploded or killed anyone because of too much puffer-fish," he hissed to Neville, upset with their teacher. "It would have boiled a little and come out a bit too strong. Why did he have to vanish it? Now we'll get a zero on the assignment!"

Neville couldn't care less about their grade. They were still alive, and to him, that was all that mattered.

Harry, on the other hand, gave vent to his frustration as soon as they were out in the hallway after the lesson had thankfully ended. "Just what's eating at him? He's never been a ray of sunshine, but this – seriously, like this, he's a menace!"

Blaise, who had overheard his complaining, came over to them. "I know what's got him so incensed," he said with a lowered voice and the smugness of someone who has a delicious piece of gossip to pass on. "Someone threw a Filibuster firework into someone else's potion this morning. The cauldron exploded spectacularly, and many students got drenched in a swelling solution. He had to dish out antidotes left and right while still in the classroom to make sure no one suffocated. A good thing he keeps a stock of so many potions close at hand."

"The twins?" asked Harry, shocked. That was really a reckless thing to do. Usually, the twins made sure not to go too far with their mischief, and they stayed clear of Snape for good reason.

"No. It was in a first year's class, can you believe it?"

"Who is suicidal in that year?"

Blaise chuckled. "I have no idea. But they're going to wish they were dead when Snape finds out who did it."

*'*'*'*'*'*'*'

Given that Riddle had deprived Harry of much of his sleep, his Quidditch performance had been somewhat lacklustre during the last training sessions. Harry's focus had been on other things. Markus Flint firmly reminded him and his teammates that the Slytherin-Ravenclaw match was scheduled for the upcoming weekend, and that he had updated their training plan. What he meant was that they were supposed to train harder, longer and more often.

When Harry entered his dormitory, freshly showered but exhausted from their last Quidditch drill before the match, he was in for a nasty surprise.

"Before you ask – we have no idea who did it, and it wasn't one of us!" said Theo in way of greeting, stepping away from him warily, just in case Harry didn't believe him.

Harry was going to ask him what he was on about, when his gaze fell on his corner of the room. Next to his bed, scattered all over the floor, lay his all of his possessions – as if someone had been searching the drawers of his bedside table and the top layer of his trunk in haste and hadn't cared about making a total mess of everything.

He found an even greater mess deep inside the trunk. It didn't take him long to find out what was missing. It was the first thing he looked for, unsuccessfully. The diary was gone. Who would steal an empty diary, and why? Sure, Draco knew about it, but he also knew it was empty. Besides, Draco had been at Quidditch practice with him and was still in the shower. And though he could have set Vince and Greg on it, Harry doubted that any of them had anything to do with it. Besides, they would have had all the time in the world considering how long practice had lasted. There would have been no need to make such a mess of things.

At a loss, Harry climbed out of his trunk again. "Nothing's missing but an empty planner," he announced to those waiting for the result of his inventory. He made it sound like it was no big thing, but in truth, Harry and Tom felt the loss.

"An empty planner?" asked Blaise.

"The one Draco thought was my diary. But there was nothing in it."

"Then why would someone steal it?"

"Well, the person who stole it probably didn't know that it was empty, but was hoping to find some blackmail material in it. Or confessions, like me being the heir."

Blaise gave him a strange look. "But you're not the heir."

Harry shrugged and began picking up his things.

"And am I the only one who's concerned about how the person got the password to our common room?" asked Theo.

"How do you know it wasn't someone from Slytherin?" Blaise asked back.

"He has a point there," said Tom. "Only I don't believe it. I bet it was the previous owner of the diary."

"Who might well be a Slytherin. It's quite possible that Riddle had children – a girl who then married, went by another name and passed the diary on to a son or daughter."

"But why wouldn't they simply have asked you to return it to them?"

"For the same reason we were reluctant to tell anybody the truth about it. It felt like an item adults wouldn't want us to have. There were some weird charms on it that made you feel protective and a bit possessive about it."

"And they were afraid we wouldn't return it or would tell Professor Snape about it if we were forced to give it back," Tom agreed.

Theo was convinced that no Slytherin would do such a thing – steal from a house member, and execute the theft so poorly. It had to have been someone from outside.

"It doesn't really matter," Harry replied to Blaise and Theo. "Whoever stole it for secret information about me is going to be disappointed. I'll just clean up this mess and get ready for dinner."