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Libatius Borage described Living Death as a powerful enchantment in which the affected would descend into a state of suspended animation, no longer reliant on the necessities of life—air, water, sustenance—and yet at the same time, be unable to perish. In a potion brewed with ingredients of the highest calibre and efficacy, the Draught of the Living Death would halt ageing, and as long as the body of the affected was kept safe and secure, grant a form of immortality.
Borage's last footnote warned readers that brewing the potion for self-consumption would produce an 'eternity without attainment, and a life without living'.
Tom thought Living Death was an accurate synopsis of his summers outside Hogwarts.
That summer, he'd made arrangements to stay in Diagon Alley, funded by his writing job and the profit that came of selling Acromantula venom to some shady patrons at The Hog's Head—which was less than he'd wanted, as the price had been bartered down after his buyers had found out that the 'donor specimen' was only a few months old. Nevertheless, during the time he'd spent in the Leaky Cauldron, he had no adults standing over his shoulder telling him when to go to bed or when to get up. And best of all, he had access to magic without the encumbrance of the Trace, and that was a vast improvement to what would have been his regular place of residence: Wool's Orphanage.
Wool's Orphanage was now no longer his place of residence, official or de facto or anything else.
He was still conflicted about it, because he was perfectly aware that the Tom Riddle of years ago would have been exultant about his change of circumstances. For many of the early years of his life, it would have been one of his greatest desires: freedom from the shackles of poverty and orphanhood, absolved of the stain of illegitimacy; he would never have to walk through the creaking iron gates up to a tiny cell of a room whose far walls he could brush with his fingers if he spread his arms to their fullest extent.
The Tom Riddle of years past spent his days with his nose pressed against the grimy, painted-shut window of his third floor bedroom, watching motorcars rumble their way through the maze of London's streets. That Tom dreamt of his eighteenth birthday, of unlimited independence and future glory, vivid images of his What-Will-Be painted behind his eyelids in gold leaf and Tyrian purple.
That Tom had only known himself to be different, and called himself Special.
But the Tom of the Here-and-Now was not just Special, but magical. He had not slept on his orphanage room's thin mattress on its narrow iron bedstead since the age of twelve. No longer did he care about poverty, for its official definition (those who survived off less than a hundred pounds sterling per year) had no bearing on his current life, when everything he saw in the shop windows of Tottenham Court Road could be his with the application of the right spell.
This Tom could buy anything he wanted, even if he didn't know the right spell, because he had a doting old granny who thought that money could buy his compliance, and a lot of money could buy his affection.
The Riddles.
Their very mention set him on edge.
Once he had had the time to speak to them and see them and know them, and now that he was away from them until Christmas, he felt qualified to make his judgement on them.
His judgement: he hated the Riddles. It didn't matter who they were, or that they weren't his parents by blood, or that he hadn't even met his real father and would never meet the fortune-hunting village tart who had whelped him in a London orphanage. The idea of them was enough. He hated the abstract idea of their very existence, and the part of him that had once stopped to listen to the street corner Socialist agitators hated them for what they stood for. In reality, disassociated from sentiment, Thomas and Mary Riddle were nothing but a pair of inconsequential Muggles. Just like Mrs. Cole had been, legal guardians or no. But despite how carefully he maintained his indifference around them, nothing could change the fact that they shared his name—or that he shared theirs.
His family...
Those two words rang discordant across his thoughts whenever he remembered them, brought to mind whenever he overheard the drawling articulation of their speech in the echo of a passing conversation, or witnessed their mannerisms reflected in the tilt of a head or the insouciant gesture of a hand on the other end of the House dining table.
He hated them for what they were, in equal proportion to what they weren't. He resented the things they gave him, because their generosity was inseparable from their selfishness, and when they offered him their wealth, it was not so much a guarantee of independence as it was a reminder of obligation.
He saw the metaphorical aspects of the Living Death reflected in his summer holidays. He had been given a glimpse of a life that was his entitlement by right of name and birth, served up on a silver platter... but consuming it was the slow and leisurely death of dignity, doled out on a silver spoon.
The literal aspects of the Living Death, however, applied quite well to the Acromantula's relatively uneventful summer.
On the last day before the holidays, Tom had cast an Imperio on the spider, before he'd forced it to ingest the Draught from a bowl. When it had gone still, he'd stuffed it into its trunk and secured the lid with a number of locking and anti-intruder charms.
When he'd finished with his Prefect duties after the Welcoming Feast, a tin full of leftovers in his bookbag, he had gone straight for the abandoned classroom in the depths of the dungeons, his wand already moving to unlock the door and light the sconces.
The lid of the trunk creaked open and nestled within, safe and sound, was the Acromantula.
Tom took a moment to appreciate the sight. His Draught of the Living Death—N.E.W.T. textbook standard, perfect in colour, sheen, and viscosity to Borage's description—had worked as expected. The Acromantula, as now revealed, was still a juvenile, not having aged in the ten weeks of summer holiday; its limbs were pliable, the joints flexing when he prodded them with the end of his wand. If the potion failed and the spider had died while locked in the trunk, the limbs would have gone stiff, curled up under the thorax in rigor mortis.
The antidote took twenty minutes to produce an effect, and while he waited, Tom enlarged the trunk and reinforced the layers of locking charms. If he'd enchanted the trunk, the permanent charmwork would render it unnecessary to check the spells every time he visited. But enchantment was a magical discipline that Tom had never thought worth the effort for the effect it produced; he'd rather learn a number of Stinging Hexes to keep the spider in line than create an unbreakable container. Besides, once an enchantment was laid, he'd no longer be able to alter the size of the trunk without de-stabilising the runework and having to go through the trouble enchanting it again.
Enchanting was Hermione's personal interest, he'd observed during the summer. She had the patience to actually enjoy what he found a chore, a time-consuming task that would have him consulting multiple reference tables scattered through half a dozen textbooks to determine the most "resonant" places to carve runes, with respect to the sympathetic alignments to the time of year, and the natural properties of the wood from which the trunk had been built. Hermione had spent days dithering over enchanting her family motorcar's fuel tank, its "rounded corners!" upsetting her calculations when she'd gotten around to unbolting a few panels and seen the motor's interior with her own eyes.
He'd humoured her, proofreading her Arithmancy work while she edited the rough drafts of his articles, but he couldn't understand her hobby himself. There was no market in enchanted Muggle motorcars, as most adult wizards could Apparate and all of them could operate a Floo. There was no novelty value to it either, since any wealthy wizard with the money and time to collect trinkets would be dismissive toward most Muggle nonsense—with the exceptions of Muggle fine art and Muggle alcohol, which shared enough pre-Statute tradition with the wizarding world to make them universally understood and enjoyed.
He found his own areas of interest to be of more practical value than Hermione's, and he was proved right when the Acromantula began stirring in its trunk, hairy joints raking against the interior in an arrhythmic chorus of muted scrapes.
"I'm hungry," it said. Its voice had deepened as it had grown, still retaining a reedy, whistling quality—but now it had a greater resonance and peculiar echoing timbre, each word it spoke issuing from deep within the chitinous shell of its exoskeleton.
The Imperius he'd cast before the holidays, when he'd forced the spider to drink from the bowl of potion, had faded during his weeks away. That was interesting to know, as the Auror handbook had said that the Imperius was the longest lasting of the three Unforgivables, not requiring line of sight like the Killing Curse or sustained concentration like the Cruciatus. The commands set by the caster of the Imperius would remain in effect once the subject left their presence, but it appeared that regular reinforcement was required over the long term to maintain the spell.
Tom brought out a box of leftovers from the feast: slices from a side of mutton, roast pork, carved chicken, and a handful of baked chipolatas, still warm and shiny with grease.
He Summoned the spider's regular food bowl, cleaned out the dust with his dependable Super Steamer spell, then dumped the food in. He floated it over to the spider, which had used its hooked claws to drag its ponderous front half out of the ragged-looking trunk.
It made Tom wonder if the trunk had been Hagrid's, and if so, what Hagrid had used to carry his things home for the summer. The replacement trunk he'd Transfigured had been a quick job, and would eventually have reverted to being a dustpan after a few weeks or so. That must have come as a surprise to the oaf, though Tom didn't feel sorry about it; when he was in Third Year, he would have been able to perform and reverse such a Transfiguration without breaking a sweat.
The spider slurped its meal while Tom watched, his wand held loosely between his fingers.
How thin the line was between Beast and Being, and how arbitrary and yet immutable.
(Had Tom been more soft-headed or philosophical, he would have contemplated the line between Man and Beast. But he wasn't one for reflecting on the allegorical potential, as he already knew the answer: Man was not Beast. He was as certain about it as he was about the fact that Magic was Might, and those that had it were superior to those that didn't.)
He'd seen Merfolk from his dorm room window, cutting leaves from the kelp beds that littered the floor of the Black Lake. They sang to each other, brushed one another's hair, netted fish and gathered shellfish, without a single care for the lives and problems of wizards. In the early mornings when he attended practical lessons for Care of Magical Creatures, he sometimes glimpsed centaurs at the edge of the Forbidden Forest. They were lighter on their feet—or hooves—than one would expect, and left distinctive footprints in the snow around the greenhouses and the groundskeeper's cottage.
They were classed as Beings by the Ministry of Magic, and the Department of Magical Creatures had an official liaison office with an appointed wizard representative. Wizards didn't respect non-human creatures, not even the ones that had human faces and spoke human languages. But they did respect civilisation, or at least the trappings of it that came in the form of mercantilism, as evidenced by the various goblin treaties that Professor Binns did so like to drone on about. Wizard liaisons were more often tasked to exchange magical trinkets for rare plant cuttings and animal parts, than actually uphold non-human legal rights to the Wizengamot.
It was funny—and convenient—how none of that, as limited as it was, applied to Acromantulas. They fell squarely into the 'Beasts' category, with no one endorsing their re-classification anytime soon. Perhaps it was due to their lack of thumbs. Everything else in the 'Beings' category had thumbs.
Or maybe it was the clicking, finger-long mandibles that leaked a flesh-disintegrating venom.
The spider looked up from its bowl of liquid meat. "The stones that were warm before my hibernation are now growing cool."
"Yes," said Tom.
"How long was I asleep?"
"Ten weeks, give or take a few days."
Its hairy limbs twitched in agitation. "Hagrid brought me outside two times before I grew too big for his pocket. I wish to see the sky again."
"No," said Tom.
"I will be obedient." It emitted a high, keening hiss, claws scratching against the flagstone floor. "I will return to the box afterwards. Just let me see the sky once more."
"That's still a 'No'," Tom repeated, lifting his wand up. "If you've finished eating, get back into the box."
The spider twitched its forelegs, picking up its head so the points of its mandibles faced Tom, oozing with venom.
"You are fearful," it said, black eyes fixed on him. "I can sense it. What is it? What makes you shy away, Master?"
Tom's eyes narrowed; he tapped his wand impatiently against his thigh. "I'm not afraid."
"I sense..." said the spider, voice rising an octave in its eagerness, "that you deny me in fear of being snared by a greater menace. Is it true, Master? Does Master have a master of his own?"
"No," Tom replied, who was growing tired of the stupid spider's antics. Did it think it could manipulate him? "Dinner's over; time for bed."
"Who is it?" the spider continued heedlessly. "Hagrid spoke of a man who invited him to learn, and paid for his wand and his shell coverings. He called him 'A Great Man'. Ah, I feel it! Your blood grows warm beneath your flesh; you recognise the name—"
"I might," said Tom, raising his wand. "But Hagrid lied to you: he isn't very great at all."
"He is, he is!" it chirped. "One day he will come for me, I know it! And then he will come for you!"
"Deripiendo!"
Tom had never cast this particular spell on an animate object. Beyond its Healing applications, he'd discovered that the Debridement Spell could pare vegetables and cut the crusts off bread, because for some inexplicable reason, there existed some people who thought that crusts had a different, worse, taste compared to the rest of the loaf.
He had no idea what would happen when the spell was cast on something that didn't have any skin, but he wasn't surprised to see a long, peeling strip of exoskeleton sheared off one of the spider's legs, which was followed by a dribble of clear, blue-tinted liquid.
The leg went limp; the spider listed to the side like a ship in rough water.
He quickly shot a Body-Bind at the spider, and when it had gone still, he rammed through to its inner mind, rifling through a succession of dark, blurry images of the inside of the storage cupboard; the array of images was soon followed by the very unsettling sensation of being caressed by large, hairy-knuckled hands, filling Tom with the urge to vomit. He pushed those memories aside and re-doubled his concentration.
An animal's imprint memory was part physiological, so an Obliviation spell that exclusively targeted the mind would never be of perfect effectiveness. He couldn't wipe out the spider's earliest memories of Hagrid, not unless he physically attacked the brain, which he was reluctant to do: a single mistake could blind the spider or cripple one or more of its legs, or damage it to the point that it lost its sentient mind—and then it would be no better than a regular spider.
So, bearing down with the force of his mind, his wand gripped tightly in his right hand, he rummaged through the spider's memories, detaching sensation from association from recollection, shattering the links between the visual and the tactile, the connection of each image to its sensory echo. From there, he proceeded to attach impressions of Hagrid's face and clumsy hands to the darkness of the closed trunk, the loud slam of its lid, the blast of red light from the tip of a wand, the nerve-searing pain and writhing convulsions on a cold stone floor.
He tore the spider's memories apart, isolating scenes from their context; he then spliced them together out of their original order, muting the sensory impressions of some scenes and exaggerating them in others. Like mental celluloid these memories were, so conveniently arranged in a chronological sequence, laid out from the first rupture formed on the surface of its egg, all the way to the present point in time. Tom knew just where to start his re-organisation, which memories to excise, and the ones he deemed the least important he left unattached, strewn loose on the cutting room floor of the spider's mind.
This level of organisation was what separated this sentient creature from the simple minds of Peanut or Old Ab's milch goats.
It was much easier to break the memories into pieces than to put them back together, Tom found, a bead of sweat trickling down his hairline and soaking into his collar. He had done this before, a few times, minor memory alterations to see if he could, and how the spider would react to it, but he'd never had a reason to go this far until tonight. He discovered that not all memories fit together well, and those that were too incompatible had a tendency to drift apart when he turned his attention away to focus on another section. He also saw that minds, especially those of a juvenile creature like this, possessed some measure of natural resilience and could heal themselves over time; the few memories of Hagrid he had altered back in the early days of spring must have re-formed in the passing months, as the spider grew in size and its intelligence grew with it.
His necktie felt too tight, suffocating, but he ignored it and kept his hand on his wand and his eyes fixed on the spider's eyes until the job was done and the trunk was locked for the night.
'A great man'. How absurd a declaration.
He expected that once the spider regained its faculties of speech, it would never say such a thing again.
When Tom returned to the Slytherin living quarters, it was with a dull throb of a headache building pressure within his skull. The hour was late, and the sofas around the fireplaces were empty apart from a handful of upper year students putting the last touches to their summer homework. The boys in his year were in the process of getting ready for bed, their pyjamas and sleeping robes laid out over their beds, along with a messy scatter of loose socks, extra neckties, monogrammed handkerchiefs.
Tom's own trunk lay at the end of his bed, his dorm mates giving it a wide berth due to the anti-theft jinxes he had a habit of applying to all his belongings. Their avoidance was also due to his trunk looking significantly more impressive this year. It was a new one, bought by his grandmother—his fingers itched for his wand whenever he thought about their family connection—a sturdy construction of wood and tacked leather with polished brass bands and hinges. It had his initials tooled into the leather surface and foiled in gold, an ostentatious feature which did little to improve the overall aesthetics, or so Tom thought. All the other boys in his year had their luggage done this way, so it was difficult to discern the owner of each trunk, unless one put in the effort to learn each person's first, middle, and last name... and Tom hardly saw the value in that.
Travers greeted him at the door with a mumbled, "Riddle", and the rest acknowledged his presence with a polite nod, except for Nott, who had turned around to pour himself a glass of water from the ewer on his nightstand.
Tom ignored the unspoken snub and jabbed his wand at his trunk, snapping open the latches and raising the lid. Wordlessly, he levitated the various bits of his school uniform out of the trunk, slicing off the string and paper wrappings in which Thomas Riddle's Savile Row tailor had packaged his shirts. A non-verbal spell steamed the wrinkles out, then sent them flying into his wardrobe, followed by his socks, underclothes, and ties into the lower drawers of his bureau. Non-verbal magic was considered N.E.W.T. level by the school textbooks, and the fluency with which he levitated multiple objects, without any of them going off track and flopping to the floor, showed a level of control similar to that of a qualified adult wizard with years of training.
It was amusing how easy it was to impress others with such simple household magic, especially his dorm mates, who had no idea how simple it really was, because their mothers or servants cleaned their bedrooms for them. It wasn't so amusing to remember that he himself had been impressed by Dumbledore performing this same spell with a tea tray back in First Year—but then again, once he examined those memories of First Year again, he was displeased to remember that his eleven-year-old self had been a nearsighted boy who was far from truly comprehending the value of having a Foil of his very own.
A Foil.
His Foil.
There were many things he hated about the end of the Hogwarts term and the beginning of each summer, when he was forced out of the wizarding world to mingle with Muggles. But spending time with Hermione was not one of them, and this year had been an uncommonly good one. There had been one afternoon when he'd invited her to lunch at the Leaky Cauldron, and then she'd come up to see the room he'd hired for the holidays. He'd shown her his collection of glossy, animated magazines with his pseudonym credited on the front covers—the name she'd given him—and they'd read the articles together on the bed, laughing at the asinine questions he'd answered in his reader advice column. She'd spent the next few hours helping him pen responses to his fan mail, and when she left for home, his pillows were left smelling of her hair.
A glorious summer indeed.
It almost made up for the annoyance that was his 'family'.
"So..." ventured Rosier, buttoning up his nightshirt, "did everyone have a good summer?"
"No," grunted Travers. "Worked as a Junior Dispatch Clerk every day of the hols, now I'm knackered. 'Night, fellas." He slipped into his bed and yanked the curtains shut.
"I got my new broom. Comet One-Eighty, with professional-grade braking charms," Lestrange said. "Mother was happy about my O.W.L.s, so thanks for that, Riddle."
"And you, Riddle?" asked Rosier. "You look more... chipper than usual."
Nott stifled a snort from the bed next to Tom's, but when Tom shot him a sharp look, he just turned away and shut his four-poster drapes.
"I got eleven Outstandings, as everyone knows," said Tom.
The boys murmured their congratulations.
"But is that all?" Rosier inquired. "You always get Outstandings, and they never make you smile like that."
Tom's expression hardened. "I wasn't smiling."
"Alright," said Rosier warily, glancing at Lestrange, then Avery, neither of whom seemed eager to proffer a comment in support or contradiction. Rosier's throat bobbed, then he gave a sheepish cough. "Of course you weren't."
The other boys fell silent while Tom gathered his pyjamas and headed for the bathroom to wash up and brush his teeth, and when he went to close the door behind him, Rosier had already changed the subject to an analysis on the current state of the Slytherin House Quidditch team, now that Abraxas Malfoy had been chosen as its Captain.
Tom wondered if he had been smiling. There weren't many things in his life that consistently brought him to high spirits.
Confirmation of his power or influence was one of them, shown in the deference given him by the other Slytherins, or the adulation in each and every bit of fan mail he was sent. He had opened up a post box at the owl mail office in Diagon Alley, because there was no way he was going to have owls mobbing him at the breakfast table, hanging around and leaving droppings over the sausage platters until he'd written out a reply to their impatient owners.
Mastering a difficult piece of magic was another, made even better when other people saw proof of this expertise.
Then there was one, which he had trouble fitting into the same category as the others, that was his singular connection with Hermione Granger. She had confirmed that he was different the second time she'd met him; she'd known from the start how Special he was, and unlike every other person within his limited circle of acquaintance back then, that opinion had meant something to him.
If he had been smiling, it was none of the other boys' business why that was. Especially if it had been for the third reason, which was private and personal, and not for the grubby minds of teenage boys who would have misconstrued it for something that it wasn't. They'd have tarnished it with their tawdry speculation—as if it was on equal standing to a crude broomshed rendezvous with a third-cousin-once-removed when Mum and Dad weren't looking—and that was something Tom wouldn't allow. He had never been one for religion, and so he had no difficulty in labelling that special attachment he shared—along with all his thoughts and feelings about her and it—with the word sacred.
Yes, sacred.
The more he thought about it, the more it fit.
He had long ago, when living among the sticky-fingered orphans of Wool's, deemed his own person as sacrosanct. It was only natural that his most prized possessions—his magic, his innate brilliance, his earned accolades, his special bond—be classed as sacred.
It made perfect sense.
After he finished changing into his pyjamas and got into bed, the smile was still there.
.
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The first Saturday of the term, an owl dropped a letter onto Tom's crumpet, smearing butter on one side of the envelope and over the purple wax seal stamped with the Hogwarts crest in relief.
After wiping off his hands, Tom cracked the seal with his butter knife and tipped its contents out onto the breakfast table. Avery and Lestrange, sitting on either side of him, had gone silent upon observing a sheet of parchment covered in swirly handwriting in a matching purple ink, which they recognised as the same writing that had marked up their essays. Professor Dumbledore, for some reason, preferred annotating student essays in purple ink when the other teachers used red.
"You're not in trouble or anything, are you?" asked Lestrange. "Do you need someone to say they saw you in the Common Room yesterday evening?"
Tom picked up the letter and skimmed through Dumbledore's message. "Unnecessary, but I might take you up on that offer another day. It's just an invitation to tea with the Deputy Headmaster."
"Well," said Lestrange, going back to his fried eggs on toast, "you'd have more to talk about than I would. Good luck with that, Riddle."
The letter was forgotten to all but Tom for the rest of the day. Instead of moodily counting down the hours, he found a book and a seat by the Common Room fire; it was an earnest attempt on his account to practice some restraint, and had he been more lacking of control, he could see himself pacing in circles and hexing any student who spoke louder than a low whisper.
After insinuating himself into their confidences from Third Year, and making himself privy to their personal opinions, Tom hadn't been surprised to hear that the majority of Slytherin House held no great fondness for their Transfiguration professor. They respected his skill and power, as his academic awards and numerous publications couldn't go overlooked, but that was the only thing about him that they could respect. The rest of Albus Dumbledore, the public image he presented of himself, was far from impressive: the endless collection of spangled robes and whimsical habits were one thing, the disloyal position he took towards the magical nation of Britain was another. Dumbledore was known for professing support of Muggles, while being neglectful of his support of Magical Britain's safety, shirking all the summons to action that the general public, the newspapers, and the Wizengamot had been sending him for years.
Dumbledore had described himself as 'Just a humble schoolteacher', and therein lay the crux of Slytherin's disapproval: the man, although he ranked as one of the most learned and powerful wizards in the British Isles, was completely lacking in ambition. He remained a schoolteacher, publishing yet another interesting household application of distilled dragon blood in his spare time, while his true magical potential went wasted.
It also didn't help that while Dumbledore was fair on subtracting points from all Houses, whenever he noticed spontaneous performances of good deeds and rewarded them with points, it was usually to the students of Gryffindor.
Inevitably, the hour of the appointment came upon him. Tom made his farewells to his yearmates, then left the Common Room to take the long walk out of the dungeons and up to the Transfiguration corridor on the First Floor.
When he arrived, Dumbledore had a tea tray on his desk, containing a matched set of pot and cups, and a cake stand with a regular assortment of the professor's favourite teatime treats: lemon shortbread, sandwich creams, and jam dodgers.
The lamp on his desk had been activated, emitting a circle of yellow light over a few sheets of paper; as soon as Tom entered the office, Dumbledore turned it off and adjusted his spectacles, pushing the paper to the side to make room for a pair of teacups and matching saucers.
"I'm sure you have surmised why I asked you to tea today, Tom," said Dumbledore, smiling at him from the other side of the desk.
Tom took a seat and returned the smile with one of his own, biting his tongue the whole time.
The papers Dumbledore had been reading were actually made of paper—pulped and processed wood chips—not the magically manufactured wizarding parchment, which was sturdier than Muggle paper, came in long rolls that students cut themselves to fit the essay length requirements assigned by their teachers, and had a semi-translucent quality when held up to direct light.
The size of the paper was another clue to its origins. There was a difference in dimensions between the paper in his lined primary school composition books and stationery paper, which Hermione had used in her correspondence when they were children, made in a size that matched standard postage envelopes. The paper on Dumbledore's desk was of the second sort, covered with well-formed, well-spaced handwriting, with room left on the top for what appeared to be an elaborate letterhead design.
"I couldn't begin to guess," Tom replied. "Has it anything to do with my O.W.L. results? I believe we scored the same number of marks for Charms, or so The Daily Prophet tells me. They say it's quite an accomplishment."
"That is indeed an accomplishment. Madam Marchbanks compliments you on your lively casting—there have been too few students who can take the textbook lessons and turn out a show with that much personal flair. A natural hand at Charms, commendably done; your performance has caught the interest of the Examinations Board." Dumbledore gazed calmly at him from over the frames of his spectacles. "However, I had looked forward to discussing what I consider a success of greater significance. Namely, this delightful letter I received this summer from your grandmother. I must admit that I was rather bewildered at first to have received mail addressed to a 'Professor Albert Dumberton', but after opening it, the surprises just kept coming."
Dumbledore beamed at Tom over the loaded tea tray.
"Pleasant surprises, I hope?" asked Tom, his gaze darting to the papers on Dumbledore's desk, then back to his professor.
"Oh, absolutely wonderful," replied Dumbledore. He began to pour the tea, sending a cup and saucer sliding over to Tom without slopping tea over the edge. The sugar bowl and creamer followed, Dumbledore watching Tom serve himself with a bright twinkle in his eyes.
"We've updated your records, so in future, your school supply lists will be owled to—" he paused to turn over a sheet of paper on his desk, "—Ah, let's see. 'North Corner Room Two, the Riddle House, Hangleton, Yorkshire'. The owls will be instructed to deliver to this room in particular, instead of wherever you happen to be in the house, as most of our Muggleborn students prefer—and as preferred by the Ministry, in adherence to their standards for wizarding secrecy, of course."
Tom gritted his teeth, concealing the movement behind the rim of his teacup. He could read between the lines and discern what Dumbledore really meant. This was no helpful intervention to keep bird droppings off the dining table, or Muggle neighbours wondering why nocturnal animals were swooping around in broad daylight. It was a way to ensure that Tom remained in his room during the holidays, even past the age of legal adulthood, because there would be no other way to get his letter if he left for London or Hogsmeade. No way to get his justly earned Head Boy badge, too.
(Tom was counting on Sluggy to procure the nomination to Head on his behalf; unlike Dumbledore, that man knew the meaning of the word 'helpful'.)
"Thank you, sir."
"Not a problem, Tom!" said Dumbledore, with a genial chuckle. "There is another matter I wished to discuss, with relation to that topic. You must have noticed that your latest school supply list lacked the usual pouch of coins from the Hogwarts Student Relief Fund. I'm afraid that from now on, you'll no longer be eligible to receive this disbursement. That won't be a problem, will it? By the state of your uniform, I assume that you were able to purchase better than second-hand this year, which the Relief Fund sadly limits its recipients to."
He had noticed it. Not on the day of his letter's delivery, but a few days later when he was doing his shopping in Diagon Alley. At the time, it hadn't bothered him as he had more than enough of his own money to buy his supplies, half of which he already owned. He'd gotten the Advanced Defence and Advanced Charms textbooks the previous summer, when he was living at The Hog's Head.
He hadn't noticed that the envelope was lighter than usual when the owl had arrived, because it wasn't—it had contained his O.W.L. results, with an extra card containing the examiners' feedback for each subject that had a practical wandwork component. His, unlike the ones of his dorm mates, had commentary on the back of the cards, detailing the extra points he'd been awarded for performing the spells non-verbally, or with interesting non-textbook variations.
"It's not been an inconvenience," said Tom. "I got everything on the list, and there won't be much to buy next year, since the N.E.W.T. curriculum textbooks are the same for both Sixth and Seventh Year."
"I am glad to hear it," said Dumbledore. "Your family are looking forward to having you for Christmas. How are you settling in with them? The staff every year try our best to make Christmas at Hogwarts a happy occasion for the students who choose to stay, but for all that we try, nothing comes close to spending the holidays with family. I'm overjoyed to see that you have found yours, Tom—family is a precious gift that ought not to be squandered or taken for granted."
Dumbledore gazed mournfully at Tom, and, as if in sympathy, the phoenix perched on the golden stand behind the desk let out a soft croon, like a single, silvery note blown from a flute. For an instant, Tom thought he had burned himself with his tea; his chest and throat felt constricted all of a sudden, too hot, as if he'd swallowed too large a gulp at once. He felt it strongly, but somehow it wasn't painful; it was an internal pins-and-needles sensation that made him vaguely uncomfortable, but not so uncomfortable that he let it show on his face. He wouldn't let it, not with Dumbledore sitting across the table from him.
"Wizards live such extended lives that it's easy to lose track of those who don't," continued Dumbledore. "We so easily forget those who matter most to us—or rather, those who should."
"I suppose I'm still getting used to the idea of having proper guardians," said Tom, trying to finagle his way around telling the entirety of the truth. From the age of eleven, he'd been aware that Dumbledore knew more about mind control and mind magic than he was willing to share, and if Tom at that age could tell when he was being lied to, it only made sense that such an ability was within Dumbledore's reach as well.
"We hardly know each other, and you might say that it's an issue with a simple solution: spend more time with them, since it seems I won't be offered the choice to stay at Hogwarts over the holidays." Tom made an effort to keep any hint of his bitterness about this decision from showing in his voice or demeanour. "But, sir, there are other—incompatible—differences between us that can't be so simply overcome, no matter how often we entertain one another's company. And to be frank, I find it unrealistic to expect people to get along in spite of them."
One of the many enchanted gadgets on the shelf in the back of the office let off a buzzing sound, but Dumbledore paid it no attention. He steepled his hands over his half-drunk tea and asked, "What makes you think that? Am I wrong to assume that these differences are due to their being Muggles?"
"I hope you aren't implying that I hold Muggles as lesser beings because they lack magic, sir," returned Tom, who did not believe that Muggles were equal to wizards, but had ensured that his phrasing had made no assertion of his personal beliefs.
"And do you, Tom?"
"Our differences have less to do with them not having any magic," said Tom. "And more to do with me being a wizard."
"I am afraid I don't understand," Dumbledore said, dipping a piece of shortbread into his tea with one hand, while he stroked his beard thoughtfully with the other. "Could you explain what you mean by that?"
"I know that magic is inherent, and there's nothing I can do about their not being wizards, as much as I can't help being a wizard myself," Tom said. "So the only option I see there is to accept our differences in that regard. But then there are other differences between us that aren't so inherent, residing in personality as opposed to identity. They're ones that can be changed, but no one is particularly eager to do so—and with these, I can't see us getting past them and getting on, not for the long term, at least."
He refrained from saying, But it won't really matter in the end because, as a wizard, I'm likely to outlive them all.
Dumbledore's mouth tilted into a thoughtful frown; he brushed soggy biscuit crumbs off his beard, and when he was done, he said, "It isn't common knowledge, but my mother was Muggleborn, and my father pureblood. They disagreed on things, as all couples do, and one of those things was on the subject of dealing with Muggles; even to their last days together they had reached no resolution on the matter. From this, I can observe that it is not unusual to have differences of opinion amongst individuals, but that is far from saying the people involved are utterly incompatible."
"There are instances where opinions can be incompatible," said Tom, giving an earnest attempt not to stare at Dumbledore's biscuity beard. He knew that beards were a proper wizardly tradition, like long hair and pointy hats, but he had never seen the appeal himself. The modern wizard, as he'd decided to be, shouldn't have to rely on the traditional wizarding uniform to demonstrate that he was powerful. Merlin could have performed the same magical feats in his royal regalia as his nightshirt and slippers.
(Besides that, he found robe sleeves cumbersome during meals. He had learned in First Year how to keep his sleeves out of his food, but not all of his fellow Slytherins had. It quite put him off his dinner when he reached out to ladle himself some scalloped potatoes and saw that some other student's potion-stained sleeve had already been dragged through the communal platter, leaving a forlorn trail of cheesy lumps smeared over the table.)
"I recall being told years ago," Tom went on, "that wizards have no formal religion, but believe in an immortal magical soul of some sort that goes on adventures upon a wizard's death. My family—my Muggle family—are members of the Church of England, and believe in immortality by salvation. Those two beliefs are hardly concurrent. Surely if there's anything that can divide a family beyond repair, it's a matter of this nature."
"I see it as your choice to make an issue of contention of it," said Dumbledore in a maddeningly kind voice. "I support the peaceful co-existence of all beings, including wizards and Muggles, but that is an ideal entirely based on personal initiative."
"Isn't it also one's personal initiative to believe whatever they want?" Tom asked.
"Of course. And it is my own to believe that the love of one's family is beyond price."
"There aren't enough galleons in the world to buy it, sir," spoke Tom confidently, knowing that he would never love Mary Riddle regardless of how many coal-seamed acres she and her husband bequeathed him.
"In that, we are in agreement," said Dumbledore, nodding in approval.
For a minute, they sipped their tea, Dumbledore refreshing his cup from the pot and levitating a biscuit over to his pet bird. With interest, Tom noted how the phoenix had the flexibility of a parrot, able to grip a biscuit with its claws and lift it up to its beak, whereupon it devoured it in a spray of crumbs. Unlike Dumbledore, who used his beard to catch his crumbs, the phoenix had a tray under its stand which was filled with a mix of fragrant wood shavings, bird droppings, and a layer of fine ash that glittered like gold dust. Tom was almost tempted to take some, as phoenix dust was a rare and expensive potions ingredient, but he was put off by the thought of putting his hands in poo, even if it was magical poo.
Returning his cup to his saucer, Dumbledore asked, "Do you still practice meditation, Tom?"
"Every other night before bed, sir," said Tom, lifting an eyebrow in question. "I've found that meditating over the day's lessons is a good way to revise for the next day's."
"And are you able to organise your thoughts?"
"I suppose so, Professor." Tom looked askance at Dumbledore. "If you asked me at this moment to characterise sequential Transfigurations, then determine how suitable it is for a given situation versus, say, modular Transfigurations... I believe I'd be capable of it."
"That is well and good, Tom, but not quite what I was after. If I asked if you could clear your thoughts, would you be capable of that?"
"Clear my thoughts?" Tom cocked his head. "I'm not certain what you mean. Think of nothing?"
"Exactly!"
"I expect I could," said Tom, who had never in his life liked admitting that he couldn't do something—at least, not aloud.
Dumbledore wriggled his bony fingers at Tom. "Go on then, Tom."
"Sir?"
Dumbledore's brows undulated on his forehead like a pair of red furry caterpillars.
Tom took a deep breath and closed his eyes. This was ridiculous, but this was also Dumbledore. Nothing about the infuriating old man had to make any sense to anyone but himself. But there was also something incredibly galling about being incapable of performing an action that Dumbledore spoke of in such unceremonious terms, as if it was a simple and commonplace feat for him. Tom saw himself as no one's lesser, especially not Dumbledore's, so of course he'd try it and see if he could do it too; it definitely hadn't anything to do with wanting to indulge Dumbledore's mysterious objectives.
Clearing my thoughts? How does that work? Tom mused, behind the red-tinged darkness of his closed eyelids. He adjusted his breathing, relaxed his shoulders, and set his hands in his lap, palms up.
It must have something to do with visualisation, he decided. There was a good chance that Dumbledore was going to show him an interesting magical trick, and most things about magic were intuitive to Tom. And he'd known, from his years of experimenting, that visualisation and imagination were essential ingredients in successful magical casting.
A vision of the night sky, aglow with wheeling constellations, formed in the back of his mind—the same glorious sky he'd denied to the tiresome Acromantula locked in the trunk. A million stars, scattered across a void of blue-black velvet, glinting like snowflakes fallen on his winter cloak.
Clear them away. Tom breathed out. Think of nothing.
The snowflakes melted into the black wool. The flickering stars, one by one by one, were snuffed out, leaving behind an empty velvet void. There was a yawning chasm opening up before him; it swallowed him whole and left nothing behind—no flesh, no weight, no senses—not even the sound of his own pulse thrumming through his ears, the quiet whisper of each breath passing through his nostrils, tinged with the aroma of herbal bergamot tea, or the soft gurgle of his stomach digesting the masticated remnants of lemon shortbread.
The chasm widened, growing endlessly wider. It was endless, giving him no sense of dimension, no indication of how far it extended; it was at once a featureless blankness and immeasurably infinite. Neither time nor mass nor distance mattered, nothing mattered, not in this empty space in between thinking and dreaming.
Nothing.
Tom opened his eyes.
"What is this meant to achieve, sir?" he asked.
"It's a practical lesson," said Dumbledore, peering at him intently. "A rather unique educational exercise."
"Is something supposed to happen?"
"Continue as you were, Tom. Try not to lose your concentration."
"Professor?"
Tom waited for Dumbledore to answer, but the man just gazed in his direction, twiddling his thumbs aimlessly, a pleasant smile on his face.
This is a waste of time, thought Tom. I could be doing so many other, more productive things, right now.
It was a Saturday afternoon, early on in the term, when the threat of looming exams had not yet crossed the horizon in the minds of the average student. His yearmates would be outside enjoying the last warm days of autumn. Tom could find better things to do; the N.E.W.T. curriculum wasn't that hard, but the homework had begun to shift away from what he was long accustomed to. What had once been essays that could be written by summarising the textbook had turned into large projects involving the practical demonstration of all the skills and spells taught over the term. Again, not difficult—but terribly time consuming when he had other projects to work on.
He had a half-completed draft of his next article, which he'd tentatively titled, 'Course Correct: Temperature Charms for Perfect Mealtime Service'. It would be accompanied by a set of wand movement diagrams, instructing readers on how to charm their servingware so hot meals were kept hot, with a reversed spell that kept drinks and desserts chilled. He could see it being useful for wealthy witches who wanted their main courses to remain hot even if their guests lingered over the apéritifs, and for the working housewitches who needed dinner ready for hungry husbands returning from their evening shifts.
It was an idea he and Hermione had come up with in his room at the Leaky Cauldron, after she'd remarked on how he still used the enchanted lunchbox she'd gifted him years ago. It had turned into a debate on the merits of enchanting versus spellcasting: enchanting was harder to learn and teach, and this had a significant influence on the number and value of enchanted objects; spellcasting, Tom argued, was more flexible, simpler to teach, and here was the most important part—it had a certain populist appeal. After all, few wizarding families could afford a full set of enchanted dinnerware, and although many families had one or two pieces in the dining room china hutch, they were usually wedding gifts or inherited heirlooms rather than enchanted by hand. However, most wizards could learn to cast a temperature charm on their food and drink.
If he hadn't been invited for tea and tiddlywinks with Dumbledore, he and Hermione would probably be working on spell diagrams, or another one of their class projects. Weekends were their main opportunity to see each other outside of class, now that the summer holidays had ended. He dared to entertain the idea that he missed her; unlike everyone else in their year—everyone else he knew in general—Hermione's presence didn't grate on him after a few hours. He enjoyed collaborating with her on magical projects, and even things that had nothing to do with magic or schoolwork were still enjoyable in her company.
And when she was gone...
During the summer he'd consoled himself, in her absence, with the interesting books and periodicals she'd brought for him, including an article on the proper notation of magical instructional diagrams, or a history on the Roman and Anglo-Saxon occupations of Yorkshire. There was also the reassuring scent of her that remained in his room after she left, a subtle combination of shampoo, bath soap, laundry flakes, and the natural fragrance of her body, which in the summertime was not as nonexistent as he supposed most girls wished it to be, but to him it was far from unappealing.
She'd be mortified if he mentioned it, so he didn't. Nor did he mention that he liked it, that once or twice during the night, he'd pressed his nose to the pillow she'd reclined on during her visit. In doing so, something had pressed rather insistently against the placket of his pyjama pants, and then he had had to press his hand against himself to relieve the pressure; it was a filthy habit whose filthiness his rational mind took no notice of during times like this...
"Tom!" Dumbledore's voice interrupted the meander of his thoughts. "You've lost your concentration."
Tom blinked.
"My apologies, sir," he said automatically—and then his attention returned to the original context of their conversation. His eyes narrowed. "Concentration, Professor? How—how did you know—you knew what I was—"
He cut himself off, feeling heat rise up his neck and bloom across his cheeks.
Dumbledore had been listening to his thoughts.
It was disgusting on both sides—that Dumbledore knew the direction that his thoughts had taken—that Tom had been thinking those thoughts in the first place—that he'd allowed himself to be out-manoeuvred by an interfering old man.
The teacups rattled in their saucers; silver and porcelain tinkled on the tea tray, and behind the desk, the phoenix squawked loudly and buffeted its feathers.
"Tom!"
Tom bit his tongue. The rattling ceased.
"Sir," said Tom, swallowing the words that he'd really wanted to say, "what was that?"
"A basic introduction to Occlumency, of course," Dumbledore answered, giving no sign that he had been disturbed by the display of accidental magic, or by the theme of Tom's personal musings. "Occlumency is an uncommon magical discipline whose function is to allow wizards and witches to fortify their conscious minds and protect the privacy of their thoughts. It is a difficult bit of magic, even to the adult wizard, and requires a consistent, applied focus that few children are capable of. And it was for that very reason, years ago, that I recommended you practice meditative techniques. I came to the decision today that you were ready to be taught. Do you think you're ready, Tom?"
"Yes, sir," said Tom. "I'm ready to learn. But... Sir, you can read minds?"
"I have learned to dabble in this and that over the years," Dumbledore said evasively, before he waved his hands over the tea tray and made it disappear with a Pop! "I believe we have the time to try once or twice more, before I send you off to clean yourself up before dinner. Remember, Tom—clear your thoughts."
For the next half hour, Tom forced his thoughts to remain on the blank, black sky in his mind, noticing that each time he began to drift away to thoughts of other things, it was accompanied by a faint tugging sensation that seeped its way into his consciousness. It was strange—foreign—a pressure so subtle that it wasn't much different from the brief touch of a fly alighting on his skin. His awareness of it was minimal unless he concentrated on following the feeling to its source, in the same way he'd learned to interpret each sensory signal of the Acromantula's tactile 'vision'.
Every time he traced that feeling to wherever it came from, he could feel the growing throb in his temples of an imminent headache, but Tom didn't allow his concentration to waver. Once or twice, he thought he saw Dumbledore showing signs of his own headache, though he spoke not a word on his personal discomfort.
Dumbledore's piercing gaze didn't relent, and to his relief, the professor made no more reprovals for the rest of the session.
(Dumbledore didn't comment on what he'd gleaned from Tom's private thoughts, either. But Tom was still too put out to feel thankful for it.)
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AUTHOR'S NOTE: Quick shout-out to reader sunshine. katz for going through and picking out spelling, grammar, and Briticism errors in the last twenty five chapters. Thanks for your hard work and editing run-through!
Tom's perfectionism and Hermione's pedantry are satisfied by your efforts.