Welcome back to another Tamsyn Chapter. Some of my favorite chapters to write.
On with the show.
Tamsyn Riddle, the last compartment on the left, September 1st.
Staying with the Weasley family was a trial for her, the chaos, the people, being forced to share a room with a silly little girl who would make moon eyes at Harry whenever he was in the room. It was the last one that she hated the most- the girl had her head in the clouds with silly little fantasies flitting about. Something Tamsyn didn't doubt that the real world would shatter as soon as little Ginny left her mother's protective embrace. But whenever Ginny made eyes at HER Harry, something ugly and hungry roared in her chest.
Dark emotions and thoughts were nothing new to Tamsyn- even on her best days, they floated in her mind and her heart; it was only when Harry was around that these dark thoughts and feelings never entered her.
But Ginny making cow eyes pushed her patience like nothing else before, even with Harry around Tamsyn had vivid fantasies of plucking Ginny Weasley's eyes from her skull and crushing them in her hands. To force the pulped remains down her throat, to use her magic to make the silly little girl burn and bleed and scream and cry…
Not even the annoying actions of Fred and George, with their insipid pranks, caused her such distress.
But for everything that she hated about staying with The Weasley family, she didn't… dislike it. It was a true oddity for Tamsyn to stay with a family unit so tightly knitted like the Weasley family coming from a group home that had happily ignored Tamsyn's existence. Molly was the oddest to Tamsyn, she was powerful- dangerously powerful, more so than anyone outside a few Tamsyn had met in her life. But the woman, with all her power, seemed to be quite content with her role as a stay-at-home mother. Molly Weasley seemed to know a charm for nearly anything that needed to be done, from sewing and washing dishes to cooking a roast to perfection and dicing vegetables to the perfect size; it didn't escape Tamsyn's notice that the spells could work on anything with the right amount of power. But Molly seemed to happily hold herself back to play her role as a housewife.
And what was a housewife without her husband? Arthur Weasley, on the outside, seemed to be just another eccentric wizard obsessed with muggles, but if one would ignore his eccentricity and see it as what it truly was, one would see the mad genius that had his beneath it all. His endless questions and curiosity about muggle inventions had lent themselves to his endless tinkering in his shed. He asked questions to understand how things worked so he could tinker and enchant them as best he could. He had shown her the old Ford he had broken down and enchanted in ways that only muggle Syfy literature could come up with. The car could fly, turn invisible, had multiple expansion charms layered over each other but the best thing was that it didn't use petrol fuel. It ran off of pure magic that was pulled from the driver and passengers passively from riding in it, a grown wizard or witch could drive the car for as long as they lived.
It was…a staggering contrast to how some of her fellow Slytherins spoke about the Weasley family. They often spoke of the squalor they lived in due to their financial problems from a gambling forefather from a few generations ago. Even their ancestral seat on the Wizengamot was held in permanent limbo until the family paid back the staggering amount of gold owed to other families. Tamsyn knew it couldn't be as bad as they told her, the blue-bloods that made up her house wouldn't know squalor from the lower middle class that the Weasley family was; the silver spoon permanently stuck in their mouth seemed to have blinded them from what true squalor was.
Tamsyn had…enjoyed staying at the Weasley's, as much as a person like her was able to. There were no morning prayers, fewer chores that had to be done, and a lot more food than what was in the group home- underfunded as it was. There was never enough food to go around, largely relying on donations from the church, and one could only eat so many casseroles until one could stomach it no more. But at the Weasley's, Molly always had a snack to feed the children under her watch and every meal was stacked with food to feed all the hungry mouths at the table. Sure, the Weasleys didn't have the gold to spoil their children, but none went to bed hungry, and that- to Tamsyn, was something worth more than any galleon.
Her stay also held no lack of surprising intelligent and curious conversations. Whether with Arthur and his tinkering or Molly with her wand work, Percy with his studies into the government and foreign affairs, or even Ron with his chess skills.
If it wasn't for Harry, all that smothering love from a family unit wouldn't have driven her insane, but luckily, Harry was always willing to sneak off with her to the orchards for long moments of quiet. Only once did Molly ask where they would get off to and after being told she had checked on them once. It struck Tamsyn as odd that the overprotective woman would allow her and Harry to wander that far from the house without adult supervision with Sirius Black running around, but the woman didn't seem to be worried about it.
Tamsyn was sure Molly had more subtle and magical means of keeping track of them while on the property, but she never asked how in respect for the family's privacy, even if her curiosity burned to know.
Then there was Remus Lupin, the very thought of the man would ignite a flame of pure rage in her heart. He had abandoned Harry to those disgusting Muggles, left him in hands that Tamsyn was sure had hurt him, and had the gaul to show up years later to try and get into Harry's good graces. She wanted to gnash her teeth in rage; she wanted to pull him apart piece by screaming piece; she wanted to see how his organs pooled upon the floor, hot and wet with blood. But sadly, she couldn't; he had ingrained himself with Harry by sharing stories of Lily and James Potter with him, and it sickened her to see. She did all she could to keep them away from one another when he visited the Burrow, bar from directly telling Harry not to talk to the raggedy man. Remus had even come to see Harry off to Hogwarts, pleading with him to be careful and stay within the grounds.
Because, of course, the dark cloud of Sirius Black had to loom over everything they did.
Even here, in her compartment, she could feel it. The whispers of younger children speaking of Black like he was the boogeyman come to life to snatch away any misbehaving children. Some of the older years weighed the possibility of Black showing up at Hogwarts to seek bloody vengeance against the one who had stopped his cousin's carnage and chaos. Tamsyn herself hoped that Black would turn up in the halls of Hogwarts, just so she could kill him herself. She would plea self-defense and she doubted many would care that she had killed him to look much deeper into it. But the brewing dark thoughts were pushed aside when the compartment door rolled open and Harry's smiling face looked back at her.
"Hey, Tamsyn!" Harry says, his smile alone lighting up like the sun and parting the dark clouds from Tamsyn's thoughts. "How's the ride been for you?" He asks as he takes a seat across from her.
Tamsyn smiles back at him. "Quite for the most part, which is a lovely change after the Burrow," she informs him. For a moment guilt flashes in Harry's eye, confusing Tamsyn; she had no idea why Harry would feel guilty about her not liking the Burrow.
"Ah, yeah…" Harry says, his eyes falling from his face to look at the floor.
"What brought you to my compartment?" Tamsyn quickly asks, hoping to distract Harry from whatever guilty thoughts he was having. "Weren't you going to spend most of the ride with the other two?" She asks, Harry had been missing the Mudblood bookworm with her trip to France over the summer and was looking forward to seeing her again.
"Yeah," he says, his voice becoming thick with disappointment. "She started asking questions again…" he says with a small sigh before taking the seat across from her. Tamsyn frowned at Harry's offered excuse, she had always disliked that want-to-know-it-all mudblood. They fell once more into the comfortable silence they were known to share, both had turned to look out the rain-splattered window; enjoying the silent company as the sun began to set beyond the horizon.
It was in moments like these that both Orphans finally thought they belonged…
Until a sudden screech could be heard as the train began to abruptly stop, sending Tamsyn flying out of her seat and sailing across the compartment. An inappropriate scream left Tamsyn's lips as she hurdled toward the other side of the compartment; but in what seemed like a blink of an eye, Harry was there to catch her.
"Tamsyn!" He cries right before she crashes into him, sending them both slamming into the seat behind him. After landing, they stay frozen in a head with arms wrapped around each other as Tamsyn slowly looks up to the shining emerald eyes of Harry. "Are you okay?" He asks softly, causing a blush to creep across her face.
She immediately extracts herself from his arms (though she wanted to stay in them for some reason) and stands before straightening her robes. "Yes, I'm fine," she quickly says before turning away from him. "...thank you," she says softly before the lights in the compartment and all across the train cut off.
"What's going on?" Harry says quickly as Tamsyn hears him stand up. "We can't already be at Hogsmeade, can we?" He asks.
"No," Tamsyn says firmly before looking out for the compartment door in the dark. "There is no way we reached the school by now," she informs Harry as her hand finds the latch on the door and locks it before closing the blinds.
"What are you doing?" Harry asks with a slight panic in his voice as it breaks through the dark.
"I'm locking the door, you need to get down; now," Tamsyn orders him before turning around in the dark, and reaching for him.
"What? Why?" He asks quickly, the panic surging in his voice.
"Harry, think!" She hiss at him as she grabs the front of his robes and begins to pull him down the floor. "There is only one reason the train stopped, and that is if someone stopped it," she points out, only for Harry to freeze.
"Sirius Black," he all but hisses through his teeth. "Tamsyn! Let me go! I need to go-"
"Nowhere!" She all but screams at him. "You need to get down and get behind me, now!" She snaps at him as she tries with all her might to force him to the floor. "He won't touch him! He won't hurt him while I'm still breathing," she fervently thinks to herself.
"What about Ron and Hermione, I need to-" Harry once more tries to convince Tamsyn, but the lady serpent wasn't having it.
"Do nothing!" Tamsyn once again snaps at Harry. "Think Harry! Wherever you are, you are a danger to those around you because of Black! He'll kill everyone one to get to you unless he is killed first," She tells him in a hard voice before finally shoving him to the floor. "Now stay down until we know the coast is clear," she informs him before turning back to the door and pulling out her wand.
"But what about-"
"Harry!" She turns to him with a hiss of frustration and snake tongue. "Harry, I am older and far more powerful than a lot of the fools in the years above me. Besides, I don't have to kill him- just busy him long enough for Professor Slughorn to get here," she quickly tells him before turning back to the door with a hard look in her eyes. While it was true that Professor Slughorn was on the train and would no doubt help, she wasn't playing on letting it get that far. For as soon as she saw the hide or hair of Black, she was going to kill him.
Her breath came out like mist as an unholy chill entered the air, Tamsyn froze at the feeling; watching in confusion as frost and ice began to creep their way across the windows. Screams began to echo down the train as whatever was causing this skulked down the corridor of the train, and before Tamsyn knew it she was shaking for some odd reason.
"Demon child," the head sister hisses in anger at her as she is dragged along the halls of the group home.
Tamsyn's head whips around, looking for the matron in the compartment on the train; her eyes wide with fear.
"He was wrong, Father," the matron demands right outside of her door. "The appraiser was wrong, she is possessed! I know it!" She nearly screams.
Tamsyn blinks before taking a step back from the door, her breathing becoming erratic as she hears the latch of the door coming undone.
Her wrists were burning from the ropes that held her in place. She screamed as she struggled against the hands that grabbed at her ankles pulling the straight to bind her leg so she wouldn't kick. "Stop it! Stop it! I didn't do it! It wasn't me!" She screamed as loud as her nine-year-old lungs could, begging and pleading for them to stop but they didn't as they bound her legs.
She trips and falls backwards, her head striking the wall, she looks over to Harry and in the dark, she can see him shaking as if he was having a fit of some kind. The compartment door slowly sliding open draws her attention as a hooded figure slowly opens the door before sticking its head in and begins to…sniff? As if it was scenting the air.
It loomed over both of them with a tattered black cloak handing off its form, it let out a rattling breath that seemed to choke the light from the rest of the dark. A grey scab-riddled hand pulls from the folds of the dark cloak, it is a slimy, dead-looking thing reaching toward her and Harry. Tamsyn throws herself over Harry's shaking form to protect him as she shuts her eyes tightly as the Latin chants to cast out demons scream in her mind.
There was a crash and a bang as warmth began to return to the cabin with a soft silver light. Tamsyn risks opening her eyes and turning to the entrance to see an awe-inducing sight of a hound, twice as big as any she had ever seen, savaging the creature. It screeches as the hound's fangs sink into its shoulder before shaking its head and throwing it into the door to the other compartment before standing before her and Harry protectively.
"Foul beast," a new voice calls down the corridor, hard and wrathful. "Sirius Black is not on the train, take you and your ilk and leave," the voice says with wroth. Irish Gorse once more wraps around Tamsyn's throat as the shadows cast by the silver light of the hound begin to extend and wrap around everything like stocks of thorns. The cloaked creature bends unnaturally and crawls up the wall and hangs off the ceiling as its cloak bellows and floats as if it was underwater; facing the voice. "Enough of this," Scáthach says in a flat emotionless tone before a spell of crimson red, the color of freshly spelt bloody, strikes the creature.
A horrible screech fills the train, like a cross between an animal dying and a wet gurgle as the creature fell to the floor; writhing in pain as stocks of iron thorns began to stroup from its body. The creature begins to tear out the thorns before finally fleeing through the back exit of the train; screeching into the storm.
With a wave of her wand, Scáthach dismisses the spectral hound before with another flick, all the lights turned back on; only for her to turn and see Tamsyn protecting Harry.
"Miss Riddle," Scáthach greets Tamsyn, her red eyes resting wearily on her wand. "How about we lower the wand, the danger has passed for now," she says calmly as she takes a step toward Tamsyn with her hands raised.
"Harry," Tamsyn mumbles as her wand shakes.
Scáthach blinks as her eyes travel to the second prone form that Tamsyn was protecting. "What happened to him? Did they grab him? Maybe tried to kiss him?" She asks with an emotionless tone but her blood-red eyes are filled with such rage.
Tamsyn slowly lowers her wand, before moving off of Harry. "He-he just started having some kind of- of fit? When that- that thing opened the compartment door," she informs the older woman as Scáthach swoops into the room to kneel next to Harry just as the compartment across the way slides open.
"-Going to find out what is going on-" Hermione snaps at someone in the compartment before turning to look across the way. "HARRY!?" She screams before charging into the cabin that Tamsyn, Scáthach and Harry are in. "What's wrong with him!? What did you do to him!?" The bookworm says as she rounds on Tamsyn a look of horror and blame on her face and in her eyes.
"Me!?" Tamsyn says, her fear edding away to anger as she turns on Hermione. "I haven't done anything to him! I was protecting him!" She snaps right back at Hermione as the two girls begin to glare at each other.
"Hermione. Tamsyn. How about you two-" Ron tries to cut in but is quickly ignored as the two continue as Scáthach moves Harry to one of the benches.
"Don't give me that, I've seen the types of books you read- the ones from the Restricted Section full of dark magic," Hermione says, stepping up to Tamsyn with a glare.
"What I read is none of your concern, you nosy little Mud-" Tamsyn begins to growl back, but is cut off by a single hard word.
"Enough," Scáthach says with a flair of her magic, quickly silencing the two bickering girls. "If you two can't behave, I will have to ask you to leave," she intones as her eyes never leave Harry as she checks him over. "And for your information, Miss Hermione, Mister Potter is suffering from a severe reaction to a Dementor's presence; not from anything Miss Riddle could have done," she supplies as she stands to look back at the gaggle of students at the cabin door.
Hermione takes a step back but keeps glaring at Tamsyn but before either could say anything a groan leaves Harry. "Harry!" Hermione calls out and moves to go sit next to him, but as she does Tamsyn flicks her wand casting the tripping hex and causing the girl to crash to the floor. Tamsyn swiftly makes her way to Harry's side, pointedly ignoring the glare from Hermione and the amused smile from Scáthach to take her seat next to Harry.
"Harry?" Tamsyn says softly, taking one of Harry's hands into hers. "Harry, can you hear me?" She asks.
"Tamsyn…" He says groggily before slowly opening his eyes, where emerald meets dark blue, Tamsyn smiles in relief. "What happened? Were you screaming? Did you slam the door on that…thing?" Harry asks, sounding so very lost.
"No Harry, Professor Árd-Greimne chased it away after you fell unconscious," Tamsyn explains gently as Hermione pushed herself off the ground to stand.
"Huh?" Harry intones before looking past Tamsyn to the compartment full of people, his eyes widening at the sight of Scáthach. "Oh, er- tha- thank you," he murmurs as he avoids looking at the new professor.
Scáthach merely smiles at Harry. "Think nothing of it Harry, my informal position as the defense teacher is the protection of the castle and all who reside in it. I am just a bit disappointed in myself that I didn't arrive in time to chase the Dementor away before you had succumbed to its powers," she tells him, a sorrowful look in her eyes but her smile never wavering.
"Was- was I the only one who passed out?" Harry asks with a shiver.
"A bit too early to tell, but as of right now; yes," Scáthach informs him before tucking her wand away and looking back at Harry, seeing the shame on his face. "None of that now, Harry," she intones, causing Harry to look back at her. "I've known grown men to faint in the presence of a dementor; do not judge yourself unfairly, Harry," she tells him with a soft smile before turning to the rest of the children gathered in the cabin. "Now, with the immediate threat dealt with, I will be returning to the front with Horace. I'll get the trolley to come down the aisle to pass out some chocolate to all the students on my sickle, make sure he eats all of it," she informs everyone but turns to Tamsyn and nods at Harry before leaving them.
Tamsyn turns back to Harry as he sits up, his hand still in hers, his eyes downcast with a forlorn look in his eyes. A look that felt like a twisting knife in Tamsyn's stomach to see on his face.
"Harry?" Tamsyn says softly, ducking her head to try and catch his eyes. "What is it?" She asks.
"I thought… I heard screaming and i-" Harry shakes his head before pulling his hand from Tamsyn's. "Sorry- I just-" he didn't finish what he was going to say before standing up and walking out of the cabin.
"Harry?" Tamsyn calls after him before standing. "Harry, what's the matter?" She asks as he walks over to the last compartment on the right-hand side and shuts the door without another word. "Harry!?" Tamsyn says as she walks toward the closed cabin door before the insipid bloody know it all Mudblood steps in her way. "Move!" Tamsyn all but growls at the girl as she gets nose-to-nose with her.
"No," Hermione says, nearly baring her teeth right back at Tamsyn. "He obviously wants to be left alone, even from you- so do us all a favor and stay away from him," she says in a sharp tone.
Tamsyn takes a deep breath to calm herself. "What is your problem with me?" she asks, quietly, calmly, and respectfully to the annoyance in front of her.
"You give me the creeps," Hermione states flatly as she looks Tamsyn in the eyes with a cold flat look.
"What?" Tamsyn asks, confused on what this annoying little shit was going on about. All Tamsyn wanted to do was cut out the little Mudblood's tongue before shoving it somewhere unpleasant. Hermione's eyes narrow at her.
"Like that," Hermione points out as Ron's eyes flick between the two girls with an unsure look on his face; not knowing who to back. "Every time you look at me like that I get goosebumps, like something isn't right- like you want to hurt me," she revealed as uncrossed her arms and pulled back the sleeves on her robes. Tamsyn looked down and saw the younger girl wasn't lying, goose flesh had coated her arms. "I don't know what's going through that head of yours, but I'm sure it's rather unpleasant; something I would like to keep away from Harry. He has a hard enough life as it is," she states before recrossing her arms.
Tamsyn, however, has had enough of the mouthy little bookworm.
Her wand twitches as she hisses a spell in her ancestor's tongue, the door to the cabin snapping shut behind Hermione. The fear and shock in her eyes was of the sweetest look Tamsyn has ever seen her wear, Hermione's hand shoots for her wand but is stopped as Tamsyn wraps her wand hand around her wrist. With another hiss, she throws up a silencing charm over the cabin before her free hand wraps around Hermione's dainty little throat and slams her against the door.
For the first time in a long time, the mask of the prim and proper girl falls away to reveal the monster that hid underneath…
"Listen to me, you filthy little Mudblood," Tamsyn snarls into the frightened face of Hermione. "Nothing is going to stop me from seeing my Harry. Not you, not that cow eyed little cunt, not anyone. He. Is. Mine," she growls at the scared girl as she keeps her hand firmly in place around her neck, tight enough to send a message but not hard enough to leave a bruise. "If you so far as even hint to Harry about staying away from me, I will know, and when I do find out you'll have… let's call it a happy little accident- well, happy for me, that is," she says with a cruel smile as her eyes shined brightly with the promise the violence and bloodshed.
"I'll- I'll tell-" Hermione gasps out, cut off by Tamsyn.
"Tell? Tell who?" She asks as she pushes herself against Hermione leaning down to whisper into her ear. "No one at Hogwarts would believe you, I'm a model student with perfect grades, I'm a shoe in for prefect next year because I have my head of house wrapped around my little finger- and if you even think about telling Harry, I'll carve out your eyes and your ovaries and switch them," she says before letting out a small giggle and taking a step back from Hermione so the other girl could take in the uncaring face of just who Tamsyn truly was.
Hermione looks at Tamsyn with such fear that it almost makes Tamsyn purr from just the look alone, but then the bookworm's eyes harden in challenge.
"Fine, but we'll see who gets the last laugh," Hermione says, her tone hard and unyielding as Tamsyn flicks her wand and undoes her spell work, and slips back on her mask.
"Oh, I'm sure we will, Hermione," Tamsyn says with a polite grin as Ron slides the door open.
"Everything… okay?" He asks as if he could sense the charge in the atmosphere of the cabin, his eyes narrowing at Tamsyn a bit.
"Of course, Ron. Me and Hermione just had to have a little chat," Tamsyn says with a charming smile. "Why don't you two run along now, check on Ginny and the twins, make sure they're okay," she tells them as Hermione steps out of the cabin, her eyes never leaving Tamsyn.
"I think-" Ron begins to say before Hermione grabs his hand and cuts him off.
"A marvelous idea? I quite agree with you, Ron," Hermione quickly says before turning and dragging Ron with her and flees down the corridor of the train.
Tamsyn stepped into the hall, watching them fly away from her compartment; Ron asked what was wrong as Hermione shot glances over her shoulder at Tamsyn. The Heir of Slytherin just smiles at the fleeing Mudblood before turning back to the last compartment on the right; knocking on the door before opening it.
"Harry?" Tamsyn calls out, in a somber voice as she opens the door. "I know you wanted to be alone, but I'm worried about you," she intones softly before walking into the compartment and closing the door behind her.
Chapter done!
And boy howdy has the mask been dropped in front of Hermione, will this come back to bite Tamsyn? Probably, but no time soon.
A little more of Scáthach in my life is what I need in my life.
But hope y'all enjoyed the new chapter.
Kingsaxcul, out!