Months had passed at Hogwarts before I realised I had met Gellert Grindelwald that day, and how he believed I'd be better off at Durmstrang, where the Dark Arts are at least partially taught.
That he guessed from my age how Dumbledore would soon inform me of what I was capable of.
And how he was indeed right about all of it – the following day I had to welcome my first and last visitor in the orphanage …

Vivian, for her part, was unmistakably a witch. One with powerful contacts to the underworld – so where else would I be drawn to, then as much as now, feeling at least as dead as Morfin and knowing of my mother's sins? Far away from Harper, from everything I ever cared about …

I end up back where life pulsates, years later, even as I'm numb to it all – Old Compton Street, as the most prominent centre of extravagant London.

Jim's establishment was well known throughout the capital at the time, even if it stoically maintained the facade of a sports bar in the eyes of institutional authorities.
And after everything Jim had seen, done and experienced himself, he was one of the few people on earth who would never find me scary.

The first time I came in out of sheer curiosity, Vivian's magic was like energy in the air. Like the only living thing in my world, it called to me until eventually Hogwarts, a place even more so charged, found me.

Jim and Vivian never asked questions. They just let me read books at the counter while the hedonists, the desperate, the nearly destitute and quite possibly local heroes went readily upstairs behind the counter to reach the upper floors.

In retrospect, the pub was probably indeed not ideal for a child, but – even if Mrs Cole would strongly disagree – certainly no worse than the sterile orphanage either.

And as if nothing had changed over all these years, old Jim's still standing behind the counter, calculating in his books. At least until he notices me.

"Impossible …" He lets his glasses slide down on his nose a bit, then he beams. "Damn it, Tom, is that you? Bloody hell, you've grown up!"

The wrinkles on his face are much more noticeable, but he's still radiating that same old, rough warmth. He's certainly murdered people, tricked many a victim out of lots of money, he surely cheated on his wife countless times, but I can't help but see him as a networking, big-thinking Oscar Wilde novelist.

I sit down at the counter as though I was eleven years old again, then I wanly nod at him.

"How are you, Jim?"

"How I am he ever so casually asks …" he chuckles to himself and proceeds to give me a hard pat on the back. "Last time you were here was … how many years ago? You were a child! And now you're all grown up asking me how I am …"

"It's been about six years," I say. "You look older."

"You too, my boy," he assures me. "But you still seem as hungry for change as back then."

"Orphans are always hungry, you know that."

"But you're not a kid anymore, Tom," he states, putting a dull glass in front of me. "So let's have a toast to this unexpected reunion!"

"That early in the day?"

He grins. "Who knows if we'll live to see the evening!"

"Fair enough," I murmur as he's already pouring us a drink. "Here's to you then, Jim!"

It's not exactly cheap whiskey, and heaven knows I can make good use of it right now.

"How have you been?" I ask as I put the glass back down.

"Over the years, many girls came here," he tells me. "Completely desperate, a huge disaster … About half of all complaints about the ladies of the town come from the landlords themselves, can you believe that? So they could get an official reprimand from the administrative authorities and had an excuse to evict them and then find other tenants willing to pay even higher prices! Usury is what it is, and to play with the dependency of others like that … No way!"

"Good thing you've always been such an emphatic landlord in contrast …"

"Don't get smart with me, kid," Jim chortles, "I've always been fair to my doves."

"Always thought so, yes … And how's the war been for you?"

"None of my nephews are alive anymore," Jim sighs, "It's a downright shame …"

"My condolences."

"Well, thank you," he groans, forcing a smile. "Life is hard sometimes."

"Indeed." I look up at him. "Was it hard for Vivian, too? Is she still around?"

"Yeah, so you can ask her that yourself – I'm sure she'll be here in a minute …"

"And Gini and Faye?"

"Faye – our Shirley – is no longer with us, Tom, I'm sorry." He glances down for a moment, then says, "The war, all these fates … it didn't do her soul any good. I'm sure you remember how she would take everything to heart."

"I do …" I slowly nod and pour us another shot. "To Faye then."

"To Faye!" He smiles as our glasses clink together. "May she rest in Peace."

"Sometimes destiny affects the wrong people."

"Sometimes it does not," he retorts. "In her case it did. But … sometimes it doesn't."

I smirk, yet it makes me wonder. Is it normal to think like that after all? Is it normal that I feel no remorse after killing my uncle?

"She talked about you a lot, you know." Jim brings me back to him as he leans on the counter. "Asked about you every now and then. She always said she saw the same sadness in your eyes that haunted her, too."

I give him a weary glance.

"Yeah, yeah, it's true," he says, waving it off. "She always seemed so brave and strong, but actually deep down she was still that sad girl who lost her parents far too early. You two had that in common. The loneliness." He pauses. "She was very fond of you, Tommy. She often wondered what became of you. Suddenly you never came back …"

"I know." I stare at my glass, then back at him. "Things have … changed a lot."

"Have they now." He takes up his towel to polish a couple of glasses. "Because of that professor?"

"Am I seeing right? Tom Riddle?"

Hearing Vivian's voice after so many years is nicer than I could have imagined.

I turn to the stairs and already see her rushing over to me, Gini close behind. The long nights reveal themselves in Vivian's features, and yet she is as elegant as ever.
Gini, on the other hand, doesn't look a day older. However more battered …

"Oh, Tom – look at you, handsome!" Vivian says like a proud mother right when she and Gini join Jim and me at the bar.

As if no time had ever passed …

"It took you six years to find your way back here?" She puts her hands on her hips. "Are you not ashamed? Where have you been?"

"You, of all souls in London, probably know best," I reply, giving her a vague smile. "You knew a lot then. And it was certainly not just a dream that the both of you had quite an infamous guest here."

They swallow, one more caught than the other, and a certain tension is suddenly palpable.

"This used to be the most famous establishment in the underworld, Tom," Vivian tries to stall. "Notorious people went in and out here, and that should've been obvious to you even when you were eleven."

"You know what always made me find my way here. Then as now."

"Well, sure," she sighs, "in a bleak world, traces of magic can be like light for other gifted people." At once I stare at her in disbelief, but she quickly explains, "Jim is a Squib, Gini a Maledictus – no need to be coy …"

They both nod as if they were to confirm it.

"Alright, then … let's not be," I decide. "You knew what I was. You knew where I was going."

"It was obvious to anyone who'd seen magic," Vivian says. "You had a lot of it surrounding you. You'd probably have needed a magical person in your life much sooner, Tom, you were well on your way of becoming an Obscurial. Gini knew one once – isn't nice. You're quite certainly an excellent student, aren't you? What house are you in?"

"Slytherin," Gini answers for me. "Of course you're in Slytherin."

I can't help but smirk.

"Does it show on my face?"

"Merlin, no way!" Vivian gasps, taking me by the shoulders in a strange urgency. "How's that possible?"

I glance at Gini in confusion, but she merely smiles. "He's always understood me," she quietly says, "but obviously, sometimes, he still doesn't realise when he switches languages."

"A Parselmouth?" Vivian seems literally taken aback. "Impossible, Nagini, please don't be ridiculous –"

Gini mumbles, "I hate when you call me that."

"Wait, that's your actual name?" I blink a couple of times. "I always thought it was Gina …"

Nagini grins, Vivian's eyes still almost fall out of her head and Jim keeps on cleaning glasses, unfazed as ever.

"I've been Nagini for far too long in my life," she soon explains, quite lost in thought, "the cursed attraction, the transformation artist … I wanted to start over."

"Stop it," Vivian whines, "it's making me shiver!"

Nagini laughs to herself and explains, "She's afraid of snakes. I'm never allowed to transform around her."

"Being a Maledictus, though, you won't have a choice at some point, will you?"

"I know." And I can see the lethargy in her face. Despite of it, she looks up. "But now you're here again. At least I'll still be able to talk to you then."

"You'd have taken me in back then, just before the war," I reply, "I won't forget that, Nagini."

"If you're so eager to chat," Vivian groans, turning around with her arms crossed over her chest, "I'll just look away for a moment …"

"Would you like to see it?" Nagini asks. "How I transform?"

I nod. "Does it hurt?"

"Like hell," she replies, "but you get used to it."

She takes a deep breath, then she wraps her arms around her shoulders and puts her head so far back on her neck that I briefly fear she'll break her spine – but she's already transforming in her movement, into a huge, dark snake, almost four meters in length and with a body diameter larger than Jim's thighs.

Vivian whimpers and closes her eyes in utmost concentration, Jim grumbles, "I'll never quite get used to that …"

And I stare at Nagini as if I've never seen anything that made more sense. She rears back in all her elegance and snarls, exposing her sharp fangs.

"Unbelievable," I whisper, moving towards her until she wraps herself around my body and neck. "You could break my bones with one moment of pressure, or just kill me with a poisonous bite."

"Not you," she hisses.

"You're not a snake the world knows. Not just a python, not just a boa constrictor – what are you?"

"Possible death in all its forms," she whispers, "just like you, Tom Riddle."

She heads for Jim – awkwardly he strokes her head – then he says, "Oh Gini, I would've killed that damned Circus guy Skender myself for you, after all your stories."

"You were in a circus?" I ask her.

"For far too long. That's where I learned to hate …"

She disappears behind the counter, and when she gets back up in her human form – and fully clothed, because magic is handy – she says, "Viv, you can open your eyes again."

"Why, thank you," the replies, smiling apologetically at Nagini. "It's nothing personal, you know – I don't like spiders either …"

"Since we're already revealing our darkest little secrets, me as a Parsel tongue, Nagini as a Maledictus, Vivian as an … arachnophobe – what was it exactly that you had to do with Grindel-"

"Don't!" Nagini looks at me with wide eyes. "Don't say his name, Tom, you'll call him …"

Vivian nods. "The name's Taboo. Just call him the Dark Lord."

"Come again?" I look at her in amused irritation. "The Dark Lord? Are you being serious?"