A/N: Sorry for the delay in getting this out- I will be posting a second chapter that was due yesterday in a hot minute after I edit it. Work dropped three more unexpected projects on me that took up all my free time and mental capacity (though were honestly good because they mean more coming in to pay for bills). Between that and other stuff going on I haven't had any free time to write (or read, I have like 3 ARCs that are past due for review ugh). My twin toddlers also woke me up at 3 or 4AM every day this week, so when I would normally try and write in the evenings, I was passing out from exhaustion.
"Absolutely not!" Molly and Minerva both said at the same time, and Tom resisted the urge to fully roll his eyes back into his head. Sirius and Remus looked much the same, the argument having gone on for at least five minutes since Minerva and Albus's arrival.
"Harry is the only one to have even destroyed one of these blasted things!" Sirius shot back, "He has more right to go than anyone else!"
"Molly, I want to protect Harry as much as any of us, but Sirius has a point-" Remus said calmly, trying to act as a mediator between Harry's Godfather and the maternal figures in his life.
"He is fifteen," Minerva hissed, "He does not need the weight of these things thrust upon his shoulders. He should never have had to deal with any of this in the first place!"
"I agree, but the weight exists regardless and keeping him in the dark creates more issues than not," Tom shot back, earning an absolutely murderous glare from the woman.
"Can Harry weigh in on the conversation about Harry?" Harry asked, leaning over the bannister from the floor above. He at least seemed to think the entire thing was a riot, a small smirk fighting on the corner of his lips as he watched the exchange. Tom knew Ron, Hermione and perhaps the other Weasleys were likely tucked up past him on the stairs just out of sight, also listening in on the exchange.
"No!" Molly and Minerva shouted up at him at the same time that Tom and Sirius loudly said, "Yes!"
Remus pinched the bridge of his nose, and Albus had yet to weigh in, watching the exchange passively, a small smile on his lips. "Where is it exactly that you're going?" The man asked Albus, cutting into the argument.
"Little Hangleton, where Voldemort's parents were from," Albus answered promptly, folding his hands in front of himself. "Given Voldemort's propensity to return to his heritage, even if he did not stow his horcrux there, it is certainly possible that he left something else of importance. Either way, it should be eliminated from our list of locations that are important to his life."
"I've technically already been there," Harry pointed out, drawing the adults' attention again, "Might be nice to see it during the daytime when I'm not tied to a headstone-"
"You're not helping!" Sirius snapped over his shoulder.
"Actually, I think that's a fairly valid point," Tom muttered, and both Minerva and Molly glared at him. "Tell me, besides his age, right now, what is the main reason you don't want Harry to go? If he were seventeen, what reason would you have otherwise to stop him?" He demanded.
There was a pause from the witches as they considered his question, but Minerva was the one to have an answer fairly quickly, squaring her shoulders. "Mister Potter is a talented wizard in regards to the Defence Against the Dark Arts, but he is still only a student; he has not graduated from his schooling or taught defence or worked as an auror. It's one thing for you and Albus and I to go traipsing into an area that may be riddled with curses and other dangers, but it would be irresponsible to encourage a teenager who hasn't even taken his O.W.L.s yet to accompany us."
Tom made a face, raising his eyebrows, conceding her point. "Fair enough," he looked to Harry, "Perhaps on the next one, then." Harry shrugged his shoulders- he seemed surprisingly lackadaisical about it, though why Tom couldn't quite say. Perhaps he was certain Tom would explain whatever transpired there or didn't think it was worth arguing with Minerva (or Molly) when they put their minds to it.
"Just like that?" Sirius demanded, looking to Tom like he'd betrayed him. "We're going to let them leave him out of things that concern him, again?"
"I only make a habit of arguing with Minerva if I have a point that is more valid than her's, or if I know something she does not," Tom said, grabbing his cloak and pulling it on, "And neither of those are currently the case. I will save my breath for when there is something more important on the line."
Sirius stared at him as if horrified by the notion. "Traitor."
Tom pressed his lips together in a thin line as he clasped his cloak together, "I'm sorry but I was only married to the woman for nearly twenty-odd years. I know when it's worth pursuing a fight or not. Tactical retreat and all that."
"If Harry and I can't go, then Remus is going," Sirius said decisively, folding his arms, and Remus' eyes widened just a fraction, glaring at the other man, hissing his name. "No, Tom seems a good sort, but someone needs to be there to make sure we know what's going on for Harry's sake, Moony, you know it!"
Remus let out a long-suffering sigh and slowly nodded his head and looked to the Headmaster. "If it will not cause a fight-"
"It shouldn't, since we've already established that the main issue here is Harry's inexperience in walking into dangerous situations, which we know he has plenty of, and his lack of formal training in how to handle them," Tom cut in before Albus or Minerva could reply. "I assume we'll side-long, since Albus and I both know where the Riddle Manor is. Shall we?" He turned, done with the conversation and unwilling to entertain any more arguments about who would and wouldn't be going and was just grateful that Remus hurried to follow him out the front door so that they could apparate.
Apparating to Hangleton was as natural as apparating to Hogsmeade for Tom. It was a familiar, well-trod path, even here in a world that wasn't his own. When he realized the night before that he would likely need to make his way there with Albus, he'd begun to steel himself that it wouldn't be his, same with what had happened in the Chamber, his home was still waiting for him, his house he'd spent two years building with his own two hands and the Manor which he'd helped his father upkeep for the last thirty-odd years before his death a couple of years prior.
They landed behind the Manor in the overgrown field. Remus released the tight grip on his arm, and Tom stepped forward, trampling the grass down slowly as he cast several spells around them and then began checking to see if there was anyone else on the manor grounds or any traps set up near the perimeter. Tom was a little surprised to realise both Riddle Manor and the Gaunt Shack were completely left unoccupied, both looking derelict and in complete shambles. It seemed a waste of space and property when the man could have used it for literally anything.
He saw Albus and Minerva arrive moments later, but ignored them as he finished and created an opening in the wards. The magic felt familiar and not- remnants of his own in it, but tainted, and the glamours and wards welcomed his manipulations as if they recognised him. He transfigured the ironwrought fence, creating a physical gate where the invisible metaphysical gate was in the wards and held it open for the other three.
"I have to say it looks quite a spot better where I'm from, but then again, Morgan and Regulus use it when they're not in London," he explained as all three slowly stepped through the wards, cautious as if they were worried the wards might still react to them.
"You were on good terms with your father then?" Albus asked gently- this was not the prodding he'd grown accustomed to in the last week from the Headmaster, but a trace of worry underneath, especially considering Voldemort had killed the man.
"I mean, better after I had kids, honestly," Tom said, shrugging his shoulders slightly. "He didn't seem to know what to do with me, or I with him, at first. I was seventeen by the time we met, I did not need or want a father figure, especially not someone who was unable to relate to my experiences, both as a poor orphan from London and a wizard."
Riddle Manor looked about as abandoned and derelict as Grimmauld Place appeared on the outside, but the interior at least had looked marginally better than parts of Grimmauld Place. The glass of the French doors at the back of the house was cloudy with dirt and smudges, but they were unlocked and creaked loudly when Tom opened them. Much of the interior was packed away, either in storage or sold, and the few pieces of larger furniture remaining were covered with sheets. There was a stillness in the air that felt wrong for the place that had long since become a wizarding home in his world.
The wallpaper and the handful of remaining decorations on the walls were that of his grandparents, not his father.
"He'd been married twice and lost both to childbirth, and didn't seem eager to attempt a third. He wanted an heir, and there I was with his face and name." Tom explained as he raised his wand and tried to see if anything was enchanted or concealed in the open plan of the downstairs rooms. "There was a bit of shouting between him and my grandfather about it, given I was a bastard, but it wasn't hard for them to legitimise me, given I didn't even need to change my name."
"Your parents were not married?" Albus asked, this time his tone shifting back to something sharp, telling Tom this meant something to the man, and Tom paused in his diagnostics to look at him.
"No," He said, thinking back to what his father had revealed to him. He'd been out one evening with his mates at the pub, too much alcohol had been consumed, and when he'd stumbled back towards the manor in the wee hours of the morning, he'd half collapsed in the road, and then suddenly someone pulled him to his feet. He'd explained it was pretty hazy after that, but when he woke up, his father was naked under a threadbare blanket with his mother. He'd made a hurried retreat back to the manor without disturbing the odd woman and hadn't even known of Tom's existence until Tom took possession of the Gaunt land.
"He didn't even know about me until I claimed the Gaunt land and title," He said instead.
Albus frowned, his blue eyes distant as Remus circled back through the ground floor to them, having wandered off as they spoke. "I'm not seeing anything- personal or magical, or otherwise. It doesn't look like anyone has been here in ages."
"According to the dreams Harry was having last year, I believe Voldemort and Peter were living here, but they may have done well to cover their tracks when they left," Albus said, looking to the younger man, "I can't imagine he'd allow anyone to find out he'd retreated to a muggle residence."
Minerva's steps creaked on the floor above them and Tom looked up as they heard them shifting back towards the landing. "I saw the Gaunt Shack was still as it had been when Morfin lived in it- I can't imagine he'd stick anything in there instead of here, especially if he was residing here for the better part of a year, but we should check it regardless," Tom said, to which Albus nodded his head in agreement.
"Nothing of note upstairs," Minerva said with a sigh, wiping the dust from her hands. "Though there is not a sheet on the bed in the master bedroom."
"That is likely where he had been camped out then," Tom murmured and Minerva either had known about Harry's dreams as well or had somehow overheard them because she simply nodded her head. "Aye."
Instead of taking the most direct route via the front, Tom led them back the way they'd come, closing the wards, like lowering a trapdoor back into place, and transfigured the gates back to a fence. The grass of the back garden and the field both so overgrown that there weren't even any footprints or tracks that needed hiding. It also helped in case anyone was watching the front, even if only nosy neighbours.
"I'm going to work under the assumption that my mother and father were married in this life, then?" He asked as they traipsed through the tall grass towards the dilapidated shack that looked like a strong wind might blow it over. "Doesn't explain how Voldemort ended up at Wool's if that was the case." After all, his grandparents' disdain had been equal parts that he was a bastard and what they assumed was his mother's lineage, being of the lower class.
"Yes, but not happily, unfortunately for all involved," Albus said quietly, pausing at the edge of the property as all four sensed the light shimmer of magic warding the shack and the nearby land. Like the Manor, it was not heavily warded by any means, more so alarms in case someone were to cross it, and once again, instead of unravelling them, Tom worked at the threads, creating a door for them to pass through.
"What happened?" Remus asked as Tom listened, but focused on the task at hand, manipulating the wards.
"I was able to retrieve a memory from a ministry worker who arrested Marvolo and Morfin, Tom's maternal grandfather and uncle, after Morfin had cursed Tom Riddle Senior-"
"Tom Riddle III," Tom interrupted, looking over his shoulder, and Albus nodded his head, "Yes, sorry, and when questioned why Morfin attacked Tom III, he revealed that his sister, Merope, had a crush on him, which enraged their father into attacking her. Both were arrested, leaving Merope home alone."
The trapdoor in the warding was complete, and Tom stepped through it first and then held out a hand, gesturing for the rest to follow, but contemplated what Albus had said. Had they done the same in his world? He'd only encountered Morfin the once and besides hating him for being a bastard of a Muggle Cunt, his uncle's words, not his, nothing else had been conveyed.
"I only know from there that she left a note that her father found when he returned from Azkaban that she'd left and married Tom Riddle III," Albus explained, stepping up the path towards the door of the shack where the same dead dried-out snake was staked like it had been when Tom had first taken over the shack all those years before.
"Given what we know happened after, I believe she used a love potion to coerce the man," Albus continued, and Tom stopped short, causing Remus to collide with his back with a soft grunt, looking to the headmaster in horror.
"What?" He demanded, his eyes narrowing.
Albus nodded his head solemnly, and the four paused in front of the door and its disgusting ornament. "I had considered other explanations, but based on the memory from the ministry worker who arrested Marvolo and Morfin, Merope was nearly a squib and unable to perform most spells with her wand, though her father admitted she was fairly skilled in potions, ergo, a love potion."
"That's…" Tom whispered, trailing off at the horrible implications. Not that it was much better than his own conception, but the use of a love potion and marriage made the whole affair much more long-term. Much more torturous.
"That's rape," Remus said, and Tom nodded his head in agreement, glad someone else had been able to say it.
Albus nodded his head, still solemn. "It is speculation, but I believe once Merope was pregnant, she believed her husband would love her even without the potion, or perhaps come to love her since she was pregnant, but instead he abandoned her in London and returned home to his parents."
"Which is how she came to be in London, pawning a locket for food and dying during childbirth in an orphanage." Tom waved his wand over the door and felt no magic or enchantments. He opened it, pushing with his shoulder to unstick it from the crooked frame. He had a lot of feelings about both of them at that moment, his mother and his father. He'd always wondered if his mother had deliberately taken advantage of his father's inebriation, but even if she had, she hadn't tried to hold the pregnancy over him, and he bore no ill will to his father, given the man hadn't even known of his existence.
This version was so much more turbulent than his. Merope had come from an abusive home life, which he'd already had an idea of, after having met his uncle as a teen. But to deliberately take another being's freedom away like that, even if just to escape abuse, was almost as bad as the abuse she'd suffered. He couldn't fault his father from this world for abandoning her, even while pregnant if he'd been mentally and physically raped and held against his will by a potion.
The inside of the shack was exactly as he remembered when he'd claimed it years and years before, save for decades of dust that had been building up over time. The dirt and flagstone floor and furniture were the same, the walls were cracking, and the thatched roof was broken in places, allowing sunlight in.
The last time he'd walked these walls hadn't been the morning he'd gone through the arch- not really. It had been before he'd gutted the shack and made it into a proper home, demolishing it and laying a proper foundation, spending far too much time learning how to utilise a combination of magic and muggle innovation to rebuild the remaining home of the Gaunts.
Something shone on the ancient dusty table, drawing his attention. He recognised the Gaunt ring immediately- the ring had never been of major importance to him once he'd been able to properly claim it as he'd claimed the Slytherin signet before it, though he'd grown used to seeing his son wearing it as he'd gifted it to TJ on his sixteenth birthday, since the lordship would carry on to him.
He felt an odd desire to snatch the ring off the table and immediately frowned, recognising the compulsion charm for what it was, tightening his hand around his wand. He looked to Remus first, suspecting him to be the most susceptible, being the youngest of the four, but his eyes widened in horror when Albus stepped towards it, hand outstretched as if to simply pluck it from the table-
He was only feet away, so he didn't cast a spell so much as he threw himself at the older man, slamming them both into the wall, Minerva jumping out of their way with a gasp. He felt Albus's wand under his chin before they had time to get their breath back, but Tom ignored it and yelled at the others, "Don't touch it!"
Albus made a noise of realisation, his wand dipping away from Tom's chin and Tom pushed himself off Albus and the wall, where he'd been pinning the older man. "Jesus, you old fool," he snapped, "Why else would someone put a compulsion charm on an object in an abandoned shack unless it was cursed to high hell?"
"He's right, Albus," Minerva said, her voice wavering slightly with worry. Tom looked over to see her and Remus both standing just out of arm's reach of the table, the transfiguration professor holding her wand aloft as she examined the ring from a distance. "It's subtle, the compulsion charms are covering the curses up ever so slightly, just enough to miss at first glance."
"Of course, I-" Albus paused as he pushed himself off the wall, slowly wiping dust from his robes, almost lost in thought, "I forgot myself- unfortunately, I am also capable of making foolish mistakes, though rare I hope them to be."
Tom's eyes narrowed at the distant look in Albus's eyes, almost like he recognised the ring, perhaps from the memories he'd been collecting? He was once again reminded that this Albus didn't tell him his thoughts, didn't bounce ideas off of Tom like a sounding board. He didn't have trust in him, for a valid reason, but moments like this it was beyond frustrating.
"The curse work is… I hate to say beautiful, but I can't see where one curse starts and another ends," Remus said, casting as he stood beside Minerva, but not stepping closer, thankfully. "It will take ages to unravel."
"Given it has the compulsion on it, I can only assume that the trigger for the curse is touch, or putting the ring on," Tom mused, pulling his handkerchief from his pocket. He flicked his wand to cast a simple levitation charm, but the ring did not budge, and Tom sighed with annoyance.
Reaching around, he pulled a pencil from his bag and stepped forward and nudged the ring gently with it. No alarms sounded- no spells or booby traps sprang to life, and Tom didn't burst into flames or turn to stone, so instead he angled the pencil through the ring and then lifted it gently with the pencil. It looked so innocuous, hanging there, but the magic, though carefully hidden, was more evident now that they knew it was there.
Remus wasn't wrong- the magic itself that was woven around the object was dark and dangerous, but so perfectly done it reminded Tom of staring at a tiger at the zoo. He laid the handkerchief on the table and set the ring down inside and carefully folded it up, slipping it into one of the empty side pouches of his satchel for safekeeping.
"I would feel better bringing it back to Hogwarts," Albus said, and Tom felt one of his eyebrows raise in challenge. "Given all six of the students staying at Grimmauld Place are known for their inclination to stumble into danger."
Tom couldn't help the loud snort as he tried to keep from laughing. "I'm sorry, that's going to be a hard no from me," he said, raising a hand and covering his mouth for a moment and then taking a deep breath to keep from laughing harder at the look Albus was giving him. "Oh, I'm sorry, Wise Old Dumbledore who just nearly gave in to a simple Compulsion Charm touching a deadly cursed magical item that may be a Horcrux, telling me that I won't keep an object safe in a house filled to the brim with cursed magical objects?" Tom cleared his throat, trying to school his face. "That's a good joke."
Remus and Minerva's eyes were bouncing back and forth between the pair, and Tom didn't know if that amused him more, or the way he could physically see the wheels turning and the 4D chess board moving about in Albus's head. "We can all reconvene in the library and discuss a plan," Tom suggested instead. "How to determine if the ring is or isn't a horcrux, how to unravel the curses, and how to destroy it."
Albus nodded. Whatever was going on in his head, he at the very least didn't seem like he was going to try and stun him for it, at least, which Tom hadn't been entirely certain about for a moment there. "Agreed- I would recommend bringing in Mister Bill Weasley- he's an excellent cursebreaker from what I have heard, he may be able to offer some insight while I retrieve something."
The tension in the shack had finally dissipated, and Tom took a deep breath, nodding his head in agreement.
It was much later when they were actually able to reconvene.
Tom and Remus apparated back to Grimmauld Place while Albus and Minerva went off to do God Knew What only to find Sirius in a heated argument with his house elf, Kreacher, who had been hoarding the worst of the Black Family Heirlooms and cursed items into the little den in the back of the boiler room where he slept.
It had taken a solid hour to calm Sirius down enough for him to understand he couldn't just throw away cursed items lest some unsuspecting individual, god forbid, a muggle, happen upon them. Never mind the house elf who kept screaming half-coherent insults at them while wailing about his poor mistress and the disgrace the family had come to. A sort of truce was reached between the pair in that Sirius would put any cursed items into marked boxes for them to be relocated to the attic for safe storage until they could be appropriately handled and by then Tom had decided he didn't have the energy to deal with anyone and instead had made himself a stiff drink and retreated to the library to try and read through Phoebus' grimoire.
The downside to reading anything older than a couple of hundred years was that the dialect differences tended to make it similar to reading another language entirely. Phoebus at least had had fairly good penmanship, but he was prone to rambling. His grimoire was clearly never intended to be something officially recorded, or at least to his knowledge, because he'd sometimes sketch scratchy little pictures on half a page, drawing on top of what he'd written. It had begun before his marriage to Eirlys and was spottily written in, with months between entries and only the occasional notation of spells, more often potions or thoughts for substituting ingredients in potions were left only for him to go back in and cross through and leave notes beside what each substitution had done.
In a fit of impatience, Tom began to skip forward, only to realise once things began happening, they escalated so quickly he was lost as to what he was reading and forced to go back. It was in here, rereading ramblings about what seemed to be inconsequential things, that Severus pushed the doors of the library open, breaking the solitude to allow the complaints of Sirius to follow in after him.
Tom looked up from the grimoire at the pair. Remus was right behind them, seeming exhausted with both but watching to make sure neither threw the first punch. Albus, Minerva, Filius, and Bill Weasley followed, shutting the doors behind them. The eldest Weasley looked particularly excited, rubbing the palms of his hands together as he approached Tom.
"Professor McGonagall says you found a nice little puzzle for me to take a look at?" He asked, and Tom shoved the parchment he'd been making notes on into the grimoire to mark his place and retrieved the handkerchief that was still tucked safely in his satchel.
Bill gingerly took the cloth and levitated some books out of his way before gently placing the folded fabric on the desk closest to them. He pulled a small leather kit out of his back pocket, laying it out slowly. Tom stood and moved closer, trying not to crowd him, especially as everyone else moved in as well. The kit seemed eclectic- there were a few picks, a wire brush, a soft bristle brush, a pair of tweezers and a few knives. Bill retrieved the tweezers and used them to carefully unfold the cloth of the handkerchief until the ring was revealed.
Everyone in the room knew about the compulsion charm, and it was not strong enough to sway multiple adult wizards who already knew about it into touching it, but despite that, everyone held their breath for a moment as Bill pulled a pair of magnifying eyeglasses out and inspected the ring.
"Eighteen karat gold band- with a band like that, you're looking at something old, maybe seventeenth century?" Bill mused. He set the ring back on the cloth and twitched his fingers over the tool kit before selecting one of the small picks and a knife, and pulled them out. He used the tweezers to hold the ring in place and tapped the pick to the stone, and then the knife, clicking his tongue in thought as he worked. "Onyx for the stone."
Tom nodded his head, as he'd heard as much from an appraiser when he'd taken it in to have it cleaned before giving it to TJ. "Early sixteen-hundreds, I believe."
"So…" Bill paused and lifted the glasses up on top of his head as he looked around the group, "Would you like the good news, the bad news, or the weird news first?"
Tom and everyone else blinked, not sure what to make of the question. He and Albus made eye contact, and the Headmaster inclined his head as if to give Tom the decision. "Bad, then weird, then good. I try to end on the positive when I can," he finally said, since no one else was speaking up.
"Excellent," Bill clapped his hands and rubbed his palms together, "The bad news is that this looks like some of the most advanced spellwork I've ever seen. It could take me ages to figure out how to unravel it, or even if I can."
"What's the weird news?" Sirius asked, hands on his hips, leaning against the wall next to where Remus was sitting.
"So with something like a ring, the gemstone is usually the anchor of the spellwork or ward or whatever you because gems are good conduits for spells and magic in general, especially if their correspondences are being used in alignment with the spellwork," Bill explained, and everyone standing there nodded their heads slowly. "Well, the gemstone isn't the anchor here. The band is."
"Why do you suppose that is?" Albus asked, folding his hands together in front of him.
"Hmm," Bill rolled his eyes upwards in thought, blowing out a puff of air. "It could be a few reasons, there could be something else nasty hiding underneath the compulsion and curses that aren't making it obvious what it's being used as an achor for, or perhaps if the curses are based on the intention of the cursed person wearing it, it could have been set intentionally in that way to keep it from being easily removed- one of the things they teach us is if something latches on to you, try and blast free any gems or other conduits that might be powering or maintaining the structure of the spell. It would be a nasty shock to blast off the stone on this only for it to still kill you because it's the band that is holding the elements of the curse, not the gem."
"That does sound like something Voldemort might do," Remus said, leaning back in his seat in thought. "And what's the good news?"
Bill's lips twitched in amusement, "Based on what Professor Dumbledore told me when he revealed the ah- nature of what it might be, we could potentially bypass the cursebreaking part entirely if you're planning to destroy it altogether, though we may want to do so in such a way to shield whoever is doing the destroying from the blowback of the curse when it's broken along with the…" He held out his hand, gesturing to the ring, and Tom couldn't tell if he was forgetting the word horcrux or just didn't want to say it out loud.
"Do we even know how to destroy it?" Minerva asked, her lips pinching together in thought.
"Potter used a basilisk fang on the diary, of which he and Riddle still have access to at Hogwarts," Severus said, his hands steepled in thought as he stared at the ring. "But I am uncertain if a fang could stab into a ring in the same manner as it could a book, or if it was simply the highly corrosive element of the venom that did the trick."
"That is why I brought this," Albus said, reaching inside his robes, and Tom didn't know what he'd been expecting because Albus certainly couldn't access the chamber and the man hadn't taken any of the fangs with them when they left, but a large longsword in a scabbard was not anywhere close to the top of his list.
"When Harry withdrew the Sword of Gryffindor from the hat, he stabbed into the mouth of the basilisk. I spent some time studying it, given its origins, and found that the sword is enchanted in such a way that it imbibes what it defeats." Albus explained, withdrawing the sword from the scabbard a few inches so that they could all see it.
There was a beat of silence before Sirius broke it, everyone staring at the sword, "Are you fucking telling me that the sword has basilik venom in it?"
"Language," Albus said, "The sword will likely do more damage than a fang alone, since we don't know what else it has imbued within it."
Tom ran his hands over his face, "So… Take the time to cursebreak so we don't experience any blowback from whatever curses are on the ring and then deal with the horcrux, or hope for the best and thwack it with the sword first?" He said, and even as the words came out of his mouth, he knew what the answer needed to be. "My vote is to err on the side of caution- Mr Weasley can attempt to break whatever curses are on the ring and then we can deal with the destruction of the horcrux separately, thus eliminating the potential unknowns in trying to destroy it ill-prepared."
"My vote is for thwacking it with the fucking venomous sword," Sirius grumbled, staring at the giant sword.
"Luckily, Riddle has more sense than you," Severus sneered and pushed himself to his feet. "He is correct, surely the Dark Lord might have also placed a failsafe of some kind in case someone tried to destroy it. Better to break the curses surrounding it before dealing with the slice of soul within."
"Well, that's decided then," Albus said, placing the sword on the desk beside the ring. "With the semester approaching, we will run short on spare time to continue this hunt, but it will need to take priority as once Voldemort becomes aware of Professor Riddle's existence via his followers' children at the school, he may try and lock down any of his remaining horcruxes."
Tom felt a tingle run up the back of his neck, the hairs there and along his arms standing on end, a tendril of energy touching his mind, and he whipped around, eyes darting around the room, making everyone freeze.
"Tom?" Sirius asked. Tom looked hard at Severus and Albus, as at least in his life, they were the only accomplished legilimens he knew, but both were looking at him with equal confusion.
He felt it against like a hand at the base of his neck, and he threw up his occlumency barriers so hard he felt his magic writhe, the faintest hint of wind throwing up papers in the room as his magic pulsed outwards.
"I'm going to give you all the benefit of the doubt and assume no one here just tried to breach my occlumency barriers, but then that begs the question, who did?" Tom said, looking around the room for any break in the faces of those there, but everyone looked equally confused and worried.
"That is not a good sign," Remus said quietly, and Tom shook his head in agreement.
"Ominous things rarely are."
A/N: Voldemort in this world also has the Lord of Slytherin signet ring. Why isn't it a horcrux? Because, at least in my opinion, the locket and the Gaunt ring were more personal to him in his immediate life and were more… precarious in how he viewed them than the ring, which had been safely locked away from the declining Gaunts. The Gaunt ring represents his wizarding family's abandonment and was unequivocally linked to his father's death, as he pinned that on Morfin, from whom he got the ring. The locket is a tethered link and betrayal of his mother, selling out her wizarding heritage and leaving him behind. What's more the Slytherin signet ring marks him as the Lord of Slytherin, and the gaunt ring was from a significantly lesser house by comparison. If he'd known the Resurrection stone was the gem, idk if he still would have done it or not. Maybe, as a fuck you to Death?
