Chapter 17 - Manuscripts and Ceramist's Wheels

Written by Nemesis

Tom sighed and rested his forehead against the cool windowpane. He was aboard the Hogwarts Express on the first of September, feeling relieved that he was finally returning to school. Milling around home for the summer had been both dull and horrible, for when he was not staring off into space, he was haunted by memories of the horrible things that had happened--that he had done.

The last two months had been a blur to him. He had taken another overnight train back to London and returned to the orphanage. His memory charms had still been befuddling the two staff members, and they had not even noticed his absence. Abby kept trying to corner him and demand what had happened, but Tom, remembering with a little disgust that she had tried to ask him to the Halloween Dance the previous year, had always shaken her off. He had spent every day locked in his room, pacing. Nepenthe had seemed to know that Tom was in no mood to chat, so he had avoided his master unless he was called.

Meanwhile, Tom's mind had been in a turmoil. He still could not believe that he had killed three people. After thinking about it awhile, though, a little of the remorse vanished. They had been Muggles, and treacherous Muggles, at that. From the sound of it, if Tom had not done it, someone else would have. The Riddles had been quite unpopular, and more than a few people would have wanted to get at their money. As Tom had started to see it, no Muggle deserved to live. No, Tom had grown to be worried about something else on top of it. He hoped nobody at the Ministry heard about the Riddles' deaths, or else he or she might smell a rat, and the person would ask the Ministry to investigate. Not that anyone would suspect a thirteen-year-old boy, but the idea of being caught had scared him, and it still did.

Tom shuddered and looked down at the book in his arms. Hogwarts, A History, which he had still not managed to finish. He flipped through the pages until he came to the one he had marked and started reading again. Tom quickly deduced that his mind was too full to take in any more at the moment. Making a sound of exasperation, he slammed the book shut and glared out the window. "Murderers don't deserve to read," someone inside him snapped. Tom had a sudden and grimly amusing vision of himself with a miniature person on each shoulder. One was someone in white robes and angel wings, and the other was an evil little person wearing red robes, a tail, and horns. Right now, it was his better conscience who was talking. The two little voices had been arguing in his head ever since he had returned from Little Hangleton, and he had been having worse nightmares than he had ever had before.

Brushing his bangs out of his eyes, Tom drew in a breath and exhaled slowly. He could not get it out of his head; their eyes… the fear that was in their eyes… Naturally, the nasty half of him had found their submissive terror enjoyable, but the other half could not shake the thought of it. "Stop thinking about it, you great stupid prat!" he commanded himself. The image simply grew more vivid than ever. "Bloody Hell," he muttered. "Father, leave me alone…"

Tom shut his eyes against the images flashing before them, but they grew so lurid that he could see them through his eyelids. They had not deserved to die in that kind of fright… "Of course they did!" Tom thought furiously. "They were Muggles, all Muggles should die!" Tom's brain would not accept this, and the memory of the Riddles' dread-filled eyes continued to pummel him.

He was so distraught that he did not notice the first knock on the door to his empty compartment. The next knock, however, was louder and more persistent, and it jerked Tom from his daydreams. "Yes?" he called.

The door slid open, revealing the largest person Tom had ever seen in his life. Tom himself had grown considerably, but this person made him feel about the size of a Cornish pixie. He was at least eight feet tall, with a wild mane of black hair and a ruddy face. He looked young, though, only about eleven. "Don' mind if I sit in here, do yeh?" he asked tentatively. "Ev'ry other booth's full to burstin'."

"Certainly," Tom replied quietly. His voice had become distinctly muted since the incident, and he rarely raised it above a lilt. He had become far more introverted, and hated to speak to anyone.

The huge boy smiled nervously and sat down across from Tom. "Yeh in yer sixth year?" the boy asked.

"Third, actually," Tom responded softly, examining the cover of his book. "I presume you are starting this year?"

"Yeah. I can' wait!" the boy grinned. "Me name's Rubeus Hagrid, by the by. Yeh can call me Rubeus, but if I catch yeh callin' me Ruby, ye'll be in fer trouble." He laughed heartily. "What's yer name, anyway?"

"Tom. Tom Marvolo Riddle." Tom held out his hand, and Rubeus shook his whole forearm.

"Which House?"

"Slytherin," Tom said, watching the color drain a little from Rubeus's face. "We aren't really as evil as everyone says, though," he added casually. "Well, most of us aren't. Watch out for Francis Malfoy and his goons, though. Then again, you probably wouldn't have many problems with them."

Rubeus laughed again. "No, bullies never did start with me." He hesitated. "Wan' ter play Explodin' Snap?"

"I've never been one for cards," Tom apologized. "Do you have a chess set?"

"Only a Muggle 'un."

"That will do," Tom said, conjuring a chess table. Rubeus stared, impressed, and took a box out of his pocket. Inside were two sets of Muggle chessmen, carved nicely out of two different kinds of wood. Tom, as always, took the darker pieces and set them up, while Rubeus did the same with the pale tan ones. As they played, Tom's mind was on completely different things. He wondered if the Ministry paid any attention to Muggle deaths. Perhaps they did not, but the way Tom's luck was going, they did. Professor Dumbledore--Tom's face went white. If Professor Dumbledore found out, he would be in for it. Tom was brilliant at lying to most people, but when he lied to Dumbledore, he always got the impression that the Transfiguration teacher saw right through him.

"Checkmate," Tom said, a note of triumph in his voice, as he cornered Rubeus's king.

"Yeh're good!" Rubeus said, impressed. "Great strategist, I'll give yeh that. Play again?"

"Well, I--oh, what the hell." Tom waved his wand and the pieces rearranged themselves. As they played, Tom and Rubeus exchanged life stories. From what he could gather, Rubeus's life had been similar to his, up to a point. Rubeus's mother had abandoned him and his father when Rubeus was three years of age, leaving his father to raise him. When asked to recount his own tale, Tom edited it a bit. He pretended that his father had died in a car crash after leaving his mother, and that his life at the orphanage had been much less violent than it actually had been. After Tom had beaten Rubeus at chess a total of fifteen times, the lunch cart turned up. They chatted over lunch, and by the time they got off on the platform at Hogsmeade Station, they had become friends.

"Okay, that's Professor Dumbledore over there, the tall fellow with the auburn hair. He'll take you up to the castle. I have to go meet my friends now," Tom said to Rubeus. "See you at the Sorting."

"'Bye," Rubeus called, striding over to Dumbledore. The other first-years gave him amazed looks. Tom made sure his friend met up with Dumbledore, then hurried off to find the other third-years.

Tom found Larkin, Zuhayr, and Adrian almost immediately, talking with an older boy. The boy's eyes were warm brown behind rather thick glasses, and his hair was dark brown and extremely messy. Tom knew him by sight, but had never spoken to him. "Good evening," Tom said. All four of them jumped and spun around, their eyes wide. None of them had heard or seen him coming.

"Hi," Larkin said, recovering before the others. "Hey, Tom--" She paused, as Tom flinched slightly. Hearing his father's name was jarring. "Tom, this is Nathan Potter. Nathan, Tom Riddle."

Nathan smiled broadly and held out his hand. A gleaming prefect badge shone on his chest. "Hey, Tommy," he said.

Tom gingerly shook the other's hand. "I prefer Tom," he said through clenched teeth. "Or Voldemort," he added to himself.

"Oh. Okay." Nathan looked a little awkward. "Well, um, yeah."
Tom gave him a withering look and was about to ask if that was the most intelligent thing he could think to say, but he decided against it. "Which House are you?" he asked instead.

"Hufflepuff," Nathan said. "Well, I have to run. See you lot at the Sorting, then." He dashed off to meet up with some of his other friends.

His friends waved goodbye after Nathan, then clambered into a four-person carriage. Before Tom could get in, his friends made space for a Gryffindor sixth-year. "What about me?" Tom demanded hotly.

"Oops," Larkin said. "You can sit on my lap, Tom." Adrian and Zuhayr roared with laughter, and the Gryffindor started snickering uncontrollably.

"As much as I appreciate it, I'll decline the offer," Tom said dryly. "I'll go get a carriage on my own." Feeling furious, he spun on his heel and stormed away. "Typical," he muttered. Normally, he would have been just a little angry about this, but his temper had got exponentially shorter over the summer.

Tom picked out an empty carriage and stepped into it, flopping irritably into the corner. Three other people turned up almost immediately. One of them was perfectly welcome. Lili Po showed up and sat next to him, grinning. She was closely followed by two people Tom was less inclined to welcome. There was Nathan Potter, the Hufflepuff, along with none other than Philip Cedric. Once they were all seated, the carriage started up. "I can't wait for the Sorting!" Nathan kept saying. "My little cousin's here this year, she made it in. She's not all Muggle after all…"

Upon returning to the castle, the four of them headed into the Great Hall and took their seats at the House tables. Tom watched the terrified first-years troop in minutes later, Rubeus four heads taller than most of them. After a few names, Rubeus was Sorted into Gryffindor. About twelve more names, then--

"Potter, Myrtle!" Professor Dumbledore shouted, starting to sound a little hoarse by now. A girl with Nathan Potter's dark mouse-brown hair, thick glasses, and brown eyes stepped forward and sat down on the stool. Her hair was rather yarnlike, and she looked horribly nervous. She looked more like Nathan's sister than just his cousin. Her Sorting took nearly a minute, but she was finally named a Hufflepuff, and she hurried over to sit with Nathan. Tom thought she looked like a very depressing sort of person.

After the feast, Tom headed up the stairs to the Slytherin common room. Not feeling much like sleeping, he headed up to his dormitory, hunted around in his trunk for his book, and trudged back down to the common room, intent on a fire-lit reading session. He was the only one who decided to stay up, but seeing as he was used to being up past four in the morning, this was not a problem. He sank into an armchair, accidentally opening the book to a later page. However, the words at the top of the entry caught his eye. "Salazar Slytherin's Chamber of Secrets."

"This could be interesting," Tom said to himself, and he read the passage, which was short and rather sketchy.

Salazar Slytherin allegedly built the Chamber of Secrets late in his life. He was a supporter of the so-called "purity of blood," and did not think Muggle-borns trustworthy. Slytherin was supposed to have captured a monster and kept it in the Chamber, and he warned that one day, his true Heir would arrive at Hogwarts. This Heir alone could control the horrors within the Chamber; indeed, the Heir alone could open the Chamber in the first place. Slytherin said that his Heir would cleanse the school of Muggle-born students and prevent more from coming. Slytherin's warning does not extend to half-bloods, however. This story is widely believed to be pure mythology, perhaps a legend created over time from a series of rumors.

Tom was immediately intrigued. He decided that no matter what, he would find out more about the Chamber of Secrets. He was not sure why the idea attracted him so. Perhaps it was simply the fact that it involved punishing Muggles. Tom did not necessarily hate all of the Muggle-born students (though he had yet to meet one who wasn't annoying), but he hated their parents, and as far as he could see, if he was harmful to Muggle-borns, he was penalizing their Muggle families. Making Muggles miserable was precisely what he wanted to do.

********************

Tom arrived at breakfast the next morning looking extremely tired. He had been up all night, searching all of the books in the common room in an attempt to find out more about the Chamber. It was to no avail; none of the books seemed to have any real information. Rubeus grinned at him from across the Hall. Tom smiled wearily in response and flopped into a seat next to someone who had his back to him. As he sat down, the other person spun around, and Tom realized it was Francis Malfoy. "I don't want to eat near a Mudblood," he sneered. "Go away."

"I'm a HALF-BLOOD!" Tom hissed, his eyes flashing. Francis laughed coldly.

"Whatever. Just move away, your Muggle fumes are curdling the milk."

Tom glared at him and moved down a few spaces. The cat in him was thinking how very fun it would be to scratch Francis across the face, while the human was thinking more along the lines of the Pertussis Curse. He ate alone as his friends had already finished, then headed off to his first class. Along with his regular classes, today he had all three of his elective classes; Arithmancy, Study of Ancient Runes, and Divination. Arithmancy came first.

It took only one lesson for Tom to decide that he loved Arithmancy. It was immensely challenging, rather like Muggle physics but twelve times harder, and with magical laws entwined. Study of Ancient Runes proved to be just as wonderful, if not more. It dealt with the properties of Latin, Greek, Chinese, Mesopotamian, and Egyptian words and phrases when used as spells. By graduation, Tom would know how to make up his own spells. The class also involved the reading of Druid symbols and how these symbols could be used for magical purposes.

By four o'clock, when he would have his Divination lesson, Tom was feeling rather cheerful for the first time in months. When he was studying, he did not have to think about anything else, and the classes were fascinating. Tom expected Divination to be just as interesting. His Divination class consisted of Slytherins and Ravenclaws. Lili was there, but on the downside, so was Francis. It was held in a beautiful tower room, with squashy armchairs around circular tables and zodiac charts hanging on the walls. Tom sat at a table with Lili Po and Electra Andes, a Slytherin girl Tom did not know very well. Sven Kristiansen, a Ravenclaw boy, took the fourth seat.

Just as the bell rang, the instructor bustled in. She had wavy brown hair long enough for her to sit on, and her eyes were dark blue. A patterned scarf was bound around her neck and she wore gold hoop earrings, but aside from that, she looked fairly normal. "Good afternoon," she said. "I apologize for my lack of punctuality, but I had to attend to a few matters in the dungeons. Right-o. My name's Professor Camden, but you can call me Ariana. My first name, you know; I think it's healthy for students and teachers to be on a first-name basis… First order of business. Today we're going to start with tea leaf interpretations."

Professor Camden explained the basics of tea leaves, then handed out teacups and poured out tea for everyone. She seemed to have boundless energy, and was extremely excited to see what would happen. Tom swirled the tea leaves as he was instructed and looked down into the cup curiously. At first, all he saw was a bunch of soggy bits of leaf. He narrowed his eyes and gazed at it, almost looking past it.

Immediately and amazingly, the shapes seemed to spring to life. There was a bird that looked like a hawk, a man at a ceramist's wheel, a crescent moon, a cross, and a dagger. The shapes seemed very sharp around the edges, and Tom could see them perfectly clearly. "Anyone seen anything yet?" asked Professor Camden. Blinking a few times, Tom raised his hand. Though the teacher had her back to him, she knew that he had raised his hand, and in an instant, she was standing next to him. "What do you see?" she asked.

"Well, there's a cross, a crucifix."

"Hmm… that means 'trials and difficulties.' Go on."

"And there's a dagger right under it, see?"

Professor Camden went slightly green. "Oh… are you a fiery sort of person, Tom? Yes, Albus and Trahern have both told me you are. This means, most likely, that you are going to solve your difficulty with an act of violence."

"Do these cups show the past, too?" Tom asked quizzically.

"They can. Why, has something like that happened in your past?"

"On several occasions," Tom said quietly, not feeling much like relating these occurrences. "Let's see… a crescent moon."

"That one means you'll be reunited with an old friend," said Professor Camden. "There's more, isn't there?"

"Yes, two more… there's a falcon. It's sitting on this bloke's shoulder--or is it a part of him? I can't tell… anyway, the fellow's working a ceramist's wheel, and the falcon's stuck to his shoulder."

Professor Camden's face fell again. "Tom… the falcon means that you have a deadly enemy. Or that you will have one. You say he's sitting on a ceramist's shoulder?"

"Yes," Tom said slowly.

Electra burst into giggles. "Riddle, look behind you, your mortal enemy is going to stab you with a ceramic kitten!" Tom glowered at her.

"Don't say that!" Professor Camden squeaked. "Tom, what is the man making on the wheel?"

Tom narrowed his eyes again and gazed at the tea leaves. "It looks like a pot," he shrugged.

"Whatever you do, steer clear of someone who makes pottery and has something against you," the teacher warned. "It could be your end."

"He'll hang you with a clay rope," Electra whispered.

Tom forced himself to ignore this and watched as Professor Camden helped the other students. "Beware a ceramist," he said to himself. Never had he had such strange advice.

********************

Tom walked slowly along a Hogwarts corridor, his black cloak swirling around him. As he stopped into an empty classroom, there it was again. The Specter. It smiled a lipless smile and beckoned him. "Come here, little one," it cooed almost fondly. "Do you want to see something?"

"No!" Tom said firmly.

The Specter laughed that awful laugh, then placed a hand on Tom's shoulder. "Follow me," it said. Tom had no choice but to obey, as the clawlike fingernails suddenly shot out like those of a cat, injecting themselves into his shoulder so forcefully and painfully that he almost screamed. The Specter laughed again and marched Tom into a back room, where there stood a mirror. Tom caught a glimpse of the reflection and felt promptly very ill. There was only one person in the reflection, but it was a bizarre person, vertically divided exactly down the middle. One half of it was Tom, bright-eyed and pale. The other half was the Specter.

"Look at him," said the Specter. "Poor, poor Tom. Torn in half."

"That isn't me," said Tom softly.

"It doesn't matter what you think. Right now, we have more important matters to attend." The Specter snapped his fingers, and the reflection melted away, revealing a swirling tunnel made entirely of mist. Smiling a demented smile, the Specter dragged Tom into the tunnel. There was a rushing sound, and Tom found himself in a room with white walls. It was completely bare, but Tom was in no condition to wonder about the lack of furnishing. The room was not empty--indeed, far from it.

There were prone figures all over the place, blood pooling around them, their eyes wide. There were some very small children, but it was mostly adults. Somewhere off in a corner was an old man who looked like an older version of the Riddles' gardener. The two nearest Tom were quite young. One was a man with messy black hair and grey eyes, the other, a beautiful woman, her dark red hair matted with blood and her brilliant green eyes wide and glassy. Tom tore away from the Specter, feeling his left shoulder being scratched open by the Specter's fingernails. He did not care. Tom knelt by the beautiful girl, staring at her blankly. Tom's eyes flashed and he rose to his feet, glaring at the Specter. "WHAT DID YOU DO TO THESE PEOPLE?" Tom demanded.

"Hmm? Oh, they're dead."

"That, I believe, is obvious," Tom said icily. He moved on to the next group of people and his heart skipped a beat. There lay his father, flanked by old Mr. and Mrs. Riddle.

"As are they," said the Specter casually. "I killed them."

"No you didn't," Tom said quietly. "I did."

"Did you, now?" the Specter remarked. "I think not. Tom was acting under my influence, not yours." It stepped forward and put a cold hand under Tom's chin. Tom suddenly felt that stabbing pain in his forehead, concentrated in an area shaped like a lightning bolt. The Specter laughed, then dug its fingernails into Tom's left shoulder again. "You are being an idiot," the Specter hissed. "Tom is not yours to control. You are too weak."

"I'M Tom!" Tom yelled. The Specter shook its head. "I am! I'm Tom! I'm Tom…"

"…Riddle," Tom said, sitting up in his bed. He looked around him and sighed with relief. It was only a nightmare… Shivering, Tom looked at his clock. Two in the morning. Sighing heavily, Tom started to lie back down, but he stopped, eyes wide with disbelief.

His shoulder was bleeding.

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