Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Lesson 2: Things in Threes

Tom hurt. He ached all over, in places he hadn’t known existed. His legs still wobbled from being pushed so hard and yet it was good . He felt great. He hadn’t truly run in years afterall. Once he knew he could affect things big enough like Billy, he never ran again. He made sure of that. It didn’t change that Tom was used to having to be quick when it counted, but not like this. Short bursts only and not in a long time. He hadn't been insane enough to want to do it on purpose. It certainly had never ended on a high like this. Usually it was adrenaline alone, hearing his heartbeat pound in his ears, feeling the cold chills upon his own neck, and then the crash would hit. Hard. He would feel horrid, shakey, and anxious the rest of a day or through the night. Paranoia was a hell of a thing in the dead of night. For an imaginative, scared child, it was so much worse. Granted it wasn’t paranoia if they truly were going to hurt you. This wasn’t that sort of thing. 

Not that fluffy wasn’t terrifying, more so than orphan children, but there was something else there. He should believe a Cerberus would be worse than Billy Stubbs, but he didn’t. Perhaps if it was in the wild but Fluffy was not a wild animal. That much was clear. Tom didn’t believe for one moment that his professor didn’t have iron clad control over his dog. Hadrian Peverell was purposeful, even in play, although there was nothing to say on whether the professor was a wild animal himself or not. At least from what Tom witnessed and Tom trusted his observations and instincts to a fault. They kept him alive, safe from Billy and the others, from the matrons and creeps that left with orphans in the night. Hadrian may be a wild animal, and was most certainly dangerous, but not to him. Not right now. 

He was safe with Fluffy, more or less, and that seemed to be the difference. Billy was a constant in his life, a bad one but a constant. He was the threat closest to him at any time when Tom was at his most vulnerable, or he used to be. Years at Hogwarts with all its dangers, hexes, and derision and yet it was fucking Billy Stubbs that remained the biggest shadow in his life. He should fear the Cerberus more. Orphans were not nearly as dangerous overall, that was true, but it was a statement that the Cerberus was preferable to the children around him. It was funny really and if he could laugh without his muscles hurting he would. For all their quirky, genius, Professor said he didn’t coddle, he kind of was. The punishment of being caught by Fluffy was in all reality more gross than dangerous. There were burns from Fluffy, and yeah maybe that was painful, but nothing that wasn’t tended and amended right away. Nothing lasting. Whereas the punishment for getting caught by the other orphans was lasting. It would take him months to feel the phantom pains of broken bones subside once he healed. The mental impressions took far longer. 

Tom had long learned that pain for wizards was an oddly acceptable facet of wizarding culture. There were strange lines drawn between what was acceptable and not. It was all centered around whether a solution was present or closeby, or whether the damage caused was illegal in nature. Just last year in potions class for instance, they were making antiboil serums which led to a great many more burns than Fluffy. Mulciber had made sure those boils lasted a whole week for those he disliked, which was everyone but Tom. They were painful things, agonizing really, but it was fixable so people didn’t care. No, they cared, held grudges, but it didn’t seem as damning as it should have been. It was considered a harmless prank. In another case, he had seen another student get wallopped with a bludger so hard that it shattered his ribcage during a Quidditch match, and that was apparently okay to the staff and students. Galiver Hobbs healed within the week with bone replenishments. Enough time to join in the next week's practice for Ravenclaw which he did so with great enthusiasm. 

So, in the end, if all he had to deal with was soreness from exercise then that was just fine with him. Orphans were not so merciful and the circumstances less than forgivable. Not that he, Tom, forgave anything. Magical or not. The reality was that Tom couldn’t exactly fault the cruelty of the others at Wool’s. Well he could and did, but he also understood it. Survival was key and one more mouth meant less food. If that mouth happened to be a freak like him then all the better to get rid of it. One less predator. He got it, on a mental level. It didn’t mean he liked it or wouldn’t repay them ten fold. Before Hogwarts, before his letter, he made sure to make them know he wouldn’t tolerate it. After he got his letter he still didn’t, but he was much more restricted in his retributions in the form of laws, than he was before. At the orphanage he was significantly more vulnerable, as magic was prohibited in the non-magical world. As a clueless child, and having cast wandlessly, lacking a wand, he had been undetectable. Now he was being monitored and he knew enough now about warding to know even his wandless talents would trigger notification if he cast. He had to get creative. 

Albus Dumbledore liked to remind him often enough that it would be illegal to use magic. His wand would be taken, he would be charged. Tom didn’t doubt the monitor charm on his orphanage was from that man himself. It would make sense, as to Dumbledoor, Tom was a monster. Those other orphans needed protection. Which meant Tom had to be craftier, more prepared but also meant he had no means to defend himself as he should during his summers. There were no potions to mend, or spells to be cast to erase damages. His only saving graces were that the orphanage didn’t know he wasn’t allowed to cast, and or that he was attending a magical school, or about magic at all, and that he had always been a fast healer.  

He just had to hope his healing factor would get him through the summers, and that he didn’t starve to death by the time September rolled around. The latter was more difficult as the older orphans had to work, which sapped energy, but still only received the bare minimum that could be afforded. Often less for Tom. He was a fast healer and resilient but even if he could stave off injury indefinitely, his body still required food and water. He was a living person! He needed food just like everyone else! It wasn’t even like Tom could remember how he came to be so hated. In his perfect recollections there was not a single instance he had done anything but fight back or take vengeance. In the eyes of the orphanage he had always been, from his birth if the Matron was correct, evil. So he had always been treated that way. It didn’t matter if he smiled or played nice, he was the problem to them. Always had been. 

The cards were never stacked in his favor and yet he made them work. He always did, but he feared that his luck would run out. Nightmares of reaching for magic that would not come haunted him often. He would wake believing he had been left broken under Billy’s fists in a way that couldn’t be repaired, or dead which was more preferable as far as nightmares went. What was the difference really? Becoming a cripple was the fastest way to get tossed from Wool’s halls. To die quick or slow were the only options in that case. He knew they were only nightmares. He knew that. The magic in his veins couldn’t just vanish, it was his. Still, there was always the slight childish possibility of what if. 

He much preferred Hogwarts as it was his truest home.This was a better place. Regardless of exploding potions, falls from broomsticks, a Cerberus, it was still better. No sticks, no stones, no broken bones. All was fine here in comparison to nights half breathless from bruised sides or the burns from a fireplace iron. Even if it wasn’t, at least he could fight back here. He was safe as odd as that sounded. Better than fine really so long as he existed in these halls. He always had the food he needed at least, and the winters could be warm. Besides, he wasn’t about to complain when he felt this great right now. It was, in some strange way, liberating to be this tired, satisfying in its own right when he did it to himself. Well, when a teacher not aiming to kill him would? It didn’t matter, it was different from Wools and that was it. 

Besides, he had other thoughts to think about than to stew over that place. He felt wonderful and he wasn’t about to ruin his good mood on Albus, orphans, or death. He had magic to contemplate and that was far more important. His head felt eerily clear after this morning and interesting things were happening to him. His magic in question was the focus. It was sharper and far more, well he didn’t have a name for it but something verging on playful? Than usual. Which was odd as playful was hardly a word he used on himself. Despite the pep in it, it was doing things . It worked smoother and easier than ever before, as if some floodgate had been opened that he hadn’t realized was there. Or rather some resistance in it had been quelled? It felt bigger in its extent. Not by much, but enough that he noticed. He imagined it was stretching out to explore in the curiously childish way it did when he allowed it to but now it was just more, it? Him? 

It was doing and achieving more than it had, learning in a way Tom didn’t have to tell it to. He was observing it in a way he never had the capacity to before, which was a new talent. He had known of course that his magic was mostly responsible for his survival up until now. From broken bones to fevers, but he was never actively tracking it, or aware when it worked before like he did now. He usually slept on it in the past and the issues, be it what they were, were gone by morning, leaving him ravenous and drained for days following. Now, he was acutely aware of this process, and it was fascinating to feel that dark, peppy, perfect bit of himself ease into his limbs to eliminate the shakes of exertion while he was awake for it. He knew he was smart and so of course his magic would be. He was powerful so of course it would be. This force so close to him was him. A passive aspect of himself that was so alien and so familiar. It was fascinating to be more aware of it. Not only it but his own body.  

He hadn’t even realized his lower spine had held so much pressure until it simply wasn’t there anymore. Little annoyances in his limbs vanished under the clear directive of his talent. He wondered why it was so obvious now, because if it could do healing actively, why hadn’t it done so on will before? Why not when he ached after a bad night on a shite mattress? Why not after he was so weary from hauling water? Hunched over from stooping to wash threadbare clothes with bruised fingers? Why was it active now?  Why was it so happy? It was curious. New and exciting. 

In anycase, regardless of whys or hows, he decided he quite liked this state he was in. He wanted more of it. He would need to run more frequently if this was the result. For that had to be what caused this. Hadrian mentioned needing physical fitness for practical uses but what if it also affected the nature of one's magical capabilities. No, he knew it did. In his mind he could see that mischievous spark in the professor’s eyes and he knew he was right. Tom awarded himself a mental point, though what kind of point he wasn’t sure, just a point. It felt good, almost as good as the points Tom had earned up to now but not as much. Still good though, it counted. He sank back happily into introspection to observe his magic work. Watching it was an inaccurate term as it was more like feeling it, or seeing it without seeing it. Regardless it felt like a river flow, or a flower open, like the subtle shift of wind. It was actively seeking and weaving, and Tom did not feel the hunger or fatigue as he did in the past. It was probably because he wasn’t starving though. It could pull without impressing on his physical wellbeing which made sense. If Tom had more to spare, so did his magic. So why was he only noticing it actively in this capacity now? Was it really the exercise? Yes, he already got that point for his excellence, but it felt like there must be something else too. It was as if something instinctual had snapped into place for it to do things in a natural way, and now, looking at it as he was, he got it. 

He was uncertain why he hadn’t realized it before but he had been so focused on plans and learning before. Of course the state of a body had an effect on magic. Strong body, strong magic. Granted there must be other factors for he had always been powerful even half starved, and Craven Dawson, the largest boy of his year in musculature, was extraordinarily weak when it came to casting. Then again Dawson had the mental capacity of a potato. So maybe that was the reason? In anycase, he winced, knowing now that his upbringing did in fact matter. His own starvation, his own weak body, had held back his magic. He was more powerful in Hogwarts, and moreso as the school year progressed, not because he was advancing but because his body didn’t need to rely on magic to keep it from dying. Being well cared for physically freed up his magic to do actual work. It just happened that Tom was also really, really good at magic. As for Dawson, well, he wasn’t sure when it came to them in particular. It was not the same for everyone perhaps? Albus was certainly not the pinnacle of fitness.

So other factors must be in play but he knew now at least one. He also knew his summers robbed him more of just his own happiness. It robbed him of his magic growing as it should and somehow that was much much worse than any broken bones. Unforgivable. He would of course be livid later, plot later, but right now, he took delight in the new extent to which his magic was  interacting with him. He wrapped himself in it and felt warm. It wasn’t a hug. It wasn’t. It was warm though, and once upon a time a littler version of himself would have said it was a hug for lack of knowing what those were.  

It also appeared he wasn’t the only one feeling this way, or affected as he was. True there were only he and a few other students of his class who had reaped immediate benefits from the lesson, but it was an observable amount. He could rely on it as a data marker for study if he wanted. Some like Lawrence Cornwallice, a student from the Non-magical world and a Gryffindor, seemed just a little more than they were before. He wasn’t limping as badly as he had been and his shoulders were just a little straighter. As for the others they didn’t seem as energetic as he was, and as far as he could tell they felt the same as they ever were so he didn’t focus upon them as much. Maybe as time went on that would change and that was by itself an interesting experiment to have. It was exciting. 

He scanned his fellows over the long tables of the great hall. His own plate had been filled with food which was quickly eaten and refilled, he was still ravenous but not in a painful way. It was eating because he could. His eyes picked out several people from his morning’s defense class. It was idle and he was more checking for outward change. Lawrence, the non-magical Gryffindor, noticed Tom watching and timidly waved, glancing about for others of his house. He then smiled nervously and hunched in on himself as if trying to disappear. Tom curiously reached out with his own magic and nearly jolted when he made contact with the other. The kid’s magic was sparking and Tom wondered. He turned his own focus back on the work his magic had done to himself and then back to Lawrence. Himself and then Lawrence, and curiosity got the better of him. Maybe a harmless experiment to kickstart his bigger side study?

If it went awry, well he was already an evil Slytherin, and what could Cornwallice possibly say anyways. “Tom was staring and then I felt odd?” What a ridiculous accusation. Besides it wasn’t like they could prove he was doing anything. Besides, the kid had the backbone of a cephalopod, which is to say, no backbone at all. Cornwallice wouldn’t tell anyone, anything. So Tom made up his mind and made his way to the other when he stood to run from his house table. He joined him at the opening to the great hall, holding open the door for him. 

“Hello Lawrence, could I have a word? It's about this morning’s lesson.” He smiled charmingly, and knew he would get what he wanted when Lawrence colored and nodded. He led them toward the dungeons, knowing well any straying Gryffindors wouldn’t dare follow them there. He started by making idle chatter about the lesson. He complimented Cornwallice’s quick reflexes as that was what gained the boy praise from the professor. It was not a wrong assessment and it was something no one had noticed until it was voiced. Cornwallice was quick with his reflexes. It was practiced. Tom also had those same good reflexes and could only assume what it meant on the other. The limp and all. Tom listened as he continued to get them away from the public eye. He smiled when needed, shifted when it was right. He distracted the boy, but his focus was elsewhere. The sparking magic and just what it was doing to Lawrence’s leg. 

It was nearly identical to what his own power had accomplished, only still in progress from what he could glean from sensing it alone. Tom wanted to know the process better and what better way than hands on learning. It wasn’t his own bone broken but it was a chance to observe a healing process. A perfect chance to experiment. With how many projects he already had, he wasn’t about to let a chance like this, that was so obvious, slip away. He directed his own magic out on a silent command, and eager as ever it jumped to explore. Tom wanted to see it in action as it healed. If only to finally get an idea of what that looked like or felt like. To fix was its directive and Tom made sure it was a clear command. Fix What Is Here. Tom did know he could affect others, break bones, induce nightmares, but he hadn’t ever attempted to fix someone. He assumed it functioned much the same. He hadn’t ever actually cared enough to fix others or ask the how behind his powers beyond what he needed for any given project. Now though it was relevant and he would endeavor to do better. So he sent it out and monitored the progress. Dark tendrils, voided and starlike, flexed into the other boy. He, Tom, sunk and traveled, taking with it what idle magic was in its wake. It guided those reserves of magic to its purpose and upon arriving the two tangled into a cacophony of Tom’s curious dark and Lawrence’s bright yellow into a swirl of glinting small lights in void. Tiny suns added to starfields. Their amalgamation of power dug deep into bone and marrow, finding the old breaks and the fractures that stacked in built up calcium. Tom found it all fascinating but also found affirmation to why those reflexes were so honed. Lawrence had years of calcification over the fractures and poorly healed breaks. He mentally filed that information away, continuing to log the healing process with rapt fascination. 

He felt dizzy for a moment as his magic pushed further and further away from himself into his classmate. More than he had ever expended to break a bone or to command a mind. He hadn’t expected the process to be so draining, or as exhilarating, but it made sense with the extend of the wounds finally being dealt with. He was thrilled with the integration, unaware that could be done, but here they were with their magics combined and he could feel Lawrence’s heartbeat as if it was his own. See as he saw and sense as he sensed. The meld was so natural and something in him soared. He needed to learn something here, do more here. So despite his initial drain he urged more of their union to work, pulling yet more pure yellow magic from vague places and lines that led to other places, to their… whatever this was called. The heartbeat that was next to his own stuttered and Lawrence stumbled. Tom’s chest constricted painfully tight and thudded out of rhythm for a fractional instant. He immediately stopped pulling and their heartbeats returned to normal, to beat in tandem. Their union continued smoothly after that when he understood he needed to leave those be.

It appeared he couldn’t just continue to pull power as he would himself? No. It was something else. That magic was fuelling some process which was necessary for the heat to beat. He thought that too was fascinating and decided to investigate it. There was something that felt inherently right in that thought. He wasn’t sure what but it was right. Whatever it was he knew it would come to him with a gentler touch. Whatever was needed today would come to him. It would be as innate as speaking to snakes or reading minds. If that was the case, what he needed to do was just observe. To listen to what his magic was trying to tell him and to do it. He focused back on his project and let it continue to move at its pace until he was sure they were both stable enough. Then he searched when that was done. He followed the pathways of magic he had been tugging on, focusing this time on mapping the phenomena he was meddling with. The lines lead to bundles of reserves that he had tried to use before hand. They were quite large, significant in their density. It was concerning, and more than a little odd. They were also everywhere. 

Lawrence’s body was a mess. There was no nice way to put it. The leg was the most obvious problem and from what he could tell, the most superficial. He could identify over fifty ‘knots’ with seven being big enough and mired enough in that stupid yellow magic that Tom was unsure how this kid was still alive. They weren’t exactly knots but that was the best way he could describe what he was seeing. They were these lumps of sparking yellow magic that bunched up and around parts of Lawrence’s insides. They had no obvious beginning or end. He focused on the biggest one deep under the left side of Lawrence’s chest. It was pulsing and angry. To Tom’s conflicted realization, he discovered the reason his heart had skipped moments prior. There was a channel of his own magic being siphoned into the mass. It was slow like pulling wool into a spindle; only the strands of his magic being added were fine. As fine as they were though, they were rife with his own energy. Tom wondered idly what it said about himself that a small thread of his magic outweighed the heavy ropes of Lawrence’s.  

Seeing it like this, it was no wonder that healing took so much out of a person. It all was enmeshed and so fine and intricate. It also made sense now why Tom was expending so much energy. Tom felt as drained as he did because he wasn't just dealing with a leg. He was dealing with whatever this mass was. When he tugged earlier, this was what he was pulling from. It was a two way street with Lawrence’s magic prioritizing the internal major, non obvious problem, over the superficial lesser problem. Tom’s directive was to fix what was here. He hadn’t known there was more than the leg and so his magic was being divided to these other major spots. No doubt if he checked the other knots he would see his magic in fine threads working. Their directives matched but Tom was stronger, his magic more than Lawrence’s was, so when Tom ordered it to bend the subservient magic, regardless that it wasn’t his body, obeyed him as the active force. As it was now, with Tom not actively directing anything, it was doing as it needed. This was what he was looking for, he realized. This was what his own magic was urging him to learn and see. This was what natural healing looked like without aid to smooth it out. This meld was important, and the knots important, and the refinement important in this observation. 

It was curious and more than a little concerning in Tom’s opinion as it should be neater than this. He knew it should. There shouldn’t be these heavy knots. It was like stacking bandages one after the other. It was terribly ineffective. Some of these injuries, he noticed, were repeated over and over again. Just like the leg, he thought. All superficial, but some were internal. The kid’s stomach was knotted in several places. It was the third biggest knot, with the fourth and fifth being lower in the system. His attention strayed back to the biggest of the masses and he had to wonder why it was the way it was. He was so wrapped up in it that when he heard the pop of a displaced bone snapping into its rightful place, why, he barely noticed. That being said, he did notice and observed. Now smooth magic, no knot, his own glinting in a smooth wrap as whip quick it broke and set the years of layered bone. Bruising vanished under sparking gold and for perhaps the first time in years, the leg bone was as it should be. It was amazing. It was glorious and something in him felt euphoric in the act of it. It was right. This was as it should be. 

He almost got lost in that feeling but there were still other matters. He wasn’t going to be able to fix all of this today but with the leg dealt with he felt he could at least do one more. There was the biggest knot, the heart knot. He couldn’t leave it this way. He knew instinctively that if he left it, Lawrence would perish. Maybe not today, but soon, it was far too large and inundated with large bulky tendrils. He wasn’t sure if he would get this opportunity to corner the boy again, so he needed to fix it now. He already sated his curiosity beyond what was needed and so he really didn’t have to do more. He felt exhausted, bones it turned out, healing like this was taxing. Yes, technically it was because he was doing double right now, with split power channels inside this guy, but it was still more than Tom was comfortable with. He couldn’t remember the last time he felt this tired from magic that he actively did. He should end this experiment here, take the loss, rest. He could, but there was something about that which rankled him at a core level. He was Tom Riddle and he was no quitter. He was strong enough and he could continue. This wasn’t about Lawrence, he told himself. He didn’t care about him. This was about, well he wasn’t sure what it was about, but certainly not about if Gryffindor Lawrence Cornwallice lived or died.  

He rerouted his power actively, locked down the channels to other knots, and honed his new craft. He surged to the heart where his magic was pulled and spindled. He could feel the tug heighten. His own insides ached as more and more of him was sucked into the growing sun of Lawrence’s chest. Anyone else would have dropped, that was certain, and Tom wasn’t sure he wouldn’t when this was all done. Still, he persisted. On the outside he was of course unaffected. He was still having a conversation although by this point Tom had led them both out to an alcove. He still smiled, still chatted, still kept Lawrence engaged while inside he grit his teeth and stood his ground. Lawrence looked wretched, all pale and shaking. Eyes glazing but trying to stay with him. He wasn’t going to hold out. He was going to drop soon and Tom would likely follow. 

It felt like an eternity. That they, yellow and black, were an eternity. All this happening inside felt like forever, whilst outside it was but minutes. Maybe only ten at most. Lawrence’s magic just took, and took, and fucking took. Tom let it, waiting for something, some indication as to what to do to fix this. Then, when he thought he would buckle, he found it. His power had plowed through the knot to its center, deep in that sun of magic that was keeping everything working, in that heart was something that very much shouldn’t be there. Ichor of some kind that his magic, in all its fine silken might, wrapped in tight cocoons and ate? Tom wasn’t sure what it did with the ichor, vanished perhaps? Could one neutralize substances like that? So why hadn’t it? HAd it been there too long? Tom was unsure but it seemed like the substance, poison, had been there, judging by the state of the organ, a long long time. Years perhaps, He wasn’t sure as he wasn’t a doctor and wasn’t a healer. He would need to get far more familiar with such information to say in this case. He knew bones, he didn’t know this. 

The poison was not the other thing there either, a piece of something, so small Tom couldn’t physically see it, was lodged into the atrium. His magic, refined as it was, could sense it beyond what Tom could see. He may not be able to see it like the knots or the lines of magic in this body but he could feel it because of his small silken strands. That was why Lawrence’s magic was ineffective, it couldn’t change in the way Tom’s foreign magic could. It was why it had pulled and refined Tom’s more capable magic into something else. He observed in wonder as this finer sense, the threads showed him the damages he couldn’t have known of. They wrapped about the foreign object, which meant he knew where it was. He could remove it right now. It was risky and if it worked then Lawrence would be better. If it failed then there was the risk that Lawrence would die. He probably should feel that the risk was sort of a big deal. He probably should have just reported this rather than doing illicit, well probably illicit, magical experiments on his fellow classmate but, when had morals ever stopped him before. Besides with what he was seeing, Lawrence would die eventually to this anyway. To leave it like this would just make that death a longer and more painful one. A waste.

Also, he kind of wanted to know if he could do it. It would be useful to know if he could vanish a heart out of a chest. A part of him argued that now wasn’t the time to deal with this, and certainly not here. He could easily grab a cat or mutt to try that on but another part, the magic part that surged euphoria over his work thus far, argued that it needed to be now. Tom must heal it now. The magic power in Lawrence was already so weak, so exhausted from the leg, if he ended now then this knot which kept Lawrence’s heart beating would fail for sure. Tom didn’t care right? He shouldn’t, but the injustice of Lawrence sat heavy in him. Not in idea, but feeling. Years huh? Years of broken bones. Just like him. Yeah alright fine. Now it was. 

He saw in his mind a flash of memory, a perfect picture of their professor. His eyes were focused on Felston. If a vampire came at him, and the tempus set to 0.56. You either know it or you don’t. His mind argued the cons of this, but his instincts, his magic, needed to fix this. Will and Intent. That made all the difference. This wasn’t about Lawrence or curiosity anymore. This was personal. Years , he thought. Tom bid his magic with the intent to vanish the object and the ichor it was encasing. Just like he bid it earlier to fix. Clear instructions backed by Tom’s iron will. He felt the strands constrict and surge, there was a flash like a nova that was swallowed into his mass of magic and then Lawrence dropped. He would have hit the floor but Tom was prepared, he caught him and eased them into the alcove. His own knees buckled as the weight of his actions finally broke through his stubborn nature. It took all he had just to settle the other boy, even as light as Cornwallice was, and he was so light, too light. 

As if summoned, he felt Mulciber and Abraxas take up sentry to either side of their hide away. Had they been there all along? Yes, he realized. They had but he had been so sucked up in his experiment that he hadn’t looked. No, he knew they had been there the whole time but he also had known they were safe. He squashed the thought away, but it had been nagging at him sometime now. Mulciber and Abraxas were perhaps his closest minions. They knew when to be there, they knew what he needed, and whether he acknowledged it or not they were reliable, regardless of vice. He liked them. He trusted them. Also he was pretty sure neither of them knew what the hell he was doing, talking to Lawrence for ten minutes and now hiding him in an alcove. To them this was a scheme and certainly not, whatever this actually was. 

Tom felt the airy, silver quality of Abraxas cast and knew they wouldn’t be bothered. A Notice-Me-Not spell stretched over their space. A specialty of his. Again, reliable. Abraxas was powerful according to others and was great at charms, which suited his magic. It was delicate but raw, powerful but unrefined, flitting like clouds of hazy silvers and whites. Somewhere in the back of Tom’s mind a thought plagued him on this new magical sense of his. Yes, he was magically sensitive and yes he was adept at feeling out magic, but it never had colors or shapes before in a physical sense, just a mental one. Magic to Tom was usually only feelings and loose interpretations that Tom could sense as if feeling hot or cold or tasting. Visceral senses. This was new. This was like adding a bit more? He realized he had been doing it for the last fifteen minutes at least. 

No, far longer than that? In the classroom he had felt Peverell move through him. It was around then wasn’t it, that magic changed for him? He had felt it as a storm, the rolling density of a squall, tasted lightning on his tongue. He had seen it as the indigo depths which subsumed the walls. It swirled with bright strands of light, refracting and shifting, like looking up from under the surface of the water into the sky. No, that still wasn’t right. That wasn’t what Tom saw. It wasn’t him. They were one right now, he realized. Cornwallice and himself. He could see magic because quite simply Lawrence could see magic. Physically see it as an aspect of the world. It was his talent. Just as Tom could speak Parselmouth or read minds. Huh. That was interesting and useful knowledge.

He turned his focus back to the physical over the metaphysical for a moment to see the ambient power. He saw his own, dark and vast; Abraxas’ snowy and fluffy; and Mulciber’s all red and popping like fireworks. His classmate’s body was rimmed with that sparking yellow sunshine. He felt a little like Mulciber in that way, sparking and active. He could see that magic all the way down into the core where it was tiredly rotating, spooling out like it had done with Tom’s magic at the heart. What was refining there started from the outside in as faded strands which spooled into bright balls of near blinding light, or it should have. What was there was all fragmented, looking more like a stained glass portrait that orbited the pale mass of magic rather than the suns that it should portray. Perhaps now, with some of Lawrence’s issues dealt with, they would be suns again, rather than scraps. Something in Tom felt buoyed by the thought. Something had been made right. 

It wasn’t just Cornwallice at this place though, his own power was easy to see among the orbits, pulled also to the center. It wasn’t the bulk of it. That was still working, having started to instinctually patch the damages to the atrium walls and valves of the heart. These were mere remnants of the main force. That which was spent and required time to recover. It had gathered as it would have naturally in Tom, within Lawrence in lieu of a core to go to. Here it curled about the yellow magic and together they spun. Tom knew that if he left it, it would sink into the other and they would always be… this. This little universe in Lawrence, where Tom and he would be one. Their eyes one, their hearts one. Their gifts, one. Tom knew his own power would subsume the other and what that would do to Lawrence he wasn’t sure. He did know that the idea was revolting to him. The idea of friendship alone was something Tom had issues with. Melding forever was out of the picture.

He was relieved when finally his magic finished with the heart. Tom felt a tug as his power was nudged to a new direction, but he had had enough. He wanted out, he was done with this. He wasn’t about to stay a moment longer and risk melding permanently with the other. He knew his limits and this was it!  He pulled his magic, carefully back to himself. He started with the remnants that swirled, before recalling his own active magic. It all surged back and he felt instantly better than he had been. Not perfect but certainly not as close to collapse as he had a moment before. He could at least get through the day now. He inspected himself, searching for any anomalies and to his dismay there were bits of yellow that clung to his magic, as if desperate to stay with him. He had to gently disentangle it and channel that back to Lawrence to not risk them assimilating. It was not particularly easy or quick. 

He was still in the process of doing that when Lawrence blinked awake. The boy groaned and leaned back heavily on the stone. He glanced about in a daze before focusing on Tom, or around him rather. He’s seeing my magic. No, he is seeing me. The thought alone was, oddly, embarrassing. Like being naked before a painter. He suddenly felt the need to shower or to leave. Too bad he was still ripping out bits of sunshine which he then stuffed back into the other. The other boy was focusing, more and more aware. Tom knew he was going to be caught and sure enough he observed wide eyes following the still open connection between them.      

“Lawrence are you alright?” He asked innocently, deliberately plucking out another blob of yellow from himself and pushing it along that connection. Lawrence followed it before those eyes refocused on just Tom. 

“Um… Y-yes? I, I don’t know what came over me. I- I’m a little dizzy. Did I faint? W-what are you doing?” Tom nodded and smiled wanly. Another bit of yellow. He needed to hurry as it was getting harder and harder to see them the less Tom and Lawrence were connected. Still, he could see them.  

“Yes, you fainted. Mulciber, Abraxas, and I escorted you to this alcove. We had been talking about the class, remember? Then you dropped. I am currently disentangling us, you will need to be patient. Hopefully all went well and you should be right as rain.” Tom pulled the rest of his magic free, feeling an instant relief from his vertigo when finally it was all back where it belonged and only himself. Instantly he was bereft of seeing the yellow of the other boy and while he disliked the idea he was missing a talent, he was glad not to hear that heartbeat anymore. He had debated lying to Lawrence but that would have taken too much energy. The boy could see their magics. He could tell that Tom had done something, and it had to do with him. He was probably also noticing just how bereft he was too. They had been one after all. Not that Tom felt empty per say but he imagined the other would.

“What did you do?!” Confusion, anger, spikes of thought rushed around them. Suspicion and accusation laced the words. He wasn’t exactly wrong to assume so. Again he considered lying but as tired as Tom felt now, he was in no mood to play the games he usually did. Lawrence had seen him in the act anyways so again it wasn’t worth the effort it would take to gaslight him into letting go of the subject as he usually would anyone else. He would go a more direct route to find a fast solution. He was weary of this. First though, he needed to know something about his classmate. Well a few things. He stared into Cornwallice’s eyes, and all of the boy opened in a different way than when Tom was healing him. This wasn’t the body, this was the mind. Thoughts, memories, feelings. All of it smashed open into an array of chaotic mess. Again where things should be smooth, there were tangles. It was a mess.

Tom tried hard to refine it and parse the chaos in his state of weariness. What seemed forever to him was at the speed of thought, and in a fraction of a moment he had what he wanted. The tapestry of Cornwallice was smooth, organized, and right. What he received was perhaps more information than he needed to know but it was useful. What concerned him was how wrong it felt to know it. No, not wrong, just unpleasant. He didn’t want to know it. With Lawrence’s injuries alone Tom could connect the dots. Injustice, something in him hissed. He had assumed a Griffyndor would be treated better. Cornwallice had gone to Albus personally. This should have been resolved far sooner and yet, didn’t Tom know better than anyone what Albus was truly like? How hypocritical the man was. Still, Tom didn’t understand, not fully. He knew why Albus would hinder himself, but Lawrence? Lawrence was no monster. It had to do with control, that much was clear. For people playing the field like Albus that's all it could be. 

Lawrence for all that the world saw him as lesser, had talent and magic. A lot of it from what Tom felt but it had all been tangled up in the boy’s wounds. Lawrence was strong, had the potential to be a powerful caster, but with far less healing talent and a weaker body the boy was unable to heal the damage dealt to him over the summers. Subsequent incidents his house bestowed upon him hadn’t helped him. Rather the circumstances had forced all that power into maintenance. All his magical strength was going into the process of keeping him alive. Or it had been. He was no Tom Riddle afterall so he couldn’t overcome it alone. The one figure that Lawrence had so foolishly trusted, had told him he was being dramatic. Had lied to him. So Lawrence hadn’t sought the help he needed. He hid his problems away as insignificant. He wasn’t lesser because he was a poor wizard; he was simply being held in check. He was lesser because he was a fool. No, he is lesser because someone failed him . Tom thought it even as he grit his teeth internally. Years, he told himself. Years on that bone and in that heart. Injustice , the voice in him hissed again. 

The time away from school had not helped Lawrence. While the kid had a home, it was far from a safe place for him. It was the root of all of this, a jealous squib of a man. Tom fumed on the inside even as he smiled on the outside. He could understand Cornwallice’s predicament, although he refused to sympathize, he couldn’t. They were not the same! Not the same at all!  Still, if Albus wasn’t going to do anything about it then he would. This posed a good opportunity anyways. Cornwallice could be useful and if all it took was this one small feat of experimental whimsy and some understanding to gain his trust then that was what he would give. He was already halfway in anyways, may as well go the full mile. It certainly wasn’t because he cared. Certainly not that. This boy would be great one day. All he needed was a push in the right direction and some guidance in order to be forged into a more suitable state to be of service. It wasn’t about anything else than that. Nothing else at all, he told himself even as he felt the rage boil under his own skin. Injustice. One day he was going to end Albus. Until that day he would thwart every plot of that old fool’s that he came across, starting here. 

“According to either of us, Lawrence my dear. I did nothing. If anyone asks you, that should be your answer. I wasn’t about to let you go another day on that leg and your heart was a right mess. We have a lot more lessons with Fluffy and you will only do more damage to them both the more active you are. I won’t ask why you didn’t get it addressed. I am going to guess Gryffindor stupidity which I don’t agree with. From now on though you should consider it a point of order to take care of yourself. There was a piece of metal in your heart for Merlin’s sake! You would have died. Your health is important Lawrence. This body is the only one you get, do you hear me. I am certainly not going to do this again, so deal with it properly this time.” Tom shifted, watching the tapestry of Lawrence’s mind shift. The thoughts and feelings swelled in bursts of anger, fear, shame, so much shame, and something else something he wasn’t sure had a name for in all the swirling chaos. 

He monitored the forefront of Lawrence’s mind watching all these things spark and fizzle. Like tiny fireworks they popped and faded at the speed of thought. Falling all of them, like tiny raindrops into a dark mire of despair. The boy wouldn’t go to the infirmary, that much was certain. Not without something to push the rest of that disgusting negativity away. What it must be like to lack the force of will, he mused. Still, he needed Lawrence to get proper help. He wanted those eyes at his service.

“Do I need to escort you there myself Lawrence? I will. Prefect’s orders. Unlike your housemates I will not turn away from you and I won’t let this go. You are injured. You are in need. You are a student here. That makes your pain my responsibility. So I look irresponsible to you?” The other shook his head, eyes down and shoulders shaking. He hid himself behind a mask of russet hair as if it could make all of this go away. Make Tom go away. He shifted his weight as if he expected to have to alleviate the pain of an injury, only to find it gone.

“My leg. You… Healed me? Why?.” His face turned up and he locked eyes with Tom. They were wide like little moons. 

“Why do this for me? It isn’t your problem. It isn’t a - You are Slytherin. All of you are snakes, you want something.” His voice was small, weak. Tom hated it, that weakness. He had never groveled or broken even in the hardest of winters. Well that wasn’t entirely true, but he had learned quickly that mercy didn’t exist. Not for freaks like him. It wasn’t like Cornwallice was wrong either. He did want something and this wasn’t exactly for free but still, it wouldn’t do for the other to be so suspicious. He steeled himself for what he was about to do. He rested a careful hand on top of the other’s head, gently arranging the nest of curls that obscured the other. They were oily and not well kept, no pride in it at all. Tom may need to heal his backbone too at this rate. 

“We may not be from the same house but we are Wizards of Howarts. Wizards Lawrence, not Freaks. Not sinners. Not demons or devils. We should take care of one another in times of need regardless of banner. You and I come from, well, let's just say we are more similar than you think if your leg was any indication. The things you have endured and I have endured, others won’t understand. Here though, in these halls Lawrence, we don’t need to endure that. We shouldn’t have to. We won’t. You are a wizard and you deserve more than pain. You can’t learn or grow if all you are doing is focusing on healing. I know it isn’t easy to admit when things aren’t great. I also know it hurts to leave here and know we can’t do shit about our circumstances. We may feel isolated out there, but here is different. We don’t have to be alone Lawrence, not here. We can be better. We can live better lives using this opportunity. We can be more than we were. That’s why I am a Sytherin, a snake as you say, because my ambition is to be more than I was before. It may not be much now, but it will be one day and I will leave that shitty orphanage and never look back. What I want from you is very simple Lawrence, and it's for you to get well. To get help. You aren’t weak for seeking help. You aren’t dramatic or crazy. Please Lawrence, go see Madame Forest.”  Like that, Lawrence broke. The shame, pain, and rage that Tom felt in him, popped and overflowed into the world. He sobbed, loud and ugly sounds. The kid was going to be a wreck, well more of one. Healing was exhausting and now add the drain of crying and Tom was sure the kid would crash. Still, it was better this way. Better to get it over with so he could move on.  Lawrence had held on as long as he could to his suffering. It was time to let it go. Not that Tom cared or anything like that.

He continued to stroke the other’s head, oil sticking to his fingers, until the sobs subsided. Ten minutes, twenty minutes, what did it matter? He did it until the other looked up. The eyes were large, blue and deep with green little flecks, little moons rimmed in red, and swollen from his breakdown. Freckled cheeks that were thin, chapped lips held scars from breaking so often, all of him was flushed red and ugly in emotion. He really didn’t want to be touching him. 

“Hey, there you are.” Tom smiled and brushed the hair away from his face. He helped arrange his clothes. He flicked his wand out from his sleeve, grateful for the yew as it hummed. He loved his wand, more than most things. Still, he rarely used it outside of classes. Wandless was his preferred method but he didn’t have the energy left. He conjured a washcloth, gently wiping away tears and other fluids. Tom could see in those eyes that the fear was sinking. It was replaced with the swelling of inspiration, and he saw something else unfold in the tapestry of Cornwallice. That something feeling again that Tom couldn’t name from before but that was large and bright. Like the sun. Like his magic. There was still anger and suspicion, but all these things were being crushed under the weight of that sun. Good, it belonged there. 

“I…  You said. You said we were alike but I’m not nearly like you. You are Tom Riddle, perfect and smart,” Lawrence gestured, and it was to all of him. Tom vanished the washcloth providing the other with a dry handkerchief instead.   

“And you! This! Everyone knows you are special. I… I am not.” He shrunk, his face turning away to the now empty hallway that was blurred beyond Abraxas’ spell. There was a large bruise on his cheekbone, faded to a yellow. Tom didn’t need magic to know it had been broken recently and magic mended what it could in the current state of things. It was too recent to be over the summer. He reached out, the back of his fingers stroking over it. He felt the other shiver, cheek hot.

“I don’t know about that, Lawrence. I am a survivor, much like you. I know what this feels like for instance.” When the other looked back in incredulity, Tom smiled in the way he knew affected even Abraxas. A slow and wide thing that often caused those around him to feel wanted or seen. Sometimes more. As intended the other’s eyes were locked onto him now. Wide and so, so blue. The other swallowed and it was audible. Tom could almost feel the phantom beating of his heart.

“I live with those that fear magic. My existence to them is one of inconvenience. I am beyond these walls, just another mouth to feed. I have had to fight for everything in my life Lawrence. From scraps of bread to eat, to threadbare blankets for winter. All of my supplies are second hand. I have had nothing in my life that was mine but my magic, and at the orphanage during the summers I have nothing but time since I am not allowed to cast magic. There is nothing for me to do at the orphanage but read Lawrence. Read and think so that is what I do and it means I know the material for classes very, very well. I have had to fight and work my whole life for what is mine and that includes all of what you said. It is kind of you to think that I am all these things, but at the core of it all. I am just like you, a survivor, and you are like me. Am I weak to you?” The other shook his head no, eyes never straying. Tom stepped further into his space until he felt the warmth of the other. His hand fell to rest on the other’s shoulder where he squeezed in reassurance.

“Then you are strong too. Special too. You are clever, quick, and resourceful. Fluffy proved that beyond all doubt that you have what it takes. You are more than you let yourself be and I certainly believe you can be more than you are. We will survive these trials. If you need to lean on me sometimes to get through them, I am okay with that.” It wasn’t a lie. Tom did believe in the potential that he saw in Cornwallice. The kid was powerful, just tied up right now. If being a bit misleading was what it took to get that power working in his favor then he would do that. It wasn’t dishonest per say, just manipulative. There was a snake on his tie and really what did one expect.

“You, believe in me?” The words were firmer and from the tapestry of thoughts the bright light of that something feeling grew and sprouted. It fed off Tom’s words which echoed into the liminal spaces. Silver and quick it grew, tendrils wrapping over hurts and crushing out the doubts. It crushed the darkness of self loathing to dust. For now at least. Enough for Tom to lay the last pieces of his scheme into action.

“Yes. Yes I do. You should too.” He squeezed his shoulder once more before he stepped away and toward his two awaiting allies. Mulciber immediately slipped into his side as if sensing the weariness. The weight was welcome and again he mused that this was perhaps the closest person he had to a friend. If it had been Mulciber or Abraxas in the state Lawrence had been in, he shut down the idea immediately. Darkness swirled behind his heart. He didn’t want to think about that. He would destroy anyone who dared harm what was his. It wasn’t about friendship, it was about possession. Nothing else but that. That is what he told himself at least, all the while threading his arms through his companions’ arms respectively. 

“From now on you can come to me if you need someone to go to Lawrence, or any of mine. They may not be the warmest but they will help you. We snakes can be suspicious of others and guarded so don’t mind the bite of them. They certainly won’t harm you as yours have done. For now, go to Madam Forest. Eat well, plenty of proteins and calcium. Study and work hard. Remember, I did nothing about the whole leg thing. I’m no licensed medi-wizard so, let's not get me in trouble for unlawful healing practices. I’ll see you around Lawrence.” He bid a farewell as his unit slipped from the alcove. He didn’t need to turn around to know the expression of his classmate. He could feel the adoration, even among the white tendrils of that odd power that he for sure should not be seeing. Madrigal did glance back at Cornwallice with curiosity once. Tom shook his head gently and knew that it was for the best to stem any questions for later. Abraxas just nodded that pretty head of his and that was that. Such good friends, er, minions.  

He slipped from them into his own musings allowing the weariness to take him and trusting them to guide him. He spun over the information he just tested and confirmed. The enormity of what he just performed. All the learning and information assimilated into building the base for new projects to be worked from. Medi-magic was one of the few branches of magic wholly encouraged by the ministry. Tom could easily pursue the knowledge on it and build this talent. He certainly would after today, and more than that he would build himself. He went about his day, sore and tired, but satisfied.

It turned out later that he had been, satisfyingly, right as always. He hadn’t been one hundred percent sure before Cornwallice but now he knew for certain. There was definitely more to his sudden growth than just fitness if both himself and Cornwallice displayed it as they did. Lawrence was much weaker than Tom, he always would be, but there was so much magic in there all wrapped up in old wounds. For him to display more when in that state meant something big . He just wasn’t sure exactly what it was.He didn’t exactly have the time to go searching the library for the immediate knowledge though. It had to do with medi-magic as well and that required a recommendation note at the least. He really didn’t think he needed to go that far.

The easiest thing to do would be to ask a professor on the matter rather than thinking in more circles than he already was. Tom had learned very early on that there were a lot of mysteries that were not really mysteries per say but rather so well known that it was assumed everyone just knew them. Which made it very obvious when one didn’t belong if they didn’t know them. Tom liked to belong. Tom usually would have asked Horace Slughorn, his head of house and the Potions professor at the school, about it all but perhaps this would be a good way to get a free lesson from his newest Professor. It would be a good opportunity to ply a little further into the man to figure out how to work him over. Tom was very sure he needed to have that man on his side and the sooner he could woo him the better.

Thinking of it, their professor was incredibly fit by all standards. A little short but built in the way only a person who worked for it could be. The Professor was also an absolute powerhouse of magic. So it was looking like Tom was right on the money when it came to his theory. That physical prowess paired with the control it must take to make all that magic as subtle as it was, and one would get a monster of a wizard. Tom wanted that. Wanted to be like that. Strong, dangerous, and subtle. He was of course all these things already or he had thought so, but there was a gap in power between himself and Peverell that he very much wanted to diminish very quickly. Tom didn’t doubt the man could kill him. He may be more powerful than any student in Hogwarts but Peverell was more powerful than any wizard in Hogwarts full stop. Tom suspected even Albus Dumbledore would be hard pressed to gain any ground with the man. How that must rankle the senile old bat, he thought maliciously. As far as pecking orders went, Hadrian was top dog.

With that in mind any lesson Tom could pry from the man was bound to be fruitful. More than that it was bound to be a complete lesson. Too often had Tom asked about magic only to be told, “It's just how it is.” As if that was an adequate explanation. Be it from Pureblood Supremacy, to how or why a spell was as it was. It was always the same. Purebloods were better because that's just how it is. Magic favors them because its just how it is. Protego functioned as only a shield because that's how it is. It was lazy as far as answers went, and harmful as far as research went. He knew, of course, that most of what just ‘was as it was’, ended up riddled with errors. If not outright wrong. He had tested these common magics where he could. For example, one could alter a protego if one damn well pleased, one could be from the non-magical world and be more capable in magic than an inbred hunk of muscle like Dawson, and one certainly could become more if they just didn’t say things just were as they were! At least Slughorn usually backed up his claims with research. As faulty as such research was, it was at least something and it usually provided a good starting point to work from. Still, it was frustrating that such important issues and parts of their world were just trusted to be right because some addled wizard decided it was how it must be. At least that's how it was in Britain. 

Professor Peverell had more than hinted that he and his classmates were hostages of the political control that the Ministry exuded. Tom knew that had existed, of course he had to know of it. His housemates were heavily involved in the monster that was the ministry. He knew that control of the ministry was tied into the House of Lords and House of Commons respectively, although the House of Lords held dominance with their votes and tended to have more political weight. The votes of their democracy was heavily influenced by these votes which heavily skewed legislature into favor of those from Noble and Ancient Houses. Most of which held outdated and coveted traditions. This meant that knowledge which challenged the hierarchy of those families was dangerous. So it was banned. With the House of Lords having a majority being “Light” based families such as the Potters, the Longbottoms, and the Bones’, it stands to reason they would put more emphasis away from certain branches of magic and certain information which would weaken their position. All was adjusted to suit and the rest was locked away or forgotten. Because their system believed in Light and Dark. Good and Evil. Which wasn’t the true state of the world. Magic was Neutral. He knew that now and knew it was true. It wasn’t just because Peverell said it, but because it felt right and Tom always trusted his feelings. 

Which meant Tom was back at square one in a lot of his projects. It also meant he had, so, so, so so many questions. For the things he thought he knew and likewise for all the things he thought he didn’t know. He could see now the human folly and political edge that colored research materials he had relied on. They were unbalanced. He had known they were, but had discounted just how much they were skewed. While there still might be truth to what he had to work with, he would need to find what those truths were amid propaganda and isolated thinking. For now he would ask Professor Peverell about what his magic was doing, and why. He felt it was vital he knew how to keep growing whatever this was. He would need it to survive the coming summer. Billy had insinuated more than a little what would await him upon his return. Although perhaps, if he got physically stronger… No, he wasn’t a barbarian. Besides, it was a good reason to begin building a repartee between the Professor and himself. He would need to ask a great many more questions in days and weeks to come so he should test the waters now. This tidbit would be a good indicator of what he could expect from the future of. Finding the boundaries of a relationship was important for building them after all. He was optimistic. 

The ending of their first lesson had been wonderful. Sure it had been hard recaps on mistakes but it was backed by possible solutions. That was the difference. Not just that it was as it was, but that there was a ‘how; and a ‘why’ and a ‘how to fix that’. There were spirited debates which admittedly came down to the professor asking the ‘Know it Alls,’ in his own words which included Tom, how they knew what they knew. What evidence did they have? Did they trust the sources they got that evidence from? Why was that the answer? Had they considered other approaches? Which was admittedly very new to all of them. It supported Tom’s assessment that Hadrian Peverell liked curiosity. A good sign for Tom. The man was quick to answer questions, delighted to shatter what he called misconceptions of magic, was ready to give real guidance, and eager to have them find the right answers or to find more questions. He was a patient man in that regard. If there was an end to his patience for questions, they had not yet found it. Granted Tom hadn’t tried in earnest yet to test those limits but he would. 

It was too bad Peverell had disappeared after their lesson and had not been seen again. Not at lunch, not in hallways, not on the fields. So Tom would need to find a way to pin him down or wait until the next lesson. Which wouldn’t be until Wednesday. That was a problem. Tom knew he wasn’t patient even if he fancied he could be. Two whole days of waiting stretched out as if forever in his mind. It was hardly the end of today and he was already chewing at the bit to dig into that well of knowledge. For that’s what Hadrian was to him. A well of power and knowledge. All he needed to do was find him. Until then he had to go through the motions to pretend to be interested in the rest of his classes. It was growing difficult to do that the longer the day progressed. Which was unlike himself and he knew it showed. Blood and Hell he still had to sit through Potions and Magical History. For Merlin’s sake he just wanted them to be done with! For once he dreaded the hours he would be spending over a cauldron or in lectures on what happened in the long long ago of magic. He was tetchy and frustrated and he wasn’t usually like that. He liked to learn! He liked to show himself capable! He enjoyed being the best and lording it silently over his brethren like the looming dragon of dread fury that he was! 

It made him feel satisfied to slap his brilliance in the faces of smug Purebloods. He should be excited to be back in the classes where he could prove them wrong. And yet, how had he never noticed how boring charms could be? Trying at his patience, yes. Redundant sometimes, yes. Never boring though. He had always been ascendant and rising, the brightest student of his age! And now he felt it, he wasn’t ascending anymore. He wasn’t getting stronger by sitting here learning about a spell he knew how to cast. He was stagnating. He was in hell, that must be what this was. He helped Lawrence and died from it. Now he was in purgatory where he had to sit like a pretty doll and pretend to care about the lackluster spells that he had learned already! Sure it was only the first day of classes, and sure maybe he was in shock with all he had done today, and sure maybe he shouldn’t have read ahead in his years text material but what else was he to do over a summer locked in the despair of Wool’s Orphanage but learn them? Sure he wasn’t allowed to actually cast them, but when had that ever stopped him before? 

At least the fifth year Charms book had listed more than what he was taught now. It even seemed mildly better than most editions as at least it offered minor extra insights. The charms  professor, Agatha Burnswith, listed no ulterior uses for anything, never asked hard questions, and how had he never noticed she didn’t care about that?! There were several ulterior uses for the spacial charm “ Engorgaes”. There were also reasons behind it being preferable to the other five known spacial charms, all of which could be testy. If she knew them, she didn’t teach them. Not a single why behind a how. She just rattled off what needed to be known to work and that was it. Then she would sit and let them work on an empty sack while she read some book by that name of “Twin Wands.” Every once in a while she would look up, catch Tom watching, and smile benevolently as he seethed inside. Something like disappointment settling heavy in his gut. Not enough to stem the goodness he felt from this morning though. He would just smile back, something he knew looked sweet. For the rest of the class he mused over a completed spell, if only to pass the time. Mulling over the uses of Engorgaes and perhaps how that could be useful in dealing with Fluffy.

He knew the hows and whys existed, of course he did. Any Ravenclaw worth their salt would and he was better than them. It was hard work but he made sure he was on top. It was a popular joke that Tom should have been a Ravenclaw with how much he studied. It had never bothered him before, the research or the jokes. Sometimes even he wondered if the hat made a mistake and that he should have been a Ravenclaw. It would have been a more peaceful and less complicated life. It was a point of pride the amount of work he accomplished to be the best at what he did. To know the most out of anyone in his year. He even held a begrudging enjoyment working alongside Ravenclaw minds the likes of seventh years Corvus Altweaver and Nelianne Corwick. Which proved he could get along with them much better than some of his own house. It was all such a fun game with time he had assumed had been well spent. He would have made an exceptional Ravenclaw but then he remembered that knowledge without power, or without platform was ultimately useless.

It was why he was a Slytherin. Before he had believed he was Slytherin because he was probably, irrevocably, a dark wizard. A dark wizard who could talk to snakes and that had been a suitable answer. Except that wasn’t right either was it? There was no Dark and Light, no delineation in magic. He was not sorted into Slytherin because he was some dark focused caster. When he put on that hat he was not being judged on whether he hung Billy’s rabbit from the rafters, which he deserved. Or that he made children at the orphanage get nightmares, which they deserved. Or that he put glass in the Matron’s pudding which she deserved. The sorting hat didn’t care about good and evil, or circumstances, or who deserved what. It cared that he had power and wasn’t afraid to use it to get his way. It cared that he was shrewd and cunning to have to survive as he had. It had cared that he had ambitions. He wasn’t sorted into Slytherin because he was bad or dark. It wasn’t a punishment and it never had been. He had been chosen to be Slytherin because he was one. No other reason than that, and that was alright. Not that he had a problem with it in the first place but at least now he knew it wasn’t because he was thought a monster that it placed him among monsters. 

He liked that a lot better than he ever had. Not that others saw it that way. Of course they wouldn’t, why would they? He was used to being seen as trouble or lesser, but at least now he had one less thing to blame it on. He thought of Professor Dumbledore and his coldness. How his eyes followed him whenever Tom entered a room. How the man was ready to deduct points regardless of circumstance. How angry that always made him and how unfair it all was. He was probably right to suspect Tom of something because he was usually up to something, but he hadn’t always been up to something. It had been for survival up to a point and Albus had known that, seen that when he arrived to give Tom his letter. 

He poked at his bag, knowing the space within was stable and easily ten times what it had been. They were idle prods, these motions, as he replayed thoughts of Albus Dumbledore. Tall and resplendent as he had been, there to take Tom away from the misery of the life he had known. He had been a wretched child then, so eager to please and to be wanted. To finally have a place to belong. He could still recall the unchanging severity on Dumbledore’s face when he, a child, admitted he could talk to snakes. Then he thought of Professor Peverell. Would it have been different? He imagined it would be. He too had Tom in his sights, singling him out near instantly, but somehow it was different. Maybe it was too soon to tell for sure and maybe he was again being idealistic. Eager to please and to belong, but it felt different. There was no coldness to the way Hadrian Peverell looked at him. Those green eyes saw everything all the time. If not the eyes than the magic. The Professor knew about monsters and yet he didn’t treat Tom as anyone but a student. He must know of Tom, probably been told by Albus and others of him, but even still, he wasn’t severe or cold.

If anything he was mischievous. He did like to toy around with points but it seemed less to do with malice and more to do with teaching. He took and gave in equal measures, stinging and soothing. He had been so happy to call upon Tom in a way that was backed by some genuine joy, if sometimes playful in the nature of it. There were expectations to do excellent from Professor Peverell, but they didn’t feel like a trap. Not like Dumbledore at all. He was seen and deemed a student over a threat. He felt understood. It was the best way he could put it. Something like that. He huffed and ran hands over his face, through his hair which fell in messy curls. Warm were his cheeks. His chest felt tight. Still, two days to go. Agatha looked up and smiled, he smiled back. She went back to reading, he went back to thinking. Boring. Boring. Boring. 

He wished all his classes were challenging like Peverell’s. He never saw fault with it before. Having to play the professors to eek out more and more knowledge was just part of the game, just like the research had been, it was expected to have to claw out the advantages he needed to get stronger. Never had he considered that he shouldn’t ever have had to need that. He should have been given those tools in the first place to achieve more complicated feats of magic. He deserved a complete lesson and to be prepared for the next one. He felt like a fool, cheated in a small way for all the time and effort he could have put into things that actually mattered. Like figuring out why Engorgaes was useful in the first place besides… oh. Actually, perhaps… It could work…

The day wore on. He just kept thinking in circles about these things. Magic, teaching, spells, ect. Rolling over old perspectives and finding out which ones were right to keep in his newly settling world view. The longer he sat in incomplete lessons, the more unmotivated he felt. The more restless he became. Professors he would have paid attention to were finally seen in a new and disparaging light. Or maybe it had always been like this and he was just, waking up after a long sleep. Thinking of Agatha, Slughorn, and Binns. They didn’t care about the hows and whys of magic, not really. They didn’t care about ulterior uses and what that could mean. They didn’t care about challenging him at all! House points, praises, what did that even mean if they didn’t give him something he needed. Even his next class that day with Albus Dumbledore, who was the closest thing one could get to an interesting, albeit aggravating teacher, seemed to lack the usual spark of malice after his morning upheaval. Tom didn’t even get angry when the professor drilled him to try and catch him unawares. They both knew he wasn’t in it, and while he wasn’t caught being inattentive, they both knew he was elsewhere. He felt those cold eyes on him all lesson. He could see the tightness in Albus’ expression but he just didn’t care. It was concerning how quickly he felt himself slipping. He just couldn’t care to put up the front anymore. At least not today. Not when his magic was questing and he was adjusting to a new skin.

He did still answer questions to perfection, because of course he did. He still smiled and responded in his usual cadence. He still did the work, top of the class as per usual even if Albus wouldn’t ever acknowledge that his box was better than Fleamont’s. They all knew it was. He just didn’t care. Not about the unfairness or the rest of it. He was only concerned with one thing, having a complete lesson. He didn't think he was alone in this either. As the day progressed it seemed more and more as if a stupor took the castle. There was a charged sort of energy that breathed new life into the hallways but also bred a contemplative silence the likes of which had never been witnessed before. Or at least not in Tom’s experience. Students of all ages, the older sixth and seventh years in particular, either walked about without really seeing anything, or in more common cases, like the first years, buzzed with a foreign vitality. It was as if they could not contain themselves or that their magic was so much more alert. Like his. The young ones felt and seemed brighter somehow. The older ones didn’t feel as radically different to Tom, not in the way that the younger ones did, but there was something there. He felt he was watching a moment that would be important in History. Though why, he wasn’t sure.

He passed by his peers and there was an instant in time where eyes locked and thoughts unfurled themselves within his own mind's eye. It was beautiful, like tapestries unwinding, book pages unfurling. Kaleidoscopic lives and thoughts all sprawled before him in their flitting existences. A split second was all it took to unveil entire mental conversations and experiences. All at that speed of thought! This was one of Tom’s many talents and one he kept hidden for obvious reasons. If people knew he could read their minds, they would be a little cagey with him. He had the ability for as long as he could remember. Seeing intents and thoughts in this way had saved him many a broken bone, or an unpleasant stay in the infirmary. It had helped him to get far ahead of public sabotage within his house, to establish power via manipulations and blackmail, and to control social situations by steering thought trains and emotions in his favor. It had also, in the years before school and in the summers, aided him in avoiding the malignant intentions of his fellow orphans. Once, it even saved him from the claws of local traffickers. Perhaps the most common and important use of his gift was that he could tell when someone was lying just by one look. Betrayals, cons, and tricks, were significantly more difficult to pull over on him to put it lightly.

It had been a useful tool over the years, this gift, albeit not always as beautiful as it was here among wizards, but useful nonetheless. Orphans didn’t tend to have nice thoughts or experiences to share afterall. They certainly had no nice things to think about him. The matron in particular was particularly nasty in her memories of him. Of the woman who was his mother. Although that particular set of memories he hadn’t looked into. He couldn’t bring himself to. It was the one thing he didn’t want answers to. He didn’t need a memory to tell him what he already knew. She had been sick, she had been weak, and in the end she didn’t have the strength to live. A muggle with no future. A woman would not love the thing which killed her. He had never pressed the memories, using his gift to skirt around those thoughts to others. He used his gift more to keep himself from being sold off to sweatshops, or to steer the matron away from foisting him off on local priests during the summers. 

His talent had a name of course, which he learned was a talent that was very illegal to possess without a license. It was called Legillimancy and in his case he was what was considered a Natural Legillimens. Legillimancy was the art of peering into the mind of another, reading their thoughts and memories, their intentions, ect. He had learned that mastery of it could even reinvent others through mindscapes, or so it was theorized. He supposed it was true to an extent. He could always make lesser beings do what he had wanted. Cats, rats, and sometimes when he had tried hard as a child, people, could all be controlled or altered. Later when he had gotten stronger, like with the Matron, they could be easily manipulated so long as they were non-magical. Thoughts could be realigned, memories erased or altered to show or say what he needed them to say. Which was by all accounts of society, a very wrong thing to do but in his case very necessary. Not that he cared much of the rightness by that point anyways. Society hadn’t been there when he was starving, or when he was punished, or when he begged the matron to let him out of the dark attic. 

He didn’t particularly care about morality when it came to enemies. To him, enemies were not people. He doubted he would ever see what he did as wrong. Not when it was needed. If he had to reinvent someone to ensure his own survival, he would. He probably could now that he was stronger and older. He could probably do it to himself if he wanted. Erase all the pain. Not that he would. It could be possible though. Maybe not with Legillimancy. He could do it through Occlumency, the art of shielding the mind. He was not a natural at it but it hadn’t been hard to learn. As the opposing art of Legillimancy it was probably the way to go if he did want to do such a thing. With talent and enough intent that is. So, probably doable. He hadn’t ever encountered an Occlumens that was strong enough to keep him out. Albus Dumbledore was perhaps the hardest nut to crack but not impossible, all white noise and static, but not enough to completely block him out. 

Tom couldn’t compel him as he could others, couldn’t erase things or alter anything in that white noise, but it was just a matter of time. He would get more powerful as he grew and one day, if he wanted to, he could peel away that noise. Not that he needed to when he got what was important. He knew when the man was being honest and if he was plotting, and that was all he needed. Maybe not exactly what he was plotting but that he was. Even when the white noise was at its loudest the intent was louder still. Other than Albus he hadn’t experienced another that could pose an issue. Except, no, that wasn’t quite right. There had been an instance, just today in fact. He just hadn’t noticed at the time. Just like he hadn’t felt the magic until it was too late and he was already in the classroom. 

He thought back and it occurred to him, for the first time, that he hadn’t seen or heard anything from Professor Peverell’s mind. Nor had he sensed lies or truth. Granted he felt there hadn’t been lies, but that feeling couldn’t have been from him and it wasn’t the same as sensing them the way he usually did. When they had locked eyes, there was no tapestry. No story, or Kaleidoscope of thoughts. Not even static. All he could see was the green of those eyes followed by that pleased but crooked smile. No noise, or intents, just him looking at Tom. He had known just as sure as he knew the sun would rise, that he was safe. He was safe with Hadrian, but where had that information come from? It wasn’t confirmed by his talents, more a latent instinct. Or something else. Did he get compelled? No. He would know. Right? He would have felt it. Now that he knew the feel of the other he would have known. 

Just his luck the one brain he wanted to pick would be occluded. Then again it fit. Hadrian Peverell was the defense professor afterall. A complete defense, nothing like the open minds of now. He wondered what it looked like in Peverell’s head. Was it as noisy as all those that surrounded him now? Was it all static like Albus? Was it full and flighty? He looked around him at all those small minds that swam past him like fish. They trailed their beautiful stories like streamers, their emotions a bright ebbing flow that leaked about them like currents. He watched them wander lost, and for the first time he felt connected to them. He too felt lost. He could see in them the same confusion he felt and for that they mattered in this instant. They now shared the same experiences he did. He could finally have something to relate to rather than needing to change to suit. Well, not all of them, but most of them. They felt as he felt, saw as he saw. Their thoughts were voided of blood maligned suspicions or childish prejudices. 

Confusion, concern, or even curiosity flashed into his radar. A state of shock that he recognized in himself. Again, he felt understood. It was a new and somewhat frightening sensation. He decided that even if it didn’t last, that it was here for the now and it was good. He wasn’t going to worry about it. Corvus and Nelianne even smiled at him when they passed each other heading for their respective classrooms. Something they hadn’t done openly before. Best not be known to associate with snakes afterall. Regardless if they were Riddle or not. He didn’t know why it was so striking or why that moment was so important, why the connection was good, but it was. Again it felt like a moment in history that was important. A set of weights lifted unseen from his shoulders. Demi moved, shifted around his wrist in warm motions. Metal wasn’t supposed to be warm, but it was. It hissed and he realized he understood what it said. 

“Heads up kid, the staircase is changing.” He paused, feeling the shift, watching the gap he nearly stepped into. The focus of the ambient thoughts around him shifted away. A gentle hand was gripping him on either side. He remembered them then, Madrigal on his left and Abraxas on his right. They themselves were different too like the others, like himself. One more manic than the other because it was Mulciber afterall, but changed nonetheless by their run with Fluffy. In fact, and it would have been suspicious any other day, they hadn’t hexed each other once. He narrowed his focus to them as they descended to the dungeons. He took the time to carefully look into them. Their minds opened, one with a little more resistance but opened all the same. What he saw was a different level of the beauty he was used to. Abraxas, with all his desire stripped back, revealed that brilliantly sharp mind. His thoughts like carved ice, and for once devoid of lewd interferences. Smooth like crystal glass. Mulciber was a mess of chaos as per usual, with his devious attentions pinging like spikes on imagined tactics, creative spellcraft flitted like bats in a dark cave. There was life to his usual malice though, a depth of curiosity that had laid untouched for a long time and that, that was new. That lake of thought was deep and unending and that was useful. Beautiful.

Then both turned, no doubt noticing his scrutiny but unsure what had alerted them to it. People rarely understood what he was doing and he never told them. They sometimes felt it though. Their eyes met and the tapestries shifted. He found he had trouble swallowing, his chest hurt for an instant. He had never bothered to pay attention to what he was seeing. His companions were Slytherins; surely any sentiments were surface level at best. They had their own agendas. He was still a mudblood, regardless of talents and suspected ties to ancient lines. He had power and control, he commanded respect but he was still lower class to them. This had always been the undertones he had seen prolifically in their persons. Abraxas more so than Mulciber. They were just using each other. This friendship was transactional right? So why was he seeing what he was seeing? 

The two tensed. Their thoughts began spiking with growing anxiety, threatening to drown out the golden threads that Tom had found with their vices stripped to the quick. Like they were awaiting a great storm to break upon them. He realized then, that he hadn’t spoken to either of them since the end of their class with the good professor. Not in Charms or in Transfiguration, not even in the halls. How patient they both were with him, how afraid they always were of him. Even after what he found, fear soured the image. 

“I’m not angry.” He started. Although he wasn’t sure why he felt the need to state it. He had long accepted fear was better than most things to be of him. Abraxas smiled, tension sinking and that golden thread flared back to life, so bright, and twisting up like a great tree. Small now, but deep enough that Tom knew there were strong roots. A genuine fondness then. He should laugh at it, feel vindicated that he had such a useful weapon to use. Abraxas really believed they were friends! Him, a mudblood. He should take this and break it before it had time to bloom further. Instead, Tom had to look away, his wrist hot. An arm slung heavy over his shoulder, a weight pressed into his side. He smelled magnolias, spice, and for once didn’t associate it with the girl he knew it belonged to. Right now it belonged to Abraxas. For whatever reason that made all the difference. 

“We knew we’d lost you for a while. You get on a mystery and you go away, gears working in that delightfully sharp brain of yours. We get it of course, he is impressive. He has to be if he is a golden shield. Those are the elite you know, the type they wipe records of when they join. Though why exactly he is here is concerning. If the united consulate of magical countries wished to ensure international cooperation a Red Wand would have sufficed.” Tom felt the other, warm and whole against him, as they walked. He watched the furrow in the other’s brow that aged Abraxas’ expression into a vision of years to come. 

“I’ll go over those once we are out of earshot but I think anyone with standing would believe it odd that the consulate let the International Auror League send a Gold Shield. It's no small thing. I knew of course that something big was happening. There are pressures building over Germany’s current political state, and with what happened in the Americas. There was bound to be some sign of the Ministry poking into families being seen as sympathetic. Father was careful not to speak about it openly but I am very good at being nosy.” Abraxas leaned in closer to whisper. His hair was a silken curtain. Molten gold in the candle lights of the dungeon. It didn’t fall a touch out of place, even as he flicked his wisp of a wand to engage a silencio. Wordless, and that was usually impressive enough for most others to see him as a wizard worth having around. Tom imagined the cosmetic hair charms were perhaps more impressive. He certainly wondered about them now. 

Tom had always allowed Abraxas to be around out of need rather than being impressed. A Malfoy was nearly as impressive as a Black when it came to wealth and political standing, but the Blacks he knew were all in different years. Walburga in sixth with Orion, and Alphard who was a year younger. So Abraxas it was. It didn’t hurt that he could keep the focus of women from Tom, which was becoming more and more of an issue as the years progressed. Now though, Tom was seeing more than he had before. He shifted himself just a little into the other. 

“He had extra wards applied to my things. To the house. To the Vaults. Blood tied I am afraid. I wasn’t even able to get my usual orders from The Torpor without his signed approval. I tried to contact you but the owls returned without succeeding in finding you. One had evidence of tampering so I didn’t risk another. Those he assured me he didn’t have anything to do with. Tom,” There was a hesitation. He was turned to face the other, a hand now on each shoulder. He knew Abraxas was taller, now it seemed like more. The light hit him and it made him glow around the edges.

“I don’t rightly know how to ask this. If it’s not my business I understand and I would hope you would tell me outright. Owls don’t just not know where to go, Tom. It requires Anti-owl wards at the least to redirect them and lets face it you live with muggles. In an orphanage, and you never talk about it! Only today with… but its okay you don’t need to, of course, if you don’t want to, but… I had thought something had happened to you. I had heard some things after the owls had returned and I…” He bit his lip, handsome features twisting for a moment into something Tom would have disregarded if he couldn’t now see the glaring sincerity in it. 

“I can’t do much for you, I realize that. Sure I can be a good resource for you here, and I have connections I can work with while we are here. I can protect you in these halls as well as any ally of the family regardless of what my Father would agree with but outside these halls I am useless right now. Against Lords established, If I can’t send you things, if I can’t protect you, then what good am I? This isn’t coming out right. I- I tried to go look for you but I have never been to Muggle London. I was caught pretty quickly. I played it off as seeing Rosaline Adder, you know the brunette from Arithmancy. So I got away with it. You just don’t know how relieved I was when I saw you on the train. I thought maybe I –” He would have said more but the rest of their peers were joining them. The noise of them ending the whispered conversation. Abraxas stepped away, hands sliding into pockets. He felt so far away so suddenly. He didn’t like it. Tom didn’t have time to miss the warmth. 

Slughorn's door opened, and Potions for fifth year began. His friend never did finish what he was trying to get at. Now though, Abraxas’ incessant clinging since term start, and even the odd way the Blacks tended to swarm him made more sense. They were worried, about him specifically, although about what regarding him specifically he did not know.  He wasn’t sure what to do about it. He wasn’t sure what he needed to do about it, if anything at all. Not now that he knew Abraxas below the mask of his usual sexual fantasies. It was useful of course, this connection. Still, he was at a lack of where to go with it. If he wanted to do anything with it at all. It was one thing to have a relationship based on mutual transactions. Those were easy to maintain and required little effort. They made sense. This type of relationship was new though. It felt like more and he didn’t know if he could give it more. He decided to focus on the other more glaring piece of news Abraxas had laid before him. Someone was preventing him from getting mail. He had a strong inkling that he knew exactly who it was. The question wasn’t even why, because of course Albus Dumbledore would strive to make his life harder. Keeping him locked away, preventing more influences to him, dogging his plans. Sabotaging Tom was just something that man did. This was a new level of low however, even for him. Tom wondered if it was even legal. 

He should be angrier about it, he should be but, but Mulciber was purposefully hexing that Hufflepuff Croft boy that pushed Tom down the stairs in third year. He kept nudging him whenever he did it. Making sure to break whatever train of thought he had to very purposefully add a tally where Tom could see atop a parchment. It should have been annoying, should have been enough to make Tom lash out. If not for that thread he saw. Roots. They did say dogs knew when to be supportive. Unlike Abraxas, he didn’t need to stew over anything to know he was keeping Mulciber. Wandless and Wordless, and all his. By the time the lesson ended, Croft was whisked to the infirmary for the many singing lesions on his person. They could hear Waltzing Matilda get ever more distant and Tom decided he didn’t feel angry at all. Not when Mulciber looked so damned pleased with himself. Smiling on Mulciber never looked nice, always literally sharp, and more than a little menacing to anyone it was directed to. Crooked with sharpened teeth that the boy filed on purpose. It was absurd. To have all that menace directed for his own benefit, to make him feel better, meant Tom didn’t mind as much. He smiled back, his shoulders lighter still. 

“You got enemies, I got hexes.” Mulciber laid it out flat, in that smoky voice that sounded so much like gravel over whispers. Scary for most, but to Tom, he knew it was because of a lesson. Mulciber’s father once tortured his children so they would know how to stave off questioning. Madrigal survived, but his vocal chords didn’t fare well. While Madrigal did not go as insane as his sister had, he hadn’t done much to stem the commonality of that thought. Very few knew Madrigal was sane, and most only knew he was very dangerous. 

“Abraxas may need to be subtle, but I don’t.” As if to prove the point, Mulciber starred down Aliaene Macreerie, Croft’s girlfriend. She flinched and hid behind some others who glared. Tom sent them a look of apology, leading Mulciber and Abraxas away with gentle hands. Neither Mulciber or himself ever admitted to friendship. Neither of them outright said what they meant. He doubted they ever would. As a Slytherin one learned to read between lines. The sentiment was there. The golden threads of loyalty were absolute. He could see those now. 

“Thank you Mulci.” The smile he received was stored in Tom's memories. One of the few that existed in that space. Right alongside seeing Hogwarts for the first time. He didn’t think any more about it than that. He linked arms with his friends and for once, the idea of calling them friends, felt right.

That evening the food at the great hall tasted better than ever. The hot chocolate was divine. Rich and salted with just enough mint to make it sing. It would have been the best meal he could remember having, what with being sandwiched in between a vibrating yet happy Mulciber and a touchy but pleasant to look at Malfoy, but it was missing. The high table was lacking a space, like a wound without stitches. He would have liked to see Peverell. This morning was starting to feel like a dream and it would have been nice to know this insanity he was experiencing was backed by reality. Albus Dumbledore must have noticed him looking, or perhaps he was always watching Tom. The latter was probably what it was. The look he sent Tom was so sharp it would have made lesser children flinch. An intent was swimming in that white noise. Some intention that he couldn’t unravel but leaned toward the idea of protection. From what, he did not know. Not knowing was becoming a common theme of the day. He was getting sick of not knowing. 

His wrist burned hot. The serpent about it moved, the tail rattled and it slipped up his robes to his neck. It hissed into his ear, words only he understood. Sybillant and tin laced in its intonation, it recounted a cryptic warning. “He intends to keep you from darkness. Fix what mistakes he wrought. Not another one, he says in the late of night. Yet he sees in you what he saw in him so long ago, and it frightens him more than he knows. He plots, tries to isolate the instances, the influences, but what can he do with a child who runs towards fire. Already in the fire. What can he do when he makes things so much worse. Good intentions but too late to make change. Watch for subtle tracking wards child, do not accept food or drink from him, and whatever you do… Never be alone with him.”  

If he heard the warnings, he made no movement to give it away. Instead, he looked away from cold blues and instead smiled seeing Rosier and the Blacks as they joined the table. They too seemed so smoothed out when he looked. Imperfections skinned back. That's what it was wasn’t it? He shook himself from the thoughts. It was time to be present and whatever dread and anger existed when he felt those blue eyes on the back of his head, well that could shove off for right now. He felt Madrigal lean heavily against his side. His chest ached and he reacted before he thought better of it. He placed his hand over his friend’s knee. Squeezed once, then let go. It wasn’t like anyone would see. He made small talk, spoke of what their lessons entailed, tried new foods, and in general enjoyed his hot chocolate. He decided that at least for now he should enjoy this moment. Besides, hot chocolate never tasted this good. 

Now to just get through two more agonizing days. 

Turns out he didn’t have to wait that long. Tom Riddle was afterall, a prefect. His duties as such were many, mostly patrolling halls after curfew for a while, helping younger students study, and in general being a liaison between professors and his own. He was responsible for the protection of his house from the other houses as well, but this was ultimately an unspoken expectation. The latter hadn’t mattered before. Sure he wouldn’t just overlook the suffering of Slytherin students, not when he had a facade to keep and they were right before him, especially the young ones. However, he wouldn’t go out of his way if it firstly didn’t benefit him and secondly if they deserved it. Today though marked the beginning of a great many things he had decided to change. He belonged here. That wasn’t something that had been decided by people like he thought, but by magic. Hogwarts was his home as it always was, but if he belonged because magic dictated it, then he couldn’t pretend the other students didn’t as well just because they were useless right now. Now they mattered a little more. Not much more, he told himself, but they mattered and that was the biggest concession he could make on that. So when he later parted with his companions, after homeworks had been completed and first years seen to bed, it had been his intention to make sure he was properly doing his due diligence. This year, he vowed, not a single Slytherin would suffer when he could intervene. With this in mind he stepped into the darkness of the halls.

The dungeons were always cold and only grew more so when the winter months set in. The air was stale, and there was a distinct lack of sunlight. Where towers held grand windows to let in light they had small wretched things that led out, like portholes of a ship, to the lake. Sometimes, on particularly bright and clear days, rays poked through the thick frosted glass and rare natural light would shine off the polished obsidian works wrought secretly into hewn blocks. Those days were rare however, and so rarely did Tom see the geodes or patterns. Otherwise, it was dark, lit only by the burning wicks of enchanted sconces and chandeliers of wrought iron. It was as far as dungeons went, exactly what it was intended to be, which was a prison. For what in this day and age, Tom could not say for he doubted the rooms were in use now save for bullies or for trysts. Once, when there had been magical wars, they had seen their fair share of use. He and every Slytherin knew this to be true as The Bloody Baron was not the only ghost that haunted the halls of the depths, merely the one that kept the maligned ones at bay from the students.  

At least twice a year a curious snake would wander too deep. They would find a room and ignore their instincts, or be lured in through various trickeries. Usually the Baron found them before serious injury occurred and ordered the head boy or girl to accompany them for retrieval. Sometimes, it was a little late. Blackened fingers, possessions that led to self mutilations, and persistent mania followed the unlucky. Granted there were worse things than ghosts which awaited those of his house. Tom liked to think it was a house only few could survive in. Still, sometimes he had to wonder why Salazar Slytherin took the dungeons for himself. It was a rather miserable place. Even without ghosts there were so many in his house that feared the darkness here. That was in part due to Tom’s own handiwork in the past years but it was more than that. An issue rooted outside the house, but inherent in its selection. Afterall, one didn’t gain a will to survive from a happy life and a shelter did not a home make. There were children here with haunted eyes long before they were dumb enough to run into the maws of ghosts. It must be very nice for those in high towers with their bright and sunlit windows to look down and judge those lost in the unseen spaces.

Tom didn’t mind the dungeon of course. He had long stopped fearing the darkness. Not when real monsters roamed free in the light. Still, even he would have enjoyed the warmth of the day for comfort at times. He would have liked such now. There was this feeling that dogged his steps. It was a paranoia he couldn’t shake while he walked the corridors. It was like a creeping vine snapping at his heels or like the silence half an inch from a knife strike. Hairs rose on the back of his neck, his hand twitched to his wand. Something was coming. Something was searching. It wasn’t ghosts, those stayed far from Tom. This was something else, and it was dangerous enough to provoke his instincts to rise as they only did when he was in peril.

Easy , he thought to himself. It isn’t targeting you, whatever it is.  

Still, best to beat feet. Except he could not simply run away. There were no doubt stragglers of his house down here. Those clandestine meetings that were too secretive to be held in the common room or dorms. He took from his pouch a small set of papers. One for each the head students, his prefect counterpart, and the Baron. He whispered a warning into it, knowing well the Baron at least could find his wayward mates faster than he could. The instant they had their designation, they folded into elegant cranes. They spread their wings and soared off. It was no more than a messaging magic but it seemed enough to spark attention. The weight of that searching presence zeroed in upon him.

Nevermind, it isn’t paranoia if it's true.

He turned into a series of corridors known to the snake house as the Labyrinth. For good reason. The halls all boasted the same portraits, same long winding ways, and the same lack of portholes although their spaces were draped with heavy curtains. If one were to get to the Slytherin wall, they would need to pass through here first, unless they knew the proper fifth floor stairway. Tom knew the ways by heart and had led more than a few pursuers through them. He wound his way through them, yet the feeling persisted. He was being stalked. He was about to turn right at an intersection of these sibling halls but that way too felt oppressive. Then he turned left and that too felt dreaded. A look behind him showed no movements, no distortions in space although the light was so dim he doubted that would be much indication. He subtly enhanced his hearing, no footsteps, but there was something. He faced back to the T section he was at. No left, no right, no back. There was only the heavy drapes where a porthole would not be, and the iron wrought chandelier ahead.

He drew his wand, the yew humming under his fingertips oddly. He noted it but his instincts came first before inquiry and right now they screamed at him to run. He obscured himself, slipped behind the drapes but changed his mind at the last second. He didn’t have time to put plan A into motion, but plan B could work. Depending on what his pursuer was, who it was?, he would have three routes of escape. He waited, the feeling grew stronger, a pressure so intense he felt his body being crushed under it. No, his magic was being crushed under it. Tom had almost drowned once. It had been a rare occasion to visit the seashore. Dennis and Amy had lured him away to see a pool of starfish. He remembered looking over the edge of the pool before Dennis pushed him in. The water had been so cold he couldn’t help the breath that escaped him when he hit it and went under. The pool had been very deep and the sides had been sharp, overfilled with barnacles and mussels to the point he couldn’t climb out. He had tried of course. He had cut himself to ribbons. The cold, blood loss, and exhaustion had pulled him under. It was only sheer will and luck that he found a water snake and followed it to air. He remembered feeling like this then, the pressure of the water squeezing him, the cold and dark of it, the fluid that filled his lungs. 

He waited, just as he had waited then while sinking. He watched the darkness, the halls, the position near his own. A cracking like a whip sounded as if from three directions, no, it was from three directions. He felt the air displaced under him and the curtains and wall where he had been seconds before were decimated. Then repaired themselves as if nothing ever happened. There was a whistle. Low and impressed. Tom squinted his eyes, aiming into the space where he knew it came from. All he saw was green. 

“Nice, Mr. Riddle. Here I thought for sure you would take the old, cubby behind the stone trick. Points for quick thinking, concealing one's presence, and for creativity. Sticky shoes was the right play. Although,” Gravity shifted, his shoes unstuck from the ceiling, the chandelier hitting him as he passed. A quick Leviosa saved him from the brunt of the damage. 

“You really should have struck when you knew I was here. Or maybe not. The environment was a nice touch, I could see how it would be useful. Everything is the same and disorienting. That would typically work on students and some adults. So long as they don’t already know.” Hadrian Peverell loomed over him, smiling wide and bright. His nose had little wrinkles near the tip when he did. His long hair blocked out the diminished light making him seem more menacing than he was. A hand, strong and sure, pulled Tom right, patted his shoulder, and returned Tom’s wand to his holster. He didn’t recall ever losing it. He took a moment to blink owlishly, then look at the mended wall, then back to the man. The professor wore robes, unfastened and slipped down to the elbows. Black thickened hide, the same uniform of earlier in the day, adorned underneath. 

Tom had no words, the magic still a gripping and squeezing coil about him. He had no doubt that his professor knew where he was from the start. Had he meant those hits to land, they would have. His heart hammered in his chest and there was a tremble to his fingers. He clenched them tight, pushing away the fear that choked him. 

“Sir? I, What are?” His words came out low, croaking almost. He felt so cold. 

“Aw. Mr. Riddle, did I scare you?” How a man could sound so cheery and feel so vast was beyond Tom. His professor was smiling, beaming, at him. He made to respond, His mouth opening to say anything, but no words came out. His vision was blackening at the edges, the world was tilting. He was shivering. That smile faded, the face falling to a look of concern. 

“Tom? … om…m…” Words were being said, he could see them. Like a slow reel of film on a wizarding picture. Then things went black. 

“Tom!” A sharp pain sent him gasping. His eyes flew open and he breathed greedily. The first image he saw was green. Then an upside down face contorted with concern. He felt leather clad hands on his cheeks, thumbs soothing the edges of his eyes. A warm body under his shoulders and head. He was okay, he was alive, he wasn’t drowning. He was safe. That face smiled, slow and steady, carefully. It almost looked fragile. 

“Hey there kiddo. Welcome back. Can you take some deep breaths for me?” He did. One and then two, a third in rhythm with the thumbs easing the sides of his face. He wondered how he got this way, then it came rushing back. He tensed but felt no pressure, just that subtle all around tide that was Hadrian Peverell. 

“You hunted me.” He stated bluntly. His professor winced at his accusation but shrugged looking away. He narrowed his eyes into a glare at his professor. There was no anger behind it. He really should be angry but instead he felt oddly calm.

“Yes, I knew you would catch on. I wanted to see where it would lead. Your spirit is so dense, your reflexes and intuition sharp. I wanted to test your limits. Perhaps even coax out a bit of your rumored ruthlessness. I wasn’t aware you would respond as badly as you did. For that I apologize. I did not intend any true damage to you Mr. Riddle.” Fingers continued to sooth, and the words, while usually empty on most people, felt full. He felt them to be true in a way different than legillimency would provide. He had known of course before his fit, that Hadrian Peverell had zero intention on murder, even harm. If Peverell had wanted him dead, he would be. He relaxed into the warmth below him, the Professor’s lap, his mind assessed. 

“I know. I don’t know why I– I don’t usually panic, professor.” The idea Hadrian could find him weak was somehow much worse than being hunted. Maybe that was why he wasn’t angry? 

“No, Mr. Riddle. I don’t see you as the type that does. I would assume most students wouldn’t even sense me coming, or if they did, would indeed panic and do something stupid. You though, you my dear sir, made a plan. Two! You tried to juke me out. I am impressed, still dead if this were a real hunt, but I am impressed nonetheless. I knew you would be an interesting one.” That smile was back, there was pride in it. The eyes sparked with a mischief that belonged there permanently. Something in Tom relaxed upon seeing it. Hadrian shifted out from under him, holding out a hand that Tom took without hesitation. Warmth in the cold of the dungeons. He was pulled for the second time that day to his feet. 

“What do you say Mr. Riddle, as an apology for spooking you so terribly, that we go hunting? There are according to my calculations twenty eight students out after curfew. Five I want to catch right away! All I want caught by the end of the rounds. What do you say? If we are going to get it done we need to put a wiggle on it Mr. Riddle. Charlus won’t be in flagrante delicto much longer. Besides, didn’t you have questions you needed to ask me?” The other was already walking away, through the Labyrinth towards the staircases that would lead to the Gryffindor tower. He was surprisingly quick and Tom had to walk briskly to keep up with him. 

His senses still stretched out, picking up the magic that overwhelmed him so heavily but now rested calm and restrained like a damned up lake. When he poked at it, It poked back at him. Like a lion tapping its cub. The same force that had subsumed him before. Deep and Vast. Hadrian must use his magic as Tom did, to sense things in the world. It was why he knew where Tom was without sight. Why he could track him as he did. He had no doubt the other could sense and ‘see’ much more than he could, and Tom could tell lots of things in a wide vicinity about his person if that was any indication of its proficiency. Hadrian had so much more and Tom wondered, for his own sake, what the range was on it. Enough to get to Gryffindor tower from the dungeons apparently, which would make sneaking up on the Professor much harder, although curiously he didn’t feel it extend beyond them as they moved. So either the Professor felt them all out earlier and singled out Tom, or he knew because of something else. Regardless he didn’t doubt that there would be a significant amount of students caught tonight. He also doubted they would feel the Professor coming as he did. It was nice to be above the pale, even if he was still caught himself.

“Are you going to hunt them like you did me? I don’t think it will be nearly as fun for you. Most in the school are not magically sensitive like I am. They won’t know you are coming.” They passed the archway to the first set of rotating stairs and Hadrian hummed, his magic stirring about him. Green eyes slid to him, the spark in them glinting ever brighter as his smile turned sharp. The corners twisted and something in Tom’s stomach slid painfully into his hips. He straightened without thought and even though he knew he was taller than his teacher, he felt so much smaller. 

“Why Tom, my dear student, you are correct! It is unfair for them to be so disadvantaged! I should teach all my students equally and that does mean tailoring the lessons to their appropriate level. How to make it fair? Ah. I know.” From the wrist of Hadrian’s right hand extended a wand. Light, near red, and slender. His own wand hummed again and he wondered what that meant. There was an elegant twist, words unuttered flitted into the world. Hissing whispers and he realized it was Demi telling him the spell exacted.  Expecto Patronum . 

Light, ghostly and blue, swirled and amassed into a great beast. Four hooves, slender body, skeletal face and wings. A Thestral pawed the ground snorting as it searched for grass that would not be there. Its head lifted when Hadrian offered a hand, the snout fitting into it affectionately. Then it shook its head and eyed Tom. It huffed into his hair and Tom could swear he felt air where there was none. He swore he could hear the distant wailing of a woman, a dreadful laugh, and the multiple voices of laughing children.

“I want you to track the students not wearing this pin and relay to them a message. Except for Charlus Potter, Dorea Black, Evian Fortesque, Septimus Weasly, and Ignatius Weasly who you will track down and relay the second of the two messages I am asking you to relay. The first message to the majority is, “You got caught. Bad Luck. Negative 4 survival points and 10 house points. Also, Detention with me on Saturday. Love, your favorite Defense Professor.” The second is, “Wow, caught with your pants literally down. Negative 10 survival points and 30 house points. Detention with me on Saturday, and perhaps we need to have a chat on ‘protection.’” Alright, off you pop. Make sure to go through walls and make it as harrowing as you can. Let this be the last and only time I need to remind them of rules.” The beast snorted and slipped away, the ghostly presence of it leaving behind something like the scent of a lightning strike and again the sound of a woman screaming. The professor looked delighted, which was admittedly horrifying in its cheer. 

“I never knew one could use them as messengers. Patroni I mean and I was under the impression they are supposed to feel…” What was he to say? That they felt good or brought warmth? “Good. Yours was screaming, is that normal?” 

“Great messengers actually. More than just guarding from Dementors and Lentifolds, a Patronus has many uses. Primarily, in messages and proving identity. Although, even that latter one could be suspected as a Patronus can change throughout one's lifetime. For example, mine used to be a Stag like that of my father before me. It's why I call it Prongs. As for feeling. I suppose they should . They are made up of good memories to most. Powerful but happy memories. The birth of a child, the first time one falls in love ect. ect. So in theory they would feel warm and bright to most. The truth is a little more complex than that and like most magic is subject to interpretation. A Patronus is made of one's most treasured and powerful memory, usually something life altering. Be that love or happiness, or something else altogether. Whatever it is it must be something unshakable in the face of total despair. Regardless of memory type. Dementors, it is said, feast on one’s worst memories, but the truth is also more complex than that. They feast on despair. The likes of which can also be born from good memories. Life events can drastically alter the tonality of a memory. Loss can taint the memories of those left behind as they miss the people who have departed. Love which is said to be good can be the most painful memory one has and bring about the most despair. Why? Because love, Mr. Riddle, is an all consuming thing. It creates powerful bonds and when severed or betrayed can cause significant damages. It is a catalyst as well as a destroyer for whole lives. Some wizards in Azkaban remember their love’s because it hurts them the most. Likewise some survive Azkaban as long as they do because they love. For it they suffer and survive in equal measures. 

“Contented people can sometimes never cast Patroni, for if they never suffer they can never know despair well enough to have something substantial in the face of it. Or something like that. In anycase happy memories just won’t do the trick when by themselves in most cases, and even the most miserable people can produce a Patronus where happy ones can’t. I once knew a miserable man, lost all he ever loved, abused his whole life, was bullied and forced into a life of lies to protect some kid he hated, and yet he had a pretty strong Patronus. A Doe. Brilliant man if not a dunderhead when it came to love. In the end Mr. Riddle, all that is required is power and a transformative powerful memory. Something life altering enough to unbalance despair and absolute enough to face it down. Some may say that’s the first time they realized they loved someone, or the first time they won a Quidditch match, or even the first time they realized they were magic. In my case, I am a bit of an outlier as in most things.” He shifted, whistling as they continued. Happy in his walk. Screams emitted down a hallway and a tally counter appeared in golden light. One, two, three. Tom wondered if the professor was indeed evil but scoffed.

“Yours had a screaming woman in it.” He stated and his professor shrugged nonchalantly.

“I am an outlier in many things, much like you. Next question Mr. Riddle.” He thought about it, all the things he had wanted to ask. Walking as he was now, with the rampage of his Professor’s Patronus, it seemed so small suddenly. Something however, some feeling in him, told him to ask anyways. Nothing to do with knowledge was ever small. 

“You said physical fitness was important. I get why it would be. Outrunning dangers or being capable of fighting physically makes sense when it's needed but, is there a reason why someone would feel stronger magically from being fit over not fit?” Their movements halted abruptly. Tom could feel the other watching him intensely. He wasn’t sure why but it felt important suddenly for him to be very clear and truthful to his professor. The magic, dormant, swelled as if breathing. A tide was rolling in. 

“What a curious thing to ask. Are you telling me Mr. Riddle that you as a fifth year student do not know the fundamentals of your own magical body?” There was a sudden silence about them, like a bubble. Portraits around them fled their scenes to other spaces. 

“No sir. I know there is St. Mungos and various medi-magic fields but that most of those arts are taught outside of the curriculum. Is that a problem sir?” Tom watched carefully as his professor blinked owlishly. His focus shifted as if thousands of miles away before returning when Tom called to him. There was an intensity in it that Tom realized was always present only it was usually masked with mischief or excitement. All the latter had been stripped back now and all that was left was cold rage. 

“For you. Yes. Mr. Riddle, indulge my curiosity if you would be so kind. I have a gut suspicion that I want to check on. Have you ever had a medi-witch or wizard give you a full check up before? I am not talking about being sent to the infirmary for injury but for purposefully sitting down with your practitioner and having inoculations or a scan? Maybe a talk about what is to come when puberty hits? It is of course your medical history and you are not obligated to even tell me yes or no. This is your right as a minor and as a magical citizen. I want to make it clear to you that telling me any information regarding your health is your decision and I will not be disappointed or angry or maligned if you tell me to kindly fuck off.” He wasn’t sure what to tell him. He didn’t know what the right answer was to these questions but he did know that lying wouldn’t get him far. He thought about it. Time slipped by, just the two of them, no portraits or wayward students to intervene. He wondered why Hadrian felt so intense about this. There was something here, something that the other knew that he didn’t. Something Tom knew was about to be unpleasant to find out. 

“No Sir. The only medi-witch I know is the infirmary witch. She treated me for several curses through my first three years but to my knowledge I was not, scanned as you put it.” The space felt tighter, colder. There was a tightness to the Professor’s lips, a furrow beginning in his brow that Tom couldn’t help but find fascinating. 

“And have you, Mr. Riddle, spoken with your Magical Guardian about any medical needs you may have need of? Have you discussed with them the curses you endured? Again you are in your full rights to tell me to fuck off. I won’t be angry, or disappointed, or maligned to you if you exercise these rights. They are yours to exact as a magical citizen of Britain and as a minor under the ministry statutes.” He shook his head, words unable to come at first. Coldness, anger, betrayal, the unfairness he felt sinking in around his edges echoed out in the hollowness of his words to follow. 

“I was not aware I had a Magical Guardian Sir. I am unsure what that means for me.” They were slow to come, these words, molasses through the hardness of surfacing emotions. One more indignity he had to face. One more thing he was denied. The walls rattled, his eyes burned. He knew of course what Magical Guardians were. They were those that watched over those of family lines while away from their families. Or when they were orphaned but apparently not for him. He felt a hand on his shoulder, the weight of an ocean upon him. It wasn’t drowning like before but he raged against it. He was lured to a steady shoulder, he grit his teeth. There was the smell of summer rain, of pines, of something powerful like a lightning strike. 

“Then we shall rectify this injustice starting tonight. I am no Medi-wizard, but I do know a significant amount about the importance of balance. Especially in regards to the soul.” There was a certainty in it and when he looked into the green that he saw, he saw that rage and realized it was not directed at him. It was for him. 

“It will not nearly be enough to make up for years of neglect but let this be the start. Let’s answer your questions on the body and magic first, then we will schedule you in with a Medi-wizard post haste. This Friday and no later. To answer you, we observe the Three Tenants of Wellness. The Mind, The Body, and The Spirit or Soul if you will. This is common knowledge and usually taught at a very young age then forgotten or neglected as one ages because people are inherently lazy. When all three are in harmony you observe a long lived and powerful witch or wizard. A strong mind means strong control, a strong body means a strong vessel, and a strong soul is equal to strong will.” Tom was led to a nearby alcove where his Professor began to scribe, in that terrible handwriting, the tenants. 

“These three core features are the cornerstones to the growth of magic and casting of magic. From these you get your Passives and Actives. That is to say your Passive Intent and Will which is tied to the spirit or soul, and your Active Intent and Will which is tied to the Mind. If you remember the core of Magic is Will and Intent. Your Actives are what you are aware of putting out. This is active casting such as a protego or patronus . It is inherently tied to your mind. A strong mind, intelligent mind like yours Mr. Riddle, can brute force magic through actively willing and intending effects so long as it has the magic base strong enough to back it up. A strong spirit, or soul, is responsible for the overall growth of magic. Your soul is part of what makes or breaks you as being magic. It is unarguably the most important asset you have as a wizard and is dictated in strength by constant growth and care.

“When we are born Mr. Riddle, we have a slate that is blank. No experiences that shape our natures. We are small. Without any passive resistances or awareness of our magic. As we grow and gain experiences it gives context but also hones our instincts and thus our natural passives. Touch a fire and get burned? Well now we know better and so on. Older Wizards are often more powerful, not because of active magic, but passive magic. Resistances and Reflexes that passively happen in response to dangers we know about. The kind you and I use to sense and respond to, and don’t think I didn’t notice. Passive magic is rooted in what we have accomplished or endured. As we age and gain more and more of those experiences. Our souls gain weight. The more weight or endurance we face, the more powerful we become passively, and the more resistances and natural defenses are active in us. You Mr. Riddle have a concerningly strong set of passives. It is not a bad thing necessarily, but it is… telling. I too had a weighted soul at your age, and my experiences were, well, they were not good.

“None of this means anything though, if the body is weak. The body holds us, is the vessel from which we cast. Without it, we are no better than wraiths, without the ability to act actively to things about us. One of course can be okay with a Strong Soul and Strong Mind like you, but if you are hindered for example by sickness, or injury, or malnutrition, then you will not be as strong as you could be. Ideally, we want all these facets of us to be strong in order to achieve our potential, but when one slips out of place then we get an alternate set of states. This is most common as perfect balance isn’t easy to achieve and hold. Common sets outside of balance can vary in severity from having little effect to having significant effects such as magic loss or madnesses. Weak minds for example usually lead to low active casting abilities, weak or damaged souls usually lead to instability of magic and weak resistances, weak bodies lead to a condition known as magical dependance. 

“The latter two are particularly damaging as resistances on the passive scale allow us to fight off things like Legillimancy, Imperio, and Compulsions found in potions and passive abilities; and Magical Dependency means our magic is too busy healing us on some level to actually do what we want in full. It can also be permanently damaging on a larger scale. Too many years of magical dependency hinders the body's natural ability to fight off infections and heal itself. If you end up without magic because of a battle, you may end up in a really bad spot. Or if you catch Dragon Pox for instance, you may not be able to fend it off. Or, if you are like me, you will end up with stunted growth and chronic bone diseases which of course you will need to combat your whole life. Unpleasant, irritating, and painful.  

“So, in summary you want to keep these three in balance. The body needs to be well fed, well maintained, and well checked regularly to make sure your magic isn’t too invested. You should keep your mind sharp and exercise active casting regularly to ensure proper collaboration to the spirit. You should maintain the experiences of your spirit and avoid backlash on magics that would sunder it or cause injury. Which is all too common and increasingly easy to do, what with the loss of proper channels to cast and knowledge of proper spell paths eradicated and all that. The worst spell to the spirit other than the Avada Kadavra that I can think of, off the top of my noggin, is the Horcrux ritual which cracks and splits the soul into vessels. The idea is to ensure immortality but as far as it goes, it isn’t particularly effective and does irreparable harm. Or mainly irreparable. The main problem with it is that a soul doesn’t break even and the pieces, much like breaking a vase or bread, can never be healed or fit back together just right. It's permanent and horribly uneven. Sure, there are ways to heal soul cracks like the ones inflicted by magics so opposed to one’s purpose , but they take time. A lot of time. Decades for the tiniest of chips in some cases so it's not a road worth taking. Not if you value sanity and magic. Besides chances are high your body will die and oops, trapped in a cup no one will pick up for a long long time, and if the person who finds you isn’t strong then you risk not even being able to resurrect properly. It's a mess, don’t do it.” He carefully listed out the definitions, and made careful diagrams of the relationships of these core things. Things that were supposedly taught to everyone. 

“What I am most concerned about, Tom, is that you have been denied a fundamental right and I suspect more than just you as a student. Which you should have gotten . Magical guardianship exists for every witch and wizard regardless of status. It is a sacred duty and the fact that someone has not done their duty is more than a little infuriating. With your permission, explicitly given, I will have a proper medi-wizard to check you over. I will need you to sign a paper and know again that anything that has to do with your health is not something you need to share with me unless you want to. I will not hold you in malignance, push, or coerce you into revealing to me any of that information as it is your right as a person to your own records. Even underaged. With your permission I would like to look into your matter as a case, identify your magical guardian, and hold them accountable for the five years at the least with which they have failed you. I understand if you do not want this as we only met this morning but I feel you should know how important it is, and how unacceptable this is.” Tom couldn’t speak. He couldn’t think. All he could see was red. He remembered nodding, he remembered signing a paper that his professor said he would have him sign again tomorrow when he was coherent but something about how this would do for now. He remembered being escorted back to his common room and handed over to Abraxas. He remembered his professor entering Slughorn’s chambers. 

He remembered the earth shaking. Then nothing.