Mine || Tom Riddle

Chapter Fifteen

Ivetta did not like admitting she was scared. She never had, but, did anyone really? She liked to consider herself powerful, she certainly had the magical capabilities to back up the claim. Yet deep down she wondered if the only reason she strived to impress professors, Tom even, was because she spent her childhood, and her holidays for that matter, being reminded how weak she really was.

She had not joined Grindelwald because she had a plan to make change in the long run, although that idea was something she would run with. She joined him because he gave her the self assurance she had looked for in her parents, and after that her uncle. Did she know that the Dark Lord knew that was exactly how to win her loyalties? Yes. But she did not care. He was genuine, his motives didn't matter.

But Grindelwald was harmless compared to Tom Riddle, in her eyes at least. Which was one of the reasons she was so terrified of the boy, she seemed to be the only one that knew he was absolutely insane. Not that it bothered her, really, she was past caring, and she could not judge, for was she really any better than him. But people knew her, the real her, people had seen her for what she truly was. Grindelwald, for example, and as a result of that, Dumbledore.

Yet Tom had them all fooled, maybe not Dumbledore, but everyone else. She was sure that she was the only one he had ever let his careful mask fall for, she doubted his little assembly of Knights even knew his truest, darkest nature. She could tell when he had the mask on. His smile was perfect, a tilt of the head, teeth shockingly white, the smallest strand of hair that was so perfectly out of place could one even call it that. Even at fifteen one might mistake his face structure for something out of a museum. She was disgusted now that she was wiser to it all that people fell for the act, that she had fallen for it.

At the beginning she had ben fascinated by him, this orphan boy that she felt so strongly pulled to, that was nothing like she had ever seen before. If she had known that he had felt the same pull, she was not sure how she might have reacted. She could tell now that the once benign friendship had turned into a festering obsession. He practically had her attached to his side all day, except for when he disappeared to do Merlin only knows what, and even then he would leave her in the company with at least two of his so called Knights.

She knew his actions should concern her much more, but she could not shake the feeling of being special. She had never felt worth being protected from corruption before. She scolded herself just for thinking that.

It had been a mistake telling him about legilimency, no matter how much she wanted to master the art herself. It would be just another thing in his arsenal of manipulation, that she had the oddest feeling he was practicing on her. Yet she was a Slytherin for a reason, she saw the benefit in all power, her weakness was her desire to accumulate as much of it as possible.

The summer had been one of the darkest of her life, which was saying quite a lot. Grindelwald, although not quite demonstrating as much destruction as he had during the twenties, was slowly preparing for a war unlike any other seen by the wizarding world. It did not help that it correlated with the muggle war. She had never seen so much death, and she had been closeted away with the Dark Lord himself for the entire summer.

She had learned more about the art of seeing in the two months with him then she had in her entire childhood with her famed "seer" of a mother. Her power was different from most seers, since it branched from magical creatures particular talents, not a gift of magic. Even so, it was more prominent then before after Grindelwald's teachings.

But then she had been released back to her uncle. Gellert had told her it was a mission, he was a high level ministry official after all. But she knew the truth. She had shared with him things about her uncle that would have displayed to even someone without half of Gellert's intellect that she would be able to access no information from her uncle. She had been dismissed from the Dark Lord's presence. He had taught her all she needed to know and no she had to be a compliant pet, her worth limited now to the power of her sixth sense.

And now here she was with Tom and it was the exact same thing. She had been weak, had opened up to him and had it thrown back in her face, had her entire self diminished to nothing more than a little magic trick. But Tom did not leave her alone. He confided in her his own secrets, and she fed off of them. Her childhood had left her starved for attention, and here was a picture perfect boy that told her she was worth protecting, she was interesting enough to hang around, and that she was powerful enough to hang around his gang.

Yet he was merely picture perfect. He was minimized in the eyes of the world to a pretty face, amazing grades, and a perfect prefect attitude. No one looked passed that because no one wanted to see passed that. No one remembered how he used to be bullied by the other Slytherins, no one questioned how one day they all stopped to worship him. No one wanted to suspect that the model student might have used not so respectable means to get to where he was. Maybe if Tom had an abnormally large nose and a jaw not so chiseled people would ask the right questions. Yet the world worked in a way that those who smiled right for the camera were forever framed in that picture perfect glory.

So she was stuck screaming to herself, because even if she wanted to say something about him, wanted to risk anything, who would believe her. Tom had not caught her bluff when they were striking there deal, or he had just not felt like calling her on it. Her name meant nothing if her uncle was not willing to back her up, which he would not be. In fact, her uncle was waiting for her to screw up just so he had a justifiable reason to cast her out. He would have done that when she had returned this summer, except that would mean revealing his own ties to Grindelwald. So instead he chained her up like the animal he believed she was.

Not like it was anything new. This was one of the more humane ways she had been treated. She was brought back to the night Tom had walked into her room. She had thought he was an angel when she had woken, her will to live had been so depleted after days chained to a bed, her food supply limited to less than scraps. And he had stayed. He had stayed. He had been concerned, he had not left her, thrown her back to her uncle like Grindelwald. He had done all that she had permitted him to do. Of course now she had to deal with him treating her like a porcelain doll. As if she was breakable. How little the boy knew.

So many people had tried to break her and so many. Tom Riddle was not the only person who had killed his parents.

She remembered the day, remembered the flames, how the strong the heat felt but how she did not burn. She did not remember her parents' faces, no, they were burnt down to nothing more but the faceless monsters in her nightmares. As a child she was scared, she wanted to know if it was wrong she felt nothing, no remorse at all as she thought back to the fit of magic that had killed her father, and burnt down her old home, and the pure hatred that had killed her mother. But as she grew older she realized that her lack of remorse was not because she was broken, but because she was strong.

Even after everything they had put her through. They had created her and they still thought of her as a monster. Her mother was the same as her, the closest anyone could ever come, and yet she had put up with the experiments, the name calling, the pain that her husband inflicted. But she had saved herself, and that was what made her strong. She had to feel power, that was what covered up the remorse.

If she did not have her power she would fall back into weakness. Her uncle had tried to steal it from her after her parents death, and he had almost succeeded, but there reminding her of it was Tom Riddle. She should have known then that it would come with a price. Her fear was what she was paying him, all power balks in the face of fear. And Tom Riddle's face showed all of hers.