For the Greater Good || Tom Riddle ||

Chapter Fifteen: The Shadows

In the shadows of darkness, Tom watched with intense interest.

His steely gaze settled on her head of golden curls which fell down her back, framing her silhouette like flickering flames against the night. Her skin was illuminous in the shaded forest. Disfigured branches reached out toward her as if all they desired was a warm embrace, as though her natural glow would fight off the dismal mist that surrounded them.

A figure clad in black stood in the threshold of what looked to be a cave or outcropping of rock. Tom could not make out any details of the person, whose body was shrouded by the shadows. However, he could tell that Gwen seemed to be familiar with them because her body language was slightly more relaxed than her normal rigid posture. But as he looked closer at her slender figure, he could see that she held a certain tenseness in her shoulders that gave away her uneasiness.

Tom turned his ear to listen to what she had to say to the mysterious person. But from his distance, he could not hear the words that left Gwen's pale lips. He could only hear the high-pitched chirping of crickets hiding in the dirt, buried beneath the soil.

He tried to cast a quick eavesdropping charm, but to no avail. There must have been some sort of counter charm in place.

Quietly, he inched closer in an effort to catch snippets of the conversation, moving further into the thick wood. His feet trampled over small black blossoms and fallen leaves as he moved through the deep underbrush. He was sure a moke slithered over his loafer. A twig snapped.

Silently, Tom cursed himself, dipping behind a nearby tree. In his obsessive interest, he forgot to cast Silencio.

Thankfully, Gwen did not seem to notice him. With a wave of his hand, he made himself silent. Slowly, he resumed stalking through the thickets like a panther on the prowl for some needed prey. His graceful strides led him toward the conversation like a magnet, until he could finally make out two voices drifting up in the frigid night air like the hazy smoke tendrils of a burning candle.

But the charm made the sounds indiscernible. They were nothing but inaudible murmurs, secrets that would never grace his ears or soothe his burning curiosity.

Tom fought the urge to hex the large willow tree next to him out of frustration. His heart squeezed with annoyance. His dark eyes studied Gwen as the conversation developed and she moved forward, toward the figure clad in black. Suddenly, she pulled out her wand and pointed it at the shadowy person.

Tom's mind raced. What would he do if Gwen began a duel with the person? Why did she feel the need to draw her wand? Tom made a desperate attempt to pry into Gwen's thoughts while he believed her mind would be unguarded, forgetting the threat that she had made just days ago in the girl's lavatory.

The practice of flipping through someone's head, like how one flips the pages of an interesting novel, felt as natural as breathing to Tom Riddle. It came even easier to him than the typical magic, such as casting a spell or brewing a potion. He had been using Legilimency to invade people's minds since his early childhood at Wool's Orphanage. Over the years, he began to enjoy the euphoric feeling that washed over him whenever he looked into the minds of others and was drawn to their fears, their pain, their loneliness.

He enjoyed living inside of others' heads more so than living his dismal existence inside the government facility filled with street rats and children produced from mothers that abused drugs and alcohol. He dwelled in their thoughts and lived in their brains almost like a second conscious as he manipulated them to do his bidding. He felt comfortable inside of other people's minds because there was nothing to threaten or hurt him there. It was an escape from reality. His reality.