Riddle's Riddle • Tom Riddle

Riddle's Riddle [ENG]

"Come in," Dumbledore said after he heard three knocks on his office's door. It opened, disclosing a boy of around sixteen, with messy dark hair and green eyes: Harry Potter. The old wizard smiled.

"Good evening, Harry. Sit down, please. I assume you have recieved my note quite quickly now that you're here."

"You said it was urgent, sir, what happened?" Harry asked in a rush. He sounded anxious and sat on the chair rather reluctantly; he looked as though he was ready to start defending himself at any moment. Dumbledore seemed to be reading his mind.

"Do not think I mean bad by urgent, Harry," the old wizard explained, still smiling widely. "In this case, it is completely the opposite."

Harry stared at the man in front of him. He will never understand him.

"Just today," Dumbledore began, standing up and walking up to one of his cupboards, "I managed to get a very important memory that may change the history. Firstly, because it confirms some rumours, and secondly, because it may show the true reason - or one of many - why Lord Voldemort is what he is today."

Harry absorbed all that, thinking hard.

"Whose memory is that, sir?" he asked curiously.

"One of his classmates' - Edward Wiseflow's. His mother died yesterday. Fortunately, she was a good friend of mine and I managed to get a fial of his memories which she had kept - and here it is," Dumbledore showed Harry a fial with silvery-white substance which he had taken out of his cupboard.

"Before we enter this memory, let me tell you what we are about to see. You know very well that Voldemort can't love, because he was concieved under the effect of Love Potion. However, love is much more powerful than magic, as you know very well, Harry," the Headmaster indicated the boy's scar. "And we are, possibly, about to find out why Voldemort hates love so much."

Harry listened to all that, careful to remember the details in case it was important in the future.

"There was a girl in Voldemort's year," Dumbledore continued. "Her name was Diana Rhyser. She was a pure-blood witch and a Slytherin, of course. A very talented witch at Potions, Charms and Transfiguration, professor Slughorn's favourite student, right after Tom Riddle of course, who was an excellent student in every subject," he was explaining and Harry thought he knew what the old wizard was going to tell him, though didn't quite believe it.

"There were rumours for years that she and Tom Riddle had quite a close relationship, but after the First Wizarding War everyone rejected the idea that Voldemort could have felt anything for the certain girl and everybody forgot about her. Not that many people knew about their relations, Voldemort made sure they didn't... Tom Riddle was a very handsome boy and he had loads of - how to put it? - fans among girls. As you may have guessed, Harry, he wasn't interested in them. The only exception was Diana."

Harry was shocked. He couldn't imagine Voldemort - even in his youth - with a girl.

Dumbledore stood up and opened the fial, then poured the subtance from it to the stone Pensieve on his desk.

"Now, we may get to know the truth, and Diana Rhyser might be known in history as the first and only person Tom Riddle has ever loved."

Dumbledore beckoned Harry to approach him and a few seconds later, they both found themselves in one of the Hogwarts' corridors. It was nighttime, but one of the rooms had its door open - Harry quickly recognised it as Slughorn's office.

In front of the office there stood a tall, brown-haired boy whose eye colour Harry couldn't distinguish, but he could see enough of his face to say he wasn't the most handsome person in the castle. A silver serpent shone on his robes when the door of the office moved, changing the lighting.