i am lord voldemort • Tom Riddle

XXVII

Looking at her over his shoulder, he shook his head. "Evil? How little you think of me. I'm a model wizard. Slughorn says so."

She snorted. "Slughorn says a lot of things. Would he have said that if he actually knew what you got up to in your free time?"

His brows furrowed in mock puzzlement. "Whatever are you talking about?"

"No one's buying that innocent act," she said, laughing despite herself.

The corners of Tom's lips curled upward slightly. "That's where you're wrong. Most believe it."

She grimaced. "Unfortunately. Now, what are you actually up to?"

He waved her over, a sly gleam in his eyes. "Would you like to see for yourself?"

Ophelia knew that look well enough to know it meant nothing good, but couldn't beat back her curiosity.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you," Julius muttered behind her, watching as she stepped over a pair of thick roots snaking out from the dense village of trees.

Tom murmured something she couldn't understand at the same time that she peered over his shoulder. Nothing was there. She shot him an inquiring glance.

"Are you just admiring the grass?" she asked, not bothering to mask the sarcasm.

"No," he said, and dropped his gaze down to her feet at the exact same moment she felt it.

Something crawling up her leg.

Three somethings, to be exact.

Not generally the shrieking type, the sound that tore from her mouth surprised even her. She backed up too quickly, tripping over the root she'd only just stepped over in her haste to put as much distance between herself and the three serpents as possible. They didn't give chase, but she scrambled backwards on her hands a bit for good measure.

Only then did she hear the laughing.

"I'm glad this amused you," she told both Tom and Julius, giving each a specially curated dirty look.

"I didn't think you'd fall," Tom replied without an iota of remorse, the shadow of a smile still on his face.

"You would, too, if your only other meaningful interaction with a snake was of it trying to swallow you whole," she groused, slowly, very slowly, sitting up.

Just like that, all humor dropped from his expression, making Ophelia wish she hadn't brought it up.

"Why were you out here talking to snakes anyway?" she asked to break the newfound tension.

"I can't very well talk to them inside the castle, can I."

She rolled her eyes and fell back onto the grass, watching the clouds drift past the canopy of trees. "That's not what I meant and you know it. Why are you talking to them at all?"

"You didn't think I got all my information through prophetic visions, did you? They spy for me."

"Don't you just use Legilimency?"

He hissed something at the serpents and they slithered off, two towards the castle and one towards the forest. To Ophelia, he spoke slowly, as though explaining something very simple to someone even simpler. "You must realize I can't very well use Legilimency all the time.  What of the people I rarely see? What of the professors? The things said behind closed doors and in the safety of common rooms? Using Legilimency was what got me in trouble with you in the first place."

"Have you considered not invading people's privacy?" she suggested.

"No," he replied in short.

"As your conscience, it's my responsibility to tell you you should."

"You're my conscience now?" He sidled up beside her until they were hip to hip, him sitting and her laying back, sounding like he severely doubted she was up for the challenge. "You don't sound particularly stern about my means of gathering information."

Ophelia waved a hand lazily between them, before letting it flop back onto the grass. "Of all the dastardly deeds you could be doing, this is nothing. Your conscience isn't paid enough to prevent something this minor."

"Sounds like an excuse."

"You talk a big game for someone who only got second place in that rigged duel. Let's see..."Ophelia pretended to think hard. "Who won again? I can't seem to recall."

"You're confidence is misguided."

She shrugged. "It's just the facts.

"Do you want to test that?"

"There's nothing to test." Knowing he was watching, she made a grand show of watching a bowtruckle peaking its leafy little head around a fresh sprig of greens with far more interest than strictly necessary. "I beat you once, I can do it again... Probably."

"That wasn't exactly a fair match," he mused, twirling his phoenix feather wand slowly though his fingers.

"What can I say? Life isn't fair," she said, enjoying herself immensely and not doing much to hide it.

The wand came to a halting stop, resting loosely in Tom's palm. He leaned closer, dark eyes sparking with equal parts amusement and challenge. "I won't even need this, you know. I won't even need a wand to win this time."

Now, Ophelia couldn't help but imagine his confidence was misplaced. Still, she humoured him, nudging his leg with hers. "Oh? Do tell. How do you plan on doing that?"

A hand came down beside her head, blocking her view of the rambunctious young bowtruckle. She turned again to face the sky, but a wide expanse of blue was not what greeted her.

"Like this," Tom said, and pressed his smile to hers.