Tom Riddle and the Pure-Blood Prince

In the Room of Requirement

Tom was waiting in the Entrance Hall just before noon for somebody before the weekend's Hogsmeade trip. He crossed his arms, and detachedly leaned against a statue as he observed the excited students who were milling about waiting to pass the caretaker, Appolyon Pringle with their signed permission forms.

He could see several of his follower's within the crowd. He spied on them. Listening to all he could make out amongst all the other chatter going on. Riddle could tell that Mulciber and Wilkes, whom were standing together looked to be in high spirits. He knew it had nothing to do with whether or not they had gotten their fun yet with Eileen last night. It would have to be more sordid topics like candy, butterbeer, the joke shop, etc. Then he spotted Macnair with a group of younger boys laughing uproariously about a cruel joke. Riddle could hear it was about a house-elf, a witch, and a giant.

The ancient clock, near the astronomy tower chimed that it was midday. Riddle had ordered him to come here at noon. If he wasn't here within a minute, this individual was going to be very sorry, indeed.

But Avery, sprung up the stone steps leading from the dungeon, and halted right in front of Riddle as he said in a wheezing voice, "I saw everything that happened!"

Riddle felt pleased knowing something had happened despite his orders of not to do anything with her tonight. He grabbed Avery by the scruff of the neck and dragged him down the hall into a broom cupboard. He yanked Avery forward into it, and then Riddle himself stepped, in closing the creaking door behind him.

He surveyed Avery fiercely, who took a fearful step back. Then Tom said to him, "Speak, Avery. Give me your account!"

"Yes...my lord," he said meekly. "The girl, I mean Prince. She got her foot caught in a hole or something....so I helped her out of it. But only because you had ordered me beforehand to see who would go against your orders of not bullying her. I was afraid they would see me, and I would have to then be disobediant to you. So I ran away and watched from a distance. Within minutes, they caught her...and...and"

"Go on. Keep going or else you know I'll-," Tom said raising his wand with ease.

"Yes! They called her names. It had something to do with you," he blurted as it was all he could think of at the moment.

Tom was very intrigued by this and he used all his power of Legilmency to see what it was. "What names?" he said contemptuously.

"Um...I can't recall," Avery could but he was really too afraid, it might offened him as he thought mistakeningly like all the others that Tom felt affection for Eileen.

"Yes you can. I can see them in your worthless mind", Riddle spoke calmly. "Yes...they said I was his mistress didn't they? And that I wanted to treat her differently. I see...they'll soon discover how Tom Riddle is not treating her softly at all."

Avery continued his tale, "Th-then Mulciber wanted to kill her. There right on the spot. Wilkes said no. But Macnair suggested levitating."

Riddle's eyes flashed and glittered at the same time. He was fighting his anger with his feeling of satisfaction. Tom surmised cooly, "So it was Mulciber, Macnair, and Wilkes? And they left after they used the levitating charm?"

"Yes," Avery murmered lamely.

Tom scrunched his eyebrows in cold fury as he considered what to do. "Go and get me all three of them before they leave. Take them to the Room of Requirement where I will be waiting! Now!"

Avery jumped and bolted out the door. Riddle watched him with a clear, calculating look on his face.

He then took the small and flat onyx stone from his robes that had a protean charm on it to contact all the members to meet at their most common location.

Riddle started treading swiftly up the stairs, planning just what to say to the three who had disobeyed him. But also making sure the entire group would suffer for the actions of the minority.

He Passed the statue of Paracelsus, down the seventh floor corridor hardly taking notice of it. A few more moments later, Riddle was stationed across from the painting of Barnabas the Barmy teaching trolls how to dance where there was a blank stretch of a black stone wall.

Riddle thought standing in front of the empty wall, "I need a place to punish my followers. I need a place to punish my followers."

Then a door materialized and Tom quickly looked around to make sure nobody was around and then went inside.

A wide smile played across his lips. His finely carved features,looked almost crude for hardly any of his teeth showed.

The room, as usual fitted his personality perfectly. It was very impressive and special looking, just as Tom considered himself.
Nearly full of darkness, lit only by candles. In the center was a couple of rows of uncomfortable chairs, and in front a raised platform.

Tom went across the room, to sit at at a throne-like chair on the platform and waited patiently, taking in what appeared for his delight. He considered devices that looked like they came from a medieval torture chamber to use on the follower's today.

There were also items of dark magic including skulls strewn about. But what impressed Tom most were the silver serpents on the walls, reminding him he was Slytherin's heir. Tom glanced over the collections of old artifacts on display beside the walls. He knew he would not like to use them for horcruxes, because all the powerful artifacts left by founder's would not appear in this room.

The door opened and all of his follower's came in at once, Avery at the back. Tom watched them all for a few seconds, carefully noting Avery's duty to put the silencing and lock charm around the door as he always did at meetings here.

He felt a surge of annoyance toward Rosier and Lestrange who were greedily tampering with the ancient artifacts in the room. The others were talking together or eyeing the torture equipments with fear evident on their faces.

Tom thought with pleasure, "Ah..I have set the right mood. The element of fear always works. Avery won't be tortured, after all he did what I ordered. Just watching will make him comply."

Then Riddle cleared his throat, and spoke, "I have much to say to you all concerning the newest member Eileen Prince."

The several followers rushed to sit down at their usual places in front of Tom as he continued speaking, "Three of you have disobeyed the orders I gave at the ceremony last night. Those three are going to stand up and admit to the rest of your comrades your idiotic blunder."

Wilke's, tall frame was the first to rise slowly, without looking at any of the followers. Mulciber was next as he glared with his large eyes at the others, aggresively daring them to blame him. Almost at the same second Macnair was on his feet, scowling.

"Yes...Avery your memory is not failing you. I can see you reported accurately."

Tom Riddle unexpectedly rose from the throne-like chair and looked down at the three culprits with an expression, that showed he was going to be completely unforgiving.

Tom rounded on Mulciber first, "Mulciber! You were about to use the killing curse last night on Prince, a pure-blood?...Yes I know all about that." It would not have truly bothered Riddle to see a pure-blood killed, as no life really matters to him but his own.

"Yes, my Lord," he announced for everyone to hear.

His eyes narrowed further, "I hear a note of pride. How foolish your hubris is," he spoke with hostility and dislike as he continued, "to waste a pure-blood who may be helpful to my cause?," he added playing up guilt and sounding somewhat sarcastic.

"I'm sorry, Master. Have-"

"That's enough. You shall suffer in a moment," Riddle snapped.

Riddle could of started using the Cruciatus Curse right there, but he wanted them all to wait. He enjoyed feeling the atmosphere of dread that filled the dark chamber, created by his diabolical mind.

"And Wilkes. Being the eldest, couldn't you have exerted leadership? Yet you still agreed to listen to Macnair's suggestion of levitating and carried it out."

Wilkes frowned, biting his lip so hard it was almost bleeding. "I-I could of-"

"Yes done better," he finished for him as he stepped directly in front of Macnair smiling strangely at him. "and our youngest member, Macnair. The one who so childishly demanded the use of the levitating charm," he said derisively.

Then he paused listening to the room, where it was so silent you could hear a pin drop. The followers were all holding their breath, for what they knew would happen next.

Before Riddle started he said charmingly and with false kindess, "You all need to learn a lesson. Yes...I, Tom Riddle your Master will provide you with any victims you desire." Then his tone became very clear and forceful, "But Eileen Prince is mine. Mine to exert power over. None of you will tell her of the punishment, I am giving out."

After that he waited a few more seconds with his wand raised then bellowed at Mulciber, "CRUCIO!"

He instantly landed on his knees and then writhed on the ground. Voldemort watched, feeling very much justified in his actions. In his mind, he was absolutely entitled to do this, not a thought appearing in his mind to the contrary. He peered at his followers, who also had degrees of pleasure (but considerably lower than Riddle's).

Riddle lifted the curse and looked down at Mulciber with pitiless eyes as he said insultingly, "I see ulterior motives. You're a depraved imbecile, Mulciber for desire to do such promiscuous acts with Eileen. Yet you now, know you know not to act on them unless I decide it."

Then he gave him another brief dose of the Cruciatus curse, and once it was over Mulciber said, "Thank-you my Lord."

Tom Riddle had a hint of the red gleam in his eyes again, as he layed the Cruciatus onto Wilkes and then swiftly placed it on Macnair.

Riddle laughed syncophantically as he said heartlessly, "simultaneous infliction... Promotes camaradie. Or killing two birds with one stone."

Once he relinquished the hold of the curses on Wilkes and Macnair, they continued to pant and hyperventilate for a minute. But Riddle took no notice of them.

"Now...What shall happen to the rest? Although you did not attack or terrorize. I am sure you all would have gone against my orders, given the chance."

He strode over to where Lestrange was seated and entered his mind through Legilimency. "Yes you...Lestrange! Your dirty imagination is also harboring infatuation. Intimate relationships are not to be formed."

"Yes Master!," he pleaded.

But Voldemort had already lazily ficked his wand and whispered harshly "crucio!"

Once it was over, he was about to torture just one more when, Rookwood bravely asked from the other side of the row, "My lord I understand I should not ask. But I am most curious if you are jealous? Is is possible that you...l-love her?

This distracted Tom Riddle completely from finishing the task of making the whole group suffer. Voldemort drew a sharp wild, breath in as he surveyed the whole, his eyes blazing with intensity, "No. Let me make myself clear. She is not going to be treated differently at all," he said in a colorless voice. He then gave a jaunty grin as he said, "But what a story it is Rabastan of when I first saw her potential."

So Riddle told them the whole story, from his point of view of when he first started talking to Eileen Prince. The group listened enraptured, many of them still believing that he did have an attraction to her, yet of course he did not. Perhaps Tom was secretely feeling desires to control, manipulate and to be intensely possessive of her, but that was all. There was certainly no love in the air.

Over the next week, Tom heard about the second attack of a mudblood by the basilisk. It had been covered up, as Dumbledore and Dippit did not think it wise to tell the whole school what was going on and luckily nobody had seen the petrified muggle-borns.

Inivisible, Tom listened at the foot of the gargoyles, guarding the staffroom to the professors discussing it.

"That poor boy and girl," Professor Merrythought said with sad desperation. "Is there anything we can do?"

"The Herbology professor is making the mandrake restorative draught," Flitwick answered in a squeaky voice.

"Yes, but who is attacking our students?", Professor Merrythought asked, glancing at Dumbledore.

"I wish I had proof, Galatea. I believe, even if Headmaster Dippit doesn't that the legend of the chamber is true. I'm almost sure it is the heir of Slytherin, unleashing it's weapon to purge the school," said Dumbledore pausing between sentences as he marshaled his thoughts.

Galetea Merrythought made a loud whimpering cry and said, "Already a Gryffindor and a Hufflepuff! It must be-"

"We cannot accuse...there is no evidence to who is behind the attacks," Dumbledore said commandingly.

Tom stepped away from where he was eavesdropping. He was smiling that awful smile and there was a manic glint in his eyes, as his heart filled with pride because he was the Heir of Slytherin. He longed to tell them all, that it was him behind the attacks. He wished he could get recognition, but he knew he would have to wait. "One day the history of Howarts will be re-written. With I, Tom Riddle, Lord Voldemort having a prominent place as the heir to the greatest of the four founders," he thought as he swiftly went back to the safety of his common room.

__________________________________________________ _______

Eileen recounted to Riddle what happened to her after the Initiation ceremony during breakfast earlier, before the evening he had listened before the Staffroom. Eileen thought it safer to do in public to avoid Tom's unpredictable temper and intimidation.

She squeezed in beside him on the benches and said gently, "Tom I have to tell you something important." As soon as she said this, Avery and Wilkes looked up at her with curiosity from several feet down the table. "It's a question about the Prefect duties," she added rather loudly. Thankfully, the two followers looked away after that and went on with the last minute writing of their potions essays for Slughorn.

"Actually it's not really about that.... Do you know what happened to me that night in the Forbidden forrest? I woke up hours later after being lev-"

"Eileen," Riddle interrupted impatiently. "I heard all about it.'

"How?," said Eileen completely dumbstruck, her expression confused.

"I have spies within my group, that I pick to watch particular members," he spat at her, after pausing to take a drink of milk and a bite of toast.

Eileen just nodded, her expression wilting into disappointment, as there was no sympathy from him. She was not really surprised, as she was starting to notice that there were things Riddle was not going to tell her. If only she knew the ones that might effect her negatively.

A moment later Riddle spoke: "Next Monday, meet me in front of the statue of the one-eyed witch to show me what you have.... You are working on the deal I ordered you to fulfill?," he questioned her with a note of warning.

"I've been able to get some stuff. But the money is harder to come by."

Riddle smiled half-way and said, "I want the money more than other silly things you might offer. IF you don't GET the galleons for me," he spoke forcefully.

Eileen grabbed Riddle's hand resting on the table and said zealously, "I promise, Tom. I'll have it. Don't you realize, how...I'll do anything for you?!"

Riddle tensed from Eileen having the gall to touch him, with a disgusted look on his face. Then his expression changed into a smile, lighting his eyes, "I know you would Eileen."