Today felt strange, as if something bad was going to happen. A sudden intake of fear washed over me, fear for this little game I thought nothing of, but could cost me my life.
Nothing special happened at dinner, my friends already seemed worried for me which made everything even worse. I knew it was going to happen soon, this game of his. But I can't back down, I can't give up now. I'm going to win this game, somehow. Even at dinner I felt like they were talking about me, the elites. They were planning waht they were going to do, something so humiliating that no one who want to speak to me, I would want to leave the school because of it.
I entered the common room, alone. I had left the hall as i didn't want to be around them, I felt somewhat overwhelmed by how everyone kept speaking about me. Maybe I was just being paranoid, maybe it was just my fear getting the better of me, making everything feel worse.
I sat down on the green sofa, letting myself sink into the comfy leather. No one was in the common room at the moment, well every student was in the main hall. I sat there for a few moments, questioning things, asking myself questions that I wanted to be answered.
I tried to push the questions out of my mind, for them to be vanished completely. But they stayed there, making me sink further and further in the chair. Making me want to have someone wrapping their arms around me, a mother. That's what I need right now.
As I lay my head back, a boy entered. He came over to me, his eyes full of pity and sorrow, his lips curved downwards. He ran up to me and I figured it was my brother, cedric. I had told him the password for the common room so that he could visit me, well he asked me for it incase something happened to me, being the protective brother he is.
"Hi, Ced," I muttered as he sat next to me, pulling me into the warmth of his chest, his arms wrapping around my meek body. I felt guilty after what I said to cedric, all he wants is for me be to my safe, I was taking it for granted.
"I'm worried about you, Clover. I want you to tell me everything, I want you to trust me and be honest with me. I only want to help you and protect you, I am your brother after all." He said, tucking my hair behind my ear. A single tear dropped onto his finger, I felt that much more would be coming out soon.
"I'm scared, ced. I just feel out of place here, like I'm different to everyone else, which I am."
He wrapped his arms around me even tighter, wiping the small tears falling down my cheeks. "what's wrong with being different to everyone else. It's better to be different than normal don't you think?"
"Yeah, I guess you're right," I mumbled, crying into his chest. Each tear draining the pain out of my body. Each drop pushing away those questions a little further. But that pain will always be there, those questions will always be left unanswered. Unless somehow I find out who I am, it has to happen someday. Someone must know who my parents are. I will never just be 'Clover diggory'.
...
I didn't feel like speaking to others in class, I had defence against the dark arts with miss.Umbridge. She wore a completely pink outfit and always had a huge smile on her face. I think she was trying to intimidate or mock us, in a weird way. All the students appeared to be revolted by her, some students didn't even come to class today, maybe because they hated her so much, including Pansy Parkinson.
She was horrible, she made this already bad day even worse. I was sat next to harry potter, I had heard Cathy talking about him. Something about him being 'the chosen one', I wasn't really paying attention to her.
He seemed sweet but quiet. He hadn't spoken to me yet and we had been in the lesson for half an hour. I also noticed a lightning-shaped scar on his forehead, Cathy said that he got this from the Dark Lord or something. I still had no clue what this whole 'Dark Lord' thing was about, it sounded bad but I didn't really want to ask what it was. Mattheo being his son, made me curious to know who this person is.
Umbridge was teaching us about centaurs, that they were 'dangerous, disgusting creatures'. They were like half horse, half-human or something. Harry seemed very bored, writing the alphabet on a piece of paper, again and again. Draco was watching us, his grey eyes darting around the class and finally landing on us. He looked at me, scoffing, then at Harry, rolling his eyes and turning back to the front.
"Hi harry, we've never properly met. I'm Clover!" I whispered, hoping that Umbridge wouldn't hear me. He turned his head to me slightly, examining me, a cute smile on his face.
"Nice to meet you! I'm harry potter. I hate Umbridge, this lesson is so boring." he said, scrunching up a piece of paper he had written on. This caught the attention of the other students, all of them turning their heads to look at him. Umbridge looked at him last, noticing the balls of paper left on our desk.
"Mr. Potter, would you care to tell me what you are doing?" the woman shouted, a terrifying smile covering her face, as usual. His head shot up, his cheeks blushing as he saw that the whole class was looking at him. Umbridge walked over to his desk, picking up one of the balls of paper, her eyes widening as she began to open it.
"I'm not doing anything professor. Those pieces of paper are just my failed attempts at writing about centaurs." He grumbled, in some kind of mocking manner. She opened the paper completely and flattened the creases with her finger, her smile enlarging making me feel strangely sick.
"The alphabet? Why are you writing out the alphabet?" She exclaimed, Harry looked around as if he was trying to find something to say. I turned to the side and was met with brown eyes. Mattheo was sat there, unamused as usual, he was watching everything that was happening but not one thing made him look even one bit interested.
I looked back at umbridge who was now stood there, waiting for something, for harry to say something. "That was me, miss. I just wanted to make my handwriting look neater." I blurted out, she moved her head slightly to me, her smile getting smaller. It was like when she was angry she was happy and when she was unimpressed the smile would get less prominent.
"Well then, that's lovely, diggory. But maybe do that outside my lessons." She said sarcastically, turning away and walking back to the front of the class, giving us another lecture on school rules.
"Thanks, Clover," Harry whispered, a smile on his face. I nodded politely then looked back forwards, Mattheo was watching us, an angry look on his face. I ignored it, trying to take in what Umbridge was telling us.
...
"Were you actually writing the alphabet or was that to cover for potter?" Blaise asked as we left the classroom.
"Covering him," I said.
"That Potter guy is a bit weird." Timmy remarked, Harry was stood next to us. He gave us a weird look. Hermione Granger was also staring at us, her lips in a thin line as she took harry with her, the opposite direction in which we were walking.
We walked through the corridors straight to the library, Timothy wanted to ask Cathy for help with the DADA homework as he didn't understand any of it, I didn't either.
The library was beautiful, I hadn't been to it before, but it was as majestic as any other part of the school. It was filled with students, and...bookcases, obviously. A LOT of bookcases, I could understand why Cathy would be in here, she was very...let's say...intelligent. That's a nice way of saying it
Cathy was sat behind a few bookshelves in a corner, on her own. She was reading a book about magical creatures. Timothy ran straight to her and asked her for help with the homework, she rolled her eyes giving him the book to read about centaurs and he opened straight away looking through the pages.
Blaise and I sat to the side, copying Timmy's work, changing the sentence order so Umbridge wouldn't get suspicious or anything. Cathy was now reading a book about Hogwarts history, she looked really interested as she read it, her eyes never leaving the pages.
"Guys, can we go for a walk or something," I said, closing my book and stepping up from the seat.
"You lot go ahead, I just want to finish reading this," Cathy shouted over to us.
"That's going to take a while." Blaise grumbled, Cathy looked over at him and scoffed "Have you seen how thick that book is?!"
"Come on let's go," I muttered. Timothy and Blaise stood up, closing their books too, they passed the centaur book back to Cathy and she placed it back on the bookshelves.
We walked through the library, seeing some familiar faces. The elites were sat together reading about polyjuice potions. "well he wasn't paying attention in the lesson." I said to myself.
Mattheo looked at us, snapping the book shut and putting in under the desk on his lap. "suspicious." He didn't look at us, he just spoke to pansy, they were terribly close together. Pansy was enjoying it, Draco didn't seem to care, he just kept writing in a book. He looked back at them again, then had some kind of frustrated look on his face.
Timothy pulled me away from them, Mattheo gave me a smile before giving pansy a passionate kiss on the cheek, holding her neck. It's like he wanted me to be jealous, Draco looked at me then whispered something to Mattheo, causing him to stop.
After a few moments, I was dragged out of the library by Timmy and Blaise. "that was weird." I said as we walked through the corridors.
"Yeah, I think he was trying to make you jealous. Did it work?" Timothy asked.
"no." I lied, I did feel jealous for a strange reason. I didn't even like him, as Cathy said, he's a manipulative sociopath. He's trying to get me to like him so that the game is easier, all he wants to do is win, he doesn't care about me.
...
The walk was quite calming, we just walked across the grounds and fields. We also went to visit Hagrid, he's really nice, different from the other teachers. He talked to me about previous muggle-born students who are doing really well in the ministry of magic and about some muggle-born teachers.
Cathy hadn't joined us during the walk, well she was reading that really long book about Hogwarts and was probably still reading it now.
We were now going back to the common room, to see if Cathy was okay and to relax for a bit before our next lesson. We set foot in the common room and Cathy was sat there balling her eyes out, her body curled in a ball as she lay on the sofa.
When she looked at me, her face was covered with a strong look of disgust. Timothy and Blaise ran up to her, hugging her, asking if she was okay. I just stood at the entrance confused as to why she looked at me like that.
"what happened, Cathy?" Timothy wondered, hugging her.
"Clover....she....she hurt me." Cathy struggled, between tears. Showing a cut on her arm which was bleeding gushes of blood.
"she was with us the whole time, how could she have?" Blaise exclaimed, ripping a piece of his shirt and tied it around the large cut.
"It was them, Cathy, it was the elites, obviously. I would never hurt you like that!" I shouted, "But there must be something else to this plan of theirs. This is a more personal matter, they would want the whole school to know. Did you tell anyone about this? Did they photograph you or something?"
"I'm not sure, I wasn't really paying attention to everything happening around me, I was in so much pain. I fainted at first, I'm so glad you guys came back to help me. And Thea you're smart, when stage one happened with Bella, well we don't even know what they did to her."
"We should get you to the infirmary," Timmy muttered, helping Cathy off the sofa, leaving me and Blaise in the common room alone.
"you okay, Thea?" Blaise asked patting the space next to him on the sofa, I sat with him, stretching my legs out.
"Yeah, I'm fine, just a bit shocked."
Blaise looked at me, he looked morose, a strong pain flashing over his eyes. He didn't look pitiful as he did at dinner the other day, he looked different like he was scared.
I got up from the sofa and he followed, he grasped my wrist before I tried leaving the common room. "where are you off to?"
"I want to check something," I mumbled, I did want to check something. I wanted to make sure the elites hadn't followed Cathy and Timothy, I wanted to make sure that they were okay. I also wanted to speak to Mattheo, if this game involved hurting my friends then I didn't want to play it.
"I'll come with you." He said, opening the door for me.
We walked through the corridors and something didn't seem right already, there were pictures on the walls and there were more and more as we went through passageways.
I thought nothing of it at first but they started to cover the corridors and there were students gathered around them. I shoved some of the first years out of the way and grabbed the small picture,a moving picture, it was 'me' hurting Cathy. All the first years looked at me, terrified. One was actually vomiting in a corner of the corridors, her friend glaring at me, a similar look on her face as Cathy's earlier. I knew this was going to happen, I somehow knew it.
Blaise hugged me tightly as lots more students looked at the pictures, Harry Potter was also there with his friends eyeing us. "don't look at them." Blaise whispered into my hair, combing it with his fingers.
"Why did you do that?" A small first year, came up to us.
"It wasn't her, sweetheart," Blaise said to the small girl, who looked petrified. She walked back to her friends, speaking to them, then the other in the corridors began to gossip about me too.
Dumbledore was walking through the corridors with Mattheo. Mattheo had a huge smile on his face when he looked at me but it quickly faded to an angered look when he saw that I was holding hands with Blaise, still, after what had happened. Dumbledore saw the pictures on the walls and he turned to me, his eyes scintillating under the light above us.
"come with me to my office, Diggory and riddle," Dumbledore uttered, Mattheo smirked when he heard my name but when he heard his, he gave Dumbledore a look of confusion.
Mattheo stepped next to me as Dumbledore walked in front of us, Blaise slowly let go of my hands as we walked away, his eyes pitiful again. "why would you do that, riddle. She has never done anything to you!" I growled, shoving him away from me. He grinned at my slight push, looking down at me.
"It wasn't actually me who did anything to her, it was you, remember." He murmured, wiping his robes.
"no, I know you polyjuiced, well one of you polyjuiced, don't deny it!"
"If I hurt someone today, I would have remembered. It was probably Parkinson or Malfoy. Anyway, don't call me riddle, call me theo."
"I can call you whatever I want, riddle." I hissed.
Dumbledore opened the door to his office and we both entered. There were paintings of past headmasters and mistresses all over the walls. There was lots of white decor and small capsules on shelves, with strange titles on them.
He pointed out two seats for us to sit at his desk, he sat at the other side as we did. Mattheo looked tired when he sat on the chair, laying back as if he hadn't slept in a few days. "miss.Diggory, those pictures on the walls, was that you was that you hurting miss.Montgomery?" Dumbledore questioned.
"Of course not, sir, I would never hurt Cathy. I believe it was one of Mattheo's friends."
"Ahh okay. Mr.riddle did you have anything to do with this?"
"I can't tell you." He whispered, looking him in the eyes. A smug look on his face.
"Well you must tell me, or I will have to find a way to punish you and your friends. Tell me the truth, Mattheo." He said, I looked at Mattheo, his eyes had now squinted and he looked somewhat angry. He ran his fingers through his dark hair, possibly thinking of what to say.
"Do you remember what my father said about my punishments, professor?" He hissed with a sinister tone in his voice, his usual grimace plastering his face. Dumbledore looked befuddled.
"Well, I'll let you off this time, but I'd like to speak to your friends. Bring Malfoy and Parkinson here. You two may leave."
"Thank you, sir," I mumbled getting off the seat, Mattheo followed me, as usual, not daring to speak to me until we left Dumbledore's office.
As we left the office, he pushed me against the wall. "You don't speak about this, okay? I'm not going to be pausing the game, Stage two is still going to happen, but I'd like it if you kept quiet, for me?" He whispered his cold hands on my bare arms against the frigid wall. His dark eyes were demonic but somehow softened as I looked at him. I tried to look past the evilness in his stare, to find the kindness behind that dark iris. But it was hard. Ever so hard.
Was there some good in Mattheo riddle?
I snapped out of my thoughts as I could now feel his warm, strange but nice-smelling breath on my delicate skin, his fingertips tapping against my arm softly. "answer me, Diggory! Are you going to be a good girl and not tell anyone what truly happened today?" He snarled, his hands tightening their grip around my feeble arms. The odd thing about the situation was that I wasn't scared of him but he made me feel something, something so unfamiliar I couldn't even think of a word to define the feeling.
"fine, riddle." I sneered trying to pull his large arms off me.
"It's theo, to you!" He let go of me and pushed me off him as he walked through the long corridors, not even looking back at me, he was focused to go wherever he was going.
I rubbed my eyes, bewildered as to what had happened just now, well what had happened during the whole day. I had been framed for something I hadn't done and Mattheo Riddle was dreadfully close to me. I thought I may have seen something good in him but maybe it was just my imagination.