On the surface, it was a normal moment, a normal sight.
Two schoolgirls with tousled locks falling over themselves in repressed giggles as they hurried along the hallways, desperate to get to their first lesson of the year on time. Their uniform black shoes tapped furiously against the stone floor, the anarchic rhythm interlacing with the girls' heavy, humored breathing to stitch together a melody that might whisper into the everyday lives of most.
However, if one was to allow their toes to dip even slightly under the surface, they would know that to Evangeline, the slightly taller of the two girls that could be spotted in the moment, it was not normal. In fact, it was anything but.
And if said person were to venture even further past the surface, submerging their heads in the water, they would see that for the first time in her life, Evangeline truly felt human. She felt fine with being human — more than fine, even.
It was alright that her spine wasn't ruler-straight, it was fine that her footfalls could be heard from a mile away and grew further and further away from graceful with every second that passed. The ringlets in her hair were no longer locked into place the way metal coils around nails to form screws, but had twisted apart in the wind and spiraled into the wild vines that curl aimlessly up wooden posts to decorate their unremarkable brown rinds.
The pair finally hurled through the archway that led to the classroom they needed to reach and came to a stop at the back of the room, their chests heaving under blue and black robes and hands clutching their stomachs as they caught their breath.
Professor Merrythought, a petite witch with curly greying hair and an easygoing look about her face, stood at the front of the room, looking at the two pupils with a single raised eyebrow. Cassi and Eva each sent her a sheepish look in return before sidling into the only empty seats left in an attempt to not draw too much attention to their delayed arrival.
Evangeline peered over to identify the brunette on her right. It was Myrtle, but she seemed adamant on not making eye contact with Evangeline. The half-angel's brow furrowed, but her confusion was cut into by an assertive voice.
"Good morning, fifth years. My name is Professor Merrythought, and I will be your Defense teacher this year. As most of you know, this is O.W.L. year..."
Eva puffed air into her cheeks in boredom, as she was quite sure she would be back in Heaven long before exams rolled around, and therefore shouldn't need to pay attention. Tuning the professor out, she resorted to examining the markings on the desk made by previous students.
One that caught her eye looked like a strange arrangement and rearrangement of the same sixteen letters over and over again to form different words, all looking like gibberish.
The Ravenclaw didn't make much of it, musing that it was most likely some student trying to create a new enchantment, and returned her attention to Professor Merrythought.
The older witch was now explaining the plan for their first lesson. "I'd like to hold a bit of a duel amongst the class, purely so I can evaluate all your skills and get a general idea of where I should begin my teaching."
A field of murmurs, some excited and some apprehensive, rose amongst the students.
"Your first opponent will be your desk partner. From there, it's winner against winner. Losers will come to the red circle drawn at the front left corner of the room and take notes on the main duels. Understood?" Professor Merrythought scanned the room with inquiring eyes before a placid smile settled on her thin lips. "Now, I will ask you all not to use anything too harmful, though. I've just met with your school nurse and would rather not get on her bad side on the first day. I think that's all there is to be said, then. Get on with it and good luck!"
The entire class got to their feet and moved with their partners to more open spaces along the sides of the room. Eva was about to turn to Cassi when she realized her desk partner was Myrtle, not her blonde friend, who was already taking a pale-haired boy to the side. She cleared her throat and nudged the brunette, still unsure of what reason Myrtle might have for not talking to her.
Myrtle's eyes snapped up to meet Evangeline's at the touch. Their melancholy blue immediately turned hopeful when she saw her partner's tentative, but friendly grin.
"So, should we...?" The half-angel gestured towards the right side of the room, where several duels had already commenced.
Myrtle gave an involuntary jolt and nodded, smiling back at her. Evangeline relaxed, but chose not to bring up her initial standoffish behavior, seeing how easily it had passed.
Instead, she grabbed the shy girl's wrist and pulled her to an open space before drawing her wand and assuming a dueling position. Her opponent did the same, though her wand was visibly shaking. Evangeline tucked her bottom lip behind her teeth upon noticing Myrtle's anxious state.
I'll have to go easy on her. And everyone else, for that matter. It would be unwise to raise unnecessary suspicion.
"Ready, Myrtle?" she asked and tilted her head with a playful smirk.
The girl nodded and her face twisted in concentration.
"Expelliarmus!"
Evangeline's voice had barely reached Myrtle's ears when her wand slipped from her sweaty grip and flew to rest in her opponent's. The strawberry blonde shot her a sympathetic smile as she handed her wand back immediately after.
Most of her other duels went similarly, though some of the students had quite strong shield spells that irritated Eva enough that she was forced to use nonverbal magic in order to catch them off guard. It had been narrowed down to only four duelers, when a pair of dark chocolate eyes latched onto her grey.
Upon seeing the pine green prefect badge pinned to his chest, she recognized him to be the same Slytherin that had caught her in the library the night before. His eyes narrowed at her and he began to walk in her direction, no doubt to challenge her to a duel.
A short chuckle escaped Evangeline's lips as she dismissed him to hold out a hand to the same peroxide blonde boy Cassi had dueled at the start of the lesson. His lips curled up smugly and he took her hand to shake it.
"Abraxas Malfoy," the boy spoke in a confident drawl.
"Evangeline Serpens," she nodded back at him before walking away to create dueling space between them. Before she turned back around to face the blonde, however, she caught Riddle looking at her with displeasure and suddenly decided she'd allow herself to show off just a bit in her last two duels.
She made eye contact with Abraxas again and nodded curtly to signal that he could make the first move.
He nodded back and shot his first hex. "Flipendo!"
Evangeline deflected it easily with a silent flick of her wand and with a swish across the air in front of her cast a Bubble Jinx, trapping Abraxas in a large, flexible bubble. His eyebrows shot up into his hair momentarily, but his bewilderment quickly vanished to be replaced by an amused expression.
Abraxas lifted his wand again and murmured something incoherent thanks to the bubble barrier he was encased in. A circle of smaller, heated bubbles appeared on the barrier to gnaw away at it until there was an opening for the blonde to step through.
As soon as he had resumed an offensive stance he yelled, "Ventus!"
Evangeline waved her wand silently again and sent the spiral of wind he had conjured straight back to him, taking him by surprise and knocking her opponent's wand out of his hand and onto the floor behind him. Directing her wand towards his fallen one, she summoned it into her hands, ending the duel.
"Good one." Abraxas gave her an impressed look and walked forward to shake her hand again.
"You too," Eva replied, giving him a cheeky smile. He rolled his eyes good-naturedly at this and took his wand back from her extended hand.
From there, she turned to Riddle, who's duel with a ginger girl had ended only moments before. They were now the only two students that hadn't joined the red circle at the front left corner that had grown significantly since the beginning of the lesson.
He was toying with and trailing his fingers along the yew wood of wand, his eyes narrowed at her once again. Evangeline walked up to him with a hint of a smile and stuck out a hand to shake despite the fact that they had already made each other's acquaintances.
"Alright, stalker?"
He clenched his jaw at the nickname, but kept his lips sealed as he took her hand and shook it briefly. Both turned and walked in separate directions simultaneously before bringing their wands eye level. She nodded to him in the same way she had to Abraxas, but he didn't react the same way. Instead he cocked his head almost imperceptibly, not breaking eye contact with her as he slowly lowered his wand and placed it into the depths of his robes.
Evangeline sported a look of confusion for half a second before realization washed over her.
He knows I can do wandless magic because of my little stunt in the Great Hall. Is this some sort of challenge?
Without a word, Eva did the same to her wand and nodded at him again, ignoring the confused whispers from the crowd of students in the red circle.
Taking her second nod as a signal that he should still make the first move, Riddle stuck out his hand and flicked it upwards, wordlessly conjuring a thrashing orb of flame and sending it in her direction. Eva's eyebrows quirked up in surprise at the abilities he possessed even in the absence of a wand before waving a hand in response, turning the fiery sphere to ashes.
Riddle's taken aback expression could barely be made out through the cinders that were floating down to rest on the floor in a charcoal sheen. Evangeline kept her gaze focused on him as they began to move in a circle, blocking out the hushed voices of the onlookers.
She thrust her palm forward to shoot out chains of dark greenery in vines that wrapped themselves around Riddle's body at the speed of light. His eye twitched in frustration and Evangeline watched, amused, as he glared down at the forest green vine. She debated Disarming him in that moment but then decided it would be rather interesting to see what else the dark-haired boy had up his sleeve.
Riddle finally freed his left hand enough to ball it into a fist and push it open, blasting the writhing plant off of himself. Evangeline licked her lips eagerly, feeling dark magic begin to boil within her, pushing at her walls, yearning, begging to be released.
The Slytherin's nostrils flared in anger as he blurted out his next curse in hopes of making it more powerful.
"Incarcerous mallum!"
Metal chains burst out of his palms, imitating her vines and twisting toward their target. Before they could imprison her, however, Evangeline stuck both hands infront of her, turning the metal into Hellfire on an impulse. The chains that were now made of cherry-red flame entwined like roguish ribbons around her outstretched arms.
Only when she registered the shrieks of her classmates did she realize her mistake. The fire should have been burning her, but she was very obviously in control of it and unbothered by the scorching inferno. Evangeline quickly clenched her hands shut and watched as the thrashing flame disappeared immediately.
Returning her gaze to her opponent, she saw that he was looking almost hungrily at the unscathed skin on her arms where the Hellfire had been only moments before. His eyes travelled in a trance up her arms to meet her eyes, where he quickly snapped out of it, his expression quickly morphing into one of slight astonishment.
Evangeline quickly lifted her right hand again with her palm facing the floor and flicked two fingers in a downwards motion. The action caused Riddle to fall to his knees and clasp his hands behind his back. He struggled furiously against the magical hold for around five seconds before giving in, fixing the victor with a murderous glare.
Her eyes, however were no longer on him. They had travelled to the crowd of speechless students that was still watching, then to the professor, who looked as though she wasn't sure whether to be impressed or suspicious of her.
Apparently deciding to settle for the former option for the time being, Merrythought clapped her hands together, freeing Riddle from his kneeling position.
"Well!" She smiled appreciatively at the two students before turning her attention to the whole class and erasing the red circle from the floor with a wave of her wand.
"You've all displayed your skills in unique ways today and I think it is safe to say that I am thoroughly impressed and excited to teach this class! Although I must say some spell choices were definitely more harmful than I would have liked, I don't believe anyone has been hurt. Your next lesson with me will be curated based off of what I have seen today, but until then, off to your next classes!"
As the students all began to shuffle towards the archway, Evangeline couldn't help but notice many of them keeping at least an arm's length distance away from her. Almost as if they were scared of her.
But what really bothered Evangeline wasn't their fear. It was the part of her that was basking in the feeling. Enjoying every terrified and awed look burning into her. Reveling in the way their heads would jerk away the moment her eyes returned a look.
She tried to brush it off as nothing and scanned the room for Cassi or Myrtle, the two closest things she had to friends. Not to her surprise, the first person that came into her line of sight was not either of the two girls she had been hoping to find, but Riddle.
The Slytherin walked towards her with a certain poise that he had unquestionably been stripped of during his defeat in their final duel.
"Serpens," he addressed her crisply once he was no less than a foot away from where she stood. His voice was low and firm, and held an underlying lilt to it that almost dared the listener to talk back.
"Riddle," Evangeline greeted, analyzing his demeanor. She couldn't be sure whether or not he was angry about her victory; if he was, then he was also unnervingly good at hiding it.
"How did you do that? The fire?" Riddle's tone got much heavier and the hunger she had seen in his eyes after she had turned his chains to Hellfire returned to braid itself into his voice.
She raised an eyebrow teasingly. "What, no 'good duel'?"
"It wasn't," he replied through gritted teeth. Riddle clearly wasn't amused, giving away his suppressed anger about the outcome of the duel.
Unfazed, Eva's lip curled up pridefully at the edge.
"How did you do that with the fire?" the prefect repeated impatiently.
"You conjured fire as well. I don't see how my actions were much different," she said nonchalantly.
"It wasn't the same and you know it," Riddle pressed on sharply. "Yours was much darker and it didn't harm you. It didn't even tint your arms red."
Suddenly the leaf design that wandered up the cherry wood of her wand became very interesting to her fidgeting fingertips.
"I'm good at controlling my magic," she responded tartly. "Now if you'll excuse me, I need to get to my next lesson. Have a nice day."
Eva chewed at her bottom lip, studying him for a moment, before turning on her heel and leaving the classroom. Riddle watched her strawberry blonde locks bounce on the back of her robes for a few seconds before remembering something and taking a few long strides to fall into step beside her.
"Your eyes." He wasted no time in speaking again once they were walking shoulder to shoulder. "They went dark halfway through our duel and didn't go back to grey until the very end."
Evangeline was beginning to panic ever so slightly now. "Don't you have a class to get to?"
"Slytherins and Ravenclaws have Potions together, too. Is that not where you're headed right now?" he said coolly, not missing a beat.
She chuckled nervously and awkwardly blew a stray lock out of her eyes, desperate for a change in subject. "Blimey, stalker. You're not even remotely trying to hide your obsession with me now."
He dismissed the comment. "You might have had your back turned to the rest of the class, but I know what I saw. Care to explain?"
Eva didn't know what to say, and so she quickened her pace and scoffed harshly, losing her polite disposition.
"No."
She turned briskly onto a staircase that led down into dungeons, with Riddle easily keeping up before the staircase gave a sudden lurch and began to switch course. Evangeline, who had been too focused on escaping interrogation to steady herself, was flung around for the second time that day.
Much to the half-angel's dismay, her lack of familiarity with the castle's staircases' tendency to move around rendered her too shocked to save herself from humiliation this time around and she toppled over her own feet to crash into Riddle's board-firm figure. Her spine came colliding into his shoulder, which stiffened significantly at her touch. Barely a beat came to pass before Evangeline had regained her composure, hastily putting a hand out to push gently away from Riddle's arm.
He couldn't help but notice that she was extremely light. And though, she was skinny, it wasn't to the point where it could justify her weighing the same as a hollowed out skeleton. It had barely felt as though any weight had been thrown on or taken off of him in those few seconds.
The Ravenclaw just kept littering his mind with more and more questions. It irritated him.
In his moment of confusion, Riddle had stopped. The grooves under his shoes stapled to the stone surface of the staircase.
He attempted to move, thinking he had stopped subconsciously. He hadn't. His dark eyes adopted a fire to boil their coffee when he realized he was now standing alone. Their steam caught sight of a rose gold veil before it disappeared into the doorway of the dungeons.
Tom Riddle's curiosity roused.
a/n: ok so i dont usually leave author's notes and will prob delete soon but i rlly rlly hate this chapter and don't think the writing was the best but it was kind of the last filler before their relationship(???) gets actually interesting so pls hang on and i promise the next chapter wont disappoint. ty for reading and pls vote and comment if u enjoyed<33