#thomas riddle

Harry squeaked and hid his face in his hands.

“Merlin, Hermione, you can’t just go bringing that kind of thing up like that,” Ron scolded, pulling Harry closer. “That gemstone essay scarred us all.”

“More confused than either of those,” Harry admitted, his cheeks flaming. “I’ve no idea what actually happened…a few hours ago? When did I even…”

“It was a few hours ago,” Ron confirmed. “Thought mum might try to strangle Dumbledore with his own beard and come find you on her own. She knew something was wrong from the start.”

“How?” Harry asked.

“Dunno, mate. Mum just knows these things sometimes. She’s worried after you all year.”

Harry sighed. He felt worse, somehow, knowing he’d worried Mrs. Weasley.

“Oi, none of that.” Ron poked him in the ribs. “Mum likes having people to worry over. She said it made a nice change from worrying what the twins might be up to.”

Harry snorted. “Thanks, Ron. It’s…tonight was so weird.”

“You don’t have to tell us,” Hermione hastened to say. “If you really don’t want to discuss it. You can wait as long as you need to.”

She took one of his hands in hers and leaned hard against him. Feeling both of them squishing in helped more than Harry wanted to think about. Something about the steady warmth and pressure helps calm him down.

“But I share everything with you. And…and I do want to. It’s just…tonight was even weirder than finding out Scabbers was actually a person and the basilisk combined.”

“Do you know,” Ron began. “I think we’re all stunningly sane, considering. Who wouldn’t be a gibbering wreck after all the things we’ve seen together. And there isn’t a gibber to be found among the three of us.”

“You wouldn’t have said that if you saw me…” Harry trailed off and then took a deep breath. “The goblet was a portkey. It was meant to go back to the main stand so the winner would be seen immediately, but someone messed with it. Cedric and I got to it at almost the same time and…and I said we should both win. It wouldn’t have been fair, yeah, if I grabbed it first. It took us to a non-magical graveyard. I don’t know where; Dumbledore already tried to find out and even he doesn’t know. We stood up and…and we were stunned.

I came to…I don’t know how much later. My watch broke at some point in the maze. I…I was tied to a gravestone and Pettigrew said something. Something about bone of the father and blood of an enemy unwillingly taken. He hadn’t touched me yet, so I thought as hard as I could that he could have my blood. That I was willing to give it. Maybe my intent would change things? I don’t know if it helped, but it made me feel a bit better in the moment. Then…” he trailed off, gulping, and rubbed a hand over his heavily bandaged forearm.

“Harry, you don’t have to,” Hermione reminded him, gripping his hand tight.

“Pettigrew split my arm with a knife.,” Harry soldiered on. “I think I screamed, but everything went fuzzy. The next thing I knew, there was loads of fog and a figure stepped out of the cauldron.”

Ron made a noise that sounded like ‘eurgh’.

“I kept sort of wavering in and out, but first thing after he had a robe on, he said ‘Oh, Pettigrew, giving into the urge to dramatize everything again?’ and he…he sounded like McGonagall when she’s really done with the lot of us. Or Percy when even Fred and George know to stop.”

“I…what?” Ron asked.

“That’s why it was so weird!” Harry stared down at the bedclothes. “He didn’t try to kill me immediately!”

Hermione sighed and squeezed his hand. Ron budged in closer and Harry wondered if he’d end up in Ron’s lap before the end of it.

“He looked normal, too,” Harry continued. “Like a grown up version of the diary Riddle. He called everyone then, through Pettigrew’s mark. He didn’t seem happy about it, though, and I heard him mutter something about how disgusting it was, branding people like cattle. The Death Eaters arrived slowly, robed and masked. He didn’t look pleased by any of it. There were a few empty spots when they’d all got there and…he didn’t say anything about them. I expected he’d be furious or something, but he just started pacing in front of everyone. I heard…I think I’d lost a lot of blood, but I thought I heard him say they were meant to be the Knights of Walpurgis, to protect and guide, not this…perverted abomination of his vision. And…he said this was the first coherent thought he’d had since he had tea with Abraxas Malfoy in nineteen-forty-two. One of the Death Eaters twitched really violently then.”

“Stop picking at the bandage,” Ron broke in, putting a hand over Harry’s to stop him. “And if it was Abraxas Malfoy who…yeah, that would be why Lucius Malfoy twitched.”

“Would you like to share with the rest of us, Ron?” Hermione asked crisply.

“Oh, yeah. Look, if Abraxas Malfoy dosed him with something that sent him mad, and there are rumors about the Malfoys having some family recipes like that, then the whole of the Malfoy family could be held liable for everything done after. It’s an old law, but it’s one reason mum and dad go spare when Fred and George dose people.”

“Oh…oh.” Hermione tapped at the bedspread in a way Harry knew meant she was thinking things through. “Without the intervention nothing would have happened…but the whole family?”

“Legally it would be the Pater- or Materfamilias. Socially it would be the whole family. No one would ever trust any of them again after that kind of scandal. They can forget influential dinner parties until the end of time.”

“What’s a—no. No, I’ll ask later.” Hermione stopped herself. “Harry, are you comfortable telling us more?”

“There isn’t too much, really. That was about when he turned around and saw me bleeding all over everything and went spare at Pettigrew over, er, harming a magical child.” Harry felt his cheeks warm. “He really got in a twist when Pettigrew bragged that I’d competed in the Tri-Wiz to show I was a formidable enemy despite my age. I…is it really weird that a resurrected Dark Lord is on the list of adults who’ve actually given a damn when I was hurt?”

Neither Hermione nor Ron had an answer.

“I thought so,” Harry muttered. “Anyway, he healed my arm and Madam Pomfrey says it won’t scar as much as it might have because of that. Then he sent Mr. Malfoy to tell Professor Snape everything…he seemed a bit hacked off that no one had told Snape anything—said he was the only one of them with any common sense so of course they bypassed him—and woke Cedric. He pulled a hood over his face before that and had all the Death Eaters except Pettigrew leave. Then he had us hang on to each other and had Cedric summon the cup. And, er, then we landed on the dais with me all over blood and Cedric really confused.”

“Is that the whole of it?” Ron asked quietly and Harry blushed scarlet.

How did Ron always know?

“He said it was clear I wasn’t being taken care of properly and the magical world would certainly hear about it. Last I heard from him before the portkey took us he was headed to Gringotts to settle everything. I don’t think anyone believed me, though. Dumbledore said something about repressed trauma.”

“Merlin’s pants but he sounds like he’d get on like a house on fire with mum,” Ron breathed, ignoring Dumbledore for the moment.

Hermione snorted, choked, and giggled into Harry’s shoulder.

“I’m sorry!” she managed after a moment. “It’s just so…Mrs. Weasley!”

“He came back wrong!” Harry insisted. “Or right…or something. I don’t even know anymore!”

“It’s just you’re used to someone trying to kill you every June and you don’t like the routine being upset?” Ron hazarded, sending Hermione into a fresh bout of giggling apology.

“I don’t want someone trying to kill me, you know. Adults only seem to care once I’ve survived, which sounds incredibly grim and dramatic,” Harry sighed. “It shouldn’t be so weird for me, someone doing his nut over me being in danger.”

“No, it shouldn’t.” Hermione sobered at that. “You should be used to adults being angry you were hurt.”

“But they aren’t usually, unless it’s inconvenient. Er, my relatives are like that. Dumbledore just seems sad it had to happen. It’s just…it’s Voldemort. I didn’t think he had feelings that weren’t rage.”

“Harry,” Ron started, thoughtfully. “Have you ever had your family tree done?”

“Er, no. Why?”

“Him saying he was going to Gringotts to get things sorted. If...there are two ways to do things like family trees. One is the Ministry Hall of Records, but you only go there if you like having your business as lunchtime conversation in the canteen. Most people go to Gringotts. They can do all the family records and trees and things only they don’t gossip. What if you show up somehow for him? Sounds like he’s keen on you living, but you could wind up his ward or something.” Ron bit his lip.

The three of them snugged closer reflexively.

“And since I didn’t know I should have it done, we don’t know what he might find.” Harry’s voice shook. “But there’s Sirius.”

“He isn’t free to take you in and I don’t think they’d find him a fit guardian right now. You’re in limbo, a bit, with your guardianship. The courts may not even recognize your aunt’s right to have you if someone powerful can show a magical relationship,” Ron explained. “Mum kept pouring over her and dad’s family trees to see if she could find any way to get you away from them after we met, but they don’t show any of the squib lineages and without that it isn’t close enough.”

Harry ignored the undercurrent of ‘the squib lineages are extra’. That Mrs. Weasley would go to so much trouble warmed something in him.

“Would it have to be a relationship through the Potters?” Hermione asked.

“Most likely, they don’t always recognize squib lines, but they might have to get Harry back to the magical world. I think a couple of the Death Eater families tried, but they weren’t related closely enough.”

Harry shuddered. His aunt and uncle were bad enough. What would have happened if a family like the Malfoys got him?

“It’s going to be a long wait,” Harry murmured. “Until we know.”

“I’m going to ask mum tonight and see if she’ll take us to Gringotts after we get off the train,” Ron decided. “She said they’re staying until morning and I can explain everything to her.”

“Do you think I…” Hermione trailed off. “Does your mum know how much a family tree might cost?”

“I’ll ask. And…maybe it would be best to ask your parents to come, too. We can make our own plans.” Ron nodded as if comfirming everything to himself.

“I hate waiting,” Harry groused.

Far below magical London, a man sat with two goblins in a stuffy, little-used office. The filing cabinets lining the wall barely closed against the reams of paper inside. Files stacked deep across their tops threatened to spill onto the floor. Dim lights cast a fitful glow over everything and hummed terribly. The whole environment, Thomas Riddle thought, reminded him of one of those crime films from the States. He half expected detective in a crumpled fedora to come bursting in, spouting nonsense. They probably kept this room in this state purposefully. It was the sort of pokey corner where he’d stick a nutter asking for a new identity if one came up to him.

“And why would Gringotts go to the trouble of assisting you?”

Thomas looked around the office for a moment as if deeply interested in Goblin filing systems. He’d been in this sort of situation before, only he’d been seventeen and without any leverage. Not that he wanted a new identity then, but they’d turfed him out of the bank before he could get half his family tree request out.

“Slytherin, Potter, Peverell, and Gaunt,” he said. “Accounts that have lain dormant for far too long. And that, gentlemen, won’t do at all. No account fees collected, no transaction fees collected…it’s a terrible thing for a bank to be considered just a repository.”

“Gaunt has nothing.”

“Perhaps. Or perhaps that vault holds something you’d like to have back. It’s an old family and old families often had Goblin-made items. Pity that dormant vaults can’t be entered by Gringotts staff until, ah, yes, until the Family is declared officially extinct by the Ministry. Amazing what information you can find these days, isn’t it?”

The Goblins stared at one another for a long minute. He knew it was risky, coming here, but they offered certain services regarding identities that could be difficult to obtain elsewhere. You could find any number of chaps loitering in Knockturn who’d swear on their mother’s graves that no one would ever know, guv, not no way. They were usually proved false in five minutes or less. He didn’t sigh though they’d been going in circles for the better part of three hours.

“I suppose for a reasonable fee of thirty percent of each vault and an ongoing fee we could—”

Thomas rose and started for the door. “I will not be treated like an imbecile. I thought to keep my business with Gringotts, but I suppose I can go to the Ministry just as easily. Pity that will close the Malfoy accounts. I expect you do rather well out of those.”

“We haven’t heard anything about the Malfoy accounts, Mr. Riddle.”

He paused with his hand on the doorknob.

“That’s because I haven’t yet sworn out a complaint against the Malfoy family. While Abraxas is no longer with us, his actions against me have a longer tail than one might expect. The Ministry does take dosing people with madness-inducing elixirs seriously. The fines and reparations alone…”

“My colleague spoke hastily. I believe we can come to some accord. Perhaps a flat ten percent fee taken only from the Slytherin and Gaunt vaults and…three Goblin-made items, to be agreed upon after an audit?” the other Goblin broke in, clearly booting his compatriot in the ankle under the table.

Thomas sat and smiled at the Goblins before him (he had to get their names before he left as they never bothered to give them…he hadn’t had so much fun negotiating in quite some time).

“I believe we can come to an agreement, gentlemen. Now, shall we begin with my family tree? We may need to go quite a way back and branch out considerably to find an identity rooted in some truth, but I believe we should begin with the Gaunts.”