Tom leaned against his desk, watching his students file in. They murmured amongst themselves on their way, and he offered them a tight smile. Only the odd student saw fit to return it—the girls, mostly.
He waited for them to settle, watching over them until they quietened.
"I do hope you've all come from the Great Hall full and energised, because I have quite the treat in store for you this evening," he said loudly once he had their attention. "Together, we will be working through a task that I've long been putting off: sorting through and clearing out Professor Binns' carefully organised filing system."
He gestured over to the back wall to where the boxes full of Cuthbert's belongings had been kept stacked up ever since he'd taken the position, and summoned them forth. They drifted on over, settling one by one onto the students' desks.
Once they each had a box before them, Tom next conjured a basket and held it out before him. He let it go and allowed it to start levitating slowly around the room. "As the basket passes you, I'd like for you to please deposit your wand inside of it. They'll be returned to you only when the final box has been properly cleared."
There were a series of quiet moans around the room, but none of the students questioned him. One by one, they grudgingly slipped their wands into the basket.
"See the board for your instructions," he said, gesturing to the wall behind him. "Should you come across any personal paperwork belonging to Professor Binns, you are to come and leave it in this box to your left. Should you come across any personal effects, trinkets, stationery, or the like, then it will go into this box on your right. Past student essays, detention slips, marking sheets, Christmas cards; anything of that nature, is to go straight into the fire. Clear?"
He was met with a quiet, synchronised murmur of, "yes, sir."
"Good. I would also like silence as you work, and should you have any questions as you go, you will direct them to me, rather than your peers."
"Yes, sir."
"Wonderful. Get to it, then."
Slowly but surely, the students obediently started fishing through their boxes, and from their sullen postures, sour faces and tired eyes, Tom felt rather smug. Many of his students, he knew, had intentionally found themselves in detention, thinking they'd be treated to an evening of his undivided attention.
With any luck, this would nip that right in the bud, and if not... there was always the forest.
"Excuse me, sir?" Holly Grimshaw said loudly without being asked, only a few papers deep into her box. "This stack looks like past assignments, but they're all.. wet?" She lifted a folder from her box, one stained with a damp brown substance. It looked moulded.
"Into the fire," Tom said, sitting at his desk.
"...But don't you think we should find out what it is before it goes in?"
Tom stared. "I'm willing to chance that it's old coffee," he told her. "Into the fire."
"But—"
"The fire, Holly."
She snapped her mouth shut and shuffled over to the fireplace. Seeming to expect some sort of reaction, she remained several feet away and tossed the folder and its contents in from a distance.
It caught anticlimactically. Tom was almost disappointed.
"Excuse me, Professor?" Ella Fawcett said from her seat in the front row. "Last week, Professor Shrew said that you also applied for Professor Shar's position."
Tom stared at her, and several of the other students around her stopped what they were doing to look at him. "That doesn't sound like a question to me, Ella, nor does it sound at all relevant to your sorting."
"Well... is it true?"
"If you can get through three boxes before everyone else, then I'll tell you," he offered.
Ella moaned and rolled her eyes. Tom thought, only fleetingly, about the quill in his hand, about how much force it'd take to drive it through skin.
Steadily, the room drifted back into quiet after that, and only the soft sounds of sorting papers filled the space. But then, just as Tom pressed the sharp tip of his quill to the parchment, intent on instructing Lawrence Biggins to see him after his next class about the quality of his essay, there was a soft knock on the classroom door.
Godsabove, what now?
He set his quill down, but his visitor didn't wait for him to get the door, and he'd only just glanced over as they let themselves in. He expected it to be Slughorn with another question about his end of year event, but he wouldn't have been surprised had it been Dippet, Shrew, or even Dumbledore. But it wasn't another professor at all.
It was Granger.
Finally.
She paused halfway in through the doorway, evidently not having expected to find a classroom full of students inside, flushing a vivid shade of pink that matched the girls in the front row.
With his students' eyes on her, Granger offered a small wave of apology and went to leave, but as she did, Tom raised his hand, signalling for her to stay.
It'd taken weeks to undo the damage he'd done at the Hog's Head, and now, he just so happened to have nineteen students in the room. Nineteen little mouths to tell their little friends all about Professor Riddle's out of hours visits from the young infirmary assistant.
Best to encourage that.
She hovered awkwardly in the doorway as he made his way over, and while the students gave their best impressions of getting back to work, he was sure they were paying rapt attention.
"Sorry," she whispered sheepishly when he reached her. "I didn't think you'd have a class just now."
"I don't," he told her, leaning on his arm on the wall next to her, intruding ever so slightly into her space. "This lot's in detention."
"All of them?"
"Yes," he said pointedly, daring her to ask, and she pressed her lips together, trying to suppress her smile.
She didn't do a very good job of it.
"Huh. What are they...?"
Tom followed her gaze. "Sorting through all of Cuthbert's old files. One by one," he said, grinning. "By hand."
"Merlin, Tom. Ruthless, aren't you?" she said, barely restraining her laugh. "I think I'd rather be out in the grounds strung up by my thumbs with Pringle."
"Oh, without question," he agreed, "any day of the week. Now, what can I help you with?"
Her smile sobered quickly and she shifted her weight back to her other foot. "I was actually hoping to speak with you about some of my research for my article. But I can see that you've got your hands full, so I'll just come back another time."
Ah. Her article.
Irritation all but entirely replaced with curiosity as to what she'd found, Tom said, "no need, it's fine. We can talk now."
"Oh. Um..." she glanced over uncertainly at the students, clearly considering whether they'd be overheard. "I don't know if... I mean... I'd rather that the students didn't... you know."
Tom raised his eyebrows. "Well now you're only further piquing my interest," he murmured. "Don't worry. They won't hear anything."
He gave a quick wink, and it only took a slight brush of magic to cast a veil over their words. Under it, the students would still hear them, but they wouldn't hear them.
Granger looked uncertain, but he continued to smile reassuringly, and his eyes drew to the movement in her neck as she swallowed.
"All right then," she said hesitantly, keeping her eyes on the students as she spoke. "If you're sure, then... I looked through the records here, from the library, and I couldn't find much useful information into the founders' genealogy. But then, Avery was kind enough to loan me some of his family's records, and it seems there are only two familial links that remain to the original founders. The Smith family, to Hufflepuff, and... the Gaunt family, to Slytherin."
Years of practice didn't fail him. He remained impassive as she spoke, and when she finished, he gave her a slow, controlled nod. "It seems," he said, carefully selecting his choice of words, "as though you've found a fantastically useful friend in Avery."
"Yes, it would seem I have," she agreed quietly. "But the issue now, of course, is that Smith has become a disgustingly common name, and the last of the known Gaunts has recently been locked away in Azkaban for the rest of his life."
Tom stared at her. He was faintly conscious of a vein throbbing in his neck; a slight, uncontrollable distraction. "Issues, indeed," he murmured, folding his arms over.
"But..." she whispered carefully, "as I'm sure you know, there is... one other descendant of the Gaunt family who might be able to help me."
He didn't move, didn't even blink, because it was impossible. The trail was buried so deeply that it'd taken he himself years to find it. Even the Ministry hadn't been able to, and there was no way some plain, bookish infirmary hand could know of the Gaunts, of his mother, of what was left of Slytherin's line.
...not unless Avery had seen fit to share that detail, too.
"I was thinking..." she said, brown eyes sparkling, "that we should speak to Hagrid."
Tom's composure momentarily slipped, and he scoffed. "Hagrid?"
"Who could give better insight into what's potentially happened to Slytherin's locket, than the heir himself?" she asked, quiet and excited. "Maybe he knows where it is. Maybe he even has it. And—could you imagine, Tom—" she said, lightly brushing his upper arm, "if we could get him to talk, we might even find the chamber."
He glanced away, and his incredulous smile grew wide. He caught several sets of eyes looking back at him from around the classroom, and so, he dropped his spell to direct his words to the room at large. "All of you, continue what you're doing. I will be just outside in the corridor. You can trust that should any of you put so much as a finger out of line, I will know about it."
He was answered by another light chorus of, "yes, sir," and ignoring the students' knowing smiles, he guided Granger out into the corridor, his grip light on her arm.
In the corridor, he kept them close to the wall, and when the classroom door was closed, he turned on her.
"Find the locket?" he hissed. "Find the chamber? Are you hearing yourself? These are things that far better witches and wizards than you have devoted their lives to for centuries. What makes you think that you could even come close to—"
"Don't you want to find them?" she countered imploringly. "I've been thinking about it ever since you loaned me Ravenclaw's diary, and I think I've figured it out. It was a test. Wasn't it?"
Tom blinked.
"A test?"
"Why would you give it to me? The diary itself is... it's an artefact. It belongs in a museum, where it could be studied by scholars and historians, and used to study the mysteries of Hogwarts and the unique magic that lives here. But instead of turning it in, instead of donating it, you've kept it to yourself, and then you loaned it to me. And I've been thinking about it ever since. Why would you let me, almost a stranger, borrow such a precious thing?" she said. "It was a test of character, wasn't it? You wanted to see what I'd do with it."
Tom felt the early prickle of a headache setting in.
"So I've decided: I'm not going to publish anything from the diary, or anything about it. It's best that it remains buried. With you—with us, I mean... it's appreciated and it's safe. Not all would appreciate it the same way. And the locket, the cup, the chamber... I don't want to write about them, either. Just like the diary, they wouldn't be appreciated. I just want... I want to see them. I want to see the magic, I want to walk where they walked, I want to know."
Tom very easily could've laughed. Giving her the diary—it'd been a perfect move. Ingenious, even, some of his best work yet. In one fell swoop, he indebted her to him, thrown her off the diadem's trail, and had ensured that anyone who read her article would be thrown off as well.
But now, thanks to Avery's wandering eye and ever generous spirit...
He closed his eyes and squeezed at the bridge of his nose, and then sighed. "And I take it, you're not just here because you wanted to talk to me about all of this?"
"Well... not exactly, no. I was actually hoping you might be able to help. I've only spoken with Hagrid once or twice, but you went to school with him. He's known you for years. He might be more open with you."
"I think you'll find that I'm the very last person he would care to speak with," Tom muttered. "What about Avery?"
Granger frowned, laughing nervously. "What about Avery?"
"Why aren't you running off to him for help?" he asked, annoyance slipping into the space between his words. Marvin had all but fed her his lineage. What else was he feeding her in his bid to get beneath her skirt? A test? Where in hell had she gotten that idea from?
Her frown only deepened. "I—he doesn't appreciate these things the way you seem to," she said. "You've met him. He'd take one look at Slytherin's locket or Rowena's diadem, and think them nice pieces of jewellery, and then continue on with his day!"
"Have you spoken to him about it?" Tom pressed.
"Not... not like this," she murmured. "He doesn't know I want to speak with Hagrid, or that I want to find the objects."
Tom sighed loudly and glanced down the corridor.
Granger was supposed to be easy. She was supposed to be a convenient, simple piece of the puzzle, one that would clamber for his attention like all the others, placate Dumbledore, and outwardly show him that there was more to Tom Riddle than his suspicions.
But instead, she was reluctant. Her thoughts were hard and unyielding, she rejected him in favour of Avery, chummed up with him to discuss him over tea, and if that wasn't enough, now, she was digging.
She wasn't supposed to be digging, but at least she'd come to him upon the first strike of rock.
"While your passion is... admirable, and while I can see where you're coming from," he eventually murmured, "it's all for naught. If Dippet and Dumbledore and all of the Ministry's Aurors couldn't get Hagrid to speak of the chamber, then I don't think you'll have much luck."
He'd seen from her written opinion of centaurs that Hermione Granger was the rigid sort. The sort to look for reason, to think in straight lines, to over analyse and characterise and stratify.
She was a creature of logic, and when he offered it, she'd see it here, too. He'd talk her down.
But instead of agreeing, Granger's lips twisted in what he was sure she thought was a coy smile, and she said, "ah, but Tom, you underestimate me."
Unimpressed, Tom said flatly, "do I?"
"Like I said," she elaborated. "I'm an excellent potioneer. I have my ways of making one spill their deepest and darkest secrets."
...Ah.
A resourceful creature of logic.
"Hermione," he drawled. "That's illegal."
She shrugged, biting down into her lip. "Are you going to tell on me? After I've so loyally promised to keep the diary between us?"
Tom laughed without meaning to, and it all started to come together—her nosing around the founders objects, her approaching him for help, Avery's interest.
Under her logic, plainness, and self-righteousness... Granger had teeth.
Maybe he had underestimated her.
"I admit that your resourcefulness is impressive, but the Ministry would've already tried veritaserum, all those years ago," he told her, sure it would do the trick.
And yet again, she didn't do as he expected her to.
Instead of agreeing, admitting defeat, and apologising for taking up his time, she looked down towards her feet. "But, if Hagrid's an occlumens... that's not the only thing we could try," she murmured, timidly peering up at him.
She was as difficult as ever to get a read on—there wasn't a single passing thought at the front of her mind to be plucked—but this time, he didn't need magic. He could see it in her posture, in the forced curve of her lips. Whatever it was she was about to say... she was nervous. Scared.
It suited her.
"The... Imperius curse could be used to get someone to speak."
He liked to think it took rather a lot to catch him off guard, but that...
He licked his lips. "The Imperius curse," he said back to her.
"Yes."
There were certain subject matters he knew very well should never be discussed in the halls of the castle, not with the swarm of portraits lining the walls, eager for the slightest crumb of gossip. But at that—the Imperius curse—he ignored his better judgement and twisted, glancing around the corridor to ensure they wouldn't be overheard. Then he stepped closer, leaning against the wall, caging her in.
In such close proximity, he caught a light, barely there scent of citrus; soft, but sharp.
"You know how to cast the Imperius curse?" he murmured.
She looked moments from trembling, but again, his expectations weren't met. Instead of crumbling, she smiled and said, quietly but confidently, "I grew up in war-torn London. I know my fair share of... questionable curses."
For the second time, he surprised himself, his laugh coming naturally.
Who... who was this girl?
She wasn't anything special. She was a slip of a girl, an ordinary, modest thing; half-blood at best. And yet, she wasn't easily accessible. Whether it was natural, or whether she was intentionally occluding him, he couldn't tell, but to get a proper read of her, to see into her mind, to see what held her together, he'd have to force it. He'd have to reach for her, pin her down and rip his way in.
It would hurt. To handle her mind so roughly would have her screaming and the portraits would see. The students in his classroom might even come running, but in that moment—he wanted to.
He wanted to hold her down, keep her still, pry her open and draw every single one of her questionable curses out from between her sharpened teeth.
But he knew better. He would have to be patient, so he said simply, "all right."
Hermione blinked.
"All right...?"
"I'll help you speak with Hagrid," he murmured. It took a great deal to keep from smiling, hackles forming at the back of his neck. "Like I said, I don't expect he'll want anything to do with me, and I'm sure the Ministry had been thorough all those years ago, but..."
Hermione smiled. She looked relieved, like she'd been hoping he'd say yes.
"Thank you. I really appreciate it, and... you can trust me," she whispered. "I think this will work, and with any luck, the locket, the chamber... they'll be within our reach in no time."
As she'd been speaking, his smile won out. Foolish girl.
"Optimistic," he said. "I think you're wrong. But you make a compelling case, and I'll try to help you, where I can."
"We will see," she said, almost playfully. "Well... I'll find you later, when you don't have a class full of students, and we'll... plan."
He nodded. "I look forward to it," he said, and it wasn't a lie. He was suddenly looking forward to the prospect of being rid of his students, alone with her and Hagrid, far from prying eyes, very, very much.
And now, standing so closely, in her state of fluster, he caught subtle passing tendrils of thought. Nothing solid enough to hold onto, but a slight sense of... confusion. A light brush of lust, clouded with worry, with something very close to fear—
Granger cleared her throat and stepped back. She looked uncomfortable. "Thank you," she repeated. "I'll, um... I suppose I'll leave you to enjoy the rest of your evening with your monsters, then."
Tom didn't move, still taking her in. His mouth watered. "I'm starting to think they might not be half as frightening as you."
Granger bit into her lip and laughed and his eyes followed the action. "Maybe you're right."
Tom smiled back. It wasn't at all forced. "Good night, Hermione," he said, and he pulled himself away, ducking back into the classroom without a look back.
The students went abruptly quiet at his entry, and while usually, the ease at which they'd started speaking in his absence after having been explicitly instructed to work quietly would've bothered him, this time, he found that he didn't mind.
Not when a challenge had come so vulnerably knocking at his door.
There was nothing he liked more than a challenge.