Peremo

The next morning, while the remainder of the castle's occupants enjoyed their breakfast, Hermione sat hidden away in the infirmary office, angrily staring down at her parchments.

She was really regretting trying to bait Tom with the article about the founders and their objects.

Because now she actually had to write the damn thing!

She hadn't yet decided the best way to handle it. She'd already revealed to Tom that she tracked Slytherin's line down to the Gaunts, so to write about that wouldn't get her very far. She couldn't very well reveal Hepzibah's lineage, but maybe she could misdirect? Write about the Smith line migrating to the US and lead Tom to the entirely wrong continent?

As for the diadem—well. That would be a waste of effort. Tom already knew of it being lost in Albania. And Gryffindor's sometimes-there, sometimes-not sword wasn't of any interest to him.

Ugh. She really shouldn't have committed to four feet. Two would've been manageable, but four—

"Hello, Miss," a meek voice interrupted from the door.

Hermione jumped like a spooked rabbit. "Oh—Hello Edward. What are you doing here? Shouldn't you be heading out to the train?"

Edward shook his head, looking toward his shoes. "My potions test didn't go very well, you see, so I'm here for the break after all," he mumbled.

"Oh," she said, softening. "I'm sorry to hear that. I know how much you wanted to have Christmas with your family," she said. "But you know, those of us stuck in the castle over the break always have a great time here. We'll have a very Happy Christmas together, you'll see."

He didn't look like he believed her. "Yeah... well, I just wanted to thank you for your help over the last few weeks."

"It's no problem at all," she said. "I'm only sorry I couldn't have helped more. And you're of course welcome to continue studying here into next year if you'd like."

"Thanks, Miss," he mumbled before he gave her a small wave. "Have a nice day."

"You too, Edward," she said after him, "and feel free to come by any time!"

He hummed in response, and then he shuffled off.

Poor kid. She'd have to make sure to remember to get him a gift.

Glancing back down on her writing, Hermione just about groaned. But she'd procrastinated far too long already. She really needed to get the piece finished, so she forced herself to write, to get any words she could muster onto the page.

Wit beyond measure, is man's greatest treasure, Rowena Ravenclaw once wrote. Yet despite the carving of these words in the goblin steel of her diadem, the artefact remains lost.

A prominent theory, as with Hufflepuff's cup and Slytherin's locket, is that the artefact has been passed down the familial line. However currently, the ancestral line of Ravenclaw remains unknown. Reports of sightings of the diadem are lacking, and reports that have been followed have all led to the findings of, albeit well-made, replicas.

Will the diadem remain lost? Perhaps the only one with the answer to that, is time—

"You didn't make it to breakfast."

Hermione's hand seized, muscles tensing.

Oh no.

She really should've locked the door after Edward left.

She slowly turned, wincing as she dared to peek at the doorway. And—God—she was blushing at the mere sight of him. Especially now in the early hours of the morning, leaning onto the door frame, Tom looked... fresh. His hair was tousled. Like he'd only just rolled out of bed.

"Yes. I-I'm sorry," she managed to stammer around thoughts she shouldn't be having. "I'm just trying to get somewhere with this article, you see, and last night... well, it was all just a bit—"

"Don't worry," Tom interrupted, laughing a little as though he enjoyed seeing her squirm. "I'm not here to give you a hard time."

She raised her brows. "That makes a change."

His smile widened. "I supposed you might have enough on your plate," he said with a single-shouldered shrug. "Here. I thought this might help."

Tom stepped into the office and came over to levitate a cup and saucer down onto her desk, brimming with steaming hot tea. It must've come from the daily breakfast feast in the Great Hall.

Hermione looked down at it. Her mouth watered at the sight of it, yet she frowned.

"That's... really kind of you," she said, starting to feel the slightest bit guilty for trying to avoid him. "Thank you."

Tom placed a hand on her shoulder. His touch was warm. "You're welcome. I hope you're feeling better this morning."

"A bit," she said, offering him a weak smile. She wished he'd go away. It was hard to think with him around. "Though I might need a bit longer for my pride to fully recover."

Tom laughed, and gently squeezed her shoulder before he let her go. "I understand. I won't bother you now, but maybe later, once your pride has had the chance to lick its wounds, we could... talk?"

Hermione bit her lip. She didn't want to talk. "We probably should."

Tom nodded. "Find me when you're up to it?"

"I will."

"Wonderful. Well, I'll uh... see you later, Hermione," he said. There was something about his expression. He almost looked sad, as if he were about to deliver her bad news.

But then he left.

Hermione breathed a sigh of relief. She watched the doorway, eyes hovering over the space he'd taken up for several moments.

She rubbed at her temples. Merlin, what was she doing?

With each interaction, he left her more uncertain than he'd found her. Bringing a cup of tea was the sort of thing she expected from a house elf. But Tom? A young Voldemort?

And—he'd touched her. It'd been tender. There was still a lingering, phantom sensation on her shoulder, and she almost wished he'd come back. Do it again, and then, they could restart from where they'd left off the night before—

No, no. Mustn't think of that. Because no matter how he treated her, she was only using him to get to his diary. Couldn't let herself forget that.

Bloody hell.

Well, at least now she had tea. She went to pick up the cup, but—ah—the handle was almost painfully hot. Best to give it a minute to cool down.

While she waited, she tried to focus on her work again. Even the damned article was more appealing to think about than what she was doing with Tom.

She picked up her quill once more and started to absentmindedly flick it, in just the way Tom didn't like.

Her eyes passed over the paragraphs she'd already written. Hmm. Should she add in a bit more about the cup? Add in more of a blur to the link to Hepzibah?

Flick.

Yes, she decided. She could fabricate in another familial line to Canada, and maybe another one to France while she was at it. With links all over the world, surely that would delay him finding the cup by several years at least...

Flick, flick, flick—

"Shoot," she said aloud. A single, long barb of her quill came loose and landed right into her tea. Gross.

She conjured herself a teaspoon to fish it out—

But before she could get it, the barb disintegrated.

Hermione blinked. She stared at the tea, right where the barb had been floating. "What the..."

Testingly, Hermione plucked another barb from her quill, dipped it into the tea.

It gently floated around on the surface. It looked completely ordinary—

Until it disintegrated as well.

The fine hairs on Hermione arms and neck stood to attention. Dread started to settle into her stomach.

Something... something was in her tea.

Hermione could hear the dull thud of her heartbeat starting to pound in her ears. She glanced back over to where Tom had been and then back to her cup.

Something was in her tea.

Doing her best to remain calm, Hermione pushed her chair out from under the desk and conjured an empty phial. She uncorked it, and with another swish of her wand, scooped up the contents of her teacup, depositing it in the phial.

She grabbed the filled phial and took her bag, leaving her pitiful start of her article where it was. She quickly made sure the coast was clear, and then hurried out of the infirmary and down the corridor to the potions space that was set up just for medical purposes.

Hermione locked herself in, and then, she got to work.

She worked for hours.

Hermione set up a row of aliquots of the tea Tom had given her, each supplemented with several drops of Rowe's Antidote Indicator. It was a handy little potion—should she add the correct antidote to the mixture, the indicator would cause the liquid to turn clear.

Seeing as the quill barb had disintegrated, Hermione's first guess was the Draught of Living Death. But when she administered the antidote to a small aliquot of her tea, there was no effect.

What else would cause disintegration? And what else would Tom want to put in her tea? They'd been getting along lately. Surely it wouldn't have been anything too... potent. With that in mind, she next tested for a calming draught. Pepperup potion. Elixir to induce euphoria. Veritaserum. She even tried Amortentia.

But none of them yielded a clear solution.

She then briefly stopped to consider that maybe she was overreacting. The only sign that anything had been added to the tea were some old quill barbs. Maybe the temperature of the tea had simply been high enough to dissolve them.

But she couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong, and so, Hermione persisted.

She tested for stronger potions. Forgetfulness potion. Felix Felicis. Then, she started on some poisons. Belladonna. Weedosoros. Hellebore.

And—nothing. Not even the slightest change in colour.

By the time it hit midday, Hermione had tried close to twenty different potions, and was starting to run out of ideas.

What the hell would he have put in it? Why would he try to spike her tea?

They'd been getting along just fine! Better than fine even, she— she'd been about to let him— with his mouth—

Then her scars had interrupted them. But he'd seemed fine with her blood status at the time. Hadn't even seemed slightly bothered. What could've changed since then? It didn't make sense—

Oh.

Oh.

Tom wore a brilliant mask. Maybe... maybe he wasn't as fine with her blood status as she'd thought. Maybe... oh hell, maybe her being a muggleborn was exactly the sort of problem for him that she'd feared it would be, and now he was trying to... fix the problem.

Maybe she wasn't reacting seriously enough.

Along that line of thought, another option popped into her head. There was... one other poison she could test for. The chances of it being what was in the tea were slim. Minuscule. She was surely—surely—being overly paranoid. But... if it was what'd been added to the tea... well.

It would be the worst-case scenario.

Hermione stared at the tea she had left. She pressed her lips together.

She had to make sure, she decided. Now that it had crossed her mind as a possibility, however remote, she couldn't not test it.

So, she got to work.

There wasn't an antidote for this particular poison. But there was a diagnostic test.

She had to look up the ingredients in one of Spindle's old books. It was a fiddly little potion; two drops of unicorn blood, ground valerian root, essence of comfrey, topped with a dash of fluxweed. The resulting paste took her another half hour to get to the right consistency. Once it was there, she mixed it together with just a pinch of rooster feather ashes, and it made a foul, thick, yellow solution.

It was hard not to gag. It smelled like vomit.

With one hand pinching her nose, Hermione took a deep breath through her mouth and with a very careful flick of her wand, added a single drop of the yellow concoction to the sample of tea.

And—

"No," she breathed, "no, no, no," Hermione whined as the solution started to turn black. "Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck!"

She threw her wand, digging her nails into her scalp. Her wand bounced from the wall, clattering as it's flight came to a halt.

Hermione held her head in her hands. This was it. If he was onto her... all that she'd gone back in time for... was for nothing.

She'd lost.

Because she knew now exactly what Tom had added to her tea.

Basilisk venom.

Hermione paced back and forth in the potions chamber. She clutched the bridge of her nose, couldn't think straight.

Tom tried to—

He tried to kill her.

...

He tried to kill her!

She hadn't even done anything, and he'd— he'd really—

Hermione forced herself to breathe in and out, to try to stay calm, but—

It was no use. There wasn't a ounce of anything remotely close to calm left in her. He tried to kill her! And if it hadn't been for dumb luck, for her aged quill, he would've gotten away with it!

She was hyperventilating. Hermione stopped her pacing and crouched to her knees. She lowered her head, trying to get it lower to the ground than her knees.

He'd tried to kill her and, oh, it was genius. Had she ingested any of the tea, as much as a sip, her symptoms would've started to set in in a matter of seconds. She would've deteriorated so quickly that she wouldn't have had a chance at getting help, and then, once she was dead, it'd look like an unusual, but ordinary case of cardiac arrest. No one would suspect her tea. Even if they thought to test her for poison, she was sure they wouldn't have found anything. Basilisk venom was rare. If she hadn't known about the basilisk living in Salazar's chamber, she herself would never have considered it.

The symptoms—they would look natural enough. The students had already cleared out of the castle, so there wouldn't be any posed risk to them and the school wouldn't be closed. It would make for such a drastically different death than Myrtle's that even Dumbledore mightn't expect—

Her head was spinning.

She didn't know what to do. She was stuck in the castle with him. There wasn't anywhere else she could go, but—that didn't matter, she decided. She needed to get out of there, even if it meant living in a tent.

Yes. She'd survived that before.

That's it. She needed to pack her things while she could, and get out of the castle, away from Tom.

She couldn't do anything for the timeline if she were dead.

Hermione straightened herself, got back on her feet, and started packing up the mess she'd made in the potions room.

But he— would Tom have noticed already, that she wasn't dead? She'd been in the potions room now for a few hours. Would he have gone back to the infirmary to check, to make sure she'd ingested the tea?

She bit into her lip.

Best that she disillusion herself then, she decided. Running into him in one of the corridors  on her way out of the castle would be... something close to catastrophic.

Hermione tucked the remainder of the poisoned tea back into her bag before disillusioning herself. Leaving the potions room, adrenaline pushed her onward through the castle, but it was a relatively simple journey to her chambers. The only others she passed were a couple of Gryffindors loitering by the charms classroom who were there for the break. They were easy enough to slip past, they didn't notice anything.

And once she was back in her room, Hermione immediately got started on packing her things into her beaded bag with a good swish of her wand.

While her personal possessions sequentially packed themselves, Hermione crossed the room and clawed at the panelling of her wall. She snatched out the box that contained Tom's ring and stared down at it. She didn't think she should take it with her.

Think, think, think.

She needed to get the ring to somewhere that Tom wouldn't find it if he succeeded in murdering her, but somewhere that Dumbledore, or someone else with the ability to destroy it could find it.

...

There was only one place like that in the castle that she could think of.

Quickly, Hermione grabbed a piece of parchment and a quill before they entered the line of packing. She placed it on the bed and started scribbling.

To whoever finds this,
Do not touch the ring inside of this box. It is cursed with murderous magic, and even the slightest brush of skin will be enough to have you in an early grave.
Now that you've found it, I must ask something of you. Destroy this ring. No matter what it takes, it must be done. The curse on the ring is powerful, and only the most extreme, potent type of magic will destroy it. Fiendfyre. The Killing curse.
I failed, but you must not. The fate of the wizarding world depends on it.
-H.G.

There. That was grave enough. That should do it.

Hermione folded the parchment up and placed it on the lid of the box that held the ring, and then fished one of her scarves out of the line of things being packed. She wrapped them both up together, tying the scarf tightly.

And then, while her packing finished, she disillusioned herself once more and then ran to the seventh floor corridor.

The Room of Hidden Things was just as cluttered as it'd been in her own time.

Perfect.

Now she just needed to find somewhere to stash the ring. Somewhere not too obvious—one day, Tom would visit the room to store the diadem—but somewhere obvious enough to attract someone like Harry.

Hmm.

Ah—there.

Down the second isle of clutter, Hermione spotted a pile of Quidditch things, all embroidered with the maroon of Gryffindor. It was all outdated gear, but it looked like the exact sort of pile that would interest Harry.

It was as good a spot as any, so, Hermione tucked the wrapped horcrux underneath the uniform.

But as Hermione left the ring, as she thought of Harry and approached the exit, she slowed. Her conscience nagged at her. What was she doing running away and leaving it all up to Harry again?

Tom had tried to murder her, and she couldn't just hang around and wait for him to try again... but...

He hadn't succeeded. She wasn't dead yet. And it... it might not be quite as bad as she first thought. Yes, attempted murder was possibly the worst case scenario for her... but the reason why he attempted it was also important.

He didn't know that she had travelled in time. She was sure of that, because knowing Tom, if he knew, surely he'd try to use her for his own gain.

He also mustn't have known she had his horcrux. If he did, he'd surely be so incensed, that he'd try to kill her with his own wand.

Which led her back to her original assumption: had he tried to murder her because of the fact that she was muggleborn? He had indirectly used the basilisk...

At first, she'd thought that must've been it, but now... now, she wasn't so sure. There were plenty of muggleborns in the castle. There wasn't a strong reason to target her over anyone else. So then it must've been something else—

Hermione came to a complete halt.

Ah.

It clicked into place. She'd underestimated his human, hormonal ways before. She wouldn't do it again.

He hadn't tried to kill her because she was a muggleborn. He'd tried to kill her, because they'd— because he'd wanted to fuck a muggleborn.

That was it. That must've been it!

And of course, while it was still a terrible scenario... maybe it wasn't quite over for her after all. If he—against all of his hatred for muggles—still wanted her, then that meant that, there was still a chance at changing his mind.

If there was even a remote chance... then she couldn't leave. She couldn't run. If there was still even the slightest chance of getting to his diary... she had to stay.

Hermione didn't know if she could do it. Harry had stared Voldemort in face—had stared death in the face—countless times, but she couldn't say the same for herself. She didn't know if she had it in her to try to stop someone who was actively trying to murder her.

But... if she gave up, she'd be letting him win. The timeline was in a worse state now than she found it. If she left it now, who knew what fates would befall everyone she'd known?

She couldn't leave.

A hive of bees buzzed in her stomach as Hermione worked her way down the Grand Staircase. She hadn't disillusioned herself this time; now that she'd decided to stay and stand her ground, she chose to leave herself freely visible.

She had to be careful though. From now on, until the air was cleared between herself and Tom, she had to make sure she only interacted with him where there were witnesses—just in case he tried again.

A difficult task seeing as that most potential witnesses had just returned to their homes for the Christmas break, but not impossible.

And, Hermione reasoned, she always had the option of going to Dumbledore. Having Tom put away for attempted murder wasn't an ideal solution and certainly wasn't a long-term answer, but it was a safety net she could use if she had to.

She would be fine, she told herself. As long as she was cautious and calculated, then everything would be fine.

Just as she was starting to relax, she stepped down onto the second floor landing—

"Ah!" Hermione sounded, running into a tall figure coming from the second floor corridor.

Their hands steadied her, an instinctive action to stop her going down the stairs, and—fuck, fuck—of course it was Tom.

With her luck lately, who else would it be?

Hermione lurched back to free herself from his touch. Her heart was barely beating, but even still, the sight of him had her fighting a smirk.

Because Tom's brows were furrowed, lips slightly parted. He was surprised to see her.

Take that, she thought viciously. I know what you did and you did not fool me. Take that, you arrogant, slimy, orphaned, bas—

In less than a second, his wand was under her jaw, pressing harshly into her skin, and Hermione yelped as her back hit the wall.

"Who—" Tom's words came from behind ground teeth, "—are you?"

Who—what? Who was—

Oh.

Oh, oh shit.

Had he used legilimency? Did he know she'd thought of him as an orphaned bastard?

She hadn't felt anything, not even a tickle at her head, but— he looked furious, and he had his wand on her in a perfectly public area. That must've been what triggered him. He must've known.

And of course, how could she possibly know that?

Hermione became forceful with her Occlumency efforts, gritting her teeth and raising her chin to lessen the pressure of his wand. "Lower your wand," she ordered as evenly as she could manage.

But Tom didn't budge. "Who are you?"

"You wouldn't dare touch me here," she hissed, deflecting. "There are countless witnesses lining these walls. You'd never get away with it."

Tom tilted his head and his dark eyes flicked between her and the portraits along the wall. Out of the corner of her eye, she could make out figures pretending to be sleeping, peeping at them between almost-closed eyes, eager for the slightest inkling of drama they could spread about the school.

While Hermione knew he was a psychotic murderer, she also knew that Tom wasn't stupid.

Tom licked his lips and lowered his wand, cleared his throat. He glanced back at the portraits one more time before he again focussed on her. "Disagreements between staff are only natural, in any workplace," he said, cold smile growing on his lips.

Hermione hurriedly stepped back, her heels hitting the edge of the stair landing. "Yes, I suppose they are," she agreed. "But of course, it would be so unfortunate to have such a disagreement in front of all of these portraits. With nothing else to do all day, their occupants pay extremely close attention to the daily comings and goings. They might very well remember even the slightest altercation—even a small one such as the one just past—for years to come."

Tom's smile grew and he flashed his teeth as they bit down into his lip. "Yes, that would be unfortunate, wouldn't it?"

"Most," she breathed. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have quite the busy evening ahead of me," she murmured before she started down the stairs.

She held onto the rail as she went, goosepimples lining her skin—what if he pushed her?—and although she could feel the prickling stab of his eyes burning into her, she refused to turn back.

Don't, she told herself. Don't, don't, don't—

"Hermione?"

The soft, gentle echo of his voice only met her ears when she'd reached the next landing. She stopped, glanced back up the stairs.

Tom hadn't moved, was still right where they'd spoken, and now, being a flight of stairs above her, was looking down at her.

At the angle, his eyes were dark. He looked impossibly tall, and she felt small, insignificant. Crushable.

And as though he knew exactly that, Tom smiled down at her. It was perfectly warm, perfectly beautiful.

Flawless.

How did he do that?

"No one will believe you."

Hermione's lips twitched. She didn't have anything to say to that, so she turned on her heel and started down the first floor corridor, back down to her chambers.

Because even with the remainder of the poisoned tea in her bag, she knew that he was entirely correct.