Chapter 86: An Old Acquaintance
With a screech of brakes, the Hogwarts Express released its final puff of white steam and slowly rolled to a halt at Platform Nine and Three Quarters.
The students poured out of the carriages like a herd of monkeys being released back into the wild.
Tamara remained in her seat, utterly drained.
Thinking back on the past few hours, she felt they had been nothing less than a brutal trial of the Dark Lord's willpower.
The air had been thick with the sickly sweetness of chocolate, the stench of Weasley's dead rat, and the suffocating cloud of perfume surrounding Malfoy.
Harry's endless prattle about Quidditch had battered her left ear, while Pansy's shrill laughter had assaulted her right.
If a soul could grow tired, hers would have ground itself to dust long ago.
Compared with that kind of mental torture, even her years as a wandering spirit in the Albanian forests now seemed almost peaceful.
With a look of disgust, she pointed her wand at her knee, cleaned away the last traces of slime left by Neville's toad, then levitated the creature and tossed it back into Longbottom's arms like a piece of rubbish.
"...Take your toad and get lost."
Neville barely caught it, his face lighting up with gratitude.
"Thanks for looking after Trevor! Tamara, you're so kind!"
Tamara felt even more exhausted.
Just then,
[Ding! Mission Complete: The Friendship Express.]
[Congratulations, host! During this long journey, you successfully resisted the urge to jinx your classmates and demonstrated remarkable patience and tolerance.]
[Reward: Love +1.]
[Current Attribute, Love: 20.]
[Congratulations on reaching a milestone.]
[Spell Acquired: Stupefy.]
A familiar warmth flowed through Tamara's fingertips at once.
Stupefy.
Though it was only a stunning spell, it was one of the most practical tools in a duel. A spell that could instantly incapacitate someone was infinitely more useful than many flashy tricks.
"Finally..."
Tamara tightened her grip on her wand, savouring the satisfaction brought by the new spell. For the first time that day, a genuine smile touched the corner of her lips.
At least the suffering of this journey had not been completely wasted.
With Stupefy, the next time one of these irritating people got in her way, she could justifiably knock them unconscious for a while.
"Let's go."
Tamara stood, flicked her wand to levitate her trunk behind her, and strode out of the compartment that had felt like a mobile torture chamber.
The platform was alive with noise.
Parents called out to their children, owls hooted from cages, and luggage trolleys rattled over the stone floor.
Tamara moved through the crowd toward the barrier.
"Tamara!"
Before she could get far, Harry's voice caught up with her.
Harry was pushing his trolley, and beyond the barrier she could already see Uncle Vernon's swollen purple face, bellowing impatiently for him to hurry up.
Harry's expression darkened at once. It was the look of someone about to return to hell.
"Um... I have to go."
He looked at Tamara, his eyes full of reluctance.
"I'm going back to Privet Drive. It's awful there."
He clearly wanted to ask where she would be staying over the holidays, whether she might write to him, or whether they could somehow meet again.
But one look at Tamara's indifferent face was enough to make him swallow all of it.
Tamara looked at the saviour who was about to be dragged back into misery and felt absolutely nothing. If anything, she found it faintly amusing.
"Good luck, Potter."
Her voice was cool, and there was a trace of mockery in it.
"I hope your Muggle cousin doesn't shove you headfirst into a toilet and flush you away."
"If he does, make sure you write to me. I'll let Draco enjoy the joke."
Yet Harry, as usual, failed to detect the malice.
Instead, his eyes lit up.
"Thanks, Tamara!"
He sounded genuinely touched.
"I'll be careful! You're worried about me, aren't you? Even if you always say it in a horrible way, I know you're actually a good person!"
"..."
Tamara's lips twitched.
Had this boy's brain been crushed by a door, or trodden flat by a Troll?
"Get lost."
She ended the conversation with suitable clarity.
Harry left, still glancing back at her every few steps.
And then, naturally, more trouble arrived.
"Tamara!"
Draco Malfoy stood not far away with his parents beside him, a polished, pale trio of aristocratic superiority.
Lucius Malfoy leaned upon his snake headed cane, his grey eyes fixed on Tamara with a measured, appraising gaze that bordered on critical.
"So this is the Miss Riddle you mentioned?"
His drawling voice paused almost imperceptibly on the surname.
His eyes narrowed slightly, and something dark flickered deep within them.
Riddle.
Ordinary. Common. Even low.
Yet to the current head of the House of Malfoy, it sounded almost like a forbidden incantation, stirring certain buried memories.
His father, Abraxas Malfoy, had once spoken vaguely of it before his death.
The Dark Lord, before he became the Dark Lord, had once borne a mediocre surname like that.
Was it coincidence?
Or something far worse?
"Yes, Father! It's her!"
Draco, completely oblivious to his father's momentary stiffness, was full of excitement.
"She's Slytherin's hero! Her spellcasting is better than some upper years, and even Professor Snape treats her differently!"
He turned to Tamara with obvious enthusiasm.
"Tamara, come to Malfoy Manor for the summer! We can practise Quidditch together and I can show you my father's collection of... well, treasures."
To Malfoy Manor?
Tamara's gaze briefly swept across Lucius's dragon hide briefcase, then lingered on the snake headed cane.
If she remembered correctly, the sixteen year old fragment of her soul, the diary that had once held such tempting promise, should still be hidden somewhere inside Malfoy Manor.
Decades ago, when she had still stood at the height of her power, she had personally entrusted it to Lucius for safekeeping.
She had stressed repeatedly that it was not merely a Dark object. It was something that had to be protected with one's life.
And yet, as memories from her previous life rose in her mind, a violent crimson light flashed through her eyes.
She remembered very clearly what this fool had done in the end. Once he believed Lord Voldemort was truly gone, he had casually thrown that diary, that piece of her soul, to a first year girl as if it were rubbish, all to frame Arthur Weasley.
And in doing so, he had allowed it to be completely destroyed.
It was one of the gravest insults ever inflicted upon her legacy.
She wanted it back.
Even touching it again would probably bring her the intoxicating pleasure of incomplete soul becoming whole.
But she could not risk it yet.
Tamara's current identity was that of an orphan.
If she accepted the invitation, Lucius would certainly investigate her past.
And if he learned that the so called heir of the Dark Lord lived in a filthy Muggle slum, it would stain the image of the Dark Lord forever and strip away the awe of a snob like Lucius in an instant.
Why not reveal herself now?
Tamara sneered inwardly.
Because Lucius Malfoy was an opportunist to the marrow.
If he discovered that the being before him was no longer an all powerful Dark Lord but merely a first year girl who had lost most of her former power, his first thought would not be loyalty. It would be control.
Or worse, bargaining.
She had to remain an enigma.
She had to make him uneasy, make him fearful, make him guess.
"I'm afraid not, Draco."
Her refusal was polite, but distant.
"I do not intend to waste my holiday on frivolities."
"But... are you really going back there?"
Draco blurted it out before he could stop himself, his pale face full of incomprehension, as though Tamara had just announced she enjoyed eating slugs.
"I mean, compared with that... that completely non magical Muggle place, Malfoy Manor is obviously far more suitable for you..."
"Draco."
Narcissa placed a gentle hand on her son's shoulder, halting him at once.
Public comments about someone's background, even well meant ones, were disgracefully impolite in their world.
Tamara did not feel the slightest embarrassment at having her origins mentioned.
Instead, she slowly raised her head and looked directly into Lucius Malfoy's eyes.
In that instant, Lucius had the distinct sensation of being watched by a cold serpent coiled in the dark.
That gaze.
That contemptuous, superior gaze, like one directed at a corpse.
It was terrifyingly similar to a figure buried deep in his memory.
His hand tightened on the cane. His pupils shrank.
A fear rooted deep in his soul rose up instinctively, and for a moment he almost took a step back.
"I have my own arrangements, Lucius."
Tamara spoke coolly, omitting any title and addressing him by name alone.
"Some things are not meant to be discussed in broad daylight. Are they?"
It was both a refusal and a warning.
Lucius's heart gave a violent jolt.
A fine sheen of cold sweat appeared on his forehead.
Too similar.
The tone, the pressure, the sense of something hidden behind a child's face.
Could it be...
"I... understand."
He drew in a slow breath and forced the turmoil in his heart back down.
The arrogance in his manner vanished. What replaced it was a caution bordering on humility.
He inclined his head slightly, deeper than he would ever have for an ordinary pure blood child, and there was unmistakable deference in the motion.
"If Miss Riddle has important matters to attend to, then we shall not impose further."
He lowered his voice, testing the waters one final time.
"But let me say this. The doors of Malfoy Manor will always remain open to... talents such as yours."
"I'll consider it."
Tamara gave a slight, haughty nod.
Then, without sparing father or son another glance, she turned and walked toward the barrier.
Lucius watched her disappear into the crowd.
Only then did he realise his palms were damp with sweat.
"Father? What's wrong?"
Draco looked up at him in confusion.
"You don't look well."
"It's nothing, Draco."
Lucius took out a handkerchief and discreetly wiped his forehead. His eyes remained fixed on the space where Tamara had vanished, his expression far more troubled than he wanted to show.
"Just... remembering an old acquaintance."
.....
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