In the Shadows
Title: In the Shadows
Fandom: Harry Potter
Rating: PG
Genre: Horror/Romance
Characters: Minerva McGonagall, Tom Riddle/Lord Voldemort
Pairings: McGonagall/Voldemort
Disclaimer: I do not own or lay claim to anything related to Harry Potter.
Summary: The love that lies in the dark recesses of your heart, hidden in the shadows of the world, is the most painful and dangerous of all.
In the Shadows
By Spectral Scribe
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He was a handsome boy, to be sure, with dark hair and dark eyes and a sort of dark, mysterious aspect about him; but he was clever, too, said to be one of the smartest-if not the smartest-of his year. All the girls fawned over him, but he seemed to have no real relationship with anyone in the castle, friends or otherwise.
Not that Minerva noticed these kinds of things out of interest, of course; it was mere curious observation that led her to pondering about the mysterious Tom Riddle, who she spotted occasionally in the hallway, but otherwise did not see, as he was a year younger than she and belonged to Gryffindor house’s sworn enemy of the green and silver.
She saw him at the library quite a bit as well, poring over thick volumes with an intensity in his dark eyes. Minerva couldn’t help but admire intellectual prowess; it was, after all, a characteristic most important to her. She, too, received top marks, and was, like Tom, a Prefect with hopes of becoming Head Girl the following school year.
The first time she ever spoke to Tom was in the library, of course. It was getting late and they were the only two students left; he was sitting on the complete opposite end of the room from her, but she caught him glancing in her direction once or twice and found herself unable to keep her eyes on the line of text in her book.
She was about to call it a night when he sat down across from her, having crossed the room with stealthy silence, and said in a smooth voice, “You’re Minerva McGonagall?”
Boys didn’t usually talk to her, she would admit. They always seemed intimidated, or uninterested. So the nervous jump in her stomach was quite understandable. “Yes.”
“Tom Riddle,” he greeted quietly, eyes trained on the book he had brought with him.
Minerva nodded, eyes flickering up to his face behind her square glasses before returning to her own book. They sat for a long while like that, each absorbed in a book, or perhaps the in distracting thoughts that often prevent one from fully understanding a page of boring text.
“I hear you’re quite the scholar,” Tom murmured, flipping a page idly. “I couldn’t help but wonder why you’re not in Ravenclaw.”
Giving up on her book, Minerva looked up. “I don’t know. I hear you’re quite the intellectual yourself; how is it that you came to be in Slytherin?”
He grinned, transforming his features into cheeky suaveness. “Cunning and determination. And I think people are too complex to be lumped into generalized categories and house stereotypes, don’t you?”
“I suppose. Then why did you ask me why I’m not in Ravenclaw?”
“Just making conversation,” he replied, face alighting with another grin. “It’s difficult to do so with someone who has a natural disinclination toward you based solely on the colors of your scarf and some Quidditch rivalry.”
“And Quidditch isn’t important to you?” Minerva asked incredulously, being a hopeless and dedicated fan of the Gryffindor team herself.
Tom closed his book. “Not as much as intellectual pursuits, same as you. Which brings me around again to why you’re in Gryffindor.”
“Which you said didn’t matter to you,” Minerva countered, straightening the stack of books on the table. “You’re talking yourself in circles.” Despite her cool demeanor and witty retorts, Minerva could not help the steadily increasing pace of her heart and the dryness of her throat. Lifting the heavy books into her hands and pressing them to her chest, she moved towards the shelves to replace them. Swift and slick as a cat (hmm, she thought, a cat, there’s an idea), Tom rose from his seat and easily lifted the stack from her arms, walking them over to a shelf and sliding them haphazardly among the other dusty volumes. When he turned to her, his dark eyes were glittering.
“I’ll be patrolling the corridors tomorrow night at midnight, probably starting my rounds at the suit of armor in the second floor corridor.” He took a step closer, and Minerva became aware of how he towered over her slight form. At this short distance he smelled of rainwater and freshly cut grass. “You’re welcome to join me.”
Tom didn’t wait for a response. With a swish of his black cloak, he vanished from the room as if he’d merely taken one step and melted into the shadows. Minerva watched the library door for a few minutes after he left, catching her breath.
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It wasn’t breaking the rules, exactly, as Prefects were allowed-even supposed-to walk the corridors at night to make sure there weren’t any wandering students. Still, her stomach did a couple of flip-flops as she exited the portrait of the fat lady and tiptoed down the silent corridor in the direction of the second floor, her footsteps echoing off the stone floor and walls in the quiet.
She was almost to the second floor corridor when she had the sudden overwhelming urge to turn around. The shadows seemed to creep at her from every direction, and while she wasn’t normally afraid of the dark, there was something ominous in the pale glint of the moon shining through the window and the sneer of the dozing portraits. It all seemed a warning to return to bed, to not break the rules, to not meet some dark and mysterious fifth year in an empty, secluded hallway in the middle of the night. She was too smart for this, and not nearly reckless enough.
Minerva anxiously pulled her ponytail tighter and arrived at the second floor corridor, spotting two figures lurking up ahead. One was a suit of armor; the other was tall with wavy, black hair.
“Tom,” she whispered, squinting through the darkness at his pale face.
“Minerva,” he replied with a small smile. “You came.”
They started walking in silence down the hall, alternately stepping into pools of darkness and streams of white light from the windows.
“Do you realize what a scandal this would make? Moonlit stroll between a Gryffindor and a Slytherin,” Minerva commented, fingering the chain of her necklace nervously.
“Indeed,” Tom replied, slow smile snaking up on his sly face. “Quite a scandal. I’m surprised you put your trust in… well, in someone like me.”
“Maybe that’s what makes me a Gryffindor. Trust,” she suggested, glancing sideways at Tom and wondering what in the world she was doing.
“Trust,” Tom mulled over the word. “Perhaps. So far I’ve trusted my instinct that you’re a fascinating person I’d like to get to know better. And I trusted that you would come tonight.”
“Well, it looks like your trust isn’t misplaced. Why, then, are you in Slytherin?” Minerva asked, the question unwillingly taking on a sort of wistful tone, as that of Juliet asking why Romeo should so be named.
“Why, indeed.”
He was smirking in the darkness, and Minerva felt briefly on the outskirts of some inside joke. But then he turned to her, still strolling along, his eyes full of earnest interest. “Can I ask where you got that pendant?”
Minerva glanced down at her necklace, right hand coming up to touch the gold lion dangling from the chain around her neck. There was a ‘G’ inscribed on the back, the front depicting the lion’s fierce pose. “My father gave it to me a few years ago for my birthday.”
Tom’s eyes lingered before returning to her face. “It’s very nice,” he commented, now without a trace of a smile. “Looks like something Godric Gryffindor himself would own.”
Minerva smirked as they passed through a patch of silver moonlight. “I trust that isn’t your idea of flirting, Tom, or I would be very disillusioned right now.”
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While sixth year was the brief breath of air between the terror of OWLs and NEWTs, it was still nearly spring, and therefore exams were still rapidly approaching. It was a quiet Sunday afternoon, the weather starting to get warm outside, and Minerva, after finishing several hours’ worth of homework, walked through the sunny hallway down to the library. There were several students in there flipping through books and scratching their quills against parchment. Minerva went straight to the shelves and started walking through, fingers trailing along the spines as her eyes swept over the titles.
“Perhaps you should try the restricted section,” came a voice, seemingly from within the books. Minerva halted, hand hovering over a thick brown volume before pulling it out and peering through the empty space to the other side. The book that would have been on the opposite end of the shelf was removed, leaving a several inch gap through which she peered.
A dark eye appeared in the space, and Minerva nearly jumped out of her skin, recovering the heavy book that had started to slip from her grasp. “What?”
“I said, perhaps you should try the restricted section. I don’t think they keep how-to books on Animagi in the regular section of the library.”
Minerva blinked, baffled, leaning closer to the gap in the shelf. “How did you…?”
“I saw what you were reading in the library a few weeks ago. I put your books away for you, if you’ll recall.”
Minerva shook her head and lifted the brown book to the shelf.
“I simply can’t help but notice details,” he apologized in an amused tone as Minerva replaced the book and started walking further down the aisle. But the voice followed her, muffled, calling from the other side, “I especially can’t help but notice details about you.”
Stopping, Minerva turned, picked a few thin books, and plucked them off the shelf. There was a flutter of motion from the other side, and then a thick book was removed opposite the empty space, revealing a mouth, which dropped out of sight to make room for the familiar eye.
“You’re exquisite,” said the voice quietly, whispering a secret to her through the shelf. “I’ve noticed the raven shine of your hair when you stand in the sun. I’ve noticed the shape of your cheek as it curves down to meet your lips. I’ve noticed every fleck of green in your eyes, especially when they’re magnified by the lens of your glasses.”
Minerva was struck dumb, warmth running through her veins as she stared through the hole in the shelf at the eye looking back at her.
“Try your luck with the restricted section. You might find what you’re looking for there.”
The book was slid into place on the other side, leaving Minerva gawking at the books as though waiting for one of them to jump off the shelf at her. Silently, she replaced the books in her hand and walked away.
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It was terror unlike she had ever felt before. Walking down the halls to class, sitting on the grounds outside in the spring sunshine doing homework, sleeping in a dormitory with nothing but a portrait of an overweight woman for protection… all of it, all of it was consumed by fear. Students were ushered through the school in quiet groups, flanked by professors. Few were daring enough to go outside-to go anywhere but the Great Hall for meals and the classrooms and the common room. It was an endless cycle saturated by fear because anyone could be next… anyone.
The bathroom in which the girl had died was closed, not that anyone would even consider going in there anyway. Minerva had been in the throng of onlookers as they removed her body under a white sheet, horror rippling through the crowd in thick waves.
She couldn’t sleep at night for the shadows, for what might lay within. The Chamber of Secrets had been a legend, of course, just a legend… Minerva had never suspected, upon first hearing about it several years ago, that it might possibly be true…
Which meant that the heir of Slytherin was about, ready to kill anyone in his or her path. They were all in danger. Not even Hogwarts, the great fortress, was safe.
The school was going to be closed. Rumors and gossip ran rampant, spread like wildfire. Minerva could hardly concentrate on breathing.
But as she stood, watching them carry the stretcher through the doors of the hospital wing, knowing that no amount of medicine would do any good for the poor girl under the sheet, Minerva gazed across the crowd of horrified, silent students and saw a pair of familiar, dark, glittering, sympathetic eyes. And she wasn’t as afraid.
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“I can’t believe it was him,” Minerva mused, shock warring with immense relief warring with residual terror. “He was always so… oafish, I’ll admit. But kind.”
Tom rested a warm hand on her shoulder, standing just behind her as they gazed at the new addition to the Trophy Room, shining, given for special services to the school.
“You never know what people are capable of,” Tom stated softly.
“I suppose not,” Minerva agreed.
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As Head Girl, which had always been the dream of the scrawny, bookish girl, Minerva enjoyed freedoms and responsibilities that she’d never had as a Prefect. She had her own bathroom, for instance. She could wander the castle whenever she liked, with no one to reprimand her (not that she took advantage of this… often). She talked to the professors like an equal because they trusted her above all other students. She had free reign. Hogwarts was her domain.
She occasionally met with the Prefects to make sure they were doing their jobs. And she never addressed him directly, but she often made eye contact with Tom across the group, and she left the meetings smiling.
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It was dark, but warm still, the last vestiges of summer clinging to the crisp autumn air like water droplets on damp hair. Minerva looked out onto the lake, reflecting the twinkling starlight, glimmering black in the night. She sat cross-legged on the grass, an open book draped across her legs, her wand spilling yellow light onto the pages.
“We should go for a dip,” Tom suggested with a sly smile.
Minerva almost laughed. “And did you happen to bring your swimming trunks?”
“No…” Tom drawled, reaching around to unclasp Minerva’s necklace. She batted his hand away, cheeks burning.
“Tom.”
He sighed, stretched his legs out in front of him, which were crossed at the ankle, and rocked his feet from side to side. She could see him watching her from the corner of her eye.
“Have you ever thought about wearing your hair down?”
Minerva quirked an eyebrow at him, lips pursed in a frown. Tom reached around and tugged gently at her tight ponytail holder, having to reach around and use two hands to loosen it and slide it out of her hair, which now hung down in long black locks with a crimp from the hair tie. He ran a hand through it to shake it from its stuck shape, letting the shiny black hair curl around her face and down to her shoulders. It tickled her neck.
“Long hair makes it difficult to read,” Minerva explained, tilting her face downward to look at the book. Her silken hair fell around her ears and along the curves of her cheeks, some sliding over her eyes and obscuring her view.
“So what were you doing with that short, brash buffoon the other day?” Tom asked casually. Minerva didn’t detect any jealousy in his voice, but she compensated for it anyway.
“Who, Remington? The most arrogant prat you’ll ever meet, so full of himself it’s amazing he was made Head Boy? He’s always following me around,” she explained. “He assumes that being Heads makes us a couple. I told him to bugger off.”
Tom chuckled, eyes flickering to the open pages of her book and then back out across the lake. “Found anything useful yet?”
Minerva shook her head, hair waving around her face.
“Then we should go to the restricted section. I need to look up a book there, too.”
Minerva shrugged and peeked to her left as Tom pulled a thin book from a deep pocket of his cloak and flipped through the blank pages, one after another. Then he flipped them back the other way, face a mask of silent pondering.
“What’s that?” Minerva inquired.
“Oh, nothing.” Tom stopped flipping the blank pages and stuffed it back within the folds of his cloak. “Just my diary.”
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They met in the corridor at midnight, by the suit of armor. Tonight was cloudy; there was no moon coming in through the window. All was dark and shadowed.
Minerva paused as they came to a corner and whispered, “You know, I could go to the restricted section any time I like. During the day.”
“But you don’t want anyone to know what you’re up to, is that it? Even though you’ll register yourself once you figure it out?” Tom suggested.
“No, this is just more exciting.”
The thrill of sneaking around after dark had grown over the last year, the urge to go wandering around in the middle of the night welling within her more and more often. Ever since she met Tom.
“Hold on,” Minerva breathed, ears picking up distant footsteps. She put a hand out to stop Tom, palm against his chest, and hesitated. “Someone’s coming.”
Tom grabbed her by the shoulders and steered her into a small nook in the wall behind a statue, pressing her back against the stone in the tight indented area, which was about one meter across. Minerva listened to her quickened breath and the approaching footsteps, which came down the hall to her right-just beyond the corner-and then started to die away in the opposite direction, fading into silence.
Minerva looked up at Tom, finding herself eye-level with his shoulder. His face was shadowed, but she could see the glint of his eyes. His hands moved to the back of her head as he leaned down and pressed his lips against hers, and Minerva closed her eyes and wrapped her arms around his back.
They never made it to the library.
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“Slughorn? Merlin, no. The bloody git’s in the middle of a love affair with crystallized pineapple,” Tom spat. “He’s quite intelligent, I’ll give him that…” he added contemplatively, “but a bit of a fool sometimes as well.” Tom’s lips curled up in a sneer.
“Everyone’s related to someone funny,” Minerva pointed out. “Just try and trace out the family tree of all the purebloods you know. I guarantee you’ll find a lot of them are related… and marrying into their own families. There are bound to be funny relatives that crop up in a situation like that.”
“What about you? Any surprising relatives?”
Minerva sighed, pushing her glasses higher on her nose as she thought. “I do have a distant cousin who thinks she’s a phoenix. Tries to set herself on fire every so often.”
Tom didn’t smile. Instead he leaned forward. “What about your ancestors? Anyone famous?”
“No, I don’t think so.” Minerva shrugged, idly fingering the chain of her necklace.
“Are you sure?” he pressed, eyes glinting eagerly. “I feel as though I’ve read about the name McGonagall somewhere, some kind of relation to Gryffindor…”
“Tom,” Minerva chuckled scornfully, “You’re being ridiculous. I’m no more related to Godric Gryffindor than you are to Salazar Slytherin.”
“Oh,” Tom murmured, looking away. “Well, then.”
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It was impossible to believe that her tenure at Hogwarts had come to an end, impossible to believe that she had graduated school and was now on her own, cast into the real world. All that was left was a train ride.
Minerva gazed around at the group of Prefects in the compartment, trying to quell the rising emotions within her. “Well, this is the last time we’ll all be sitting here together.” She paused, eyes lingering for a moment on Tom. “I wish all you fifth and sixth years the best of luck next year. But for right now, school isn’t officially over until we pull in at platform nine and three quarters, so-Stacey, Jonathan, Linda, Mark-I want you to go patrol the train for a bit, make sure no one’s causing mayhem. The rest of you can go meet up with your friends, you’re dismissed.”
The Prefects stood up to leave, chattering animatedly about the end of the year, wishing Minerva luck. Tom took a few extra minutes tying his shoe as they left, and Minerva glanced over at Remington, who was sitting next to her with a smug grin on his face.
“Oh, and Remington, would you mind seeing if the food trolley’s coming around? I haven’t heard it yet and I don’t want everyone getting hungry and then causing a ruckus.”
“Too right,” the Head Boy said with a wink, patting his thighs as he rose. “Be right back.”
And then it was just the two of them in the compartment. Tom came over and sat next to Minerva, who didn’t quite know what to say.
“I suppose this is it,” he murmured, leaning forward and placing a hand on the back of her neck. Minerva closed her eyes and breathed in the scent of fresh grass and rainwater at the close distance. Tom kissed her, hand on the back of her neck, pressing the warm metal chain of her necklace into her skin. Minerva wasn’t aware of how long they kissed, just the feel of his lips on hers, his hand on the back of her neck, fingers brushing against the clasp of her necklace…
Then the compartment door slid open and in walked a devastated and abashed Remington. They immediately broke apart, Minerva catching her breath and trying to slow her heart, Tom leaning back easily against the seat and giving the Head Boy a dark smirk.
“Well,” Remington started, obviously flustered. “Minerva. I.” He shook his head. “Well!”
Even though it was just Remington, Minerva still felt the flush of embarrassment creep into her face, the moment sufficiently destroyed.
Remington refused to leave the compartment after that, and there were none others empty. Tom, his glower growing deeper and darker, hand twitching by his wand, eventually stood up and left, eyes shadowed as he went. He said nothing to Minerva.
She didn’t see him again for eleven years.
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Minerva was walking into Hogwarts-enjoying the familiar clack of her shoes on the stone floor, the old grand look of the entrance hall, the statues and suits of armor and tapestries adorning the walls-when she saw him and stopped dead in her tracks.
The years had done something to him, changed him. His face was thin and pale, bone-white and waxy, lacking any of the charm that had once made him handsome. Thin, greasy black hair was cut short on his head, lacking the luster it once had. And his eyes… when he turned towards her, Minerva saw his cold, bloodshot eyes, hard and hooded like stone.
He was still tall, but he’d lost some of his boyhood muscle and now appeared thin as a skeleton, his robes hanging loosely around him as he stopped in the middle of the entrance hall and stared at Minerva.
“Tom!” Minerva exclaimed, startled, bewildered. “What-what…?” She wanted to ask what had happened to him, what had made him this way, but couldn’t bring her lips to form the words. “What are you doing here?”
He blinked, seeming to compose himself, to wipe the hateful scowl from his face. When he spoke, his voice lacked the smoothness she remembered. It was cold and harsh: “I’ve just come from a job interview with Dumbledore.”
“Really? That’s why I’m here as well,” Minerva explained, torn between excitement to see her childhood friend and anxiety to see him in such a state. “I’m applying for the Transfiguration post… who knows, we could be colleagues.”
“We won’t,” Tom spat. “I’ve been denied. It seems Dumbledore’s kept his old grudge.”
“What?”
“You must have seen the way he treated me at school. The old fool’s always hated me, from the day I met him. Oh yes, he had his favorites-you were one of them, Minerva-and I… I certainly was not. And it seems he still maintains this grudge,” Tom ranted, almost to himself, aside from the interjection aimed at her. She found herself at quite a loss of what to say.
“I’m sorry, Tom.”
That seemed to snap him out of his fever; Tom, who had looked ready to start pacing the hall and throwing hexes at anything that moved, stood dead still, staring at Minerva again, his eyes regaining their old glitter. “Forgive my behavior; I cannot help but be somewhat… vexed. We should get together sometime, you and I. Catch up on lost years. I know time has changed me, and it appears to have changed you as well. You look different. Your hair is shorter. And you’re not wearing your necklace, with the lion.”
Minerva shrugged. “I’m not terribly fond of jewelry anymore. I don’t mean to be rude, but I really should be getting to my meeting…”
“Yes. Of course.” Tom’s smile grew bitter, and while she couldn’t blame him, it wasn’t a pleasant addition to his already startling features. “Why don’t we meet up this Saturday? I’m afraid I have to work at Borgin and Burkes in Knockturn Alley until seven o’clock, but why don’t we meet there and walk over to Diagon Alley?”
Wariness warred with delight warred with an odd sense of foreboding. Minerva nodded.
“Seven o’clock.”
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Knockturn Alley was as gritty and gray as the last time Minerva had been there, and while she didn’t fancy walking down the crooked, cobbled street past a surplus of dark-cloaked, dubious figures, the anticipation of meeting Tom quashed her nervousness and sent a thrill through her heart.
She waited outside of Borgin and Burkes until Tom emerged, his features melting to pleasure when he saw her.
“Minerva,” he murmured, his dark eyes drinking in the details, raking over her body. “You wore your necklace.”
She brought her fingers up to touch the cool metal lion hanging from the chain. “I know you like it.”
“I do,” he replied, hunger in his voice, desire in his eyes. Minerva was slightly unnerved, but still she could not see beyond her youthful glee.
They started to walk, and she decided to bring it up.
“You look so different, Tom…”
“No, not Tom, not anymore,” he cut in, turning to face her and stopping in the middle of the nearly empty street. “My friends call me Voldemort now.”
“Friends?” Minerva asked wryly. “I don’t recall you being a very social person. And… Voldemort? Whatever made you decide upon a name like that? I prefer Tom Riddle.”
“I despise that name,” he breathed, taking a step closer to her. “It was my father’s name.”
He was backing her up into the side of a building, into the shadows that fell about their shoulders and mingled with the waxy pallor of his face, which was distorted into a cold smirk. Now Minerva’s pleasure began to ebb, leaving worry in its place.
“Soon everyone will know my name,” Tom whispered, giving a high laugh that sent chills down Minerva’s spine. He took another step closer, cornering her against the wall, grinning in perverse delight. His face was twisted, demented, like a skull.
Then one hand was snaking around the back of Minerva’s head, his cold lips pressing against hers in a deep, rough kiss, and for a moment Minerva thought only of the nook behind the statue at Hogwarts, in the shadows with no moon, and she could not stop herself from kissing him back.
His long, thin fingers snagged the clasp of her necklace, and it fell loose. Startled, Minerva made to pull away, but Tom reached up his free hand and pressed the palm against her mouth, watching her through bloodshot eyes. He dangled the lion pendant in the air before their faces, holding it by the chain, and Minerva’s breathing quickened behind his hand, and she struggled to escape, but Tom had her pinned against the wall with his body, hand over her mouth, and it was getting difficult to breathe…
“You tell me this didn’t belong to Gryffindor?” he spat, eyes wild. “I must say, the signs all point to yes.”
Minerva let out a pathetic, embarrassing whimper behind his hand, sucking in sharp breaths through her nose. Her heart thudded painfully in her chest, like heavy footfalls in a silent, echoing chamber.
“All those years,” he whispered feverishly, almost to himself. “At last, I have it. Perhaps you should be the soul that preserves mine…”
Tom removed his right hand from her mouth and went for his wand, and Minerva took a deep breath and shoved him away from her, panic pounding through her veins.
“You want that stupid pendant? Fine, you can have it. It’s nothing but junk, just like I’ve told you. If that’s the only reason you ever spoke to me, you were wasting your time.” To prove her point, she whipped out her own wand and sent a jet of steaming air at the necklace in Tom’s hand. He watched, wide-eyed, as the metal melted in his grip; his hand twitched as he dropped it to the ground.
They watched for a brief, silent moment as the golden lion melted away into the darkness of the ground; then Tom rounded on her, wand inches from her face, and muttered furiously, “You’ll pay for that.”
Minerva raised her own wand, and the last thing she saw before she Disapparated was Tom’s cold, dark eyes.
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“-seventeen killings already, Muggles and wizards alike-”
“…seems to be recruiting followers, pureblood maniacs; something’s starting-”
“He calls himself Lord Voldemort-”
Minerva felt like she was going to be sick.
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The second time the Chamber of Secrets was opened, Minerva walked around like a ghost, the terror that had so overwhelmed her all those years ago fresh and vibrant as a reopened wound.
More so, now that she knew who had really opened it the first time.
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Watching Lord Voldemort crumple to the ground, dead, at Harry Potter’s feet was a wash of cool relief; a dazzling, exhilarating, balloon-like joy; a deep, deep ache somewhere in the deep, deep recesses of her heart.
Somewhere in that gaunt and skeletal form had once been a handsome, dark-haired youth with a charming, suave voice and clever mind. But he was long gone, and perhaps had only ever been a front, anyway; a façade fashioned for the purpose of achieving his ends. Tom Riddle, it seemed, had never really existed. Somewhere, deep within, he had always been Voldemort.
Which meant that Minerva had loved a man who had, in truth, been fiction; not that Minerva thought often about these things, such trivial matters as schoolgirl romance. But all the same, the ache remained.
She had grown wise in her years, but she could not help it when a flash of her past reawakened feelings she’d thought long dead, such as when she happened to spot a golden lion, perhaps on a chain.
And sometimes, in her solitary ponderings, Minerva wondered which was the greater of two evils: a love long lost, or a love never had.
She knew both.
Fandom: Harry Potter
Rating: PG
Genre: Horror/Romance
Characters: Minerva McGonagall, Tom Riddle/Lord Voldemort
Pairings: McGonagall/Voldemort
Disclaimer: I do not own or lay claim to anything related to Harry Potter.
Summary: The love that lies in the dark recesses of your heart, hidden in the shadows of the world, is the most painful and dangerous of all.
In the Shadows
By Spectral Scribe
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He was a handsome boy, to be sure, with dark hair and dark eyes and a sort of dark, mysterious aspect about him; but he was clever, too, said to be one of the smartest-if not the smartest-of his year. All the girls fawned over him, but he seemed to have no real relationship with anyone in the castle, friends or otherwise.
Not that Minerva noticed these kinds of things out of interest, of course; it was mere curious observation that led her to pondering about the mysterious Tom Riddle, who she spotted occasionally in the hallway, but otherwise did not see, as he was a year younger than she and belonged to Gryffindor house’s sworn enemy of the green and silver.
She saw him at the library quite a bit as well, poring over thick volumes with an intensity in his dark eyes. Minerva couldn’t help but admire intellectual prowess; it was, after all, a characteristic most important to her. She, too, received top marks, and was, like Tom, a Prefect with hopes of becoming Head Girl the following school year.
The first time she ever spoke to Tom was in the library, of course. It was getting late and they were the only two students left; he was sitting on the complete opposite end of the room from her, but she caught him glancing in her direction once or twice and found herself unable to keep her eyes on the line of text in her book.
She was about to call it a night when he sat down across from her, having crossed the room with stealthy silence, and said in a smooth voice, “You’re Minerva McGonagall?”
Boys didn’t usually talk to her, she would admit. They always seemed intimidated, or uninterested. So the nervous jump in her stomach was quite understandable. “Yes.”
“Tom Riddle,” he greeted quietly, eyes trained on the book he had brought with him.
Minerva nodded, eyes flickering up to his face behind her square glasses before returning to her own book. They sat for a long while like that, each absorbed in a book, or perhaps the in distracting thoughts that often prevent one from fully understanding a page of boring text.
“I hear you’re quite the scholar,” Tom murmured, flipping a page idly. “I couldn’t help but wonder why you’re not in Ravenclaw.”
Giving up on her book, Minerva looked up. “I don’t know. I hear you’re quite the intellectual yourself; how is it that you came to be in Slytherin?”
He grinned, transforming his features into cheeky suaveness. “Cunning and determination. And I think people are too complex to be lumped into generalized categories and house stereotypes, don’t you?”
“I suppose. Then why did you ask me why I’m not in Ravenclaw?”
“Just making conversation,” he replied, face alighting with another grin. “It’s difficult to do so with someone who has a natural disinclination toward you based solely on the colors of your scarf and some Quidditch rivalry.”
“And Quidditch isn’t important to you?” Minerva asked incredulously, being a hopeless and dedicated fan of the Gryffindor team herself.
Tom closed his book. “Not as much as intellectual pursuits, same as you. Which brings me around again to why you’re in Gryffindor.”
“Which you said didn’t matter to you,” Minerva countered, straightening the stack of books on the table. “You’re talking yourself in circles.” Despite her cool demeanor and witty retorts, Minerva could not help the steadily increasing pace of her heart and the dryness of her throat. Lifting the heavy books into her hands and pressing them to her chest, she moved towards the shelves to replace them. Swift and slick as a cat (hmm, she thought, a cat, there’s an idea), Tom rose from his seat and easily lifted the stack from her arms, walking them over to a shelf and sliding them haphazardly among the other dusty volumes. When he turned to her, his dark eyes were glittering.
“I’ll be patrolling the corridors tomorrow night at midnight, probably starting my rounds at the suit of armor in the second floor corridor.” He took a step closer, and Minerva became aware of how he towered over her slight form. At this short distance he smelled of rainwater and freshly cut grass. “You’re welcome to join me.”
Tom didn’t wait for a response. With a swish of his black cloak, he vanished from the room as if he’d merely taken one step and melted into the shadows. Minerva watched the library door for a few minutes after he left, catching her breath.
----------------------------
It wasn’t breaking the rules, exactly, as Prefects were allowed-even supposed-to walk the corridors at night to make sure there weren’t any wandering students. Still, her stomach did a couple of flip-flops as she exited the portrait of the fat lady and tiptoed down the silent corridor in the direction of the second floor, her footsteps echoing off the stone floor and walls in the quiet.
She was almost to the second floor corridor when she had the sudden overwhelming urge to turn around. The shadows seemed to creep at her from every direction, and while she wasn’t normally afraid of the dark, there was something ominous in the pale glint of the moon shining through the window and the sneer of the dozing portraits. It all seemed a warning to return to bed, to not break the rules, to not meet some dark and mysterious fifth year in an empty, secluded hallway in the middle of the night. She was too smart for this, and not nearly reckless enough.
Minerva anxiously pulled her ponytail tighter and arrived at the second floor corridor, spotting two figures lurking up ahead. One was a suit of armor; the other was tall with wavy, black hair.
“Tom,” she whispered, squinting through the darkness at his pale face.
“Minerva,” he replied with a small smile. “You came.”
They started walking in silence down the hall, alternately stepping into pools of darkness and streams of white light from the windows.
“Do you realize what a scandal this would make? Moonlit stroll between a Gryffindor and a Slytherin,” Minerva commented, fingering the chain of her necklace nervously.
“Indeed,” Tom replied, slow smile snaking up on his sly face. “Quite a scandal. I’m surprised you put your trust in… well, in someone like me.”
“Maybe that’s what makes me a Gryffindor. Trust,” she suggested, glancing sideways at Tom and wondering what in the world she was doing.
“Trust,” Tom mulled over the word. “Perhaps. So far I’ve trusted my instinct that you’re a fascinating person I’d like to get to know better. And I trusted that you would come tonight.”
“Well, it looks like your trust isn’t misplaced. Why, then, are you in Slytherin?” Minerva asked, the question unwillingly taking on a sort of wistful tone, as that of Juliet asking why Romeo should so be named.
“Why, indeed.”
He was smirking in the darkness, and Minerva felt briefly on the outskirts of some inside joke. But then he turned to her, still strolling along, his eyes full of earnest interest. “Can I ask where you got that pendant?”
Minerva glanced down at her necklace, right hand coming up to touch the gold lion dangling from the chain around her neck. There was a ‘G’ inscribed on the back, the front depicting the lion’s fierce pose. “My father gave it to me a few years ago for my birthday.”
Tom’s eyes lingered before returning to her face. “It’s very nice,” he commented, now without a trace of a smile. “Looks like something Godric Gryffindor himself would own.”
Minerva smirked as they passed through a patch of silver moonlight. “I trust that isn’t your idea of flirting, Tom, or I would be very disillusioned right now.”
----------------------------
While sixth year was the brief breath of air between the terror of OWLs and NEWTs, it was still nearly spring, and therefore exams were still rapidly approaching. It was a quiet Sunday afternoon, the weather starting to get warm outside, and Minerva, after finishing several hours’ worth of homework, walked through the sunny hallway down to the library. There were several students in there flipping through books and scratching their quills against parchment. Minerva went straight to the shelves and started walking through, fingers trailing along the spines as her eyes swept over the titles.
“Perhaps you should try the restricted section,” came a voice, seemingly from within the books. Minerva halted, hand hovering over a thick brown volume before pulling it out and peering through the empty space to the other side. The book that would have been on the opposite end of the shelf was removed, leaving a several inch gap through which she peered.
A dark eye appeared in the space, and Minerva nearly jumped out of her skin, recovering the heavy book that had started to slip from her grasp. “What?”
“I said, perhaps you should try the restricted section. I don’t think they keep how-to books on Animagi in the regular section of the library.”
Minerva blinked, baffled, leaning closer to the gap in the shelf. “How did you…?”
“I saw what you were reading in the library a few weeks ago. I put your books away for you, if you’ll recall.”
Minerva shook her head and lifted the brown book to the shelf.
“I simply can’t help but notice details,” he apologized in an amused tone as Minerva replaced the book and started walking further down the aisle. But the voice followed her, muffled, calling from the other side, “I especially can’t help but notice details about you.”
Stopping, Minerva turned, picked a few thin books, and plucked them off the shelf. There was a flutter of motion from the other side, and then a thick book was removed opposite the empty space, revealing a mouth, which dropped out of sight to make room for the familiar eye.
“You’re exquisite,” said the voice quietly, whispering a secret to her through the shelf. “I’ve noticed the raven shine of your hair when you stand in the sun. I’ve noticed the shape of your cheek as it curves down to meet your lips. I’ve noticed every fleck of green in your eyes, especially when they’re magnified by the lens of your glasses.”
Minerva was struck dumb, warmth running through her veins as she stared through the hole in the shelf at the eye looking back at her.
“Try your luck with the restricted section. You might find what you’re looking for there.”
The book was slid into place on the other side, leaving Minerva gawking at the books as though waiting for one of them to jump off the shelf at her. Silently, she replaced the books in her hand and walked away.
----------------------------
It was terror unlike she had ever felt before. Walking down the halls to class, sitting on the grounds outside in the spring sunshine doing homework, sleeping in a dormitory with nothing but a portrait of an overweight woman for protection… all of it, all of it was consumed by fear. Students were ushered through the school in quiet groups, flanked by professors. Few were daring enough to go outside-to go anywhere but the Great Hall for meals and the classrooms and the common room. It was an endless cycle saturated by fear because anyone could be next… anyone.
The bathroom in which the girl had died was closed, not that anyone would even consider going in there anyway. Minerva had been in the throng of onlookers as they removed her body under a white sheet, horror rippling through the crowd in thick waves.
She couldn’t sleep at night for the shadows, for what might lay within. The Chamber of Secrets had been a legend, of course, just a legend… Minerva had never suspected, upon first hearing about it several years ago, that it might possibly be true…
Which meant that the heir of Slytherin was about, ready to kill anyone in his or her path. They were all in danger. Not even Hogwarts, the great fortress, was safe.
The school was going to be closed. Rumors and gossip ran rampant, spread like wildfire. Minerva could hardly concentrate on breathing.
But as she stood, watching them carry the stretcher through the doors of the hospital wing, knowing that no amount of medicine would do any good for the poor girl under the sheet, Minerva gazed across the crowd of horrified, silent students and saw a pair of familiar, dark, glittering, sympathetic eyes. And she wasn’t as afraid.
----------------------------
“I can’t believe it was him,” Minerva mused, shock warring with immense relief warring with residual terror. “He was always so… oafish, I’ll admit. But kind.”
Tom rested a warm hand on her shoulder, standing just behind her as they gazed at the new addition to the Trophy Room, shining, given for special services to the school.
“You never know what people are capable of,” Tom stated softly.
“I suppose not,” Minerva agreed.
----------------------------
As Head Girl, which had always been the dream of the scrawny, bookish girl, Minerva enjoyed freedoms and responsibilities that she’d never had as a Prefect. She had her own bathroom, for instance. She could wander the castle whenever she liked, with no one to reprimand her (not that she took advantage of this… often). She talked to the professors like an equal because they trusted her above all other students. She had free reign. Hogwarts was her domain.
She occasionally met with the Prefects to make sure they were doing their jobs. And she never addressed him directly, but she often made eye contact with Tom across the group, and she left the meetings smiling.
----------------------------
It was dark, but warm still, the last vestiges of summer clinging to the crisp autumn air like water droplets on damp hair. Minerva looked out onto the lake, reflecting the twinkling starlight, glimmering black in the night. She sat cross-legged on the grass, an open book draped across her legs, her wand spilling yellow light onto the pages.
“We should go for a dip,” Tom suggested with a sly smile.
Minerva almost laughed. “And did you happen to bring your swimming trunks?”
“No…” Tom drawled, reaching around to unclasp Minerva’s necklace. She batted his hand away, cheeks burning.
“Tom.”
He sighed, stretched his legs out in front of him, which were crossed at the ankle, and rocked his feet from side to side. She could see him watching her from the corner of her eye.
“Have you ever thought about wearing your hair down?”
Minerva quirked an eyebrow at him, lips pursed in a frown. Tom reached around and tugged gently at her tight ponytail holder, having to reach around and use two hands to loosen it and slide it out of her hair, which now hung down in long black locks with a crimp from the hair tie. He ran a hand through it to shake it from its stuck shape, letting the shiny black hair curl around her face and down to her shoulders. It tickled her neck.
“Long hair makes it difficult to read,” Minerva explained, tilting her face downward to look at the book. Her silken hair fell around her ears and along the curves of her cheeks, some sliding over her eyes and obscuring her view.
“So what were you doing with that short, brash buffoon the other day?” Tom asked casually. Minerva didn’t detect any jealousy in his voice, but she compensated for it anyway.
“Who, Remington? The most arrogant prat you’ll ever meet, so full of himself it’s amazing he was made Head Boy? He’s always following me around,” she explained. “He assumes that being Heads makes us a couple. I told him to bugger off.”
Tom chuckled, eyes flickering to the open pages of her book and then back out across the lake. “Found anything useful yet?”
Minerva shook her head, hair waving around her face.
“Then we should go to the restricted section. I need to look up a book there, too.”
Minerva shrugged and peeked to her left as Tom pulled a thin book from a deep pocket of his cloak and flipped through the blank pages, one after another. Then he flipped them back the other way, face a mask of silent pondering.
“What’s that?” Minerva inquired.
“Oh, nothing.” Tom stopped flipping the blank pages and stuffed it back within the folds of his cloak. “Just my diary.”
----------------------------
They met in the corridor at midnight, by the suit of armor. Tonight was cloudy; there was no moon coming in through the window. All was dark and shadowed.
Minerva paused as they came to a corner and whispered, “You know, I could go to the restricted section any time I like. During the day.”
“But you don’t want anyone to know what you’re up to, is that it? Even though you’ll register yourself once you figure it out?” Tom suggested.
“No, this is just more exciting.”
The thrill of sneaking around after dark had grown over the last year, the urge to go wandering around in the middle of the night welling within her more and more often. Ever since she met Tom.
“Hold on,” Minerva breathed, ears picking up distant footsteps. She put a hand out to stop Tom, palm against his chest, and hesitated. “Someone’s coming.”
Tom grabbed her by the shoulders and steered her into a small nook in the wall behind a statue, pressing her back against the stone in the tight indented area, which was about one meter across. Minerva listened to her quickened breath and the approaching footsteps, which came down the hall to her right-just beyond the corner-and then started to die away in the opposite direction, fading into silence.
Minerva looked up at Tom, finding herself eye-level with his shoulder. His face was shadowed, but she could see the glint of his eyes. His hands moved to the back of her head as he leaned down and pressed his lips against hers, and Minerva closed her eyes and wrapped her arms around his back.
They never made it to the library.
----------------------------
“Slughorn? Merlin, no. The bloody git’s in the middle of a love affair with crystallized pineapple,” Tom spat. “He’s quite intelligent, I’ll give him that…” he added contemplatively, “but a bit of a fool sometimes as well.” Tom’s lips curled up in a sneer.
“Everyone’s related to someone funny,” Minerva pointed out. “Just try and trace out the family tree of all the purebloods you know. I guarantee you’ll find a lot of them are related… and marrying into their own families. There are bound to be funny relatives that crop up in a situation like that.”
“What about you? Any surprising relatives?”
Minerva sighed, pushing her glasses higher on her nose as she thought. “I do have a distant cousin who thinks she’s a phoenix. Tries to set herself on fire every so often.”
Tom didn’t smile. Instead he leaned forward. “What about your ancestors? Anyone famous?”
“No, I don’t think so.” Minerva shrugged, idly fingering the chain of her necklace.
“Are you sure?” he pressed, eyes glinting eagerly. “I feel as though I’ve read about the name McGonagall somewhere, some kind of relation to Gryffindor…”
“Tom,” Minerva chuckled scornfully, “You’re being ridiculous. I’m no more related to Godric Gryffindor than you are to Salazar Slytherin.”
“Oh,” Tom murmured, looking away. “Well, then.”
----------------------------
It was impossible to believe that her tenure at Hogwarts had come to an end, impossible to believe that she had graduated school and was now on her own, cast into the real world. All that was left was a train ride.
Minerva gazed around at the group of Prefects in the compartment, trying to quell the rising emotions within her. “Well, this is the last time we’ll all be sitting here together.” She paused, eyes lingering for a moment on Tom. “I wish all you fifth and sixth years the best of luck next year. But for right now, school isn’t officially over until we pull in at platform nine and three quarters, so-Stacey, Jonathan, Linda, Mark-I want you to go patrol the train for a bit, make sure no one’s causing mayhem. The rest of you can go meet up with your friends, you’re dismissed.”
The Prefects stood up to leave, chattering animatedly about the end of the year, wishing Minerva luck. Tom took a few extra minutes tying his shoe as they left, and Minerva glanced over at Remington, who was sitting next to her with a smug grin on his face.
“Oh, and Remington, would you mind seeing if the food trolley’s coming around? I haven’t heard it yet and I don’t want everyone getting hungry and then causing a ruckus.”
“Too right,” the Head Boy said with a wink, patting his thighs as he rose. “Be right back.”
And then it was just the two of them in the compartment. Tom came over and sat next to Minerva, who didn’t quite know what to say.
“I suppose this is it,” he murmured, leaning forward and placing a hand on the back of her neck. Minerva closed her eyes and breathed in the scent of fresh grass and rainwater at the close distance. Tom kissed her, hand on the back of her neck, pressing the warm metal chain of her necklace into her skin. Minerva wasn’t aware of how long they kissed, just the feel of his lips on hers, his hand on the back of her neck, fingers brushing against the clasp of her necklace…
Then the compartment door slid open and in walked a devastated and abashed Remington. They immediately broke apart, Minerva catching her breath and trying to slow her heart, Tom leaning back easily against the seat and giving the Head Boy a dark smirk.
“Well,” Remington started, obviously flustered. “Minerva. I.” He shook his head. “Well!”
Even though it was just Remington, Minerva still felt the flush of embarrassment creep into her face, the moment sufficiently destroyed.
Remington refused to leave the compartment after that, and there were none others empty. Tom, his glower growing deeper and darker, hand twitching by his wand, eventually stood up and left, eyes shadowed as he went. He said nothing to Minerva.
She didn’t see him again for eleven years.
----------------------------
Minerva was walking into Hogwarts-enjoying the familiar clack of her shoes on the stone floor, the old grand look of the entrance hall, the statues and suits of armor and tapestries adorning the walls-when she saw him and stopped dead in her tracks.
The years had done something to him, changed him. His face was thin and pale, bone-white and waxy, lacking any of the charm that had once made him handsome. Thin, greasy black hair was cut short on his head, lacking the luster it once had. And his eyes… when he turned towards her, Minerva saw his cold, bloodshot eyes, hard and hooded like stone.
He was still tall, but he’d lost some of his boyhood muscle and now appeared thin as a skeleton, his robes hanging loosely around him as he stopped in the middle of the entrance hall and stared at Minerva.
“Tom!” Minerva exclaimed, startled, bewildered. “What-what…?” She wanted to ask what had happened to him, what had made him this way, but couldn’t bring her lips to form the words. “What are you doing here?”
He blinked, seeming to compose himself, to wipe the hateful scowl from his face. When he spoke, his voice lacked the smoothness she remembered. It was cold and harsh: “I’ve just come from a job interview with Dumbledore.”
“Really? That’s why I’m here as well,” Minerva explained, torn between excitement to see her childhood friend and anxiety to see him in such a state. “I’m applying for the Transfiguration post… who knows, we could be colleagues.”
“We won’t,” Tom spat. “I’ve been denied. It seems Dumbledore’s kept his old grudge.”
“What?”
“You must have seen the way he treated me at school. The old fool’s always hated me, from the day I met him. Oh yes, he had his favorites-you were one of them, Minerva-and I… I certainly was not. And it seems he still maintains this grudge,” Tom ranted, almost to himself, aside from the interjection aimed at her. She found herself at quite a loss of what to say.
“I’m sorry, Tom.”
That seemed to snap him out of his fever; Tom, who had looked ready to start pacing the hall and throwing hexes at anything that moved, stood dead still, staring at Minerva again, his eyes regaining their old glitter. “Forgive my behavior; I cannot help but be somewhat… vexed. We should get together sometime, you and I. Catch up on lost years. I know time has changed me, and it appears to have changed you as well. You look different. Your hair is shorter. And you’re not wearing your necklace, with the lion.”
Minerva shrugged. “I’m not terribly fond of jewelry anymore. I don’t mean to be rude, but I really should be getting to my meeting…”
“Yes. Of course.” Tom’s smile grew bitter, and while she couldn’t blame him, it wasn’t a pleasant addition to his already startling features. “Why don’t we meet up this Saturday? I’m afraid I have to work at Borgin and Burkes in Knockturn Alley until seven o’clock, but why don’t we meet there and walk over to Diagon Alley?”
Wariness warred with delight warred with an odd sense of foreboding. Minerva nodded.
“Seven o’clock.”
----------------------------
Knockturn Alley was as gritty and gray as the last time Minerva had been there, and while she didn’t fancy walking down the crooked, cobbled street past a surplus of dark-cloaked, dubious figures, the anticipation of meeting Tom quashed her nervousness and sent a thrill through her heart.
She waited outside of Borgin and Burkes until Tom emerged, his features melting to pleasure when he saw her.
“Minerva,” he murmured, his dark eyes drinking in the details, raking over her body. “You wore your necklace.”
She brought her fingers up to touch the cool metal lion hanging from the chain. “I know you like it.”
“I do,” he replied, hunger in his voice, desire in his eyes. Minerva was slightly unnerved, but still she could not see beyond her youthful glee.
They started to walk, and she decided to bring it up.
“You look so different, Tom…”
“No, not Tom, not anymore,” he cut in, turning to face her and stopping in the middle of the nearly empty street. “My friends call me Voldemort now.”
“Friends?” Minerva asked wryly. “I don’t recall you being a very social person. And… Voldemort? Whatever made you decide upon a name like that? I prefer Tom Riddle.”
“I despise that name,” he breathed, taking a step closer to her. “It was my father’s name.”
He was backing her up into the side of a building, into the shadows that fell about their shoulders and mingled with the waxy pallor of his face, which was distorted into a cold smirk. Now Minerva’s pleasure began to ebb, leaving worry in its place.
“Soon everyone will know my name,” Tom whispered, giving a high laugh that sent chills down Minerva’s spine. He took another step closer, cornering her against the wall, grinning in perverse delight. His face was twisted, demented, like a skull.
Then one hand was snaking around the back of Minerva’s head, his cold lips pressing against hers in a deep, rough kiss, and for a moment Minerva thought only of the nook behind the statue at Hogwarts, in the shadows with no moon, and she could not stop herself from kissing him back.
His long, thin fingers snagged the clasp of her necklace, and it fell loose. Startled, Minerva made to pull away, but Tom reached up his free hand and pressed the palm against her mouth, watching her through bloodshot eyes. He dangled the lion pendant in the air before their faces, holding it by the chain, and Minerva’s breathing quickened behind his hand, and she struggled to escape, but Tom had her pinned against the wall with his body, hand over her mouth, and it was getting difficult to breathe…
“You tell me this didn’t belong to Gryffindor?” he spat, eyes wild. “I must say, the signs all point to yes.”
Minerva let out a pathetic, embarrassing whimper behind his hand, sucking in sharp breaths through her nose. Her heart thudded painfully in her chest, like heavy footfalls in a silent, echoing chamber.
“All those years,” he whispered feverishly, almost to himself. “At last, I have it. Perhaps you should be the soul that preserves mine…”
Tom removed his right hand from her mouth and went for his wand, and Minerva took a deep breath and shoved him away from her, panic pounding through her veins.
“You want that stupid pendant? Fine, you can have it. It’s nothing but junk, just like I’ve told you. If that’s the only reason you ever spoke to me, you were wasting your time.” To prove her point, she whipped out her own wand and sent a jet of steaming air at the necklace in Tom’s hand. He watched, wide-eyed, as the metal melted in his grip; his hand twitched as he dropped it to the ground.
They watched for a brief, silent moment as the golden lion melted away into the darkness of the ground; then Tom rounded on her, wand inches from her face, and muttered furiously, “You’ll pay for that.”
Minerva raised her own wand, and the last thing she saw before she Disapparated was Tom’s cold, dark eyes.
----------------------------
“-seventeen killings already, Muggles and wizards alike-”
“…seems to be recruiting followers, pureblood maniacs; something’s starting-”
“He calls himself Lord Voldemort-”
Minerva felt like she was going to be sick.
----------------------------
The second time the Chamber of Secrets was opened, Minerva walked around like a ghost, the terror that had so overwhelmed her all those years ago fresh and vibrant as a reopened wound.
More so, now that she knew who had really opened it the first time.
----------------------------
Watching Lord Voldemort crumple to the ground, dead, at Harry Potter’s feet was a wash of cool relief; a dazzling, exhilarating, balloon-like joy; a deep, deep ache somewhere in the deep, deep recesses of her heart.
Somewhere in that gaunt and skeletal form had once been a handsome, dark-haired youth with a charming, suave voice and clever mind. But he was long gone, and perhaps had only ever been a front, anyway; a façade fashioned for the purpose of achieving his ends. Tom Riddle, it seemed, had never really existed. Somewhere, deep within, he had always been Voldemort.
Which meant that Minerva had loved a man who had, in truth, been fiction; not that Minerva thought often about these things, such trivial matters as schoolgirl romance. But all the same, the ache remained.
She had grown wise in her years, but she could not help it when a flash of her past reawakened feelings she’d thought long dead, such as when she happened to spot a golden lion, perhaps on a chain.
And sometimes, in her solitary ponderings, Minerva wondered which was the greater of two evils: a love long lost, or a love never had.
She knew both.