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Root of Desire	By : MegiiOfMysteriOusStranger Category: Harry Potter > Het - Male/Female > Hermione/Voldemort Views: 42312 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 6
Disclaimer: I own nothing. Not Harry Potter or anything else quoted within. I make no money from writing this. Zip. Zilch.

Chapter List
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Hermione made him more than just a scarf and mittens, it turned out. She also made socks, a hat, and an entire sweater, all in midnight blue. His trouble with his housemates had obviously not escaped her notice, and the color was distinctly not Ravenclaw blue, for which he was relieved. Even more amazing was that the clothes were all wool. Growing up in an orphanage, Tom had most often been privy to cotton instead of the warmer wool, as had all the other orphans. Wool was more expensive, and so was often passed over in favor of cheaper materials.

His dorm mates may have thought it a small thing—had they stayed behind for the holiday and actually seen it—but to Tom it struck him as an immense gift, all the more so because it was made just for him. And it was his only present. It wasn't as if teachers like Professor Slughorn freely gave holiday gifts to their students, and he expected Hell would sooner freeze over than Mrs. Cole sending him something when she didn't have to.

He sat in bed for some time, his mind strangely blank as he ran his fingers over the cable stitching, the ribbed trim. He felt… utterly mediocre. He wasn't a grateful person, not by any means, but he felt as if he ought have given Hermione something in return. A card or something at the very least, but no, he hadn't done a thing. He was…

He sighed, frustrated, and pulled a hand through his hair. He was grateful. Hermione wasn't some pompous rich lady who donated all of her grandson's castoffs to make herself feel like a good-natured philanthropist. Hermione was… well, something like a friend, he supposed. He hadn't had anything like a friend since Dennis Bishop—before Dennis ruined it all and Tom ruined it back tenfold, anyhow.

His stomach chose to make its needs known, and he decided that he would be better off thinking things over on a full stomach. He slipped his new socks onto his feet, and neglected his Hogwarts jumper in favor of Hermione's. It was warm, and fit perfectly, with a little extra length to grow into. It smelled like her.

Hogwarts was astonishingly quiet without its hundreds of students to cluster the halls. There were, of course, the teachers, but fewer than a dozen students had stayed at school during the holidays. Tom loved the quiet; he seldom got to experience it. The orphanage was always noisy, London was always bustling, and Hogwarts was always full of chattering students. The silence was new and lovely, but also somewhat intimidating.

Candles with red, green, and gold colored flames peppered the hallways and classrooms, growing in number closer to the Great Hall. The Hall itself was decorated most extravagantly. Enormous pines and decorations filled up the empty space where students usually sat and ate. The enchanted ceiling was snowing, though the sky outside was clear and blue. The Christmas trees were covered in brightly colored fruits, and fairies alighted in their fragrant boughs—glass ornaments were highly out of style, considering what was going on with Germany lately.

It had been interesting to learn that the magical world had troubles with Germany parallel to the non-magical world. It made the wizarding world seem less separate.

Not all of the staff and remaining students were at the lone, circular table, happily munching away at breakfast. However, Hermione was present, and when she spotted him she wasted no time making space at the bench spot beside her.

"Happy Christmas, Mister Riddle!" Slughorn greeted jovially. His cheeks and nose were bright pink, his round body clad in a bright red robe with golden reindeer prancing along the edges. Beside him, Dumbledore was clad in forest green, his robe dotted with spiraling silver candy canes. It was obvious that the two teachers were very good friends if they were daring enough to exchange House colors for the day. They each looked like a strange version of Father Christmas.

Dumbledore also looked to be in a good holiday mood, though he was substantially less jovial than Slughorn.

"Happy Christmas, sir, Professor Dumbledore," Tom replied.

"Happy Christmas, Tom," Hermione said. Her greeting was much less noisy than Slughorn's.

Tom looked over at her, feeling thick mucus build up in his throat. "Thank you," he said sincerely. "Happy Christmas to you, too."

She was smiling at him, her brown eyes bright. Obviously she realized what he was really thanking her for, though he had hoped she would have been oblivious. She tugged lightly on the edge of the dark blue sweater and winked. She lifted a forkful of eggs to her mouth.

Tom averted his gaze and set about filling his plate. The fare was even better than usual. The plates were piled with hot, crispy rashers, towers of buttered toast, sunny-side-up eggs, bubble and squeak, fresh sliced fruits, jars of gooey marmalades and jams, steamy black puddings, golden hash browns, meaty sausage links slippery with grease, flaky croissants and scones, crisp kippers, and slimy sautéed mushrooms. Tom poured himself a goblet full of hot, spiced cider instead of the usual pumpkin juice. Hermione, he noted, had thick, creamy cocoa. It left a little brown line on the bow of her lip every time she took a drink.

The talk around the table was jolly and lighthearted. Dumbledore was bragging about some socks he'd gotten. Slughorn was going on about how great his Christmas Party was going to be this year (Tom was already a well-established member of the Slug Club, but students under third year were not able to attend his more extravagant holiday parties). Hermione split a wizard cracker with the Hufflepuff boy sitting near her other side; the cracker exploded in blue smoke with a colossal bang like a cannon. White mice skittered around the table and several enormous, glowing balloons floated toward the enchanted ceiling. Across the table a Gryffindor older than Tom but younger than Hermione had a fruit-covered hat burst out his cracker, and he happily planted it on his head.

Hermione held out a cracker to Tom once he had cleaned his plate.

"Split a few with me?" She asked.

He obliged her without reluctance, and before long found himself with an impressive pile of chocolate frogs, peppermint canes, and other sweets—which he contentedly nibbled away on—and several silly toys and baubles. Neither he nor Hermione were fond of the gobstone set that had appeared—after all, who liked having ink squirted all over them?—and they happily traded it to the fruit-capped Gryffindor for the boy's chess set.

That pained, lonely look that Tom had gotten so good at spotting drifted across Hermione's face, but was smothered almost as quickly as it came, and she played chess with an eager hand. He lost more often than not, which Tom found immensely frustrating. He had only won three times by the time Hermione humorously pleaded that they find other things to do.

Late in the afternoon Hermione ended up in a snowball fight with the boy with the fruit hat, who turned out to be a fourth year named Albert Bott, nicknamed Bertie, and the two Gryffindors briefly dragged an unwilling Tom into the childish game. Hermione laughed so hard that her legs no longer supported her, and she fell back into the snow, unable to get back up for over a minute. She ended up carving out a snow angel while she lied there, pink cheeked, bushy haired, smiling and soaked to the bone.

Bott and Tom both helped pull her to her feet, though Tom quickly pressed himself against her side, viciously territorial all of a sudden. A fellow male, Bott raised his eyebrows and smirked knowingly, baring his upturned palms in surrender, an action that thankfully went right over Hermione's head. She was too busy draping an arm over Tom's shoulder and mussing his hair. Her promise was still in place, after all. Tom allowed it because it kept Bott at a safe distance, and… well, if he was honest, her fingers felt nice against his scalp.

For the following few days, Tom practiced the Orchideous spell when he wasn't in the library or with Hermione. Soon, he had flowers of every shape and color erupting from the end of his ivory wand, though, of course, he blasted them away not long after—he couldn't fill a boy's dorm with flowers, even if he was the only one presently occupying Slytherin Dungeon. Nevertheless, he had what he wanted: a stalk of small, delicate flowers, with tops and speckles the purplish-red color of a fresh bruise. He left the dungeons at a quick pace, absurdly proud of himself and puffed up with anticipation, but as he neared the upper halls that eagerness slipped away into horrible, muscle-freezing insecurity.

What would Hermione's response be when he gave her the flower?

He twirled the Burnt Orchid between his fingers, and worried his bottom lip with his teeth. Oh, he certainly was no Gryffindor if he couldn't even give a girl a stupid flower.

'She made me a gift; I should thank her somehow, even if it's with something this small. She'd appreciate it. That's what people are supposed to do, right?' rationalized his ego.

'What do I need to give her a flower for?' said his super-ego. 'She likes me already, doesn't she?'

'But I want her to like me more,' exclaimed his id.

Hogwarts' library was still a ways away, so he resumed walking, though at a more subdued pace. What would he do if Hermione rejected him? What if the Burnt Orchid wasn't good enough? What if she wasn't even in the library? He should probably just turn around and go back to the Slytherin Dungeon and save himself the embarrassment. Except, that wasn't a very appealing idea either.

All right, so, which outcome would he rather not endure, he asked himself? Not giving it to her and having nothing change, or being turned down?

His mouth narrowed, pressed tight, and he frowned until it felt as if his face would freeze that way. He glared at the flower, gripping it so hard his fingers trembled.

"Fine!" he hissed, turning and throwing it down a stairwell. "Don't take it, see if I care! Because I don't!"

A surprised squeal echoed up the staircase.

"A flower…?" Came a female voice.

"Hello, is anyone up there?" came a man's voice.

Tom froze stiff, eyes wide. Those were definitely teachers' voices. Mrs. Cole always said to "look before you leap," how great that he chose now of all moments to forget it!

The female giggled. She sounded a bit drunk. "Oh, don't mind it, Humbert, I'm sure he or she is long gone by now."

"Quite right, my dear. It's just as well, I'd hate to have to take points or assign detention at this hour, it would ruin the entire mood of the evening!"

The woman giggled again.

Insatiably curious, Tom crept to the banister and glimpsed over it to spy on the two persons below.

"Here, let me get that for you, Galatea, my dear…"

"Oh, Humbert, look," she giggled again.

And then Defense Professor Merrythought was kissing Herbology Professor Beery under the mistletoe.

Well, more than kissing really, they were outright snogging, and Professor Beery's hands were moving over places that no decent gentleman's hands should ever go, and… ugh! Tom's lip lifted in disgust. Forget kissing, the two adults seemed more intent on eating other's faces off. Tom had read about kissing and witnessed a few, and that was no kiss, that was just some strange form of cannibalism as far as he could tell.

'Gross!' He thought, hurriedly walking away, back to the dungeons. The image was stuck in his head; he wouldn't be able to look either teacher in the eye for weeks, surely!

'That wasn't something I ever needed to see. That wasn't something I ever wanted to see. Beery and Merrythought, yeugh!'

What was supposed to be so great about kissing, anyway? It looked wet and sloppy—and if there was one thing Tom Riddle wasn't it was sloppy. Books portrayed it quite differently, but the real thing didn't seem to be a whit like it was in stories. People always has this annoying need for physical intimacy, even Hermione had a consistent desire to play around with his hair, which, of course and thankfully, she couldn't do without Tom's permission. Why was that? Just how often would she be running her fingers along his scalp if he relieved her of her promise, he wondered? Far too often, he was sure.

What would be like if they…?

Tom paused, slowly sitting down on a couch in the empty common room. He hadn't thought of it before:

What would it be like to kiss Hermione?

For his entire life, magic had been something that existed only in storybooks, but that had been proven to be real over the summer, so there was certainly a chance that intimate encounters like those in books existed too, and not simply those messy, face-slurping ones like Merrythought and Beery were doing the motions of (Gross!).

Would it be… well, if he was going to spend time imagining the scenario, he was damn well going to imagine that it was a good and proper meeting of mouths. He certainly couldn't imagine Hermione sucking-face like Professor Merrythought, and he certainly wasn't as ungentlemanly as Professor Beery. Why Merrythought allowed Beery to fumble along her robes like that was surely something he'd never understand! Tom had seen men slapped silly for such conduct!

He exhaled long and slow, and lied back on the sofa, folding his arms behind his head. He stared up at the translucent ceiling. The greenish light that was filtered through by the lake was dark with evening. If he closed his eyes and listened closely he could faintly hear the water currents moving. The giant squid was up there somewhere—was it hibernating due to the cold, or had it perhaps migrated, or was it still lazily drifting around, waiting for the ice to melt?

He wanted Hermione Wilkins very much. He wanted to own her. She wasn't really his yet, and probably wouldn't be for some time, but someday she definitely would be and he certainly considered her to be his. Thinking of her in a romantic way, however, hadn't occurred to him before. Now he couldn't stop thinking about it.

In hindsight, his emotions had probably been building up to this. It was the natural order of things, after all, and anything that felt this exhilarating couldn't be bad, so he wouldn't try to discard the feeling (though he could certainly do without that apprehensive curl in his gut that accompanied the giddiness). The question was what he should do with the revelation. How could he make Hermione like-like him? He certainly wasn't about to ask Professor Slughorn for advice.

So, courting her would take time, probably a lot of time. Tom was patient when he needed to be, but like any adolescent he preferred the path of instant gratification; the sooner he got Hermione to like him the sooner she would be his, which was undeniably better.

He sat up, a determined line appearing between his eyebrows, and re-cast Orchideous.
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Root of Desire