Melpomene → T. Riddle

xiii. late night rounds

xiii | late night rounds

          𝕽ounds with Tom Riddle were silent, that was what Celeste had found out. The night itself had been dead quiet, no one up, all blackout curtains and shutters in place, no lights on, just the faint glimmer of their wands to guide them. But, between the two prefects, they were also dead silent like they would wake the whole castle if they spoke a word to each other.

Celeste did not have any words to say to the man, nor did she want to have a conversation with him outside of academic work. Every time she looked at his face, looked in his eyes, all she could see was the faces of the people that he had killed and her friends that she'd lost. She knew that he had yet to do that, but he was going to and that was just as bad, if not worse.

It was like the calm before the storm, that she had to stop and the thought of trying to stop the tsunami that was Tom Riddle was a terrifying one. It kept her awake most nights, thinking about what she could do.

They'd been on these rounds, in silence, for about an hour and a half now, and they were coming up to their final bit. Having gone through most of the sixth and seventh floor, looked in the empty classrooms and double checked the Ravenclaw and Gryffindor common rooms were closed, they had one last bit to do. Up to the top of the Astronomy tower and then finally, all the way back down to the dungeons to go back to their own common room.

It seemed a bit mean to give the two Slytherin prefects the route furthest from their dormitories but there was no way that they could change it. 

Celeste had previously gone up and down to the Astronomy tower once a week on a Wednesday, though it had moved day each year as she grew older, for her Astronomy lessons. She had adored climbing up to look at the view, to see the stars and occasionally, if they were lucky in the winter, the Northern lights.

Though, she could definitely do without the stairs.

Huffing, she continued up and around after Riddle, finally reaching the top. Riddle broke away from her, checking the darker shadows of the circular room, but Celeste slipped her wand away and stepped out onto the balcony, looking out across the school grounds.

The stars were out on that November night, the wind cold and Celeste could just about see the sparkling of the snow on the mountain tops surrounding the loch that Hogwarts was situated beside. The snow was creeping down towards them, ready to encase the entire castle in a blanket of white. Normally, well, back in her time at least, you could make out Hogsmeade and the other magical villages in the distance, but now, in the war, it was all dark to keep bombers from finding them though she doubted they would ever venture this far north.

Her breath was condensing ahead of her, turning into smoke, and she could already feel the cold seeping through her layers and turning her nose a shade of pink. But still, despite that, she stayed and looked at the view and the stars.

"What's the matter?" Riddle called from behind her, but Celeste didn't turn, still admiring and pointing out the stars to herself. It was a nice little refresher from her previous life. "Miss Baker?"

"Sorry, give me a moment. I haven't seen the stars like this in a while." Celeste smiled, despite her companion, watching as a shooting star flashed above them. She had never been able to do her Astronomy OWLs, not since Dumbledore had been killed on the tower and Snape and the Carrows took over. Her experience of the Astronomy Tower after that had been during the battle. She'd fought on the stairs going up to this place and she'd probably killed a person somewhere on the way down. 

"Did you not do Astronomy at Beauxbatons?" Riddle questioned, stepping forward to stand beside her and look around. She doubted that he had ever seen the point in Astronomy and one look at his slightly annoyed expression confirmed that. "They are just stars, they don't move."

"I don't expect you to understand." Celeste rolled her eyes at Riddle's voice and words. He was such a prat.

"Explain it then." Riddle shot back.

"Back home..." Celeste trailed off. She didn't want to lie knowing that he would pick up on that, but she hadn't been to France during the war. She had only her knowledge of Hogwarts, but she supposed that would have to do. "They banned us from doing Astronomy last year. Someone had been killed in the tower during an attack, so they banned us from watching the stars. I missed them, that's all."

"What was it like? In France?" Riddle leant forward, and most would have taken this as a sign of him being nice but Celeste wasn't stupid. He was trying to trip her up, to make her tell him what secret she was hiding, because he knew she was hiding something, he just couldn't work out what. Or maybe, he thought that they knew each other on a better level, and thus, Celeste would trust him. Or he thought that he'd charmed her.

He was wrong on all accounts but she needed him to think that he was in the right. That way, he wouldn't suspect a thing. So, she'd play him at his own game.

"Horrible. The amount of death and pain, it makes the air heavy, like someone is trying to suffocate you." Celeste took a deep breath, making herself relive the horror of it all, if only to make sure that Riddle didn't figure out that she was lying and trick him into thinking that she was trusting him. "Last year, it was bad. I remember holding onto a girl's hand, she was thirteen, two years younger than me, maybe three, and I thought we were both alive, except I walked away with all my limbs and I couldn't find the rest of hers. I don't know if her parents ever found them. I'd been running, holding her hand and thinking someone was on the other end of it, and there was no one."

Riddle said nothing, and Celeste took another deep breath.

"I don't think I'll ever be able to walk those streets again, seeing places that I once loved and knowing that someone died there, or something was destroyed there. I can still hear the screams and I can visualise watching these people that I know die. I can't go home that's for sure."

"Why not?"

"My parents are dead, Riddle." Celeste turned to him. His face held no emotions, no sympathy or hatred, and Celeste was glad of that. She hated when people pitied her. "They were hunted and killed by Grindelwald's forces. I wasn't there, lucky me, but if I was..."

She sighed, before looking back up.

"Anyway, it's nice to see the stars again." She pushed back, stepping away from him to head back inside as Riddle was left staring at where she had been. His eyebrows were furrowed, a look plastered on his face that neither of them had a name for, nor could they explain.

He wasn't sure what he had been expecting when he had asked that question, but the truth was not one of them.

∘☽༓☾∘

Hiya,

So, I forgot to publish this yesterday, but here's Tom and Celeste on their prefect round, having fun and causing chaos. I just really enjoy writing them cause they're just so much fun and I love their characters.

Let me know what you think,

Love Li xx