Soulbound : Tom Riddle

7: Bad Apple

"What do you mean you have to meet Riddle to get some notes?" Abraxas asked as Victoria made her way to the library with her bag.

Abraxas had been paranoid about Victoria's behaviour that he considered to be reckless. He didn't think she fully knew of the consequences that'd happen if Tom found out about her seeing what happened that night.

"Did you not see what he did to that child?" Abraxas stopped her in front of the library doors and pulled her aside harshly before reminding her. "He killed him with no hesitation, Victoria. He's slick with everything he does. The death of Myrtle Warren, the removal of Rubeus Hagrid... all of it, he could wipe you off the face of this earth if he pleased!"

"I'm not even from this earth," Victoria thought to herself as Abraxas tried to find a loophole around the little situation.

"I don't understand why you can't just take notes from Zephyr," Abraxas said.

"I've already made arrangements with Tom," Victoria said regretfully. "You have nothing to fear Abraxas, everything'll be fine. I'm just getting notes, he's not interrogating me."

"It's got to be. He's not willing to take time out of his day to only share his notes," Abraxas said. But as he saw her, he knew there was no changing her mind.

Reluctantly, Abraxas stepped aside and sighed. "You don't know what you're getting yourself into, Victoria. This may just be the beginning of his involvement in your life."

"I'm hoping it's the last," Victoria said as she made her way into the library, passing Abraxas.

Tom was nowhere to be seen as she sat down at their designated spot. She waited patiently, sitting as she shut her eyes daringly after being haunted by the same prophecy in her sleep over and over again.

Earlier that night, she dreamt about the same boy bumping into her, but rather than picking up her basket like she did in Hogsmeade, she ran after him into the dark alley. That was moments before he disappeared and she found herself falling through the rabbit hole again with the same prophecy repeating itself so many times that she had come to memorise it.

The dreams always started differently, relating to her worries before she found herself in the same rabbit hole. Many times, she contemplated going home and many times, she battled herself in thoughts about what would happen to her body in that world. After all, this world of magic was quite real.

She couldn't find time to think much of it when Tom arrived and set down his scroll across from her. He sat across from her without any eye contact as if he were there against her will, but it was really the roles reversed.

"Hurry on with it, I've got much on my hands today," Tom said quietly as she took out her scroll from her bag.

Without speaking, she nodded, barely acknowledging him, as she quickly began to jot down his notes.

Unbeknownst to her, he was trying to get into her head, despite telling her to hurry on with it. Though the furrow of his brows revealed that it was more challenging than he anticipated.

His handwriting was hard to read, not that it was sloppy, but because he wrote in cursive. Victoria was a smart woman, but she could not read a book of cursive even if her life depended on it.

"Tom."

His ears twitched at his name.

"Yes?"

"I can't read your handwriting..."

"Surely, you're dyslexic?" Tom asked, to which she took as an insult and stopped herself from scoffing. "Do you expect me to read word-to-word for you?"