Tom Riddle had a secret - he had murdered his family. Arabella Chambers knew his secret - she had witnessed it.
After Tom Riddle kills Arabella Chambers, he steals her wand for safekeeping. But, unexpectedly, Arabella shows up at Hogwarts, very much...
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Arabella Chambers was Tom's greatest enemy. She was the thorn in his side, the first thing he thought of before going to bed at night and the first thing in the morning.
She plagued his mind like a disease and Tom could not stand it. He thought of every single way he would kill her, every single way he would get rid of her, send her away and out of his life.
And then he would realise that it was futile — because he had killed her. And she had not stayed dead.
Though, he still fantasised about torture methods because it brought him a certain feeling of contentment. He could not describe it, but it was enjoyable.
Tom did not believe in the idea of a God, of the Heavens, or Hell. He did not believe in ghosts. He did not believe in divine punishment or salvation, in angels or demons. But Arabella's existence had made him wonder if such things were possible — not out of faith, but from fury. Perhaps the universe, if it had a will, had conspired against him by making her his shadow, the one person he could not destroy or control.
Maybe his lack of belief in the creatures of the afterlife was the very reason he had not believed Arabella's story on Halloween. The devil was not real. And if the devil was the real, the devil was not a woman. If the devil was real, the devil had not created a vampire out of a grieving young girl.
If anything, Arabella was the devil.
Tom would not be surprised if that was the truth, however absurd it may be. If she was the devil, of course she had survived the killing curse.
He was only mildly joking when he thought that. After all, he was not a humorous man.
Arabella Chambers was a riddle he had no desire to solve. And yet, there was so much about her that drew Tom in. There was something about her which made Tom want to unravel her secrets, even if it meant tangling himself further in her web of lies. It infuriated him, this pull she had over him — unbidden, unwelcome and utterly inescapable.
Arabella Chambers was a riddle, and it was ironic. Tom Riddle bore the name, but Arabella was the one he could not figure out.
She had opened Tom like a chamber, and yet stood like a riddle before him, taunting him.
Her survival was the greatest taunt of all. She had claimed to tell him the truth when the "time was right," but she had danced around that promise. Arabella had not survived the killing curse through wit or luck — he knew that much. But she had survived, and she refused to tell him how.
Tom hated her for that. For the power she held over him in her secrecy. For how she had made him feel like a fool in this alliance, knowing more about him than he did of her.
He didn't know much about Arabella Chambers — her secrets, her origins, or the true nature of her power. But he knew one thing, and it burned in him like a curse:
