18+ content
Tom had talked their way out of it.
Hannah hadn't doubted him.
Aurors descended like sharks to blood, the doors blasted open, trailed by Dippet and a rather shaken Slughorn.
'Post traumatic psychosis', they'd called it.
You see, she isn't well.
We've been coming here to unwind, it helps her.
Must've been a nasty hallucination.
She wouldn't hurt me, I'm her friend.
Tom's voice drifted low and slow around her, and for a moment Hannah felt as if she were sinking into a warm bath- watching the telltale fists he held so tightly at his sides as he paced, recounting, lying so smoothly that for a second even she believed him.
She's fine, really.
She wasn't.
He wasn't either.
Her eyes found the slick, wet patch of blood on the collar of his robes. She'd done that. Riddle hadn't forced her hand- crucio had come easy, like a harmless jinx, any mindless spell. Only it wasn't- it was an Unforgivable. Illegal.
Sometimes fatal.
I could have killed him.
She watched Tom circle them, Slughorn's pallid face warming slightly, the aurors tense and confused.
"Professor," Riddle appealed to Horace now, his voice calmer than she'd ever heard it. "Let me take her back. You know I can help her."
Slughorn dithered, looking first at Hannah, who sat cross legged on the floor, covering the splatter of blood where Tom's head had collided with the wall.
She tried to smile, only to find her cheeks stiff and unmoving.
"Tom..." he began, glancing now at Dippet, who seemed more irritated he'd been hauled out of bed than anything else. "She's-"
"She's fine."
Tom shifted, hoisting Hannah to her feet, one hand tight around her waist. I'll fall, she thought faintly. Don't drop me.
Perhaps it was the tone of his voice that sealed it. A stubborn, wilful boldness had him leading her from the room, past the aurors, and out into the corridor.
Portraits watched them closely, but Hannah barely registered their inquisitive faces. She let him lift her, pulling her tightly to his chest.
There was that smell again- whiskey, coffee, pine.
It was only when he'd passed the stairwell leading down to the dungeons that Hannah lifted her head, confused.
"Where-"
"I'll tell you when we get there."
*
Water seemed to drip from every surface.
Melodic, in a way. It trickled in rivulets, tiny rivers following the curve of brick and stone, meeting in black puddles on the ground.
She sat up.
Tom's hand found her in the gloom, pulling her to him.
"Lumos maxima," he murmured.
A blast of blinding white light erupted from the end of his wand, illuminating the vast cavern around them. Hannah could see clearly now- a carved face in the rock, the mouth open, gaping.
YOU ARE READING
HUNGER.
Fanfiction"I'm not scared of you." "Is that a challenge?" ---- Tom Riddle was bored. Luckily for him, the last thing Hannah Grey could be called is boring. They find cat and mouse is just as entertaining for them both- though they aren't quite sure who is who...
