The Second Subject

Chapter One~ The Dark Days of You-Know-Who

Mrs. Longbottom, a rather tiresome old witch with a particularly foul sense of fashion, sipped her tea and sat reading The Daily Prophet with the best of posture. She was a most proper sort of lady, whose manners gave the Queen a run for her money. She always looked like she was going to a funeral, but nobody ever speculated about it, for the killings in the wizarding world were growing worse every day. They all spoke of a certain wizard; some even called him a sorcerer with incredibly terrible intentions. But, of course, they never used his name, instead calling him You-Know-Who.

Mrs. Longbottom never feared this wizard, and, therefore saw no harm in calling him by his true name. No, not the name he gave himself, Lord Voldemort, but his other, lesser known name; Tom Riddle. The old woman knew him well when he was still a boy, a student at Hogwarts. She worked as the school nurse and went by the title of Madame Longbottom. She remembered those days well, the days when young witches and wizards would come in looking horrendous after all sorts of calamities and magical horrors. Such things always occur when you've got an entire school full of inexperienced wizards flailing wands about at each other, she used to say. That was why she prided herself for doing such an excellent job nursing the students back to health and making sure that all was well at the end of the year. Of course, every so often one hopeless boy or girl would go home with their hair a different color than before or their ears bigger than their faces, but those were rare, very rare.

Mrs. Longbottom remembered the first time she met little Tom Riddle. It was his first year at Hogwarts, actually his first night. The sick ward was already packed with students who ate the slug-stuffed pastries that Peeves the Poltergeist had substituted for the good ones. It was almost midnight, and she had sent most of the students to their dormitories for a good night's rest, and in walked Tom Riddle. He was a small boy, even for his age, and he had dark, brown hair that made him look paler than he really was. Mrs. Longbottom was certain that this boy was very ill, and started to go fetch some chocolate, when the boy said something in an odd voice, a very strange voice. At the time, she couldn't make out his words, but later, she learned that it wasn't his voice that was strange; it was the language he spoke, for Tom Riddle happened to be one of the rare few who knew Parseltongue. He looked directly at her as he spoke, and it seemed as though he was warning her of something to come; something dangerous to come.

That was years ago, thought Mrs. Longbottom as she sipped her tea. And I never thought much of the boy after that anyways, she recalled. Oh yes, everybody seemed to love Tom Riddle. They praised his every movement, marveled at his talent, pitied his orphaned childhood, but Mrs. Longbottom, even as a young nurse at the school infirmary, had a knack for seeing a person's true colors, no matter how well hidden. Tom always struck her as one desperate for power and glory; one who felt so abandoned that they would do anything to gain the recognition of those around them. Others claimed that was nonsense.

"Of course the boy wants attention," the headmaster, Professor Dippet, told her. "All children at that age want to be special, somehow better than those around them. And this one was orphaned! Can't you imagine how much he aches to be noticed, to be loved?"

"I suppose so, Professor, but I-," she began.

"I see nothing peculiar in the least, Madame Longbottom," he had said, and pointed in the direction of the door.

Mrs. Longbottom let her mind drift back to those days, thinking about all the lives that might have been saved if Professor Dippet, that fool of a headmaster, had listened to her words and paid more attention to the boy. But, of course, Mrs. Longbottom never let herself revisit the past, and now was no exception. She snapped out of such nonsense and looked down at her paper. She hoped that there might be word about her son and daughter-in-law, for they were famous aurors and found themselves on the front page of The Daily Prophet rather often. Mrs. Longbottom carefully adjusted her spectacles to her liking and peered down at the headline. It read: Aurors Found on Living Room Floor After Being Tortured: You-Know-Who's Death Eaters Suspected.

She skimmed the lines of the news as fast as she could, hoping that the worst didn't happen. But, her wishes were for naught; the worst had indeed arrived.

~

In all her years as the head of the infirmary at Hogwarts, Mrs. Longbottom never fainted. As a matter of fact, she had never fainted in her entire life! But this was very different, for nothing worse could have happened to her. The paper came with grave news for the wizarding community, especially Mrs. Longbottom. The front page read:

Today, two aurors, identified to be Frank Longbottom and his wife, were discovered in on the floor of the living room in their house, after suffering from being tortured. Though they are not dead, they have suffered severe brain damage, so severe that their chances of ever recovering are very small. They are now at St. Mungo's Hospital, receiving much attention in their Constant Care section. The ones responsible for the crimes are unknown; though the Ministry of Magic suspects that You-Know-Who's faithful Death Eaters are to be blamed. The Longbottoms recently became the loving parents of Neville Longbottom, whose life is now in the hands of his grandmother. Rumor has it that the young boy's name was mentioned in some sort of prophecy about You-Know-Who, and sources claim that the Death Eaters really wanted to find the baby. Currently, the boy is in the custody of "the Ministry's most elite aurors," according to the Minister of Magic. He also stated that "I trust these aurors with my life, and I trust that in their hands, the boy will be well cared for until it is safe enough to put him in his grandmother's care." Hopefully, this is true.

When Mrs. Longbottom woke up from fainting, she found herself in a disheveled heap on the floor. After finding a way up, off the floor, she made haste and, at once, apparated directly into the office of the Minister of Magic.

"Explain yourself at once!" she bellowed at him. "How dare you let my son and his wife be tortured by those Death Eaters, report it to the media before telling his mother, and then, on top of everything else, keep a newborn child away from his only grandmother! Explain how you and your Ministry let this happen! You tell me everything, you shameful, excuse of a Minister! And I want details!"

"Ahh,...ahh, Mmm, Mrs. Longbottom," the Minister said in a fearful voice. "There was nothing to be done, we couldn't have found them sooner. I am sorry. At least they, well,... at least they were brave, Mrs. Longbottom. And, and they didn't die, Mrs. Longbottom, surely you can see how well that is."

"Look at me, you foolish, foolish man and look what you've done!" she yelled at him. "My son had more courage than you could ever muster, and he was so, so talented! Look what you've taken away from him, stolen! Not to mention his poor son, Neville. What is to be done with him? He will never know his father! His mother! A child that is not raised by his parents, that isn't recognized by them, is practically an orphan! You've orphaned my grandson! And look at me, Minister! I am old, very old, and I am not going to live forever! I am certainly not going to live long enough to care for this boy, raise him to be an adult! What is to become of him then? Explain that to me! And where are they? I want to see my son and his wife!"

~

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