My Soul to Keep

"Did you know - then?" asked Harry.

"Did I know that I had just met the most dangerous Dark wizard of all time?" said Dumbledore. "No..."

Noise. The world was all noise and chaos, smoke and steam and bustling crowd. Owls screeched and fluttered in cages as the wheels of luggage trolleys squeaked and skittered across the platform. Clustered groups of people passed through the barrier, first years clearly identifiable by the expressions of pure wonder that passed over their faces at the sight of the scarlet steam engine. Parents bid goodbye to their children, hugs and kisses and overlong farewells. Their hesitation was understandable in light of the war, the danger, the uncertainty. But no place was safer than Hogwarts, or so they had been promised. So they had always believed.

As far from the crowd as possible was a dark-haired boy apparently content to watch the noisy crowd. The boy was already wearing his school robes, black and emblazoned with a green and silver serpent. No family stood near him, no fellow students waved or called out his name. Tom Riddle stood all but invisible on the far side of the platform, alone with his thoughts and his trunk by his side. Not that Tom would complain of this situation of course. He had no business exchanging pointlessly pleasantries with the other witches and wizards attending Hogwarts. He needed nothing from them.

Purely out of habit now, Tom reached into the bag slung over one shoulder, checking to ensure that the battered leather journal was still safely inside. He had taken great pains to find the journal, after all, and it simply would not do to lose his prize after so great an effort. Tom had checked his bag twice before leaving the orphanage this morning, just to make sure no one had decided to pull a joke on him and steal his books. Not that he should have been especially concerned. The boys at the orphanage had stopped playing jokes on him three summers ago after unfortunate accidents kept happening. Tom was only sorry that they seemed to catch on so quickly - he had intended to make a rather memorable example out of the next boy to attempt any troublesome pranks.

Out of all his fourteen summers, Tom felt as though this past summer had been by far the best. He had spent very little time at the orphanage, for starters. He had managed to locate the Riddle family, his alleged relations, and had dealt with them all accordingly. And in a surprising turn of events, he had also located his mother's last surviving relative. The man had been nearly useless, save for serving as a convenient scapegoat for the mess at the Riddle estate. In the ruinous house that Gaunt lived in, however, Tom had picked up a trophy or two - a black-stoned ring, which he now wore on one hand, and the leather journal that now rested in his bag. On the surface, the journal was battered and old, the leather cracked and peeling and several pages hanging loose. A fair amount of the entries had been encrypted as well, written in small, pinched handwriting. But Tom was well aware of the fact that he was the brightest wizard in his year, if not in all the school, and solving the code had been simple work. There, on yellowed pages, in ink faded and smeared with age, Tom had finally found the key he had spent the past years searching for. The final piece of the puzzle. At last, in his fifth year at Hogwarts, Tom would be able to claim his birthright as the heir of Slytherin. He would be able to open the Chamber of Secrets.

A whistle blew, loud and shrill over the noise, drawing Tom out of his thoughts. Checking once more that the journal was safe, Tom lifted one end of his trunk and began making his way toward the train. By this time, most of the older students had already boarded, and only a few of the younger students were still wrestling their way free from parents' arms.

"Tom!"

Halting abruptly to avoid colliding with a small blond boy who was having trouble with his trunk, Tom turned to glance over his shoulder in the direction of the voice. Richard Nott was jogging across the platform, stopping only to glower at a girl in a Muggle dress who happened to step into his way.

"Mudbloods," Nott muttered under his breath. "School's going to be overrun with them."

Tom nodded in agreement, watching the girl board the train.

"Pity, isn't it?"

"Not like there's anything we can do about it," Nott grumbled. "Been looking for you though. Got a compartment and everything."

"Splendid," Tom said coolly. "Although, you do realize, I'll be spending most of the trip in the prefects' meeting?"

Nott looked momentarily surprised by this, but the surprise faded into a wide smile.

"You made prefect? Should've known, I suppose. Well, you can leave your trunk with us all the same."

"I appreciate that," said Tom, reaching down to lift the handle of his trunk as the whistle blew once more in warning. Nott shook his head and motioned for Tom to move out of the way.

"I'll carry it. I don't mind."

Tom released his grip on the handle without ever breaking eye contact with Nott. He rewarded the older Slytherin with a small smile, and Nott gripped the trunk handle in two hands and began to pull. Although a seventh-year, Nott was truly no bigger than Tom himself, and certainly not any stronger. But if Nott wanted to carry Tom's trunk around for him, well, Tom certainly was not about to complain. In fact, Tom had actually encouraged just this sort of behavior for the past four years. The only shame was that after this year, Nott would be gone, and Tom would have to find someone else to replace him.

Following along behind Nott, Tom slowly but surely found his way onto the Hogwarts Express. The stairs proved to be a bit of a challenge for Nott to manage, but Tom waited patiently and finally the heavy trunk cleared the last step and the way was open. Most of the compartments were already full of chattering students eagerly recounting their summer adventures to their friends, the noise from the platform magnified in the enclosed space. The words buzzed at the back of Tom's mind, white noise. Nott halted in front of a door at the end of the car, banging on the glass with one fist rather than opening the door himself. Muffled voices came from inside, and then the face of Damien Rosier appeared around the door frame. Another seventh year, Rosier rather closely resembled Nott to the point that they were often confused for brothers. Both were short, wiry, and dark-haired, and Tom had always assumed that somehow the pair were indeed related. He had never actually cared enough to ask outright.

"Hello, Tom. Good summer?" Rosier asked, helping Nott maneuver Tom's trunk into the compartment.

"Better than usual," Tom conceded. He waited in the hall, hands in his pockets, until Rosier and Nott had safely stowed the trunk up on the luggage rack. The only other occupant of the compartment was Reynard Lestrange, a burly sixth-year boy that had, in Tom's opinion, all the eloquence and wit of a house elf. But Reynard did tend to prove useful in situations that required more physical intimidation than Tom himself was capable of producing. At some point, Tom intended to remedy this problem, as he did not at all like the fact that he was forced to rely on someone else to get certain jobs done. Until then, he would keep Lestrange around. Finished with the trunks now, Rosier sank onto the bench beside Lestrange as Nott pressed his face to the window.

"Looking to blow a kiss to your mum, are you?" Rosier sneered. Nott pulled away from the glass abruptly, glaring at Rosier and fists clenched.

"Looking to see if anyone's got left, more like. Every year I always hope some little mudblood gets left on the platform."

Rosier laughed at this, and Tom allowed for another smile as he seated himself near the door. Lestrange merely frowned, glancing toward the window confusedly.

"But we haven't left yet, so nobody could be-"

As if the train had been waiting for the words, the view from the window shifted and jarred violently as another whistle sounded. The crowd of parents stood waving and smiling, more than a few mothers crying as the train began to roll forward.

"Never mind," Lestrange muttered. Then, after a pause, added, "So, did anyone get left?"

Rosier rolled his eyes, and Nott merely snickered. Tom watched them all with his usual disinterest, already pushing the conversation to the back of his mind as he had done with all the noise from the platform. Nothing but background noise. He had more important things to worry about.

"You know, I don't think so," Nott said slowly. "Shame isn't it? Maybe next year."

"We won't be here to see it," Rosier pointed out.

"Means we could cause it though, doesn't it?" Nott asked, snickering again.

This time Lestrange joined in the laughter as well. Tom waited another moment or two, then made a great show of checking his watch. Rosier was the first to notice.

"Now that's a nice piece. Where'd you pick it up, Tom?"

"Family heirloom," Tom said shortly. "Would any of you gentlemen happen to know where the prefects meet?"

Unsurprisingly, not one of the boys had the faintest idea. Tom shrugged, tucking the silver watch back into his pocket. He himself knew precisely where the meeting was to be held, and when, but this gave him an excuse to leave the compartment early. Perhaps, if he was lucky, he could find a free compartment somewhere further down the train. There were still pages of the journal that needed translating, and Tom did not especially feel that his present company was best suited to that sort of work.

"Well, that's a shame. I'd best get started looking then. Wouldn't want to be late."

"Will you be back before the end of the trip?" Nott asked, stretching his legs across the bench as Tom stood to leave.

"You know, I don't expect so," replied Tom, shaking his head. "All the rules to go over and that sort of thing."

Nott nodded solemnly at this, as though suddenly rules were of grave importance.

"We'll take care of your trunk then. You want to leave your bag here too?"

Tom's hand had been on the door handle, but shifted abruptly to the strap of his bag, clutching tightly.

"No, I think I'll keep it with me. I'll see you all later."

Tom was not especially concerned that Nott or Rosier would be able to interpret the journal, but all the same he did not want the book out of his sight. Closing the door behind him with a heavy, rolling thud, Tom set off down the corridor. The train rolled along beneath his feet, bouncing and clacking on the tracks and barreling through the countryside. Snatches of green and blue, smears of clouds and trees and pastures passed by the windows, repeating endlessly. One particular line from the journal floated to the forefront of his mind, a line that had proven slightly more difficult to decipher. A few compartment doors were open, their occupants pausing in conversation as Tom passed by. A group of Hufflepuffs watched him warily, a few halfway smiling and the rest simply waiting for him to move on past. One particularly noisy compartment turned out to hold several Slytherin girls, many of whom waved hello to Tom. He waved back, ignoring the sudden burst of pleased chatter that erupted. He had no time for girls, not just now. Currently he was far more preoccupied with translating the code.

Tom shuffled the words about in his mind, counting with each step, drumming his fingers against his palms as he walked. He passed from one car to another, growing ever closer to the front of the train, neatly sidestepping the witch with the tea trolley. The solution was just there, hovering just beyond reach, and Tom had nearly solved the puzzle when he collided with something solid and moving. The words left him, the carefully composed concentration vanished as quickly as smoke, and Tom stumbled and would have fallen entirely if he had not caught himself. The cause of his distraction hit the floor and rolled as the train moved, ending up a few feet away from the actual site of the collision.

Tom's first thought was brief, cold panic that perhaps the journal had been damaged. A cursory check, hands prodding the leather book, proved that no definite harm had been done. The panic thus was replaced by a definite irritation, and Tom drew his wand before approaching the figure on the ground.

"Sorry, I wasn't looking where I was going," came the voice of a boy, and Tom did not wait to hear the end of the apology before seizing the fellow by the front of his shirt and hauling him to his feet. The boy was younger, first or second year, still wearing a muggle shirt and trousers. He had very dark auburn hair and looked fairly familiar, although Tom could not recall ever having seen the boy before. At the moment, he was far more concerned with making sure the boy did not make the mistake of stumbling into him again.

"It's not very polite to run into people you know."

"I said I was sorry," said the boy, squirming a bit to get free. "Was an accident."

Tom raised his wand beneath the boy's chin and all struggles ceased.

"I'm a prefect you know." Here the boy's eyes darted to the silver badge pinned to the outside of Tom's robes. "So it's probably doubly impolite to run into me."

"You weren't really looking where you were going either," the boy retorted, frowning now. "Otherwise you'd have dodged me easy."

"I suggest you switch back to apologizing," Tom said coolly, "unless you'd like me to make an example of you."

"And I suggest," a deeper voice spoke now, barely more than a growl, "that you leave him alone. Unless you'd like me to make an example of you."

The boy's eyes brightened at the sight of whoever stood over Tom's shoulder. Although the newcomer was out of his own range of vision, Tom had a fairly good idea who precisely had intervened. With a sigh, he released his hold on the boy and turned on his heels, quickly proven correct. Alastor Moody, a sixth-year Gryffindor with an infamously bad temper, stood in the middle of the corridor, scowling and wand outstretched. Moody seemed to have grown again over the summer and looked to have managed some semblance of a haircut as well, although his auburn colored hair still fell periodically into his face.

"There a problem here, Tom?"

"No problem at all. Just a clumsy first year I was helping up," Tom explained, stepping to one side. The boy stayed where he was, looking back and forth between Tom and Moody.

"Get back to wherever it is you're sitting, Albert," Moody said with a sigh, motioning with his wand.

"I'm a second-year," Albert said firmly, ignoring Moody and instead glaring up at Tom. "A Gryffindor second-year."

"Oh, well that certainly explains everything," Tom said, wand at his side as Albert passed. "Gryffindors are always walking about as though they own the world."

Moody's face began to turn red, an early warning sign that Tom had no intention of minding. If Moody wanted to get himself into trouble on the Hogwarts Express, Tom would be happy to oblige. Impressively however, Moody remained silent, seizing hold of Albert's shoulder and pushing the smaller boy behind him. With Albert peering around one side of Moody, Tom suddenly realized why the younger boy had seemed so familiar.

"You didn't tell me you had a brother, Moody," Tom murmured, stepping away from the wall now, closing the distance between himself and the older Gryffindor.

"None of your business," Moody muttered, turning to look over his shoulder at Albert. "I said get back to where you're sitting, Bert."

Frowning up at his elder sibling, Albert raced away down the corridor, disappearing into an open compartment. The door slammed in the background and then Moody turned his attention back to Tom. Metal rolled on metal, skipped and screeched along, and for a moment or two the noise of the train was the only noise at all. Tom was perfectly content to wait, wand at the ready at his side. A door rolled open to Moody's right, and two more sixth year boys emerged, frowning worriedly and wands raised. The dark haired boy with round, owlish glasses was Pritchett, a Ravenclaw and a muggleborn, if Tom recalled correctly. The slim, sandy haired fellow was Goodchild, who had been to a number of Slug Club parties in the past. Tom had never especially cared for Goodchild, largely because he chose to hang around with bothersome types like Moody.

"Told you I'd handle it," Moody said, glowering at his two friends as he lowered his wand to his side.

"You were taking a bit long," replied Pritchett, who had cast a sideways glance at Tom. "Is it always going to be you, Tom?"

Tom shrugged, pushing his bag around so that the strap did not impede his movements. If this all came down to a three on one duel, he needed full range of motion.

"I'm sure I don't know what you mean. Any more friends waiting to jump to your aid, Moody? Where's that giant of yours?"

Typically, Moody was usually not seen without the exceptionally tall Scotsman, Tiberius Kirk, somewhere nearby. At the moment however, Kirk appeared to be nowhere in sight.

"Prefect's meeting," Moody said flatly. "With Minerva."

Tom had entirely forgotten about Minerva McGonagall, the third member of Kirk and Moody's little Gryffindor trio. He smiled, twirling his wand between his fingers.

"I'll be sure and tell her hello then."

Moody stiffened, wand swinging upward once more. Pritchett made an effort to push Moody's arm down as Tom watched, smirking.

"S-shouldn't you b-be staying out of t-trouble, if you're a-a prefect a-and all?" Goodchild spoke up at last, stammering as always. Tom had been under the impression that one grew out of such speaking habits over time, but apparently he was mistaken, in the case of Goodchild at least.

"S-sorry, didn't catch that."

Tom simply could not resist, and Goodchild's face flooded red, mouth working furiously even as no sound came out. While Goodchild stood frozen, Moody and Pritchett were both moving quite abruptly. Tom was unsure whether Pritchett was trying to catch Moody or aid him, but either way Tom suddenly found himself pinned quite firmly to the wall. The nearby doors shook at the force of the impact, and a few curious faces began to lean out into the hall.

"Now, now," said Tom, tapping his prefect's badge with the end of his wand, voice low. "Let's all play nice."

Moody grumbled something about bloody Slytherins, but glanced around at the growing crowd of witnesses and released his hold. On the opposite side, Pritchett did the same. Tom made a great show of dusting off his robes and checking his bag.

"I do believe that'll be five points from Gryffindor and Ravenclaw. And five from Hufflepuff, since Goodchild clearly has such dismal tastes in friends."

"Least he can say he's got friends," Pritchett muttered with a scowl, pushing his glasses back into place.

Tom merely smiled, the jab entirely useless. Rough hands grabbed him by the shoulder of his robe and propelled him forward, sending him staggering down the corridor.

"Get moving, Tom," Moody said, voice dangerously level. "And if I catch you messing with Bert again that badge won't protect you."

"I'll be sure and keep that in mind," answered Tom.

He smiled darkly, straightening his robes once more as he passed through the car door. The three sixth years watched him go, Moody in the middle, still scowling. Shutting the door and dispelling the crowd of watchers, Tom spun on his heels and checked his watch. Just enough time to reach the meeting without actually being late. Tom hurried along, mood steadily improving as he went. Moody would be sorry, soon enough. A few more lines in the journal, a few more codes to break, and then everyone would be sorry.

The door to the prefect's car was guarded by none other than the towering Tiberius Kirk himself, who scowled down at Tom.

"They made you a prefect?"

"I rather think I've earned the job," Tom said.

"Course you do," Tiberius replied, rolling his eyes. "Go on inside. We're about ta start."

Tom pushed open the door, smirking at Tiberius' continued grumbling. Inside the prefect's car turned out to rather resemble the rest of the train, only without separate compartments. The benches were all lined up in orderly rows, and quite a number of prefects had already arrived. Most were faces Tom recognized, more or less. Lucy Pendergast, a girl in his year, seemed to have been made the other Slytherin prefect and was smiling at him very determinedly. Matthew MacMillan and Amelia Bones, sixth year Hufflepuffs, paused in their conversation to watch him, plainly a bit surprised.

"I think you must be in the wrong place."

Tom glanced to his right to see Minerva McGonagall already seated, a book in her lap and glasses balanced precariously on the end of her nose. Her dark hair was loose and curly, free of her usual braid.

"I have the badge." Tom gestured towards the badge in question and wondered how often he was going to have to use that particular motion.

"I see that," Minerva said, sounding as though she wished she did not.

She returned her attention to her book and Tom took the opportunity to seat himself beside her. The only downside of his summer was that with so little time at the orphanage, Tom had been without anyone to serve as his entertainment. The girls at the orphanage had always been far too easy to toy with though. Perhaps a witch like Minerva would prove more of challenge. If nothing else, toying with Minerva McGonagall would elicit a reaction from Alastor Moody, and Tom certainly would not mind landing the temperamental Gryffindor in trouble.

"Tiberius will not be happy to discover you've taken his seat," said Minerva, turning the page of her book without ever looking up.

"Perhaps I'd rather sit here," Tom offered, raising an eyebrow. Minerva glanced up at him this time, disbelief evident in her features.

"I can't imagine why. Especially since Ms. Pendergast is trying so hard to get your attention."

Lucy Pendergast was indeed still smiling in his direction, occasionally adding in a wave and a pointed look at the empty seat beside her. Tom smiled weakly but otherwise made no acknowledgment.

"And yet here I think is the better company."

If Minerva had been disbelieving before, she looked plainly startled now.

"What?"

Just beginning to enjoy himself, Tom leaned in, secretly a bit pleased when Minerva leaned away. Before he could speak however, two fingers tapped him on the shoulder. The moment was broken, and cursing to himself Tom turned to find Tiberius Kirk glowering down at him, arms crossed.

"I thought you were the doorman for this event," Tom said, more irritated by the interruption than he was willing to show.

"Doorman's got ta have a seat too," Kirk replied slowly, straightening up to his full height, mop of curly brown hair barely inches from the ceiling. "And you're in mine."

Tom rose slowly, stepping to one side and allowing Kirk to pass.

"Oh." Tom paused and leaned down again, voice low for only Minerva to hear. "Your friend Moody. He says hello. And may I say the fellow's temper only seems to be getting worse."

Tom shook his head, frowning in mock concern. Minerva gasped as Tom stood upright, and he knew without looking that as he walked away she was whispering urgently to Kirk. Let them wonder what he had done, Tom decided. Let them worry about Moody for the rest of the train ride. Crossing the compartment, Tom seated himself beside a very pleased Lucy Pendergast, setting his bag on the floor and stretching his legs out in front of him. The last remaining prefects filed in, scurrying for seats and saying hello to friends. Tom watched them all with amused disdain, ignoring the glares being sent his direction by Kirk and McGonagall. Soon enough, the Chamber would be open, and soon they would all be sorry.