Extra Ordinary (Riddle Era)

Chapter 4

Tom barely slept that night. Instead, after reading through as much of the theory books as he could bear, which still hadn't been nearly as much as he'd have liked, he stared up at the canopy of his four poster and thought.

And his thoughts all came back to the same place: Steele was a problem. A big problem. Or at least, bigger than he'd anticipated. He'd assumed that he didn't know anything about her because she was simply another ordinary girl camouflaged among the dozens like her at this school. He'd assumed it had been an oversight on his part and that the entire, and very small, problem that she posed would be solved by a few conversations and a bit of time spent together on this project.

But now, after today... Tom had to wonder if he didn't know anything about her by design. If she'd been hiding herself from him. If she was... well. Working against him sounded stupid, even in his thoughts. Because, of course, there was nothing really to work against. So he was building himself a network. So he was making himself known. So he was telling a few critical little lies along the way. He wasn't doing anything that threatened anyone. Not yet, anyway.

So why then, why had she acted like that? Why had she offered him those well chosen words or that calculated look? Why had she felt the need to look him in the eyes and, without ever speaking the words outright, remind him that he was worthless? What did she have to gain from it? Why would she want him to know how she saw it? What was her game? Or did she even have one?

And that was another problem. Aside from her lack of belief in him, aside from those biting words and aside from that strange way she looked at him from behind that smile he didn't believe for a moment was genuine, he couldn't even figure out if it had been on purpose. He didn't know if it had been coincidence or a lucky guess or some strange way of looking at the world, or if those words really had been targeted. If she'd really meant to make him feel as small and weak and awful as she had.

And she had. Far too easily too. He just couldn't figure out why.

He kept replaying the encounter in his head. Kept remembering her words, which had been simple and to the point and which had sounded so... honest. He kept seeing her expression, trying to read more from it than he had in the moment. She had grimaced when he had essentially accused her of jumping to conclusions and it had looked real. But then, it was possible she'd just been acting. If so, then she was a damn good actress, but Tom knew better than most how possible it was to tell a lie without ever opening your mouth. Really, he wouldn't have put much stock in her features as at - it was too easy to fake an expression - but for that one look he couldn't seem to stop thinking about.

It had come right after he'd denied his upbringing being a touchy subject. A lie, of course, but one that people usually believed. Or, if they didn't, they at least believed that he didn't wallow in it and tended to admire his bravery for not letting it define him. Steele, however, had responded by looking at him with an expression he hadn't been able to read. And that was rare.

Tom was good at reading people. It was a talent that had served him well here at Hogwarts. He knew how to gauge reactions. How to tell if someone was becoming offended or else pacified, convinced or suspicious. And yet that look from Steele had been... Well. He didn't know how to describe it, which was entirely the problem. It had been like looking at words in language he knew only to realize he didn't understand what they meant. And that hadn't been a comfortable feeling. Far from it.

Really, if he was honest, it had felt like she'd looked right through him. Like she'd been staring into his soul and reading whatever truths were written there. Like she'd taken a handful of glances and a few words and a reputation and somehow figured out what lay beneath it.

It was the sort of thing he might have done. The sort of thing he had done, with plenty of people before her. And he had learned today that being on the receiving end was far from pleasant. Though, he thought, at least he had the tact not to use information like that against anyone unless he needed to. But Steele certainly had used it against him. And he didn't see why she could possibly have needed to.