Iniquitous

Chapter Twenty

A tremor ran through Hera. The scepticism cleared swiftly from her mind, to be replaced by awe and dread. She held it up to the window, to the light which showed off the beautiful grain of the wood and the primitive design of shallow gouges that lent the wand its rough unpolished look. It pulsed. Another tremor ran through her, another long shudder.

"Useful things, horcruxes..."

At the low sound of his voice, Hera turned slowly round.

Tom Riddle was in the doorway, smiling indolently as if she were not currently wielding the Elder Wand.

Except... It was more than that, wasn't it? It was much, much more than that.

If Hera had thought once that he was the grim reaper, she thought now that he was the reaper of his own soul, chipping away at it one murder at a time.

Suddenly, not even knowing why, she wanted to cry. Her eyes stung. Her lower lip trembled. She stared at him with wide eyes. "I wasn't trying to- to steal it or anything..." She really hadn't been. She had been drawn to the wand and had picked it up and then he had come in.

"I know you weren't," he said soothingly. "I know."

"Is this from yesterday?" she asked in a low voice. She felt sick and sad. "Did you make this yesterday?"

He cocked his head. "Does it matter when I made it?"

"I don't know..."

He stepped into the room. "Do you know how a horcrux is made?"

She didn't know. It was Hermione that had found the instructions in one of the books locked away in Dumbledore's office. Hera hadn't bothered to read them. Her directive had been to destroy, not to make, and she'd always been a one-minded individual. But Hermione, who had read the book cover to cover, had described it as a gruesome process.

Gruesome. Not a word to be taken lightly.

Hera shrugged a miserable shrug. She was still holding on to the wand, to that powerful piece of his soul. It somehow comforted her. Maybe just having something to hold was comforting.

"Murder splits the soul," she offered grudgingly.

He was coming closer, advancing with languid grace. "Murder," he laughed, as though the word was comical in and of itself. "Nothing so poetic as that. The process to make a horcrux does not require a murder, it only requires, among a few other things, the power discharged by a would-be maker's successfully cast Avada Kedavra."

"That sounds a lot like murder," said Hera sceptically. "Dumbledore told me-"

"When did that rotting fool become the authority on horcruxes?" he said cuttingly, sounding nevertheless tickled by the idea. He shook his head slowly once, twice. "People like Dumbledore... Even if they kill a hundred times, can never succeed in dividing their soul and keeping it divided. They lack adamance. They lack strength and courage..."

"That's quite the indictment," scoffed Hera. "I don't think anyone else would say that killing requires courage or strength."

"And yesterday," he said, gently reminding, "when you failed to do what you needed to do... What is it you would say you lacked?"

Any attempt she might have continued to make at light-hearted impertinence was dropped at once. Hera blanched and trembled from head to toe, but she never took her eyes off him.

"I don't say this to put you down, Hera. You're brave, in your own way. But to sacrifice your life is easy. So easy you almost did it yourself. To sacrifice your soul is much, much harder, is it not?"