Power

Chapter One

Tom Riddle turned out to be the antithesis of her father's 'wrong sort.' She'd discovered that almost immediately.
For starters, he was sorted into Slytherin. Her father couldn't object to that, no matter what. That was his first and most important requirement for his children's friends.
Then, as they got older, he would make statements sometimes, statements that her father would secretly like and her mother would scorn.
Should the Muggles be subjugated? Yes, Tom thought so.
Should Muggleborns be allowed at Hogwarts? No, Tom thought not.
After Seraphina and Tom had both been sorted into Slytherin, she'd been open to making friends.
And make friends she had.
She was beautiful, and she was smart, and she was wealthy. That made friends real quick in the Slytherin House.
Tom Riddle was handsome, and he was smart. He wasn't rich, but he was friends with Seraphina Nott, and that made friends just as quickly.
The difference, though, was that he didn't have friends, not really.
He disliked everyone. In fact, he hated everyone.
He liked Seraphina Nott, though, and he tolerated Vivian Lestrange.
On his side, he had diplomacy. He figured out what Seraphina wanted, and he gave it to her.
Dislike of Muggleborns? Check.
Hatred of Muggles? Easy.
She wanted it, and it was done.
He even started believing it himself.
Vivian Lestrange and Seraphina Nott were hard to handle, especially when they were one's only friends. But Tom kept quiet.
He let them do as they pleased.
He warned them, sometimes, but they never listened, no matter how many times he was right.
First and second year went by without a hitch. He'd almost kissed Seraphina in third year, and that would have been bad. He didn't, though. Fourth year was perfect, and fifth year wasn't too bad.
Sixth year, Vivian started dating every boy within a ten mile radius.
That made Seraphina angry.
She didn't mind Vivian dating people. She wasn't thrilled that she only dated idiots who wound up hurting her. But what she despised was that instead of spending time with her best friend, Vivian would rather snog a Gryffindor in a broom closet.
Seraphina didn't speak much with her parents. She was supposed to be their perfect, Slytherin daughter, she wasn't supposed to have anxiety disorders.
But she did, and Vivian and Tom were, in her opinion, her only family--the only family that counted, at least.
Seraphina was so bitter about Vivian's perceived abandonment that she seemed to forget Tom was still around. So she started dating everybody too, and Tom was left to try to pick up the pieces whenever anything was broken.
Needless to say, with all the pent up anger between the two friends, group activities were a bit strained. The tension was palpable.
One night fifth year, Tom was waiting for them to come back from wherever they were--or even just one of them.
It was late, though, and they hadn't come, so he went to his dormitory.
Vivian was engaged in activities in another dormitory not too far away. Seraphina was engaged in an argument in a dark corner of the library.
"Get your hands off of me!" She hissed, pushing her current lover's hands away.
"Come on, baby. It isn't a big deal." Isaiah said, stepping forward to kiss her again, once more trying to unbutton her shirt.
"Not to you! Is it to me! Get off!" She shoved him.
"You know I'd never make you do anything you don't want to do." He said, kissing her neck.
"Isn't that what you're trying to do?"
"No. You want this."
"I don't." She said.
She couldn't breathe very well.
"Please let me go." She said.
"Baby--"
"Don't call me that." She said, her breath coming in short gasps. "Please let me go."
But he kissed her again, wrestling her back against the wall.
A while later, she ran, gasping and sobbing, back to the Slytherin common room.
She went up to her dormitory to find Vivian, but she wasn't there, so she went back to the common room where she wouldn't wake anybody.
She sat in a chair by the fire, and calmed down after a while. She stared at the floor, shaking.
She looked up when Isaiah Thornpike walked in a while later, looking smug. He saw her and had the nerve to give her a wink and keep walking.
Isaiah wasn't 'the wrong sort' in her father's eyes, and that was a problem.
Her father had to go.
She fixed her hastily buttoned shirt, smoothed her hair down, and followed Isaiah up the boys' dormitories, but didn't go into his. She went into Tom's dormitory to find him in bed, reading by the light of a lamp.
He smiled. "Hey."
She didn't feel like talking, so she didn't talk. She crawled up beside him in bed, pulling his arm around her.
"Is something wrong?" He closed his book and put it on the table beside his bed.
She shook her head and curled up against him.
"Sera?" He asked, looking down at her.
She looked up.
"What's wrong?" He asked.
She looked back down and closed her eyes.

Seraphina sat with Tom and Vivian at breakfast. Vivian was jabbering away about some Muggle band. She only liked them because her parents disapproved.
She didn't notice Sera hadn't said a word.
Isaiah came to sit beside Seraphina, putting his arm around her and kissing her cheek.
Sera gave a panicked look, but quickly masked it with indifference. Tom caught it though, and looked steadily at the newcomer. "I suggest you leave." Tom said.
"Excuse me?" Isaiah asked.
"I said that I suggest you leave."
"Yeah? What'll you do about it?"
"Well, I suppose we'll see if you're still here in five seconds."
Of course, nobody was scared of Tom Riddle just yet. He was simply the half-blood in Slytherin, Seraphina's and Vivian's friend. He was nothing to be afraid of.
"I don't think so. Sorry, mate." Isaiah said.
Seraphina kept quiet. Even Vivian stopped talking.
Tom held Isaiah's gaze.
Anybody would be uncomfortable in that situation. Tom Riddle had that effect on people.
"Come on, babe. Let's go." Isaiah said.
Seraphina followed.