Masquerade- Tom Riddle Fanfiction

Powers of Mind

Addie's POV

"I will instruct my sorrows to be proud; for grief is proud, and makes his owner stoop."

-William Shakespeare

*****

My hand grasped at the curtain around my hospital bed, unfeeling.

My eyes tried to blink away the tears, unfaltering.

Pain was a constant and unwanted friend and companion.

*****

I blinked upon my eyes as I saw Madame Pompona bustle about, treating students who were too adventurous for their own good. Tom was silent in the bed beside me. The door closed behind us, as she left to talk to the Potions teacher. Just Tom and I this time. Everyone had left.

He spoke first, breaking the silence. "I heard about the Ministry--" his voice reached my ears, "they are going to take you away."

Silence.

"You are going to lose the trial; you will have to spend your days in Azkaban," the sound of his voice came again, cold. It was truth. I had no defense against all of the things that I have done. The Ministry was never like Albus Dumbledore.

My mouth unhinged. "It is for the greater good," my voice was emotionless, "can't have the daughter of a war criminal running around, can we?"

The curtains around my bed were yanked away as I saw Tom, his face looking tired yet the same fierceness that I saw in his eyes was still there, along with the darkness. I knew that look. "You are a fool, Robins," he intoned, "do you not even have an inkling of self-preservation?" I knew what he was suggesting, he knew that I was capable of it. 

I answered swiftly, "I have done things; helped spy on people so that someone else could kill them, and all I did was watch. I put the Memory Charm on a couple, masquerading to be their daughter so that they could be killed in my place. You only know me as the Addie Robins, the prankster who helped bring down Grindelwald's power; you don't know the person that I was before that. My main goal is achieved, now I pay the price of everything that I have committed."

Tom looked at me. "You've never killed," he said in a low voice, before chuckling, "how sentimental you are. What is it like to feel such idiotic guilt over nothing?"

I gazed back steadily. "You will be surprised to know that it feels better than nothing at all; because you know you deserve every single moment of it. You think I am being dramatic? Fine then, have it your way. I spied on people, I turned in their families. I hid behind the safety of an innocent facade so that someone else could go in and kill them. I had plenty of opportunities to turn back, only I didn't. My hope was that I could bring down Grindelwald, so that no one else would be hurt. But in the process, too many people had been killed. I see their blood and their empty eyes every single night, Tom-- this is beyond what I feel; this is what I did. What has been checked off on a piece of paper that signifies death. I am a criminal, Tom, and when criminals get caught, they pay the price."

"Death means nothing," I could see his sneer, "how pathetic are you?"

"If death means nothing, then why are you trying to avoid it?" I asked coolly. His eyes flashed at my remark, but he remained poised and elegant. I chose to speak again, my mouth dry. "I promised you-- use Legilimency on me."

He laughed, cold and cruel. "I never cared for what went on in your past," he said, "that means nothing to me. I know about all the history behind the Ring of Dispel; how your mother's bloodline is ancient enough to support such a relic. I know what it can do-- I know you are Grindelwald's daughter. So, I am telling you, Robins--" he leaned forwards, "--escape. Run away; you still have your wand, you can go and run. Save your own neck while you are at it. Those people at the Ministry, they just need a scapegoat since the Bulgarian Prime Minister of Magic took Grindelwald into Numengard. The Ministry of Magic needs someone to satisfy the people with, to put another person in Azkaban so that they would have something to show."