Harry Riddle || Harry potter

Chapter 13: Unforgivable

"Swish and flick, remember, swish and flick!"

Harry raised his wand, rather absentmindedly. He didn't much need Flitwick's instruction. He had used his father's wand to perform the levitation spell several times when he was younger, though his father had watched him closely, not trusting him with something so important to him.

"Wingardium Leviosa," he shouted, swishing and flicking. The feather sitting on the desk in front of him slowly rose about five feet to hover over their heads.

"Oh, w-well d-done, Mr. R-Riddle," Flitwick stuttered out, almost starting to shake again. Harry found it amusing that all the teachers who knew that he was Voldemort's son could never talk to him without a quiver in their voice.

Seeming to gain some composure, the professor more clearly managed: "Look, everyone, Mr. Riddle has done it!"

On the Gryffindor side of the room, Ron Weasley and Seamus Finnigan scowled. They were both in very bad moods by the end of the class.

Crossing his arms over his chest, Harry glared at the bats that swooped down over the tables, then out at the entire Hall, which was decorated with pumpkins and candles and anything else Dumbledore thought would make a good Halloween decoration.

He hated Halloween. He had always hated Halloween, in fact. In the first place, he thought it was a terrible muggle mockery of Wizarding Customs. Witches with huge moles on their noses - he snorted.

And then . . . there was always . . .

"You seem rather subdued tonight, Harry," Pansy said perkily, popping a piece of candy into her mouth. She sat next to Millicent Bulstrode, who had chocolate almost all over her face.

Draco, Blaise, and the rest of the little Death Eater sycophants all nodded their agreements.

"Excuse me if I'm not a beacon of joy and light," Harry snapped. "My mother was murdered ten years ago on Halloween."

"Oh." Pansy sounded like she wished she hadn't ever spoken to him. The rest of the Death Eater children all apparently found their food fascinating.

That was the other reason he hated Halloween. Most children grow up thinking that their parents can do no wrong, but Harry never really had that, at least once he realized that the things his father did weren't considered moral by the world at large. He'd known ever since then that his father was a very bad man, but he could accept that. He hadn't been born on the 'good' side of things, he wasn't supposed to find anything wrong with his father's behavior.

However, when he was seven, he had accidently discovered that his father had murdered his mother, thanks to a bout of reminiscing on Bellatrix's part. And he'd struggled with that more than he ever had with any of the other numerous crimes he knew his father had committed. He didn't know why, he just had trouble wrapping his mind around it.

But even though his mother's murder disturbed him, he was usually able to put it out of his mind. Not on Halloween, though. It just dragged all the morbid questions and insecurities he had about the . . . justifiability . . . of his father's actions right back up to the center of his thoughts.

Harry was thankfully brought out of his reverie by the rather loud arrival of Professor Quirrell, who came sprinting into the Great Hall, the doors banging against the wall behind him. Somehow pale and greenish all at the same time, the man looked about ready to collapse, but he managed to make it to the middle of the hall before stopping.

"Troll! Troll in the dungeons!" he exclaimed, and after a long, unsure pause, he continued, taking a deep, unsteady breath. "Thought you ought to know."