Chapter Text
Orion, Theodorus, Walburga, and Dorea discretely watch as Abraxas Conjures more marbles for Tom and Evelynn - Orion had the brilliant idea to have them play another round of that 'game' of theirs. Turning the marbles into something else - they had to stay glass, but everything else was fair game.
Tom won the last one, though nobody knows what he's asked her for or if he's even done so yet - as such things are getting more and more precious as they get older - but it seems Evelynn isn't going to just let him win again. She taps her latest marble, and it turns into a figurine of a beautiful female Snowy Owl with amber eyes sitting there. Evelynn puts that one to the side carefully, casting a few Charms so it won't get broken.
Tom then makes a figure of a Hippogriff, so Evelynn makes a miniature replica of Hogwarts. Tom then makes what looks like a large snake, and Evelynn makes what a few of the others recognize as a Thestral with a smaller version that's meant to be a foal at its side. Tom frowns, then makes a Phoenix out of his next marble. Evelynn then makes a Grand Piano, with a figure sitting at the bench like she's playing.
Dorea and Orion share a look, thinking it's the closest Evelynn will probably ever admit to knowing how to play. She has no problems whatsoever tearing a strip off someone's hide using her own past, but make it about something she can do and she goes red as a Stunner and says its nothing special. Seems those relatives of hers did more damage than they originally thought.
Tom blinks, then makes a fully-detailed replica of the Christmas Tree that gets put up every year and decorated. Evelynn smirks at Tom, then makes a small pile of presents out of her next Marble and puts them under Tom's tree. Tom responds, after a moment, by recreating Hepizbah Smith's figure from Borgin and Burke's. Evelynn glares at the figure, then blanks her expression and makes a figure of a majestic-looking Stag, a wolf, and what looks a bit like a Grim. She quickly puts them beside her Owl, not noticing the look on Tom's face.
Tom, for his part, is quietly internally panicking - Evelynn's got many more years of experiences to draw off of, and she's using it. That owl was Hedwig, who he's sure she desperately misses even now, and the three other animals were her father and his two loyal best friends in their Animagus forms. He has to stop himself from swearing when she counters his own Mer-person with a Hungarian Horntail.
And again, when he feels something enter his head like his Occlumency Shields he's been working on every night since Evelynn gave him a book on the subject aren't even there.
I'd suggest you lose with some grace. My Mistress is determined to win this one.
"Oh, really? Why's that?"
Simple. I told her to. The favor she'll get from you will help in the long-run. Also, I'd refrain from using yours just yet. Your going to need it, my Mistress is rather stubborn when she's hurt, and was used to taking care of her own injuries long before she first attended Hogwarts.
Tom immediately decides to listen, the idea of Evelynn being hurt makes his insides turn to ice and she would be stubborn enough to decide she could just walk it off.
After Evelynn makes an Occamy curled around three silver eggs, Tom leans back and says "You win."
Evelynn blinks in shock, asking "What?"
"I'm out of ideas. You win, Evelynn." Which is, technically, true - his brain went from ideas for outdoing her sculptures to when and how she might be getting hurt in the near future.
The entire Common Room is so silent you could hear a pin being dropped in one corner at the far side of the room. At least he gets to see her face slowly light up as she realizes she beat him this round, its something of a consolation prize.
Tom leans back, fully prepared to be a 'gracious loser' just this once - and just for her - and asks "So, what do you want of me?"
Evelynn hums, tilting her head to the side for a moment, then says "I'll hold onto it for now, Tom. Who knows when it'll come in useful." She scoops up the pieces she wants to keep - the figurine of Hedwig, and the three animals - and heads to the hallway to go to her room.
Tom picks up the Piano figurine, Banishing the others, and holds it up to the light. Orion makes his way over carefully, and casually says "That piano looks familiar. Going to ask her about it?"
Tom hums, and says "Eventually." He turns the figurine in his hand, and sees the small person on the bench…looks like Evelynn. Its hard to see because of the small size, but the resemblance is in the finer details. The length of the black hair, the size of the figure's body, etc. She probably didn't even realize she did it.
Dorea comes over, sees the Piano Figurine, and glances at Orion, clearly asking 'does he know?' Orion nods at her, then says "You know, if you wanted her to play something, you could use that favor she owes you." An unlikely event, really, but not impossible.
Tom shakes his head, saying "I'm saving it for something important that I can't convince her to do otherwise. Besides, I've got a way to ask sitting in my hand."
Dorea finds Evelynn staring at the Owl figurine she made, and asks "Something wrong, Evelynn? You seem down."
Evelynn shakes her head, saying "Just thinking about a friend is all."
Dorea raises an eyebrow, asking "While staring at a Snowy Owl?"
Evelynn shrugs, saying "She liked Owls. Especially Snowy ones, for some reason."
"And you miss her."
Evelynn nods, saying "Yeah, I do."
Dorea hums after a minute, then says "Well, Tom was looking for you, Evelynn. Something about a question he had for you."
Evelynn puts the Figurine down, then rolls off her bed and says "Lead the way." Five minutes later, Dorea opens the door to an abandoned classroom deep in the dungeons, revealing Tom sitting on a desk looking at a glass figurine she made - the grand piano, she realizes with a jolt.
Once Dorea leaves - with a grin on her face that makes a pit of dread form in Evelynn's stomach, even more so than the near-blank look on Tom's face - Evelynn asks "You called? Dorea said you wanted to ask me something?"
Tom looks up at her, saying "I do. Something you'd like to share? Something you didn't tell me?"
Evelynn scoffs in exasperation, saying "Tom, I've told everything you could possibly find interesting about me!" He'd better not think Dorea's declaration after the snowball fight a week ago is even the slightest bit true. If so, she's going to have words with Dorea - Black or not, her grandmother or not. What, exactly could he think she didn't tell him? How people would follow her into the Loo? How she'd be Hexed by even the foriegn students in Fourth Year? The exact lineup of Umbridge's little student enforcer group? She told him everything that matters!
Tom switches to Parseltongue, asking "Oh, really?"
Evelynn crosses her arms, saying "I told you so much, you fainted from shock. Yes, really."
Okay, she's got him there. She's really got him there.
Tom gives her a look of innocent confusion, one that she clearly doesn't buy for a single instant, and asks "So, why does the figure playing this piano…look exactly like you?"
Evelynn's eyes snap to the miniature piano, and she asks "What?! Tom, it's a miniature figurine! I made it not even an hour ago!" How could you possibly have stared at me THAT MUCH to see features I wasn't even trying to put on the figurine?!
Tom must read the question on her face, or perhaps in her thoughts, because he smirks and asks "You didn't really think I wouldn't recognize you? Even on a figurine that small?"
Evelynn blushes brightly, even as she looks at the Figure closer - its got her dark hair, and wearing a dark robe. Other than that…there's not much detail to it. She didn't even think about the figurine, she was more focused on her Piano when she made it. Oh Merlin, this is going to be embarrassing. No, it's going to be mortifying.
When she looks up, though, Tom's all but crowding into her space, the blank look on his face replaced by one of intense possessiveness. "In case you hadn't noticed, Evelynn, I've been interested in you since the moment you arrived here. You Apparated through the school Wards, Wards that are supposed to be impenetrable."
He backs her into the desk, effectively trapping her there. "You did that while more injured than should've been survivable, and then you woke up. You woke up and set your own arm back into place, doing so without even a peep. You eventually collapsed, but not before getting my interest even further when you met my gaze for that brief moment."
Evelynn blinks, asking "What? How did I-"
Tom cuts her off, saying "Your shields were down, Evelynn. Everything you were feeling hit me like a bag of bricks, and in all of that was recognition. You knew me from somewhere, even if I'd never seen you before. And you threw Dumbledore through the air without so much as twitching. Of course you got my interest."
Evelynn blushes, looking away until Tom's fingers find their way under her chin and tilt her face back up towards his. "You woke up from a plethora of Curses that should've done you in a mere two days later - not even a full two days, crazy as that sounded at the time - and got Sorted into the same House I'm in. You proved to be every bit as strong and talented as I am, the only person that could give me a challenge in the practical portion of class. And then, as if that wasn't enough, as if you seeming to know what I was trying to do, or what I'd be thinking of doing without even having to tell you anything wasn't teasingly fascinating enough, as if you weren't already the most interesting mystery I'd ever come across in my entire life, you got sent to the same place I have to go to. But you aren't expecting it to be wonderful, you came prepared with a year's supply of food."
Tom finds himself holding Evelynn by the shoulders, his face mere inches apart from hers - when did that happen and how? - as he finishes "And then you tell me everything about yourself, how you managed all of that. You tell me you're a story come to life, the Master of the Deathly Hallows, you show me everything you went through, everything I put you through, and yet you didn't kill me as soon as you saw me for some reason."
Evelynn glares at him, hissing"You've done NOTHING, Tom! You've done nothing that would make me want to kill you! What's a damn rabbit, or a broken bone or two when the only two choices you seemed to have were to be feared or beaten?! The same choices I had, but I was basically de-clawed?! How many times am I going to have to tell you this before it gets through your skull, I'm not-"
That fire in Evelynn that's so unlike almost literally every other girl he's ever met, that defiance in the face of everything that most people wouldn't even think once about, the power she could call to her fingertips that's so intoxicating to him, the magic that's literally humming and buzzing between them…everything about her overwhelms him, and before he knows it he's slamming his lips against hers.
Electricity, that's the first thing Evelynn registers after her brain goes perfectly blank. The same kind of electric feeling she gets when she summons the energy of the Void - like ice with a live current running through it, freezing cold and yet almost heart-stoppingly electric at the same time. Her face is the only thing she can really feel, specifically her lips - its like she's been half-numb her entire life, and her face is only just now fully feeling anything at all.
Tom's mouth itself is the next thing that registers, insistent and demanding against her own, an almost bruising force behind his lips as they move against hers. And it drives away any other thought that might've gotten into her head when he nibbles on her bottom lip to get her to open her mouth. Not even the thought of 'where did Tom learn to kiss this well' makes it through the piece of the Void that's currently invading her head.
When they finally break for air, it seems to take a lifetime just to get her brain working beyond breathing. At least Tom looks equally disoriented. When she finally finds some words, Evelynn breathlessly asks "You felt that to, right?"
Tom equally-breathlessly asks "The feeling of electricity filling up my face?"
Evelynn nods, bringing two fingers to her still-tingling lips, murmuring "Never felt that before in all my life…" And she's pretty sure most people don't feel that when they kiss. If they did, somehow she thinks Ron wouldn't have been complaining that all Lavender Brown wanted to do was snog him - not that he was correct, she didn't want to just snog him but he didn't pick up on any of the not-so-subtle hints she was dropping. Or the ones she was throwing, even as she threw herself at him.
"Lets find out if it's a fluke." Before she can answer, Tom's taking her lips once more - no, no its definitely not a fluke. If anything, its gotten stronger - getting stronger with Tom's desire and magic. And her own, for that matter.
When they finally break for air, Evelynn dazedly asks "What was the question again?" Also, what happened to Tom's hair and when did her hands tangle themselves in his shirt? And why do her shoulders ache when his hands are on her hips now?
"Something about the piano figurine…" Tom hums for a minute, tightening his hold on Evelynn as he does as if to never let her go, then it comes to him. "Right. You play Piano?"
Evelynn goes a gratifying shade of red, and mumbles "Its just something I picked up…wait, who told you?!"
"Theodorus heard you playing, peeked in, came and got Orion and I. Why?"
Evelynn blushes even harder - she might die of blushing, lack of blood to anywhere else in her body, who knows - and says "Merlin, that's embarrassing."
Tom smirks at her, deciding he likes teasing her like this, and adds "And then Dorea came in…" Evelynn lets out a horrified sound, burying her face in her hands. "So…I'm going to change the world, huh?"
Evelynn blinks, looking for all the world like that's an obvious conclusion, and says "Course. There's no reality I can imagine where you end up doing something less than utterly astounding. You've got too much ambition, power, and drive for anything less."
Tom gives her a smile that makes something in her chest tighten even as the rest of her insides practically liquefy, then says "Well, right now, I think I'll listen to you play on your Piano. It was wonderful, after all."
Orion meets Dorea's gaze questioningly, and quietly asks "He's asking?"
"About the Piano playing, yeah. Want to see if it worked?"
Orion groans, then says "Fine. Fast. I swear, Tom was going to Hex one of us after that snowball fight a few days ago." The only reason he didn't, the two of them are sure, is because of Dorea's timely declaration of 'Evelynn likes somebody!'
When the two Blacks poke their heads around the right doorway, invisibly of course, they see Tom sitting on a desk next to Evelynn as she plays on a miniature Piano.
They quickly head back to the Common Room, with Dorea planning a betting pool on when they'll finally get together.