Title: Malice Characters: Tom Riddle Jr. Rating: PG Disclaimer: Harry Potter and all related characters and situations are the property of JK Rowling. I make no money from this work. Warnings: Little psychopath Tom Summary: Some people are determined to be afraid on Halloween. It seemed a waste not to give them a reason to be. Notes: Happy Halloween, redcandle17!
People inclined to think about such things seemed under the impression that, beneath all the festive trappings, Halloween was a genuinely frightening holiday. Even at Hogwarts, the last place Tom Riddle would have expected people to be afraid of haunts and demons, there were superstitious whisperings about the veil between worlds being thin, and the things one should do to keep oneself safe on Halloween. That these students were wasting their time by fearing ghosts while other ghosts floated freely among them never seemed to register.
And Tom had been so sure when he arrived at Hogwarts that he would finally be freed of the neurotic Muggle superstitions that had plagued him at the orphanage.
Clearly, that was not to be.
But if they were so determined to worry themselves sick over malicious spirits, then perhaps it would be best for Tom to play along. Oh, not as another paranoid student, of course; that role would never suit him. In this fearful pantomime that they were so convinced was reality, someone had to play the part of the malicious spirit, did they not?
Halloween was the only time of year that the most dangerous of acts could go entirely unnoticed.