Chapter 117: Strategic Transformation
Late at night, the Hogwarts Hospital Wing was so quiet that only the soft patter of rain against the windows could be heard.
Harry Potter lay on his hospital bed, staring up at the ceiling, completely unable to sleep.
Compared with the discomfort in his arm, what he found even harder to bear was the heavy, suppressed breathing coming from the bed beside him.
Tamara was still feverish.
Even after Madam Pomfrey had forced another dose of Potion down her throat, her normally pale cheeks remained flushed with an unnatural heat. Her brows were tightly drawn together, as if she were still enduring great pain even in sleep.
Harry turned his head, and guilt surged through him uncontrollably.
If not for him, Tamara would never have ended up like this.
"Am I only good at bringing disaster to other people...?" Harry muttered in self reproach.
"Pop!"
Just then, a sharp crack rang out in the silent ward.
Harry snapped his head around and nearly cried out in shock.
In the aisle between the two beds, a creature with enormous bat like ears and tennis ball sized eyes had appeared at some point.
He was still wearing that filthy old pillowcase, looking at Harry with eyes full of sorrow and fanatical devotion.
"Dobby!" Harry lowered his voice and growled through gritted teeth. "What are you doing here?"
"Harry Potter has returned to school."
Dobby whispered mournfully in that grating, high pitched voice of his, large tears rolling down his face.
"Dobby clearly warned Harry Potter. Dobby even sealed the passage to Platform Nine and Three Quarters, but Harry Potter still came back..."
Harry's eyes widened.
"It was you?" His voice trembled with extreme anger. "You did that? Ron and I were almost expelled because of that flying car!"
"Dobby only wanted to protect Harry Potter!" the House elf sobbed, wringing the pillowcase with his long, thin fingers.
"Today too! Dobby thought that if Harry Potter was badly hurt, Harry Potter might be sent home..."
"That Bludger was your doing too?"
Harry could hardly believe his ears.
He sat up abruptly, jarring his right arm before it had fully recovered. Pain lanced through him, and he hissed sharply, but he barely cared. An unprecedented fire burned in his green eyes.
"You call that protection? You nearly killed me!"
Harry kept his voice strictly low, afraid of waking Tamara in the next bed, but the finger he pointed at Dobby trembled violently.
"And look what you've done! Because of your damned Bludger, I fell out of the sky. That idiot Lockhart nearly removed my bones! And Tamara..."
Harry pointed sharply at the girl sleeping fitfully on the next bed, still trapped in fever. His eyes reddened.
"Tamara is lying there with a high fever because she stopped Lockhart. She can't even hold her wand! If anything happens to her, I will never forgive you!"
Dobby followed Harry's finger and looked at the black haired girl on the bed. Her delicate face looked painfully ill.
The House elf's large eyes were instantly filled with terror and self reproach.
"Bad Dobby! Dobby hurt Harry Potter's friend! Dobby almost killed an innocent witch! Dobby must be punished terribly!"
With a sharp wail, Dobby suddenly turned like a mad thing and slammed his head into the bedside table holding the water jug and iron tray.
"Bang!"
"Clatter!"
The heavy iron water jug crashed to the floor, making a loud, piercing noise.
"Shut up! Dobby! You'll wake her!" Harry tried to grab the frantic House elf in panic.
But it was too late.
Amid the noise loud enough to wake the dead, the black haired girl who had been tossing restlessly in pain suddenly stopped breathing unevenly.
The next second, in the darkness, Tamara slowly opened her eyes.
A foul temper from being woken, combined with a splitting fever headache and pain aching deep in her bones.
At this moment, the former Dark Lord who had once commanded storms felt the killing intent in her chest boil into something almost tangible.
She threw back the covers and pulled the holly wand from beneath her pillow.
"Flipendo!"
Tamara stepped barefoot onto the cold marble floor. Her wand swung forward in a movement that seemed casual, yet carried suffocating tyranny and ruthless force.
A sharp blue light flared through the dim ward, saturated with killing intent.
"Bang!"
Harry did not even see what happened. He only felt a violent gust of wind sweep past his scalp.
Dobby, who had just been wailing on the floor and banging his head, was struck head on as if hit by an invisible giant hammer. He was sent flying at once.
He blurred through the air, then smashed heavily into the thick oak doors of the Hospital Wing ten metres away. A bone chilling thud followed before he slid to the floor.
For a House elf, who was extremely sensitive to magical fluctuations, the moment that spell touched him, even his wails became stuck in his throat.
Dobby curled up in pain on the floor, clutching his chest. His enormous eyes reflected a primal fear that came from the depths of his soul.
In this seemingly weak twelve year old girl, Dobby had witnessed not only terrifying nonverbal casting, but also a pressure of pure darkness and death.
It was an aura ten thousand times more terrifying than that of his cruel master, Lucius Malfoy.
Tamara's pale face was flushed with fever, and cold sweat soaked her fringe.
She lowered her wand coldly, looking down at the trembling House elf ten metres away.
"...Get out."
Tamara's voice was hoarse, yet it carried a chill like death.
"Disappear from my sight immediately."
She leaned forward slightly. A faint red light seemed to swirl in the depths of her pitch black eyes.
"Otherwise, with the next spell, I will skin you alive, drain your blood, and sew you together with a Bludger."
"Aah!"
Dobby let out a short, shrill scream.
He did not even dare plead.
Under that terrifying pressure and crushing force, he tremblingly raised two fingers and snapped them loudly.
The House elf vanished without a trace, as if a demon that might chew him up and swallow him at any moment were hidden in the ward.
The Hospital Wing returned once more to a deathly silence.
Only the cold sound of rain outside continued.
Tamara stood where she was. The fever made her head spin, and she had to reach out and steady herself against the edge of Harry's bed. Her chest rose and fell as she panted lightly.
Harry sat on the bed in a daze, clearly shocked by the scene just now.
But once he recovered, guilt quickly surged up from his heart.
"Tamara..."
"I'm really sorry."
He lowered his head and blurted out everything Dobby had just confessed, including the fact that he had been the source of all this trouble.
"Whether it's at the Muggles' or at Hogwarts, trouble always sticks to me like a shadow."
"That House elf was right. The danger is aimed at me. You didn't need to end up lying here suffering like this just to stop that idiot Professor for me."
He clenched his jaw, suppressing the bitterness churning in his chest, and forced himself to say the most heartless words.
"So if, because of this, you think I'm a jinx and never want anything to do with me again... I'll completely understand."
"Because even I think staying away from me is the safest thing to do."
Tamara leaned against the bed frame, listening to this unguarded confession.
In her mind, the primal tyranny belonging to Lord Voldemort screamed wildly.
Of course you are a disaster! You filthy half blood! If it weren't for fear of being shocked into an idiot by that damned system, I would have stuffed that Bludger down your throat myself long ago!
But just as this vicious mockery was about to leave her lips, Tamara's gaze fell upon Harry's green eyes.
They were filled with unreserved trust, guilt, and even the willingness to go through fire and water for her.
It was a nauseatingly hot and sincere emotion.
Lord Voldemort despised such things. They were weak, blind, and full of uncontrollable variables.
But in that instant, the cunning and calculation carved into the Dark Lord's bones split through her fever heated mind like lightning.
Wait.
Since this damned system would force her to protect the saviour with humiliating punishments no matter what.
Since she could not escape this ridiculous setting of becoming his friend.
Then why should she not simply treat this nauseating emotion as the most indestructible collar?
Guilt, gratitude, blind adoration.
These were the most perfect means of control in the world, even better than Imperio.
Imperio could be broken by strong willpower.
But loyalty born from self justification would make this fated nemesis willingly become the sharpest blade in Tamara Riddle's hand, and the most perfect shield.
How ironic.
Tamara let out a hair raising cold laugh in her heart.
She perfectly concealed the churning calculation and tyranny in her eyes, forcibly suppressing the physical nausea in her stomach caused by Harry's fervent affection.
She took a deep breath and let go of the bed frame.
Then she reached out with a slightly trembling hand and, with restraint, gently placed it on Harry's uninjured left shoulder.
Harry shuddered all over and snapped his head up, looking at her in disbelief.
"Stop saying such stupid things, Harry."
Tamara's voice was still weak, but her tone carried a resolute helplessness that seemed to accept everything.
She gazed quietly at Harry with those deep black eyes, as if looking at an immature younger brother.
"What that House elf did wasn't your fault."
Tamara gently patted his shoulder and continued softly.
"As for stopping Lockhart, that was my own choice."
Tamara withdrew her hand and stood a little straighter. Even weakened by illness, she still carried an imposing nobility.
"Even if I had to choose again, I would never stand by and watch that incompetent fool ruin you."
She looked at Harry's completely stunned face and delivered the final blow.
"So put away that ridiculous guilt. When I, Tamara Riddle, do something, it is not for anyone else to bear the consequences for me."
This sentence was utterly assertive, leaving Harry no room to argue.
Harry stared at her blankly.
Growing up with the Dursleys had long since taught him to suppress extreme weakness and tears.
But his intact left hand clenched the bedsheet tightly at his side.
He took a deep breath, forcing down the heat surging in his chest.
When he met Tamara's gaze again, the panic and self reproach in his green eyes had vanished. In their place was an unbreakable stubbornness.
"I understand."
Harry's voice was steady as he looked at Tamara seriously, giving his promise one word at a time.
"I swear, Tamara, no matter what happens in the future, no matter what you do..."
He gritted his teeth, as if making a sacred and unbreakable vow.
"I will always be on your side. And if danger comes again, I will stand in front of you."
Listening to this sincere speech from a Gryffindor brute, Tamara felt another wave of uncontrollable nausea rise in her stomach.
But she forced herself to endure it.
"Put away your ridiculous heroism and worry about your own arm first."
She withdrew her gaze, turned around, and walked step by step toward her own bed.
"Rest."
The moment she turned her back on Harry, under the dim moonlight, the feigned gentleness and tolerance on Tamara's delicate, pale face vanished instantly.
In their place was a cold smirk.
"How simple."
.....
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