Chapter 184: Absurd Comedy
The dim, flickering corridor lights fell across Tamara.
Her long black hair lay in disarray across her cheeks, several strands clinging to her skin with cold sweat.
Gone was the arrogance with which she normally looked down upon everyone around her.
Gone, too, was the mocking expression that always seemed steeped in venom.
Clear tears slid silently down her cheeks, passed over her tightly pressed lips, gathered at her chin, then fell onto her black robes.
Harry stared at her blankly.
At that moment, he understood something with painful clarity.
Tamara, just like him, had experienced something unspeakably dark and agonising beneath the influence of that creature.
That strange resonance born from shared suffering swept away the resentment and anger Harry had accumulated almost instantly.
"Tamara..."
He had sworn to himself that he would never approach her again.
Yet Harry realised, almost miserably, that he had already released the doorframe and was unconsciously walking toward her.
However, the instant he called her name, Tamara, still slumped on the floor, blinked sharply.
Her unfocused eyes cleared.
The cold wetness on her cheeks immediately told the Dark Lord, who had only just escaped that abyss of despair, exactly what had happened.
She had cried.
Because of some uncontrollable physical reaction, she had actually shed such cowardly, disgusting tears in public.
And worse still...
That damned saviour.
Potter, the boy she dreamed of killing, was staring directly at her most pathetic state with an expression filled with shock, pain, and even a trace of that cursed sympathy.
An indescribable surge of fury and humiliation exploded inside her.
"Don't look at me like that!"
Tamara gave Harry no chance to come any closer.
She raised a hand, harshly wiped the tears from her face, sprang to her feet, and hurried toward the lavatory at the end of the carriage without looking back.
Bang!
The door slammed shut.
Inside the cramped, suffocating space, only the distant rumbling of the train could be heard.
Tamara stared at her reflection in the mirror.
Her face was pale.
The corners of her eyes were red, and a lingering wetness still remained in them.
"Ridiculous..."
She ground her teeth, her chest rising and falling violently.
Even the most agonising Cruciatus Curse would have been ten thousand times preferable to what she had experienced moments ago.
Pain, at least, proved that she was alive.
It proved that she was still that violent, arrogant Dark Lord.
But that creature...
That disgusting creature had been devouring her ambition, draining away her hatred, and had even made her believe, for one dreadful moment, that continuing to live was pointless.
Without her desire for power...
Without her contempt and hatred for those fools...
Without even the desire to kill Potter...
Then who was she?
Tamara stared at the reflection before her and, for one brief moment, felt as though she were looking at a stranger.
Ordinary people could fill the emptiness inside themselves with foolish things like love, warmth, and so called beauty.
They could use those feelings to reassure themselves that they existed.
Tamara could not.
She had been born incapable of understanding such cheap things.
Power.
The ambition to trample everyone beneath her feet.
The fear she inspired in others.
Her obsession with immortality.
Those were the foundations upon which she had built her sense of self.
And that disgusting monster had nearly drained every one of those precious things from her in an instant.
If she could have done so, Tamara almost wanted to cast the Cruciatus Curse on herself twice just to force her mind back into clarity.
She had originally intended to use the Dementor to filter out the unwanted impurities in her emotions.
Instead, she had been betrayed by this body and forced to experience a moment of utter weakness beneath despair.
Worst of all...
Why was it always that damned Potter who saw her whenever she was at her most miserable and humiliating?
"Truly... an absurd comedy."
Just as the hostility in her chest threatened to boil over with nowhere to go, a cautious knock came from outside the lavatory door.
"Tamara?"
It was Draco Malfoy.
He had clearly searched the train until he found her. His voice carried unmistakable tension and concern.
"What happened just now? Are... are you all right?"
Tamara closed her eyes and drew a deep breath.
Then she used Occlumency to forcibly seal the surging humiliation and hostility within the deepest recesses of her mind.
When she opened her eyes again, her expression had returned to its usual cold arrogance.
The lock clicked.
Tamara opened the door.
"I'm fine."
Her voice was slightly hoarse, but her tone remained unmistakably blunt.
Draco stood outside.
The moment he saw Tamara's pale face, panic flickered through his eyes.
He did not dare press her with more questions.
Instead, he quickly reached into his robe pocket and pulled out a large piece of something wrapped in foil.
"That... there was a professor outside who looked like a tramp, handing these out to everyone."
Draco frowned, apparently unimpressed by the professor's appearance, but still held the item toward her.
"He said eating this would make you feel better."
It was a piece of chocolate.
Tamara stared at the unevenly broken chunk, and undisguised sarcasm flashed briefly through her eyes.
It was practically the sort of trick used to coax children.
Yet her entire body still felt cold, and the exhaustion rising from the depths of her soul was steadily eroding her ability to think clearly.
If she did nothing, she might soon be swallowed by that emptiness again.
Tamara remained silent for a moment.
Then she reached out and took the chocolate.
She peeled away the foil and bit into it without expression.
A rich, bittersweet flavour melted across her tongue.
No matter how strongly she resisted the idea, no matter how unwilling she was to admit it, the moment the sweetness passed down her throat and settled into her stomach, her body responded with embarrassing honesty.
A faint warmth began to spread slowly through her chilled limbs, pushing back some of the despair that had left her feeling as though she had been plunged into an icy cellar.
Draco watched Tamara's expression gradually ease.
Only then did he quietly release a breath of relief.
He hesitated.
Remembering the awkward and unpleasant atmosphere between them earlier in the compartment, he finally could not stop himself from trying to explain.
"Tamara, about what happened earlier in the compartment... I really wasn't trying to interfere with your decisions. I just thought..."
"Enough."
Tamara interrupted him.
There was a trace of exhaustion in her voice.
She raised her eyes.
Those pitch black eyes had lost the usual spark of calculation and mockery.
"Let's go back."