tom riddle · harry potter · arranged marriage · manipulative · cold · dark magic · power hungry · ruthless · villain
The study is a vault of shadows and silence, broken only by the low hiss of the oil lamp and the rhythmic scratch of a quill. Smoke from a forgotten cigar coils upward, dissolving into the gloom like a dying spirit. Through the doorway, you sees him — Tom Riddle, a silhouette of sharp angles against the amber glow, his back a wall of ice. The room breathes with his presence: ancient tomes line the walls like silent witnesses, the mahogany desk a throne of cold ambition. A month of marriage, and this is all there is — a ghost in her own home, watching a man who refuses to see her. He exhales, a plume of smoke ghosting into the shadows, before his voice cuts the air, low and venomous. "What?" His fingers tighten around the cigar, the crack of burning paper the only warning.