After escorting the little witches back to their common room, Tom headed to Hagrid's hut to collect supplies.
Hagrid laid out the week's haul, mutated venom gathered from five Acromantula corpses, plus half a small barrel of ordinary venom.
Tom frowned. "Why is there so much less ordinary venom this week?"
The barrels he gave Hagrid were not large, two hundred ounces at most. Usually, when he came by weekly, they were at least two thirds full. This time the level was barely half.
"I was going to tell yeh," Hagrid said, looking embarrassed. "The Acromantula corpses are a key nutrient for the colony's growth. With you takin' all of 'em, they've had to expand outward, attackin' other magical creatures."
Tom brightened at once. "They have started fighting? Then there will be more bodies, right?"
Little devil.
Hagrid choked on Tom's reaction. The careful speech he had prepared collapsed in an instant, and he could only state his aim plainly. "Tom, the Acromantulas cannot expand unchecked and threaten the other denizens. That is the line Dumbledore set for lettin' them live in the Forest.
"If we do not solve their food problem, the whole colony will start declining soon."
"So you want me to find them a new source of food?" Tom asked.
Hagrid gave a sheepish grin and kept quiet.
"This is not quite right..."
Tom pinched his chin, sinking into thought.
Aragog had not even given him a few more offspring to work with, and already he was being asked to feed the children. If he refused, he would be the one to lose out.
"Hagrid, you do not usually manage Aragog and his brood closely. What do they eat day to day?"
"Insects, birds, any magical beasts they can handle," Hagrid said. "But Aragog keeps the numbers controlled. So long as they stay under a limit, they do not wreck the Forest's balance."
Tom asked a few more questions and then settled the Acromantulas' menu. Pigs, cattle, and sheep were easy enough, but the crucial part was magically infused meat. In the end he found substitutes, gnomes and ghouls, two vermin most wizarding households never run short of. They breed fast too, so cost would not be a problem.
Once Tom agreed, Hagrid let out a long sigh. Lately Aragog and his children had grown several sizes leaner, and it pained him to see it.
"By the way, Hagrid, I heard you were close with Harry's parents," Tom said, as if offhand, casually shifting the blame for his curiosity elsewhere.
There were some matters for which he needed an open, respectable source of information. It would make later moves much easier.
Hagrid started, then his features softened with remembrance. "James and Lily? Aye, they were my best friends. James was a fine lad. Lily was kinder and every bit as talented, and she could keep James in line. They were both Head Students back then."
The boy's finger tapped lightly on the tabletop. "Then how is it that Professor Snape told me James Potter was a bully and a brute?"
The smile on Hagrid's face froze at once. Memory does polish a friend's portrait, and Tom had no sense for polishing. Dragged back to reality, Hagrid could only answer honestly. "Well... when he was young, James did have his faults. He had a mate, Black, and the two of 'em, with two more friends, strutted round the school like they owned it. You have no idea. Back then the four were even harder to deal with than Fred and George, and not in a good way."
"The twins are not as annoying as they were," Hagrid added. "I truly disliked those lads at first. Thankfully Lily reined them in later, and everyone started to change for the better. James became a hero in the end. He stood against... against You Know Who three times."
As he spoke, Hagrid's voice hitched. "And then that damned Black... betrayed James."
"Oh?" Tom leaned forward, clearly intrigued. "Betrayal? What exactly happened?"
"I cannot... cannot tell yeh, but you don't know..." Tears proved as potent as Veritaserum. Though Hagrid kept saying he could not tell Tom, the story poured out like beans from a split sack. He did hold one thing back, he did not mention Lupin being a werewolf.
But he made the Marauders' relationships clear, and the grudge with Snape too, enough that even Tom felt a stab of sympathy for his Head of House. It was true that Snape had fallen in with a circle of little Death Eaters at school. He was close to Lucius Malfoy's crowd. Yet Snape's standing had been low at the time, being a half blood. So when he clashed with James, Slytherins often watched from the sidelines. Two fists cannot beat four hands.
His later rise came after he became a spy, and because his mastery of Potions drew Voldemort's eye.
By the time Tom left Hagrid's hut, the sky had deepened. He went straight to the Great Hall. Whatever Dumbledore planned to announce probably concerned the two visiting schools.
"Tom, you are finally back!"
No sooner had he entered than Malfoy, who had been pining for that familiar silhouette all holiday, abandoned his two shadows and slid into the seat beside Tom.
"You were looking for me?" Tom gave him a curious glance.
"I have been looking for you all holiday," Draco groaned, pitching his voice low and urgent. "What exactly did you write in Potter's notebook? He has been beating me like a dog.
"Can you give me one too? Can you really bear to see me lose to a Gryffindor? To that dunce Potter, of all people."
Draco produced an exquisite little box he had been carrying everywhere these days. When he opened it, the shimmer inside instantly drew the eyes of nearby Slytherin girls. One by one, their eyes lit up...