This idea had been driving me insane (well more insane than I am already) for the best part of half a year, just needling away in the back of my brain, nip, nip, nipping at me until I finally caved in and started to write it down.

If you hadn't guessed from the summary this story is going to be considerably darker than my usual fare. Not much in the way of fluff and fun here I'm afraid as this is from that deep, dark place at the depressive end of my mind which makes, thankfully, infrequent appearances. Unfortunately for you that also means rather infrequent updates as, for my own mental health, I can't stay in this kind of a mood for long. Although I have found that 'writing it out' is a much more productive use of these depressive spirals, that I get caught in every now and again, than sitting, brooding in a darkened room.

This is the first time I have written in 'first person' perspective so please forgive any rookie errors that I may make along the way.

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I'm not JKR and I don't make any money from this. Which is a bit of a shame.

DtR xx.

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Riddle; Story of a Devil.

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Prologue. Confession.

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Bless me Father for I have sinned. It has been twenty five years since my last confession.

That is how I would start if I actually could bring myself to walk into that pretty little catholic church at the bottom of the hill upon which my home sits. But I can't. Far too much time has passed and I have done far too many terrible things in my life for the pere to forgive me now. Still the exercise of confession itself may have some merit as it may provide me with at least a modicum of catharsis. Very well then, I shall do as many before me have done and write my confession out. I shall lay out all the truths that I have hidden and the sins that I have committed in a letter to posterity and in the style of a true penitent.

I give my story to those who come after and let them do with it as they will.

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My name is Marie Deschamps and this is my confession.

Of course it won't be much of a confession if I start it off with a whopper of a lie like that.

My name is not Deschamps. It is Riddle.

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I was born in late September of 1979 and given the name Therese Mercedes Riddle, daughter of a simple French country witch and the worst Dark Lord to vent his malevolent will upon Europe for four centuries. Not that he had had any kind of a clue that he had impregnated the dumb salope of a temporary maid who he had his wicked way with at the Bordeaux Castle fundraiser that night. He would not know that little detail until almost a year later and if he had he would certainly have hit her with a post coital contraceptive charm instead of assuming that the slutty bitch had done it herself before their encounter.

Of course once he did know he had sent one of his most trusted Death Eaters, the feared and fearsome Bellatrix Lestrange, to the dingy apartment in Bordeaux in order to carry out a little post natal termination. Luckily for me grandmere was visiting and got me out of the apartment before I was killed. Mother was not so fortunate. She bought my survival with her life just as a little over a year later another mother would more famously buy the survival of her own son with her life. This act was without a doubt the most note worthy thing that she had done with her life although in the years to come many, myself included, would wish that she had not done it.

It turned out that this being orphaned by Voldemort was not the only thing that Harry Potter and I had in common. There were many parallels in the lives of myself and the 'boy-who-lived' and it was honestly a shame that I had to ...

Ah but we are getting ahead ourselves. Everything in it's proper order as they say.

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The house that I occupy these days is very different from the one where I grew up. The main one I suppose is that this is a large, comfortable Roman style villa and that one was dirty, shabby, hovel of a shack in a dirty backwater in the rural west of France. They are technically in the same country I suppose but looking out across the sparkling, azure, glory of the Mediterranean Sea beyond my balcony it certainly doesn't feel like it. There is not nearly enough rain that falls here and considerably less in the way of mud.

Our home back then was little more than a large wooden shed, complete with it's single lapped wooden outer shell, that froze in the winter and baked in the summer. The charms that grandmere used to make the temperature more bearable, one way or the other, were only cast in the direst of need as she required most of her magical energy for the planting and brewing that brought in the funds for our survival. I never begrudged her doing that as it was only done for our benefit. It is always easier to pull on an extra blanket when the cold bites than to eat something that does not exist when your hunger comes calling. Still even with her almost constant brewing it was often not enough to make ends meet and we had to keep a few scraggy chickens and a too thin cow to ensure that we would not starve.

These animals were my responsibility from the time that I could walk and it gave me two things that I would come to rely on in the future. One was the rather healthy attitude that if I didn't do things for myself then they would not get done and the other was my hardy constitution and well muscled body. The first of these led me to teach myself to read, which grandmere seemed to approve of, perhaps in the hope that I didn't repeat the mistakes of my mother and the second enabled me to fight. Something that was unfortunately necessary as the children of the nearby magical village were cruel and often violent in their ignorance. I was six when I beat one of them insensible with a rock after he punched me for being a bastard and a pauper and we were left alone from that day on. Though the village relied on grandmere for their healing potions we were outcasts in all but name. The fact that we were Roman Catholics in a pagan society didn't help.

It was a lonely existence for me with just my grandmere for company. My childhood was full of chores as is the experience of most of those who live a life of subsistance farming as we did but I still made time to read every book that I could beg, borrow or steal to get my hands on. Just as many of these were muggle as they were magical and my attempts at self education were somewhat patchy at best until it came to brewing. Grandmere, in all her pragmatic glory, decided that if I learnt the subtle and ancient art of potions then I would be even more help to her and may help to relieve some of her constant burden so a minor miracle happened and she ordered an actual magical textbook for me.

This was something of a revelation for a child who thirsted for and yet was starved of knowledge and I took to it with a passion and total committment that impressed the old woman. This was evident in the fact that she taught me with a vicious ferocity that only comes when the master sees true potential in their student and grows angry when they feel that it is being wasted or not taken seriously enough. That was never a problem for me as I loved the business of potioneering but the slightest mistake on my part would have grandmere spitting and cursing in rage. It perhaps wasn't an ideal way to learn but it did have the advantage of making me extremely careful in order to avoid those mistakes.

Outside of our lessons we did not speak much and I had no male role models growing up other than the pere of the local church where my grandmere occasionally took me to worship. Even then he was a distant and disapproving figure who rarely looked upon me with any form of kindness. I was the bastard child of the bastard child of a mad old woman that lived in a shack in the styx and was widely considered (rightly as it happens) among his flock to be a witch so I can't really blame him for that.

Forty some years previously grandmere had engaged in very brief entanglement with the leader of a group of occupying mages in the great European conflict of that time. What she did not know, and I only found out many years later, was that he was actually the leader of all the mages and indeed the instigator of the entire conflict, Gellert Grindlewald. The witch was then in her early sixties and although still rather buxom and good looking had believed herself to be well beyond child bearing age so was inordinately surprised when she discovered some weeks later that she was pregnant. It was a similar way to which her daughter had become encumbered with me. Unlike her, however she was on her own and decided that a child would be a useful tool to help in her small holding.

My mother's upbringing was almost identical to my own with the exception that she did not possess my unquenchable thirst for learning new things. She was a mediocre witch at best, barely more than a squib if truth be told, and a less than intelligent human being which is why she never performed the contraceptive charm after her liason with my father. She didn't know it. Unsurprising as she had never been to either a muggle or a magical school and, not having the talent or inclination to teach herself as I had, could hardly read more than a few words.

I'm sure that you will agree that this was a less than ideal way for a young woman to grow up and although she did fly the nest eventually to try out a new life in the magical section of Bordeaux she never prospered. Living in a tiny apartment and taking part time work whenever she could get it, selling herself when she couldn't her life was not easy, nor was it pretty. Grandmere stayed in contact with her and helped out when she could but my mother was stubborn and not very clever and I was definitely not the first child to fill her womb but I was the first and only one to continue past the two month stage and on to full term.

I have a suspicion that this may have had something to do with grandmere as she could read and had a wealth of knowledge of those dark and dangerous potions that she was always brewing as well as access to the necessary ingredients. Most of which she grew herself in a small, filthy and over-run greenhouse in the corner of her garden. It did not require a great stretch of the imagination to see her slipping something into my mother's food to end an unwanted pregnancy that would see another mouth to feed on their paltry budget. Why she decided that I was worth the bother when those others weren't has always been something of a mystery to me.

Regardless I ended up at the old woman's shack for better or worse and lived the same life that my mother had minus the miskaken belief that all you need is a strong wizard to take care of you. Given my family tree and my loveless chidhood it was honestly not that much of a shock that I ended up as a Dark Lady really.

Apparently getting knocked up by a Dark Lord is something of a tradition among the females of my mother's family. One that I certainly won't be continuing.

You see I have always been what you might call a 'witches witch' and while preferring the exclusive company of your own sex is not unheard of in the magical world it isn't exactly common. But that's me all over really. A very uncommon witch. And a very queer one at that. I knew it from the moment that I first walked into the great hall at Hogwarts and saw all of those lovely, sweet smelling girls laid out in rows before me like some delicious banquet at which I was the guest of honour.

Like so many before me when I saw the sheer, rich variety of nubile young womanhood displayed in front of me for the first time it was the blondes that immediately drew my attention. When I chose to sit beside one that night, however, and got my first sight of her incredible silver eyes and my first taste of her unique personality all the others faded from my view. I was hers from the moment that she laid her small, perfect, pale hand on my arm and began to prattle away to me in a language that I didn't understand.

Not that knowing how to speak English at that time would have particularly helped me out on that front. My love always did a very special way of communicating.

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The thought causes the ghost of a smile to pass my lips as I watch my current lover stopping briefly to fuss over the magnificent floweres spilling from their raised wall beds. Lover is a bit of a mis-nomer for what she is really. The girl is my pet, my plaything and nothing more. She is there to fill in the time when I grow bored of reading my spell crafting texts, a diversion to keep me occupied and away from my own thoughts. It has nothing to do with love that is for sure.

There has only been one love in my life. My 'Grande Amour'. The quirky girl with the strange silver eyes and the breathy, dream-like voice. She was my everything, the sun literally rose and set for me on her command and this primping, preening pillow princess in front of me is nothing but a pale imitation.

And when she died something inside of me broke and what had lain buried deep in my soul roared as it broke free.

The beast that had hidden far below the surface had then escaped to wreak it's bloody vengence and when Voldemort finally fell it was naturally his vanquisher that the sheep of Wizarding Britain turned to. Instead of a Dark Lord they had set up a Queen, not dark but terrible and beautiful as the dawn, tempestuous as the sea and stronger than the foundations of the Earth. All who looked upon me loved me ... and despaired. My light which came from her was gone and all that was left was the darkness. A darkness that I fully embraced.

I have hunted and killed many different people for many different reasons. For vengence for my slain lover, for the protection of my people, for justice, most recently for a place to live, but all of those have some justification, however warped in it's conception. The reason that all of these deaths really occured though was the reason that could never be justified. The unpalatable truth is that I killed all of those people because I liked it. I killed them because it was fun. The beast had been unleashed and there is nothing that the beast loved more than blood.

My Britain started out as a just and fair society and the sheep were more than happy to bend their knees to me and call me saviour. Mistress. Queen. Of course it was not a good place to live if you were in opposition to me. My responses to the threats of those who, all too often, came seeking my throne were swift and vicious. Blood flowed and the beast fed.

It couldn't go on forever. In fact there hadn't been a 'Dark' administration that had lasted for more than a couple of decades since the mighty Atilla's Hunic horde had swept up out of their balkan strongholds a milennium and a half ago. Mine was about average at fourteen years but in the end it was more about keeping hold of my power than helping my people so resistances were bound to rise. Some I put down, usually with brutal efficiency and a great deal of bloodshed to discourage others, but soon enough another would come along and eventually I saw the writing on the wall.

I will admit to some pride as I am one of the only Dark rulers in history to simply give up my reign and walk away rather than fight it out to the bitter and inevitable end of my untimely death. So I gathered up some gold along with a few irreplaceable items and my latest in a long line of sex pets and I walked off into the sunset.

Not that I actually walked obviously, more like apparated, port-keyed and then jumped on a muggle train to the South of France, but I believe that I am allowed the occasional flowery descriptive phrase in my ramblings.

Speaking of flowery brings me back full circle to my current companion who, having finished her floral ministrations, is now seemingly intent on teasing my libido with her bikini clad gyrations to some awful, saccharine muggle tune. She isn't to know that the feelings that she is attempting to stir up are all tied into the beast. The beast who howls for her blood while using her body as it's taught and fleshy playground. Dumb bitch.

Not that I can blame her for that. It's why I chose her after all. They all have some similar characteristics in common, my playthings, like their long, light blonde hair, short, slim stature and grey eyes to resemble the physical presence of the girl who, even now, still holds what is left of my shattered heart. They don't have her intelligence of course but then so few people could claim to. Granger could have but even if she had the physical attributes of my love she would never have succumbed to my charms, Certainly not after I did ... what I did to her friends.

I briefly consider disposing of the tiresome, blonde creature before deciding that having to go through the effort of finding someone to replace her with is far too much to be bothered with right now. She will have to be kept, at the very least, until I finish my new project and can afford the time to go off looking for someone to take her place.

As is all too usual these days my thoughts have wandered off the topic at hand. I am supposed to be giving you the story of my life not some loose, random diatribe on how I choose my sexual partners. I beg your forgiveness for this and for all my other offences. Don't give it yet though you haven't heard anywhere near the worst of it.

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So let us make a start.

I suppose that for this to be a real confession I should start at the beginning. Or at the beginning of the end at least. At the point where my grandmere died and I was claimed by a new and powerful Magical guardian and shipped off to another country.

I should start at the Castle which actually is a school in the north of Scotland and with a girl called Luna.

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A shortish little prologue to set us up. We get to the real stuff next.

As usual I write for me. Honestly I really don't mind if nobody else reads this at all but reviews are always nice and I'd certainly never turn them away, just don't get caught up in the whole 'they would never do that' trap. This is all going to be pretty AU stuff.

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DtR xx.