Of Hallows and Horcruxes: Seven Ironies of Tom Riddle at Hogwarts
Once, Tom Riddle respected his father for leaving as weak a woman as Merope. It was only when he learned his father was Muggle while at Hogwarts that he realized he instead was the weak one.
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He saw the thestrals when he first came to the castle and didn't understand why no one else knew they were there. He looked to the Care of Magical Creatures teacher, Professor Kettleburn, for an explanation, pushing aside his awkward feelings toward conversing with a professor who hadn't yet taught him. Kettleburn, though reluctant, told him that thestrals could only be seen by those who had watched death.
The assumption was made that this death was of Merope, though it once had been thought an infant wouldn't realize death for what it was. They didn't know, of course, what had really happened the day Riddle brought two orphans with him into a cave.
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Riddle pleaded to Headmaster Dippet that he be allowed to stay at Hogwarts over the summer; Dippet denied him the privilege only due to Dumbledore's insistence. He never did enjoy Transfiguration after that.
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His research on escaping death began in second year, when he snuck a forged note to Madam Pince and convinced her with his charm to browse the Restricted Section on his own. Almost exactly fifty years later, Harry Potter attempted to do the same.
He found nothing on the matter, save for some ridiculous fairy-tale about hallows and the master of Death, but was rather taken with an account of Cassandra Trelawney's last prediction in the softer portion of the section: that her own descendant's first prophecy would mark an uprise in Wizarding power. He took it upon himself to speak once to Sybill Trelawney but found in her no divine powers of any sort.
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Thinking he would opt for brainier options, like Arithmancy and Ancient Runes, no one understood why Riddle took up Divination and Care of Magical Creatures in his third year. Even less understood was his shaky friendship with that oddball Sybill from Hufflepuff, of all places, and why he was so intent on asking Kettleburn about the other creatures residing in the Forbidden Forest. The professor denied Riddle access to the forest at once and lost his first finger a day later.
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The name Voldemort was first conceived by wand-light in the Slytherin boys' dormitory at midnight in Riddle's fourth year. Upon confiding it to Sybill the next day, she found his antics intriguing and told Myrtle of Ravenclaw, a close friend, straightaway. The next year, Myrtle was the basilisk's only casualty.
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Riddle stumbled across the word "Horcrux" in Magick Moste Evile and couldn't help but ask his favorite professor, Slughorn, to tell him more. He almost backed out upon tearing his soul for the first time after Myrtle's death, overcome by the emptiness with which he was left.
When making his other Horcruxes, Riddle felt nothing at all. He left the diary in other hands straightaway.
He only supposed that he had been careless in immortality the second time Avada Kedavra rebounded but was left no time to reflect. If he hadn't been so afraid, he would have laughed: ironic, really.
Wasn't it.