Welcome to Gaia! ::

Once he was securely on the train, Tom gave little notice to his surroundings, focused as intently as he was on the schoolbook lying open on his lap. He had spent every moment he could spare poring over his books since the minute he had bought them (a few second hand, but he had been sure they hardly looked it). Tom wanted to know everything he possibly could about magic before he even set foot in Hogwarts. Albus Dumbledore (Professor Albus Dumbledore) had told him that it didn’t make a bit of difference one way or the other, whether he was raised around magic or not, but Tom had a sense that this wasn’t entirely the case.

He had been tempted, once or twice, to have a go at some of the magic he found in his textbooks. But Dumbledore had been clear that unsupervised, intentional magic was expressly forbidden to underage wizards, and there would be Consequences if Tom were to use any. Though he did not think Dumbledore was very honest, Tom doubted that he was a liar, and at the very least, Tom wanted to know exactly what these Consequences were before he incurred any.

Upon boarding the train, Tom had been sure to find an empty compartment to sit in, but the train was very full, and before it had even left the station, two girls had joined him without so much as asking his leave. He had given them a quick glance- one was smiling angelically under a mass of white-blonde curls, and the other was skinny, her face almost hidden behind lank, mousey brown hair- and then resolved to pay them as little mind as possible. Just now, though, he thought he’d caught a number of words that sounded like something from one of his textbooks; “Ravenclaw” and “Slytherin.” He looked up.

“The Hogwarts Houses,” he said.

The skinny one stopped mid-sentence and stared at him. “Right.”

“Well, what about them?” he asked.

The other one beamed at him. “We were just talking about which one we’ll be in.”

He nodded.

“Gryffindor, probably,” the skinny one said.

“I mean, I wouldn’t mind Slythering, obviously. A lot of good families end up there.”

“As long as it isn’t Hufflepuff?” Tom offered.

“Well, one shouldn’t judge,” the blonde one said quickly, blue eyes wide, “but it would be a let down, wouldn’t it?”

“Bunch of snitches,” the plain one said bitterly.

“Florence, really!”

Florence merely shrugged. Her companion fixed Tom with another exhaustingly bright smile. “Well, which one do you think you’ll be in?”

He pretended to consider the question, though he had known the answer for weeks, since he first came across a mention of Houses in Hogwarts, A History. “Slytherin, I think,” he finally replied.

Florence’s friend smiled even more broadly, if it was possible. “Like I said, it’s a good house. A lot of great wizards come out of there. And Gryffindor can be almost the same, for girls.”

“For girls,” Florence repeated.

“Right. Of course, it’s different for boys.” She gave Tom a conspiratorial little grin.

“Really?” he feigned interest.

Florence sniffed. “I don’t think I’d want to spend much time with a Gryffindor boy.”

“Florence, you really mustn’t be so unkind!” her friend scolded. “But she’s right, of course. You know that saying, ‘boys will be boys’? Well, Gryffindor boys are the worst.” She paused, and Tom thought her smile seemed to falter for a moment. “Of course, you aren’t like that. Well, you don’t seem like that.”

Just then, Florence glanced out the window and gave a little start. “We’re nearly there!” she cried.

“I hardly noticed!” exclaimed her friend. “We barely have time to get our robes on!”

Saying this, the man turned and strode resolutely into the darkness that ringed the platform’s glowing lamplight. The group of new students followed, torn between hesitation and the man’s admonition to keep up. Tom fell in with them, and before long, he found himself at the front of the other students. He had not intended it that way; it was simply that he was less given to hesitation than they were. He recognized Rookwood, from the station, near his elbow and, on the other side, a boy who loomed somewhat over the other children. Florence and Umbridge, he was unsurprised to see, were nowhere near the front.

As if the universe recognized the exact moment Tom was most enmeshed in his own thoughts, and choose to take advantage of it, the man with the lantern halted abruptly, and Tom had to scramble to keep from running into him. It was a good thing he had scrambled, Tom thought, as the old man had lead them down a sharply sloping bank that ended, not too far from where they were standing, in an inky gleam of dark water. A line of little boats edged the shore, but if he had fallen, Tom had no way of knowing he wouldn’t have missed and plunged into whatever the boats were floating on. And it would have been terribly undignified, either way.

“Well, then, get in,” the man with the lantern said, jerking a gnarled hand towards the boats.

Tom, with a growing sense that the man’s instructions would lead him to neither harm nor humiliation and that a lack of hesitation might impress some of his peers, was quick to move. He strode, (or, to be perfectly honest, tried to stride, as the bank was very steep) down to the nearest boat and got in. He was a bit surprised, (but not that much, really) to see Rookwood and two other boys following him. As they finished boarding, Rookwood took the lead.

“I’m sorry our meeting at the station was so brief,” he began.

Remembering how short Rookwood had been with him, Tom smiled sweetly. “Likewise.”

Rookwood seemed both the slightest bit relieved and the slightest bit disappointed. “Allow me to introduce my friends,” he said, leaving an ever-so-slight pause before “friends,” not even a significant pause, “Dorain Lestrange and Alfred Potter. Dorian, Alfred, this is Tom Riddle.”

The two boys watched Tom intently, reaching to shake his hand as Rookwood said their names, muttering “honored, really” under their breath as they did. All three of them sat impeccably straight as the boat glided noiselessly over the lake’s surface, and said nothing about Tom’s name. If, for a moment, Tom had doubted that he was among aristocracy, it was the last that convinced him. It was a stroke of luck, really, that he had fallen in with them so quickly. Tom allowed himself the smallest grin, and accounted for it by launching into conversation.

“You know, I met two of the most… engaging young women on the train.”

Rookwood looked mildly interested. “Really? Who?”

“Miss Dolores Umbridge and Miss Florence Hawthorne.”

The other three boys quickly exchanged looks before Potter said, “Well, we’ve certainly heard of them.”

To Tom, the meaning was clear. “Yes, Miss Umbridge was entirely as friendly as one could possibly want.”

Lestrange smiled. “Oh, but she is, trust us. And Miss Florence?”

Tom feigned a look of puzzlement. “Oh?”

Lestrange laughed, and the rest joined in quickly.

Through the archway lay a room of such enchanted grandeur that Tom knew clearly that it must be the Great Hall. He followed the Professor (and, lined up as they were, a number of the other students) to an aisle that ran the length of the Hall, then down the aisle past the four long House tables, where older students turned to watch them. They drew to a halt in front of the teachers’ table, where someone had placed an old, battered hat on a low stool. Everyone around Tom was looking intently at the hat, though he had no idea why.

The hat gave a dusty cough and sang:

[write later]

When the hat drew to a close, the Hall filled with applause, and Professor Finchworth turned to the lines of incoming students.

“Now, please, when your name is called, step forward,” she instructed, “and sit on the stool. When your House is announced, make your way to your House table.” This said, she produced a long roll of heavy parchment, seemingly from nowhere, and unrolled it with a neat flick of her wrist, and reading from it, proclaimed, “Abernathy, Gentian.”

The skinny, reddish-haired boy at the front of the line tripped forward, and Professor Finchworth placed the Sorting Hat on his head. For a few tense moments, the whole school watched as Gentian Abernathy sat rigidly on the stool, eyes closed tightly. Then, from the same rip it had used to sing, the hat proclaimed “RAVENCLAW!” and the boy rushed off to his new House amid scattered applause.

“Blackthorne, Cordelia” was next, to which the Rookwood boy, standing directly behind Tom, murmured, “the Blackthorne look.” She was certainly more self-possessed than Gentian Abernathy had been, and Tom ascribed it to her likely aristocratic upbringing. She perched lightly atop the stool for a moment or two before she, too, was sent to Ravenclaw.

Any lingering doubts about the Sorting assuaged, Tom began to look closer at the Great Hall and its occupants. The professors, besides Professor Finchworth, were seated on a raised dais set apart from the four long student tables and backed by soaring windows of intricately leaded glass. They were the most wildly assorted group of individuals that Tom had ever laid eyes on.

At the center of the teachers’ table, in a chair that looked particularly like a throne, a balding man that Tom guessed must have been the Headmaster, Armando Dippet. He looked nervous, just a bit, and supposed that, as he was most assuredly not the oldest of his colleagues, he must be somewhat young for the position.

To the Headmaster’s right was an empty chair, and to his left, Albus Dumbledore (Professor Albus Dumbledore) was talking animatedly with a jovial, somewhat rotund wizard. Tom could not be certain, but he thought for a moment that Dumbledore had turned to look at him, then stopped upon finding himself already under observation. It was hardly surprising.

Tom looked back to the sorting hat to see “Hagrid, Reubus,” the enormous student he had noticed on the way to the boats, sorted into Gryffindor house. He remembered what Florence and Umbridge had said about boys in that house and thought that, in this case at least, it was likely to be fairly accurate.

As “Hawkins, Persephone” made her way to be Sorted, (wizarding families had the strangest names) Tom turned his attention back to the Hall itself. For the most part, the Hall was lit by a multitude of candles that hung, unsupported, overhead. There seemed something odd about them, something unsettling…

It was the way they were floating—as if they were on the surface of a lake. They were all about at the same height, and if he looked carefully, Tom could see waves and eddies moving through them. He turned quickly away, tried to focus on something else, anything at all, but he couldn’t shake the sense that he ought to be drowning.

The hall, like the antechamber Professor Finchworth had lead the first years through, was constructed entirely out of stone, and had it not been so full of students, professors, furniture, and candlelight, Tom supposed that it would have felt rather cavernous. This must have occurred to someone, because aside from the necessary accommodations, the Hall was decorated with a multitude of gently rustling tapestries in the House colors and a veritable army of suits of armor. Some of the suits were so outlandishly designed that Tom was sure that they had never been worn into battle, and others most certainly were not designed for human use.

As “Knotwood, Eurydice” was assigned to Hufflepuff House, Tom steeled himself to look up (not at the candles drifting placidly overhead, but up) to see the fabled ceiling of the Great Hall. He had read, of course, in “Hogwarts, a History,” that the ceiling of the Great Hall was enchanted to take on the appearance of the sky above. And in another, less scholarly book, (for Tom knew well the value of rumors) he had read a tale that when the Hogwarts castle was built, the founders had meant the ceiling to follow the weather that passed over the castle’s roof. But the spells were newly invented, and complex, and strange to their casters, and something had gone awry. And indeed, when Tom looked up, he saw that although the sky outside was shrouded with clouds, the ceiling of the Great Hall shone with silvery stars.

Directly ahead of Tom, Alfred Potter was called to sit on the stool, so Tom ended his visual exploration of the Great Hall. It was several moments before the Sorting Hat proclaimed “SLYTHERIN!” and then Tom was already striding forward as Professor Finchworth called, “Riddle, Tom,” to an increasingly fidgety body of students. When Tom reached the stool, Professor Finchworth gave no hint that she was aware of his presence save that she dropped the Sorting Hat onto his head.

Tom wondered briefly if everyone experienced something similar in the Sorting, but the other students had all looked pleased, or at least somewhat relieved, when they had been assigned a House. He didn’t think he’d spent an exceptional length of time under the Hat’s thrall, but there had definitely been something different about his little chat with the Sorting Hat. And, given what the Hat had said about essentially being him, there was something different about Tom. Not that it was all that surprising, really. Only it might have been more pleasant.

“You’ll eat yourself alive.” What did that even mean? Oh, it sounded bad enough, but probably it was just nonsense meant to frighten him, with no real significance.

As the last student, Melchior Wilcox, was sorted into Hufflepuff House and took his place at that table, Professor Finchworth set the Sorting Hat upon the stool, and with a flick of her wand, sent the stool scurrying off through a side door. As she moved to sit at the empty seat beside the Headmaster, the balding man rose abruptly, hands clasped tightly before his chest.

“Greetings, greetings! For those of you who do not already know, I am Armando Dippet, your Headmaster.”

So that much, at least, was exactly as Tom had suspected. And he did seem nervous, too.

“I’m sure we’re all going to have an excellent year at Hogwarts, just as we always do. But, just to be sure, there’s a few things I’d like to go over, especially with our new students. Our caretaker, Apollyon Pringle, would like everyone to know that…” He unfolded a slip of parchment into existence. “Ahem. He ‘will be looking forward to dragging your mangled bones out of the Forbidden Forest if any of you lot are stupid enough to forget that you aren’t supposed to be there.’ Well, then. That’s a bit strong, I do say, but it holds true. Aside from that, you are not allowed to perform magic except at your teachers’ direction, and I hope that I can expect you to comport yourselves in the manner becoming to students of a prestigious magical academy. Which, of course, you are.”

All around Tom, students were beginning to grumble and shift in their seats. Tom could hardly blame them—the Headmaster’s speech was exceedingly long and dull.

“Remember,” Headmaster Dippet continued, “great things are expected of you. You are the future of magical Britain, after all. So work hard in your studies, and let’s all have an excellent year, shall we?”

The Headmaster remained standing for a while, and there was a weak smattering of applause, mostly from the teachers’ table. Tom joined in, half-heartedly, mostly out of a sense of obligation. The scant cheering died rather quickly, but Headmaster Dippet did not sit down until the very end. As he did so, the great golden serving dishes laid out on every table filled suddenly with food, and the Hall filled with the chatter of students.

“Pretty standard Sorting, this year,” Sebastian commented, “no real surprises.”

“Miss Blackthorne went to Ravenclaw. Templeton should be pleased,” Lestrange observed.

“Templeton?” Tom knew that he would be expected to keep track, but this was not a name he’d heard yet.

“Her brother.” Sebastian indicated a boy, sitting a ways down the table, who bore a striking resemblance to the girl Augustus had drawn his attention to. “He’s a year behind me, and I fully expect him to make prefect next year.”

“Is it true that he’s seeing Miss Crouch?” asked Lestrange.

“Quite. Her parents should be pleased.” Sebastian turned to Tom. “Crouch is a good family, but they’ve seen a scarcity of children of late.”

As the dinner dishes emptied, (as suddenly as they had filled) Sebastian turned away to speak with a fair-featured boy to his left. A moment later, the golden bowls and platters filled themselves with dessert: mountainous creamy concoctions and jeweled delicacies.

Tom hesitated. He wished desperately to ask Lestrange what, exactly, the rich, well-bred crowd wanted with him, and why, but the question itself seem designed to drive them away. Much as Tom hated it, he knew he would be lost in their endless rules of etiquette, and that, for the present moment, it would be best to be quiet, enigmatic, and exemplary in his studies.

But Lestrange, as if he were aware of Tom’s thoughts, leaned in close and told him, “It was Augustus who picked you out, you know.”

Remembering how dismissive Augustus Rookwood had been at the train station, Tom wondered what had made him change his mind. But it would be best to figure that out eventually, as it came. “And you followed him?” Tom asked Lestrange.

“Our families are close, we’ve known each other for ages. And Augustus is… clever. He’s good at figuring people out.”

That sounded like a lot more than ‘clever’ to Tom, especially the way Lestrange put it.

“It was a bit of a surprise, you know, meeting his brother. I didn’t know he had one.”

Lestrange laughed easily. “Most people are much more familiar with Sebastian, of course. He’s the heir to a powerful family.”

“But you know Augustus?”

“He’s nearer my age.”

Tom suspected that there was a bit more to it than that. “So, do you have any brothers or sisters I ought to know about?”

“None. But I’m not heir to the head of my family, my cousin Balthasar is.”

So. A younger brother and an heir’s cousin. It made sense, at least. “And Potter?”

“The latest in a long line of only children.”

“You three’ve known each other for a long time.”

“Ages. Come to think of it, I can’t remember when we all met.”

“Your parents introduced you?”

“Must’ve.”

Of course, an arranged friendship Tom had no more questions and nothing that he wanted to discuss, but the Lestrange boy kept watching him with a half-hidden curiosity, and it was not in Tom’s nature to passively accept observation, so he often glanced back at Lestrange. This lead, unfortunately, to the very question Tom had been dreading.

“You parents--?”

“They’re dead.”

“I’m sorry to hear--”

“My mother is, anyways. At the orphanage, they told me how she died not an hour after I was born. I suppose she mustn’t have been magic, to give me a name like Tom.”

“I suppose not.” The Lestrange boy stared into his plate. “But, your father--”

The Lestrange boy was interrupted by the dinnerware abruptly vanishing altogether, and the rise in volume that accompanied the end of the feast. The prefects especially contributed to the din, and Tom gathered that they were attempting to direct students to their assigned dormitories. Having been introduced to Sebastian Rookwood, Tom found him amid the crowd and made his way to the older boy, not at all surprised when Lestrange followed him closely.

The room was laid out symmetrically, dominated by a large and stately fireplace opposite from the entrance. Emerald-green flames danced in the grate, casting a shifting, greenish glow over the mostly-bare walls.

Sebastian, coming in after the first years, gave them a moment to look and then indicated two doors, one on either side of the fireplace. “Boys to the right, girls to the left. Find the door with your year on it, and your trunk’ll be at the foot of your bed. Washrooms at the end of each hall. Now, best be off to bed early, so you can make a good start.”

Tom was sure there was something odd about the light in the common room, but remembering the candles in the Great Hall, he thought it might be best to leave it for another time. He passed through the right-hand door, as Sebastian had instructed, and found a dimly-lit hall lined with a row of doors, similar to the one he had just passed through, identical to one another save for the silver plaques on each stating the year assigned to that room.

The door marked “First Year” was third from the common room, and passing through it, Tom saw four wrought iron beds hung with deep green, brocade curtains. Tom found his trunk at the food of one bed and, in order to avoid any more awkward questions from Lestrange, (who was still watching him) he changed quickly for bed and twitched the curtains closed around him.

Gazing up at the dimly lit ceiling, Tom recalled certain nights at the orphanage, long past the lights were all turned out, the other boys reduced to voices in the dark. Together, they would build a single wish: adoption, a family, and the miraculous happiness it would bring them.

Is that it? Tom would ask himself. Is that the greatest aspiration they can come up with? He despised those nighttime fantasies. They reeked of misery.

But in the orphanage, diverging from the popular consensus had a price. You had to prove your ruthlessness to have an opinion, or suffer the cruelty of the other children. And so Tom would listen, silently, letting every word feed his growing resentment.

That was over now, though. He might have to return on holidays, but Tom had found his future, had passed through the hidden door in the wall to which his exceptional nature granted him access. Holding this in mind, Tom drifted softly to sleep.