Mudblood
After the feast Dorea Black, a prefect, led them all to their common room in the dungeons. She did explain a lot about it, but Tom did not really listen, as he was too impressed by the castle. There were walking suits of armor, talking portraits, silvery ghosts and some weird looking floating guy singing a horribly cocked up version of the national anthem.
“And this is the entry to our common room. The password is “noble”. Just say it and the snakes will let you in.”, Dorea explained, smiling. “God Save our stinky shiiiit! Long flush our naaasty shit, God save the shit! Send it victorious, happy and glorious, long to reign over the toilet booooowl, God save the shit!”, the little guy sang enthusiastically. “You are not allowed to let any other students into the common room. It’s for Slytherins only!”, Dorea sternly carried on. “Thy choicest shits in store on first years be pleased to pour, long may it stiiink!” “Peeves, will you shut up? You know that the bloody baron lives here, right? And he will not be pleased to hear that you spilled... feces onto his new first years!”, Dorea screamed at the guy. He fled laughing maniacally.
Dorea rubbed her temples. “That was Peeves. A poltergeist. We can’t get rid of him and he only respects the bloody baron, our house ghost. Any questions?” Tom’s hand shot up. This was a school after all. “Yes, Riddle, right?”, Black said, trying to smile nicely but looking like she wished Tom hadn’t had any questions. “Is the bloody baron the ghost of the red baron?”, he asked excitedly. His grandfather had told him about the best pilot in the war. A German nobleman, who shot down 80 rival planes and was such an impressive warrior, that the French had buried him with full military honors.
Dorea shook her head, a confused look on her face. “Ahm, I don’t think so, no?”, she answered. A bit disappointed, Tom nodded. He would have loved to meet a real war hero. But he could not sulk about it too long, as Dorea now told the snakes on the wall the password and a big hole opened in the wall. The first years followed their prefect through it into a beautiful, big room. It had tasteful green carpets and black and green, elegant furniture. A fire burned in a fancy fireplace, that reminded Tom of the tea salon at home. Outside the big windows he could see the water of the black lake bubbling. That was really cool. Dorea led the boys up a staircase to their dorm and then took the girls to theirs. Tom and Constance waved each other good bye as they left.
The Slytherin dorm had exactly five beds, one for each of them and their trunks were already standing by their assigned sleeping spots. Tom’s was next to a window. “Check pot”, he thought as he realized that he would be able to look out into the lake, while lying down. Miss Noodles was still curled up in her basket, sleeping peacefully. Tom opened his trunk and fetched his night clothes, his bathroom stuff and the framed poster of Tommy Pardoe, that he hung on the wall next to the window first.
“No need to make yourself cozy here, Riddle! We don’t want any mudbloods in our dorm. Go back to your dirty little muggles, muddy. You don’t deserve to taint this school!”, the blond boy suddenly called out from behind him. “I got the letter. That sparkly nutjob, Dumbledore, turned up in my noble and powerful family’s time-honoured manor and insisted I come here, so no. You can’t kick my out. You will just have to live with my presence. Oh, and I have met some of you purebloods. At least my parents are not siblings or cousins!”, Tom snapped at the boy. Abraxas Malfoy he thought he recalled.
“Shut your dirty mouth, muddy! Even Underground over there is more pure then you and his grandmother was a Squib!”, Avery, the first boy that had gotten sorted joined in. Otto Underground, a cubby boy with Asian features, flinched. “Does it feel good to know that in a few generations your family will turn into cross-eyed, drooling messes with gigantic chins, you inbred idiot? It is proven that inbreeding is bad for the body and the mind. I’ve seen it my self. The Gaunt’s live in my village. Have you met one of them? They are all crazy and ugly and live in their own filth”, Tom growled quietly. Grandma had told him, that the Gaunts likely were this mean because of inbreeding. And he had seen and smelled their dirty shack.
Malfoy pulled his wand out of his robes and pointed it at Tom’s face. In the background he could hear Alphard coming out of the bathroom. “You will not talk about our ancient and pure families like that, you dirty little mudblood. Come on, muddy! Duel me! You will go down! Let’s see how dirty your blood really is!”, he shirked. Suddenly he reminded Tom an awful lot of Merope, who had once insisted to fight a muggle-born shopkeeper over the price of newt eggs.
Tom looked over to his bed. Tommy Pardoe looked at him, almost encouragingly. “If you don’t defend yourself, they will never stop”, a voice, that suspiciously sounded like grandpa Thomas whispered in his mind. Tom let his legs slip into a boxing stance and drew his wand. Malfoy screamed something and a slim shower of red sparks shot out of his wand. Tom used the shield he had practiced at home. The sparks burned up, long before they even reached the wonky bubble. Malfoy went red as a tomato and dropped his wand on his bed. “You don’t deserve magic, muddy! Go back to your stupid family! Muggles are like animals! They should all just die!”, the blond boy shrieked and pushed Tom backwards. Suddenly the fight had gotten a whole lot easier.
“Left hook!”, grandpa Thomas’s voice commanded. Tom dropped his wand and swung his left fist upwards, into that pointy jaw. Malfoy howled and stumbled backwards. “Don’t talk about my family like that”, Tom growled, “Come on, is that all you got? Get up! Fight! This was your idea!” Abraxas scrambled to his feet, tears in his eyes and lunged himself at Tom. “Dodge!", grandpa’s voice called, and Tom took a quick step to the side, letting Malfoy crash into the frame of his bed. The pale boy pulled himself up by the wooden frame and attacked again. “Block and attack!” Tom wiped Malfoy’s fist aside with his forearm and punched him into the stomach with the other hand. In the background Alphard started to laugh. This was probably the easiest boxing match of Tom’s life.
“Gordian, help me!”, Malfoy sobbed. Gordian Avery suddenly didn’t look so smug anymore, but he decided to help Malfoy anyway. He opened his trunk and pulled the dagger they needed for potions out. “Let’s see your dirty blood, muddy!”, Avery spat. That was bad. Tom might have been able to fight one boy with a dagger and zero fighting experience off, but with Malfoy also there? That was really bad. He needed and ally. “Miss Noodles, help me! Stop him! Miss Noodles he has a knife!”, Tom hissed in snake-language as loud as he could.
For a moment everybody in the dorm stared at him, like he had lost his mind. Then a lot of things happened at once. Avery started to charge at Tom, Tom threw Malfoy, who tried to scratch now, onto the ground once more and Miss Noodles lunged out of her basket. It was an impressive sight, how the six meter long snake shot though the air, sunk her needleish teeth into Avery’s hood and wrapped her strong body around him, knocking him to the floor. Alphard Black had collapsed onto his bed from laughing too hard. Otto’s jaw dropped.
Tom placed his foot onto Malfoy's chest, glaring down on him. “Leave me and my family alone, or I’m thwacking your butt again”, he ordered. “Who taught you that?”, Abraxas wailed. “My muggle grandfather”, Tom snapped. Avery made pathetic choking noises in the background. “You can let him go now, Miss Noodles, I think he got the message”, Tom hissed. The massive snake unwrapped the boy and slithered back into her cozy basket, peeking out of it, like a curious dog. “You can talk to snakes?”, Alphard wheezed, pushing back some of his beautiful curls. “Yes, always could”, Tom replied with a smirk, grabbed his pajamas and toiletries and made his way to the bathroom.