Losing Appetite

Anticipation thrilled through Hadrian's veins.

Oh! This was going to be an interesting spectacle. He couldn't wait for it to begin.

Ha!

He had realised that with age, he had become brutal and perverse. But, he had never thought he would find these so-called 'power plays' entertaining to watch.

But it wasn't his fault.

Truthfully, he had been so bored out of his mind since his rebirth that even his sense of humour had taken a turn for the worse.

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Hadrian felt that it would be entertaining to watch the upcoming battle of wits, magic, and power.

Oh!

It might be painful for some and heart raking for others when they realised that whatever ideas or dreams they had before coming to Hogwarts wouldn't be fulfilled.

After all, in the magical nexus of the country—where the elite gathered, there were mountains above mountains and heavens beyond heavens.

He didn't know how these machinations were going to play out but it was going to be so much fun!

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When the other students didn't allow him to sit at the table for dinner, Tom knew that treachery was afoot.

He didn't know the whys and what's but he knew he had to curb it in the bud if he didn't want Hogwarts to turn into the same living hell he had left behind at Wool's.

He looked at all the first years crowding around the table and noticed their expressions - malevolent, suspicious and blatantly challenging.

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"Watch your steps, Mudblood," Heir Rosier spoke from where he sat opposite and one seat away from Hadrian.

These kids felt made them look sophisticated but only ended up making them distort their faces

Then, another pipsqueak Heiress Bullstrode said with a smirk on her face, "There is no place for people like you in our house."

For a moment, Harry wondered if he should tell these kids that the sneer they saw on their parent's faces and tried to copy, might end up giving them wrinkles and a lopsided smile.

However, he cast that thought aside; waiting to see how Riddle will counter these children and his reply didn't leave him disappointed.

"The Sorting Hat placed me in Slytherin, so, I have as much a right to sit on this table as any of you or are you saying that a magical artefact created by the founders didn't make an informed and right decision in regards to my sorting?" Riddle questioned.

Hadrian smiled at that sharp retort that didn't leave others any leeway. Slytherin was all about traditions and family.

None of them could argue that the hat had made the wrong decision.

The Sorting ceremony was a rite of passage for every student who had undergone tutelage at Hogwarts—it was a century-old tradition.

Furthermore, they couldn't deny Riddle's first part of the sentence either because their Hogwarts affiliation was as much a family to all magicals as their blood related one.

Truthfully, Hadrian wouldn't have been able to give such a befitting reply when he was Riddle's age and he snorted at that.

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The other first-years thought that Heir Black was laughing at them for not even being able to subdue someone who was practically an outsider to their world just short two months ago.

They had also slowly realised in the intervening months that though Heir Black never socialised with his own year group and was always surrounded by Heir Malfoy and his ilk, he seemed to pay attention to Riddle - even if unconsciously.

This had already become a sore spot for them.

They had been instructed by their parents to try and form bonds with Heir Black but the other person would rather side with a Mudblood than with people who had met him frequently.

Unable to keep her anger in check and without thinking about the consequences of her words, Heiress Bullstrode sharply retorted to Heir Black, "What is so amusing to you, Black? You want to consort with people who are far below your station in life or is that you simply don't put importance on Slytherin and its rules?"

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Hadrian was stumped by an uninitiated attack on his person by Heiress Bulstrode.

He knew she was speaking out of anger but he couldn't let her words go unpunished.

She hadn't used his title, which was an insult to his family because he hasn't given her the leave to talk to him without it and secondly if any such words spread, it would put his upbringing into question.

Barely reigning in his anger, Hadrian spoke with a lowered voice.

"Oh! Laiyla Darling, you think that if the cat isn't paying attention to the mice, they can come out to play? The cat might ignore you but it wouldn't take more than a swipe of its claws to draw blood from you," and with those words, he picked up his bag and left the Great Hall.

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Tom hadn't thought that this mindless peer pressure these pure-bloods were trying to exert on him would also pull Black into the conflict.

However, it had also given him the opportunity to see the power dynamics of his year-mates.

Oh!

They had been uneasy when Heiress Bullstrode had made the sharp remark to Black - their fisted hands and tightened lips were proof enough.

However, there was something....something more than just a respect for his family name in their eyes.

What was that emotion?

Moreover, why was it so prevalent?

He had noticed the same thing when other pure-blood heirs looked at Black as well.

Oh!

He had seen plenty of jealousy and envy in the stares directed at Black from others.

The pure-bloods envied The Black name the other boy carried.

They were jealous of various doors opened to Black just because of his name and the muggle-borns of their year felt envy towards the said person when they saw how effortlessly magic came to Black.

Black always performed every spell taught in class in his first try, never struggling to understand the theory behind it or how to wave his wand—in a swish or a flick or a slight twist.

The reasons for the pure-blood's jealousy were also simplistic in nature.

They feared that their uneasy and often unreliable alliances with others in Slytherin could be broken easily by one word from Black, whereas, the muggle-borns weren't jealous of Black.

Why?

Because jealousy occurs when something a person already possesses is threatened by another and most of them realised that Heir Black was better than them in all the ways that mattered, at least at this juncture.

Except for a Gryffindor girl, she seemed to be quite jealous of Black.

The girl had thought that she would be the best at Transfiguration in their year—which was a speciality in her family—both her parents seemed to have gained a reputation in duelling circles due to their Battle Transfiguration tactics.

Sadly, the reality didn't seem to coincide with her dreams and wishes.

No matter how hard that girl tried, she couldn't best Black in the subject which seemed to infuriate her.

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Tom had noticed that at the starting of the year, Black had made polite talk with the girl and offering an olive branch to someone who wasn't a part of the elite circle of Magical Britannia.

What was her name again?

Ah! Yes.

Minerva McGonagall.

The girl had seemed distrustful of a Slytherin and a Black at that, making overtures to a Gryffindor but somehow she had started forming a delicate bond with Black which had promptly shattered when she realised that the other person was a cut above her in a subject she prided herself on.

After that, she had distanced herself from Heir Black who had seemed almost resigned but amused by the outcome.

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Shaking his head at the irrelevant path his thoughts had taken, Riddle left The Great Hall as well - his appetite had already vanished from the earlier unprovoked (at least, on his part) actions of his housemates.

Tom didn't realise but it was this moment that a play for the future Slytherin Hierarchy had been made, only the results were still unknown and this group of first years still had to go through many more things before anything concrete was decided.

Not only had they to fight for a spot for themselves, they even had to go through the curtailing by the upper years as well.