V is for Victory: 1940
Tom Riddle creates a Mary Sue. Questions will be answered like: Why it is not smart to duel a baby giant, Why Myrtle is a stupid git, Why the Internet is more useful than a compostion notebook, Who preceeded Madame Pomfrey at the Infirmary, And foremost, Why the Dark Mark was almost an Eagle and A Union Jack? (Damn Mungdungus Fletcher)
**** The year was 1940. Tom Riddle wiped his hands and began drawing the hot ashy line in the stone. Burning them into the stone so that it was scorched black and unchanging. The triangles and the angles were all perfect, tangent, and above all, closed off. The 13 year old had read Goethe's Faust closely enough to learn that when drawing a protection ward, you had better make sure it was closed off. In the circle of the star, with the eight names of God to protect it. He feared placing his name down. Even smashed together it had looked different. Once when he had been in a ring conjuring he had sworn he heard something in the dark call his name. What was his name, anyway? Just some mindless thing they had slapped on him, with no parents in the world. He wondered what his father's name was. His middle name was real, at least. It had always upset the nuns so very much. Marvolo. It almost looked *cough* Italian or some such vile thing. But Tom did love it. He squeezed it together like one stupid word. "TOMMARVOLORIDDLE" He still had to be careful. He carefully rearranged the letters in his name in his usual sequence. Maybe it would be lucky. Maybe someone clever and good could one day figure it out. And he could help them from the great beyond, if he was dead yet. It was one thing to be cautious, but how could he let history be ignorant of the creator of this ward? "AMILDREDVOLTMOOR ATODDLERIMVOLROM ADIDMOVERTROLLOM DAMM VERDI LO LOT OR." He scratched out the letters in the twenty combinations, circling the outermost circle. So that Tom Marvolo Riddle's name was hidden in an eternal circle of letters. I AM LOVED OLD MR ROT. I OLD MOLD RAT MOVER. I AM OLDER DR MOLTOV. I AM LOVED LORD MORT He wrote down as many different guises for his name as he could think of until he finished the cycle with the last one, his favorite one. He stopped and made the letters big and with a fancy seriph font. Burning them deep into the stone "I am Lord Voldemort." Lord Voldemort, it just sang to him somehow. Such a stately and wonderful word. Vol-demort. Vold-de-mort. Or Someone was going to think a real cracker lived here in Slytherin, writing all these fake names all over the seal. "Oooh look there. Lord Voldemort is signing his handy work."
The gang crowded around him, leaning over. "It's just a little protection spell." "A little spell? You're doing it with pigeon blood and scorched stone. It took you all night to draw this circle. It's not a little spell." "You and Professor Dumbledore saved the school all ready. Kolder and Grindewald aren't going to be coming back here." "No sirree Bob." Mung Fletcher shook his head. He could sound so very out of place sometimes, both at a magical school and in Brittain. "I want to make sure. I don't want to leave it to chance. Who knows what they could do over the summer." "You should save your energy on making a ward in your orphanage. That doesn't even have a ward on it. With the Gerry dropping bombs on it like it was a paper werewolf in a hexing gallery." "Now no one can attack but Lord Voldemort himself." Tom tapped the name.
Myrtle stopped, stopping all the other girls on their way to classes as well. "Look, it's a sign." Myrtle kneeled on the floor "Tom, who made that?" "You can't read. I. am. Lord. Voldemort." "That's the circle's name?" Myrtle asked. Not the brightest girl Myrtle "No, the authors name." "Vol-de-mort. Flight From Death." Nick Malfoy said in his continental accent. He did know how to speak French. Unfortunately, he made it a point to make certain that everyone else knew as well. "Lord Voldemort is the greatest Wizard there is. Most powerful, most fiersome Dark Wizard and an ascetic in grey robes. Haunting eyes like flame, and pale ebon skin. He doesn't eat or sleep or nothing like that." "He's an animagus. His form is a giant white cobra." "A white one." "And he's an Elemental Mage of the Wind, an Expert Alchemist, The Greatest Dueler." Plah? You suck at dueling, Tom. Even that Roo Hagird could out draw you. You look stupid standing their with flowers on your bloody head. Cause he pulled a Fleurate curse on you." "That's different. He uses a two foot wand." Tom held out his arms "He's a bright one he is. Didn't they send him two classes ahead?" "You couldn't even beat a little boy." Cal shoved him. Tom shook his head. "Voldemort doesn't. Woldemort would beat him any day of the week. Anybody. Voldemort is far a better dueler than Tom Riddle." "He'd have to be. You are very bad." Verloc teased at him. "If he's so bloody great, why don't you just marry him?" Cal said. Tom had a wilder imagination now than he ever had as a child, thinking of such things. But even as a child he had been bad at playing make believe. He did whatever he wanted. He also made them all do whatever he said. He was always the hero, and made Cal Snape his best friend, Nick the villain and Verloc the villain's minion. And Mungdungus was always the Muggle victim. It was a wonder that they stopped playing those story games. Of course, it had helped when they had all found out that girls didn't have cooties. And if it was a choice between girls and mucking about outside under a bridge with Tom yelling at you, girls would definitely win. Especially in Caligula's case. "He's a guy. Don't think he would fancy me." "Yeah whatever, Tom." Verloc chuckled under his breath. "Voldemort doesn't need a girlfriend, okay." "But he is just like you." Verloc said. "Except perfect and annoying." The other Serpents began howling in appreciation. "He's not perfect. He has flaws." Tom frowned a little. He hated feeling foolish. He was very prideful. "Yeah, he bemoans the fate of the universe, which is cold and cruel," Nick drawled. "He's like Superman, except more handsome and intelligent," Mung added. "My God, he's John Gant, Clark Gable, and St. Francis of Assisi all in one. And he uses Dark magic. Just like Tom." "Superman? Who?" Cal asked. "Friedrich Niezche's philosophical ideal man." Nicholas Malfoy straightened his glasses. "I'm talking about the bloke in the red longjohns you can buy at the Muggle Chemists," Mung said. "Mung, you should know more about Dark Magic. And we've all tried it. That doesn't make him just like me. That would make everyone in Slytherin like him."
"How did he become Lord Voldemort?" "Well, it's a long story." The kids crowded around Prefect Riddle who told them of Voldemort's mysterious origins. His childhood in India, his trip through the Sahara desert. He just had to put him in World War I as a pilot along side the Merlinsbloods. The kids watched as Tom finished the seal, drawing holly and a snake around it. "How long did it take you to think up that silly name?" Cal asked. "A whole day?" "Oh, shut it." "He filled a whole page of his notebook with lucky anagrams," Mung volunteered. "I think it's rather Hot, the name. Like Mallory orthat guy who wrote the Hobbit-dwarf thing book. The Wizard Voldemort setting his sacred seal on Hogwarts to protect it from the world." "Yeah." "I think he'd make a good Storybook character." Myrtle smiled. Jenny Carmicheal blushed. "You're so clever to think all this up. I'll bet they could make it into a movie after that." "They don't make wizard books into muggle Movies." "They might. If it someone like the great Voldemort." Tom looked down, "I hate story books. He's much too cool for that." The Slytherins said nothing. When had it happened? When had he decided that the books he read had become useless things. Nothing but tools, nothing but ideas that he could squeeze out. He always wondered why that had to happen. So long ago he could curl up with a J.R.R Tolkein, or a copy of the Illiad or Something stupid like Lost Horizon. But he couldn't even pick up Gone with the Wind, the muggle roman du jour, without conceiving something bigger. Without catching the outline of something huge. He had stopped reading the words, overcome by the visions of the things a mortal left unwritten that he knew. His reading became faster, suddenly. As if he wasn't reading at all but absorbing. He'd sit there looking at a page and be overwhelmed by this sense of futility. Place it down and tell everyone every detail they had missed. The only words he could read anymore were the ones he wrote. The scrawls in stone that scorched them black.
"I am Lord Voldemort." Something he had seen. Something he had made. "This way no one will ever attack Slytherin." "I swear Tom. You're crackers. You talk more about Voldemort than real people." Caligula said. "Yeah and you wasted all night here. You missed the entire Hay Ride." "It seemed like the right time to do it while everyone was off at the party. It was night time. I read about it and it seemed effective." "Do you do every bit of magic you read about?" "Well yes." "Even in the Restricted section. Dark Magic is one thing, but some of that is illegal." "Next thing you'll say all Dark magic should be evil Mung, like one of them bloody Gryffindors." "You need to relax. We need to find you a nice half blood girl, one who just happens to like a nice sob story. You'd definitely win there. Just tell them you're a Catholic orphan and the dames will melt into your arms." "Maybe he just needs a shag."
*** There wasn't going to be much in the way of a Goodbye Feast. There was a War on, what? They didn't need to look at a bunch of sour-puss Gryffindors sniveling into Christmas cake and old molasses flavored cookies. They started retelling the time when Caligula knocked Ellen Gordan and George Potter into a cowpie with a jelly legs curse. Then they raced about the empty Slytherin dungeons playing Sardines. "This time the catacombs were forebidden. It had taken three weeks to find Mung. That boy was impossibly strange. But they loved him. "This is our last night here, before Summer break." Mungdungus Fletcher smiled his snaggle-toothed grin. "We'll meet again. Oh come on." "Well thank you Mr. Roy Rogers. I just don't fancy going back. This summer I heard the Lufftwaffe is on the move. What if they attack London again. It'll be horrible." "At least you're house quartering a bunch of Goddamned Nazi scum. I hear they cleared out a few wizarding villages already near Oschweim. They've been industrializing the area for weeks. It had always been so isolated. Now full of Muggles." "Do you think we're all very odd people for wanting to stay here?" "It's an odd world." Caligula said curtly. None of them looked forward to the summer. You looked in each pair of eyes and you got another story. Verloc had no home now. He could never go back to his homeland. Given away beyond his reach by a man named Neville Chamberlain. His home sacrificed for political expediency. His father had been shot already and now he was cast out of his homeland. Verloc may have been the most blessed, for he knew where his troubles would lie. The others of them still had to wait for their calamity. Caligula was going home to his tennis courts and his horses, cautiously. All the while waiting for it to fall apart. Certainly no one could tell if he were broke. The stately and marvelous Snapes, insolent as Stallions with the same sparkling brown eyes and winning grins. It would be his first summer without the protection of Cleopatra Snape. His lovely and trampy sister would not be anywhere near Snape Manor this year. She would be causing trouble in some facist Regime. Most likely Italy this time. Not many Dark Wizards had deigned to actually leave England. But Cleopatra had no love for her mother's eccentricities. "Mum said you couldn't stay." "It's okay." Mrs. Snape would never let her son's friends into her home. Tom was an illegitimate Halfblood straight out of West End. Mung was the son of a Muggleborn Profiteer. It was uncalled for. As hard it was to get letters into London it was all the harder to get anything into Acheron. Even if Tom had had an owl. Mung had one, and he never got his owl through to the Snape's home. Even Nick had trouble making contact. After all, the Malfoys hadn't arrived in England until the Norman conquest in 1066, while the Snapes had been around since Roman days, a good seven centuries earlier. His mother was not as stately, not being born a Snape. Intolerant petty woman. Though the Purebloods were too polite to say, it she was not the best woman to raise children. They only said that Caligula had run into too many walls and had gotten hit by many bludgers over the years, that he was a rough and tumble little boy. The second he got into Hogwarts most of the bruises disappeared. He trusted few, and never kept a girl long enough for her to notice the occasional bruise on his face, in the shape of a bird head cane handle. Cal looked strangely helpless with his hair shorn off like that, in the tidy way, like his mother wanted. "Let's make an oath here." Verloc said. "To each other too." Cal nodded. "An oath, then?" Mung asked. "Yeah, that's what a wizard does," Cal said. "Wizards Oath," Nick Malfoy nodded. They had never been in the mood to make promises before, let alone a real oath. They were in Slytherin and a promise was only as good as it was convenient. They all looked to Tom to say something clever. "We make our solemn promise. By our honors as Wizards. Even a Slytherin can't bend that." "Yeah and if you break it we'll cut out your eyes and pull out your tongue by the root and-" "No hot coals and bamboo splinted. Tom shook his head. "No. No. If you break your oath, you're out." "Out?" "You are out forever. You'll no longer be our friend." "Is that enough?" "Being out is the worse thing there is in the world," Tom said. "And if anybody breaks this oath, we will never talk to him again. And everyone in the Entire world will know he betrayed his oath."
They all put their arms in. "What do we promise?" Verloc asked. "We're friends," Cal smiled. "We promise to always be brothers." Tom patted him on the back and put his right arm around Nick. "We promise to hate Nazis," Mung said patting Verloc on the back "And Italians," Cal said. His own sister was fighting his fascist uncles back in Italy. His Uncle Hadrian was involved with a famous Italian general. They had cast him out of the family after that. He cursed Grandpa Julius with long nose hair. "And the Nips." "Oh come on. All Italians, ever? What about Michealangelo?" Tom rolled his eyes. "Or Augustus Caesar. Or, like, the guy who invented Gnocchi." Nick asked "He was Roman," Caligula sniffed. "Yeah and those Russians are bad." Verloc shook his head. "The Irish Republican Army." Mung shrugged "Not that it's all their fault." The list began to rattle on and on. In every country there was something. Though Cal doubted General Sherman in Atlanta counted, as the civil war had been 90 years ago and he was dead. "How about. Any muggles who have united to oppress wizarding kind, be they Yanks or Nips or Italians, or even Nazis. Wherever anybody tries to push each other around we'll be there to hate them for it." Tom concluded. "Yes, make it equal," Verloc nodded. "We'll stand up to all the people of the world who try to hurt each other." "Muggle and wizard." "Yeah. And never fight as soldiers in these stupid wars," Mung said "Yeah. War is stupid," Caligula said. "Yeah. We'll never fight for muggles. Never with the Muggles. And if need be, we'll against them if they should declare war on us. We never fight for them, ever," Tom codified. "And we'll stop any muggle or group of muggles anywhere in the world who says boo." "Boo." They lifted their arms out of a circle. "Now that we made an oath what do we do. to prove we have?" Mung asked "A sign of Brotherhood." "Like a handshake?" Nick asked nervously. "Or a seal. Like in the books. A secret seal for us to gain power from." "Let's make it an Eagle," Mung cheered. "What does an Eagle have to do with anything?" Verloc asked. "That's the Ravenclaws' house symbol." "I dunno," Mung shrugged. "They're hot." "Oh no. I can't get one of those tattoos," Cal said. "They are just low class." He knew his mother would disapprove. Tom looked at the sizzling point of his wand. "Think I got an idea."
***
That morning at Divination, they were reviewing Palmistry techniques. "I want you to do a palm reading of your partner. Boy to girl this time. You usually get it that way." Professor Crowley said. Kay Carmicheal, a pretty 5th year Slytherin, was across from Tom. She motioned him over. Tom sighed. She was very busty and enthusiastic, of course much too high maintenance. Not his type at all. He saw how she treated Cyrille Lupin, like a bloody puppy dog. At least he got one of the Slytherins. Caligula was stuck with George Potter's runty little crush, Emily Gwydion, a runty scrawny Gryffindor who had ragged black curls, a sniffly nose. And the thickest pair of ugly black glasses you have ever seen. She looked like a ten year old boy, not a fourteen year old girl. George was far on the other side of the room whispering with Ellen Gordan. But the Dark haired blue eyed tom boy, wasn't really a girl was she? Nick managed to snag a seat next to Pina, the most beautiful girl in Slytherin and Girls Prefect. She also was skipped ahead and was only there to help out the teacher. Tom held out his arm, so she could look at his palm. She took it in her hand. Kay looked down at it, bared for the first time since he cast the healing spell. "EWWWW." She lept back in her chair. "Wow." George Potter looked up from Ellen Gordan's hand. Ellen, a jumpy boisterous tom boy of a girl, pushed him out of the way. Emily Gwydion straightened her dorky black glasses. The entire world was staring. "What is that?" Kay winced and pointed at the obvious livid red burn "Yeah. It's a seal. A Vol-de-mort, as Nick calls it "Flight from Death." Courtesy of Tom Riddle." Mung rolled up his sleeve. "Yeah we made an oath. You know how good Tom is with seals. He gave us all one." Verloc nodded. Kay cowered in her boyfriend's arms, looking at the gross sight. "Cyrille, they cut themselves with their wands. Gross." "The snake is for Slytherin." "Is the skull for Vanity? Mortis.Death?" Cyrille Lupin, a shy Ravenclaw was chattering away. He touched the scar. They nodded. Pina Proserpine nodded at Cal. "That's a really nice symbol. I'll bet it's a powerful seal" For once the over critical and snappy elder girl was impressed. She gave Cal a nod that could have been construed as admiration, maybe even attraction. "It's stupid. Why can't guys do anything normal? Men are crazy." She tossed her head. "You want to prove your friends so you just start carving each other with your wands.." Kay flapped her arm at them. "No wonder I don't date men in my own house." "Yeah and you're a bloody tart." Verloc sniggered. "Oh Cyrille. Are you going to stand for that?" she shoved him. "He didn't mean it." Cyrille defended Verloc. The boy was 6'3" at fourteen. "I demand you fight that big ugly mook for my honor or I'll never let you touch me again." 'But Cuddlelumps." Cyrille frowned. "I mean it." Kay crossed her arms. "I shouldn't be necking with you anyway." "But he'll kill me." Cyrille pointed up at Verloc "You're not willing to die for, my love. Fine. So Tom." Kay tweaked his cheek. are you free Saturday for Hogsmeade." Cyrille whimpered. "But we were going to. You aren't going to go with Tom." "I'm sorry Cyrille. But Tom is cuter." Lupin bought it hook line and sinker. To think he was from the smartest house. Those squares had no idea how to take a joke. Roo Hagrid gently nudged the mammoth Verloc out of the way. The youngest student at school and still the tallest. A gentle nudge might leave you windless. "Can I get one?" Hagrid muttered. "I don't know." "Yeah. You can make mine like a Lion and a manticore." "Ooh or an Eagle," Ellen Gordan smiled. Mung snorted "Eagles don't have anything to do with anything." The other members of the class began chattering. "Children, you are supposed to be doing palm reading. Seeing into the future. Not looking at Tom Riddle's silly arm mark. on his..." She finally got a look at it. "My heaven what did you do to your arm, boy?" "A skull, ma'am. I didn't draw it very well." The other Slytherins covered up their arms and began whistling. "Yeah Tom. That's an awfully gross burn," Cal said. "How ever did you get it?" Malfoy asked innocently "You bloody cheats," Tom snerked. "You're going to abandon your Lord Voldemort in his hour of need?" "Tom," Cal scoffed, "do you really have to ask that question?" They were still Slytherins. They began theatrically working on their divination work. "So Emily. you have a.Venus in retrograde, kind of." "Well, what does it say, Pina?" Nick asked her. *** Kay Carmicheal was buttering her bread. "Do you think Tom is going to missthe House Cup Party. It's going to be a gas. They might even have tea cake, and candy. I heard that Willy Gandywine is gonna spike the teachers Pumpkin punch." "Blast. They shoulder have sent him to Master Tourniquette. The man is a ghoul. He loved to wrap you up in bandages and just leave you ther. He's so paranoid. it's healed up. It doesn't even hurt." Pina stabbed at Cal's seal with her nail. "Stop it." Cal shoved her off. "I just think it's cool." Just then their Head of House appeared in a mustard dress, floating over Verloc's shoulder. "Mssrs Snape, Malfoy, Morgenstein. I believe you are wanted in Master Tourniquette's infirmary" "But we are okay? We aren't hurt." Mung yelped. Verloc smacked.
Tom was curled up in an angry ballinside of Master Tourniquette's infirmary as the old skinny man tried to convince him his arm was gangrenous. He stared at them. Professor Poppins only crossed her arms. This was enough to evoke her disapproval but not enough to frighten them witless. She disapproved of them all the time. Headmaster Dippet was pursing his lips to prevent any words from escaping. Professor Dumbledore was wringing his hands. "If I go down, you're all coming with me." Tom nodded. "Brothers." The boys said listlessly. "Oh I heard. How could you hurt yourselves like this. You could have.
"Albus." Headmaster Dippet cut him off. "Sorry Headmaster." Professor Dumbledore always did care to much about his students. "Normally when Teenagers do this sort of thing they don't have the forethought to heal it." Poppins said "I'll leave this all to you Master Tourniquette." "It's just a scar. It's not any magic," Tom said. "I, I should be able to do this if I want to. It's my body." "Yeah." Cal said. Ever eager to flaut authority. "Don't call my mum," Mung begged. The boys rolled their eyes at him. "You'll have to live with those scars for the rest of your lives. Even you, Tom. "There are no healing charms that will heal those scars." "We did it so we wouldn't forget . Professor Dumbledore, sir. Headmaster Dippet, sir." "Well, they will never heal all the way." Professor Poppins stared at them. Her indigo and farey light eyes, losing their spark, becoming a little more grey. Dumbledore frowned. "And we'll never be the same." Tom said. "Tom, if you are going to be the Prefect of Slytherin, you must be more careful and responsible with your housemates." Dumbledore shook his head. "I promise we won't do something like this again." Tm said. "Yeah." The other three boys agreed.
Tom walked off with his fellows towards their last night in Slytherin before the summer came. The Gryffindors were waiting around, with Myrtle and Jenny. Tom sighed I can do a lion. He pulled out his wand. The little boys looked in Terror at the hot point of the wand. "Hold still. Hold out your arm." "I thought. it was a spell." Hagrid gulped. "It is a spell. We have to use incedio to make the wand hot enough." "brand." "I'm going to go pack. We'll see you Tom." The Gryffindors scattered. "Fools rush in where Angels fear to tread." Mung saluted them. "You'd think a Gryffindor would be braver about a ritual scarification." The Slytherins walked towards their room laughing and still hot and excited from the night before. United forever in friendship.
*** "The best animal would be a snake," Tom said "We are the Slytherin Serpents," Cal agreed. "If I do get a tattoo, it should be of a snake. "You draw good snakes, Tom." "Yeah. I just normally do it in charcoal. Not fire." "It'll be much cooler than a tattoo." Tom pulled out his wand. "Incendio. " Until the point was as hot as a coal.
He looked at Verloc's arm. On it were the tiny blue numbers placed there but a few months ago. When the World Ended. "We'll put it on the left arm. To cover that nasty muggle thing." Verloc, sniffed lifting his chin. "No." "What?" Tom asked. Verloc stroked the blue number on his wrist. "I don't want to forget. Put it up here." Verloc gritted his teeth. The S of the serpent curled over his flesh. "The muggles almost killed me and my mother. My father, my uncles, were not strong enough. Kolder.Hitler, Yamato, Lenin, Saberhagen, and Grindewald. We'll never forget who they are. That's what we say when we are together."
"Nah. It's kind of small." "There is something missing." Cal Snape shook his head. "Yes." Mung put down his magazine.
"Tom, is that still hot?"
"My Father died. He was good man who brought himself up in the world. He was a clever wizard. He had a whole factory for brooms and such. But he could not fight the muggles. I remember his laugh and his fluffy mustache. He used to like going out and stealing one of his inventor's brooms to test it out. We'd go flying over the countryside around the Tatras, in the mountains. The Carpathian Mountians. with a big heavy cloak on. So high you could fly and no muggles would see you. And we'd smile. And Mama said we always went too fast."
"There is something missing."
"How about a star of David? On account of you're a Jew." "I know I'm a Jew." Verloc snapped. "I wore that damn yellow patch for all those years. I hate the sight on it on my body. I'm not going to carry it on my skin."
"Alright. How about a Chevron?" "A rune." "V is for Victory," Mung suggested. Tom began painting in fire on the arm with his wand. A simple realistic image. "A skull," Tom said. "To remind us of those dead. Those killed by the Muggles and their allies. Those we have buried this year and all those we will bury." "Never Forget," Verloc said, he shook Tom's hand. He finally covered his arm. Nick unfroze and cast a healing charm on his arm "That's so it doesn't get infected." Cal pointed to his own arm right where Verloc's seal was. Just under his elbow. "It's a brotherhood. Put it there, Tom. I want a skull too. That way it doesn't matter what you believe. Eh. Jew, Christian, pagan. doesn't matter anymore. We're all Wizards." Mung shook his head and his hardened his resolve. "Mr. Merlinsblood. He was so brave. I'm going to learn to be brave. If it kills me. I'm going to make everyone proud. I can handle a little. Shit that burns!!" "You first, then." "Suck it up, Fletcher." Cal's face was cold. He didn't even clench his teeth. The only sign that he was in pain was a faint stream of sweat. As Tom finally put the last detail on Cal's arm, Malfoy looked around the common room. His friend all wincing over their arms, knowing, growing, staring at each other. "Here. Just don't." Nick rolled back his sleeve and shut his eyes. "We have to do this. But if we get caught, it wasn't my idea." Tom readied the spell again and began drawing. "EEEEEEhh!" Malfoy cried out. Cal was already casting a healing spell on Verloc's arm. Something light, so they wouldn't get caught. They were underaged to be doing such spells. "We are with you, Tom." "I love you, guys." Tom recited the incantation one more time. The wand was very hot. Tom drew a crucifix into his arm and started the skull. Mary Mother of God, it hurt. His wand jerked at the man "Odbodkins, why didn't you mates tell me it was gonna sting like tha." Tom's voice deteriorated into pure Cockney nonsense. They all looked at Tom's serpent "That looks like crap, Tom." "Well, I'm not going to give you my damn wand to draw on my arm. You can't even draw naked stick people.
"Oh no. Mine is upside down."
"Actually yours is the right way. We're all upside down," Mung laughed through the pain. Verloc placed a healing curse on his arm. They all displayed their left arms in a kind of circle There something brilliant was born. Something wonderful in the union of that night, in the hall of Slytherin. Something that would bring great marvels, and begin a whole new world for them all. They could see a bright future of happiness.
"This is so cool." "Yeah."
Tom Riddle creates a Mary Sue. Questions will be answered like: Why it is not smart to duel a baby giant, Why Myrtle is a stupid git, Why the Internet is more useful than a compostion notebook, Who preceeded Madame Pomfrey at the Infirmary, And foremost, Why the Dark Mark was almost an Eagle and A Union Jack? (Damn Mungdungus Fletcher)
**** The year was 1940. Tom Riddle wiped his hands and began drawing the hot ashy line in the stone. Burning them into the stone so that it was scorched black and unchanging. The triangles and the angles were all perfect, tangent, and above all, closed off. The 13 year old had read Goethe's Faust closely enough to learn that when drawing a protection ward, you had better make sure it was closed off. In the circle of the star, with the eight names of God to protect it. He feared placing his name down. Even smashed together it had looked different. Once when he had been in a ring conjuring he had sworn he heard something in the dark call his name. What was his name, anyway? Just some mindless thing they had slapped on him, with no parents in the world. He wondered what his father's name was. His middle name was real, at least. It had always upset the nuns so very much. Marvolo. It almost looked *cough* Italian or some such vile thing. But Tom did love it. He squeezed it together like one stupid word. "TOMMARVOLORIDDLE" He still had to be careful. He carefully rearranged the letters in his name in his usual sequence. Maybe it would be lucky. Maybe someone clever and good could one day figure it out. And he could help them from the great beyond, if he was dead yet. It was one thing to be cautious, but how could he let history be ignorant of the creator of this ward? "AMILDREDVOLTMOOR ATODDLERIMVOLROM ADIDMOVERTROLLOM DAMM VERDI LO LOT OR." He scratched out the letters in the twenty combinations, circling the outermost circle. So that Tom Marvolo Riddle's name was hidden in an eternal circle of letters. I AM LOVED OLD MR ROT. I OLD MOLD RAT MOVER. I AM OLDER DR MOLTOV. I AM LOVED LORD MORT He wrote down as many different guises for his name as he could think of until he finished the cycle with the last one, his favorite one. He stopped and made the letters big and with a fancy seriph font. Burning them deep into the stone "I am Lord Voldemort." Lord Voldemort, it just sang to him somehow. Such a stately and wonderful word. Vol-demort. Vold-de-mort. Or Someone was going to think a real cracker lived here in Slytherin, writing all these fake names all over the seal. "Oooh look there. Lord Voldemort is signing his handy work."
The gang crowded around him, leaning over. "It's just a little protection spell." "A little spell? You're doing it with pigeon blood and scorched stone. It took you all night to draw this circle. It's not a little spell." "You and Professor Dumbledore saved the school all ready. Kolder and Grindewald aren't going to be coming back here." "No sirree Bob." Mung Fletcher shook his head. He could sound so very out of place sometimes, both at a magical school and in Brittain. "I want to make sure. I don't want to leave it to chance. Who knows what they could do over the summer." "You should save your energy on making a ward in your orphanage. That doesn't even have a ward on it. With the Gerry dropping bombs on it like it was a paper werewolf in a hexing gallery." "Now no one can attack but Lord Voldemort himself." Tom tapped the name.
Myrtle stopped, stopping all the other girls on their way to classes as well. "Look, it's a sign." Myrtle kneeled on the floor "Tom, who made that?" "You can't read. I. am. Lord. Voldemort." "That's the circle's name?" Myrtle asked. Not the brightest girl Myrtle "No, the authors name." "Vol-de-mort. Flight From Death." Nick Malfoy said in his continental accent. He did know how to speak French. Unfortunately, he made it a point to make certain that everyone else knew as well. "Lord Voldemort is the greatest Wizard there is. Most powerful, most fiersome Dark Wizard and an ascetic in grey robes. Haunting eyes like flame, and pale ebon skin. He doesn't eat or sleep or nothing like that." "He's an animagus. His form is a giant white cobra." "A white one." "And he's an Elemental Mage of the Wind, an Expert Alchemist, The Greatest Dueler." Plah? You suck at dueling, Tom. Even that Roo Hagird could out draw you. You look stupid standing their with flowers on your bloody head. Cause he pulled a Fleurate curse on you." "That's different. He uses a two foot wand." Tom held out his arms "He's a bright one he is. Didn't they send him two classes ahead?" "You couldn't even beat a little boy." Cal shoved him. Tom shook his head. "Voldemort doesn't. Woldemort would beat him any day of the week. Anybody. Voldemort is far a better dueler than Tom Riddle." "He'd have to be. You are very bad." Verloc teased at him. "If he's so bloody great, why don't you just marry him?" Cal said. Tom had a wilder imagination now than he ever had as a child, thinking of such things. But even as a child he had been bad at playing make believe. He did whatever he wanted. He also made them all do whatever he said. He was always the hero, and made Cal Snape his best friend, Nick the villain and Verloc the villain's minion. And Mungdungus was always the Muggle victim. It was a wonder that they stopped playing those story games. Of course, it had helped when they had all found out that girls didn't have cooties. And if it was a choice between girls and mucking about outside under a bridge with Tom yelling at you, girls would definitely win. Especially in Caligula's case. "He's a guy. Don't think he would fancy me." "Yeah whatever, Tom." Verloc chuckled under his breath. "Voldemort doesn't need a girlfriend, okay." "But he is just like you." Verloc said. "Except perfect and annoying." The other Serpents began howling in appreciation. "He's not perfect. He has flaws." Tom frowned a little. He hated feeling foolish. He was very prideful. "Yeah, he bemoans the fate of the universe, which is cold and cruel," Nick drawled. "He's like Superman, except more handsome and intelligent," Mung added. "My God, he's John Gant, Clark Gable, and St. Francis of Assisi all in one. And he uses Dark magic. Just like Tom." "Superman? Who?" Cal asked. "Friedrich Niezche's philosophical ideal man." Nicholas Malfoy straightened his glasses. "I'm talking about the bloke in the red longjohns you can buy at the Muggle Chemists," Mung said. "Mung, you should know more about Dark Magic. And we've all tried it. That doesn't make him just like me. That would make everyone in Slytherin like him."
"How did he become Lord Voldemort?" "Well, it's a long story." The kids crowded around Prefect Riddle who told them of Voldemort's mysterious origins. His childhood in India, his trip through the Sahara desert. He just had to put him in World War I as a pilot along side the Merlinsbloods. The kids watched as Tom finished the seal, drawing holly and a snake around it. "How long did it take you to think up that silly name?" Cal asked. "A whole day?" "Oh, shut it." "He filled a whole page of his notebook with lucky anagrams," Mung volunteered. "I think it's rather Hot, the name. Like Mallory orthat guy who wrote the Hobbit-dwarf thing book. The Wizard Voldemort setting his sacred seal on Hogwarts to protect it from the world." "Yeah." "I think he'd make a good Storybook character." Myrtle smiled. Jenny Carmicheal blushed. "You're so clever to think all this up. I'll bet they could make it into a movie after that." "They don't make wizard books into muggle Movies." "They might. If it someone like the great Voldemort." Tom looked down, "I hate story books. He's much too cool for that." The Slytherins said nothing. When had it happened? When had he decided that the books he read had become useless things. Nothing but tools, nothing but ideas that he could squeeze out. He always wondered why that had to happen. So long ago he could curl up with a J.R.R Tolkein, or a copy of the Illiad or Something stupid like Lost Horizon. But he couldn't even pick up Gone with the Wind, the muggle roman du jour, without conceiving something bigger. Without catching the outline of something huge. He had stopped reading the words, overcome by the visions of the things a mortal left unwritten that he knew. His reading became faster, suddenly. As if he wasn't reading at all but absorbing. He'd sit there looking at a page and be overwhelmed by this sense of futility. Place it down and tell everyone every detail they had missed. The only words he could read anymore were the ones he wrote. The scrawls in stone that scorched them black.
"I am Lord Voldemort." Something he had seen. Something he had made. "This way no one will ever attack Slytherin." "I swear Tom. You're crackers. You talk more about Voldemort than real people." Caligula said. "Yeah and you wasted all night here. You missed the entire Hay Ride." "It seemed like the right time to do it while everyone was off at the party. It was night time. I read about it and it seemed effective." "Do you do every bit of magic you read about?" "Well yes." "Even in the Restricted section. Dark Magic is one thing, but some of that is illegal." "Next thing you'll say all Dark magic should be evil Mung, like one of them bloody Gryffindors." "You need to relax. We need to find you a nice half blood girl, one who just happens to like a nice sob story. You'd definitely win there. Just tell them you're a Catholic orphan and the dames will melt into your arms." "Maybe he just needs a shag."
*** There wasn't going to be much in the way of a Goodbye Feast. There was a War on, what? They didn't need to look at a bunch of sour-puss Gryffindors sniveling into Christmas cake and old molasses flavored cookies. They started retelling the time when Caligula knocked Ellen Gordan and George Potter into a cowpie with a jelly legs curse. Then they raced about the empty Slytherin dungeons playing Sardines. "This time the catacombs were forebidden. It had taken three weeks to find Mung. That boy was impossibly strange. But they loved him. "This is our last night here, before Summer break." Mungdungus Fletcher smiled his snaggle-toothed grin. "We'll meet again. Oh come on." "Well thank you Mr. Roy Rogers. I just don't fancy going back. This summer I heard the Lufftwaffe is on the move. What if they attack London again. It'll be horrible." "At least you're house quartering a bunch of Goddamned Nazi scum. I hear they cleared out a few wizarding villages already near Oschweim. They've been industrializing the area for weeks. It had always been so isolated. Now full of Muggles." "Do you think we're all very odd people for wanting to stay here?" "It's an odd world." Caligula said curtly. None of them looked forward to the summer. You looked in each pair of eyes and you got another story. Verloc had no home now. He could never go back to his homeland. Given away beyond his reach by a man named Neville Chamberlain. His home sacrificed for political expediency. His father had been shot already and now he was cast out of his homeland. Verloc may have been the most blessed, for he knew where his troubles would lie. The others of them still had to wait for their calamity. Caligula was going home to his tennis courts and his horses, cautiously. All the while waiting for it to fall apart. Certainly no one could tell if he were broke. The stately and marvelous Snapes, insolent as Stallions with the same sparkling brown eyes and winning grins. It would be his first summer without the protection of Cleopatra Snape. His lovely and trampy sister would not be anywhere near Snape Manor this year. She would be causing trouble in some facist Regime. Most likely Italy this time. Not many Dark Wizards had deigned to actually leave England. But Cleopatra had no love for her mother's eccentricities. "Mum said you couldn't stay." "It's okay." Mrs. Snape would never let her son's friends into her home. Tom was an illegitimate Halfblood straight out of West End. Mung was the son of a Muggleborn Profiteer. It was uncalled for. As hard it was to get letters into London it was all the harder to get anything into Acheron. Even if Tom had had an owl. Mung had one, and he never got his owl through to the Snape's home. Even Nick had trouble making contact. After all, the Malfoys hadn't arrived in England until the Norman conquest in 1066, while the Snapes had been around since Roman days, a good seven centuries earlier. His mother was not as stately, not being born a Snape. Intolerant petty woman. Though the Purebloods were too polite to say, it she was not the best woman to raise children. They only said that Caligula had run into too many walls and had gotten hit by many bludgers over the years, that he was a rough and tumble little boy. The second he got into Hogwarts most of the bruises disappeared. He trusted few, and never kept a girl long enough for her to notice the occasional bruise on his face, in the shape of a bird head cane handle. Cal looked strangely helpless with his hair shorn off like that, in the tidy way, like his mother wanted. "Let's make an oath here." Verloc said. "To each other too." Cal nodded. "An oath, then?" Mung asked. "Yeah, that's what a wizard does," Cal said. "Wizards Oath," Nick Malfoy nodded. They had never been in the mood to make promises before, let alone a real oath. They were in Slytherin and a promise was only as good as it was convenient. They all looked to Tom to say something clever. "We make our solemn promise. By our honors as Wizards. Even a Slytherin can't bend that." "Yeah and if you break it we'll cut out your eyes and pull out your tongue by the root and-" "No hot coals and bamboo splinted. Tom shook his head. "No. No. If you break your oath, you're out." "Out?" "You are out forever. You'll no longer be our friend." "Is that enough?" "Being out is the worse thing there is in the world," Tom said. "And if anybody breaks this oath, we will never talk to him again. And everyone in the Entire world will know he betrayed his oath."
They all put their arms in. "What do we promise?" Verloc asked. "We're friends," Cal smiled. "We promise to always be brothers." Tom patted him on the back and put his right arm around Nick. "We promise to hate Nazis," Mung said patting Verloc on the back "And Italians," Cal said. His own sister was fighting his fascist uncles back in Italy. His Uncle Hadrian was involved with a famous Italian general. They had cast him out of the family after that. He cursed Grandpa Julius with long nose hair. "And the Nips." "Oh come on. All Italians, ever? What about Michealangelo?" Tom rolled his eyes. "Or Augustus Caesar. Or, like, the guy who invented Gnocchi." Nick asked "He was Roman," Caligula sniffed. "Yeah and those Russians are bad." Verloc shook his head. "The Irish Republican Army." Mung shrugged "Not that it's all their fault." The list began to rattle on and on. In every country there was something. Though Cal doubted General Sherman in Atlanta counted, as the civil war had been 90 years ago and he was dead. "How about. Any muggles who have united to oppress wizarding kind, be they Yanks or Nips or Italians, or even Nazis. Wherever anybody tries to push each other around we'll be there to hate them for it." Tom concluded. "Yes, make it equal," Verloc nodded. "We'll stand up to all the people of the world who try to hurt each other." "Muggle and wizard." "Yeah. And never fight as soldiers in these stupid wars," Mung said "Yeah. War is stupid," Caligula said. "Yeah. We'll never fight for muggles. Never with the Muggles. And if need be, we'll against them if they should declare war on us. We never fight for them, ever," Tom codified. "And we'll stop any muggle or group of muggles anywhere in the world who says boo." "Boo." They lifted their arms out of a circle. "Now that we made an oath what do we do. to prove we have?" Mung asked "A sign of Brotherhood." "Like a handshake?" Nick asked nervously. "Or a seal. Like in the books. A secret seal for us to gain power from." "Let's make it an Eagle," Mung cheered. "What does an Eagle have to do with anything?" Verloc asked. "That's the Ravenclaws' house symbol." "I dunno," Mung shrugged. "They're hot." "Oh no. I can't get one of those tattoos," Cal said. "They are just low class." He knew his mother would disapprove. Tom looked at the sizzling point of his wand. "Think I got an idea."
***
That morning at Divination, they were reviewing Palmistry techniques. "I want you to do a palm reading of your partner. Boy to girl this time. You usually get it that way." Professor Crowley said. Kay Carmicheal, a pretty 5th year Slytherin, was across from Tom. She motioned him over. Tom sighed. She was very busty and enthusiastic, of course much too high maintenance. Not his type at all. He saw how she treated Cyrille Lupin, like a bloody puppy dog. At least he got one of the Slytherins. Caligula was stuck with George Potter's runty little crush, Emily Gwydion, a runty scrawny Gryffindor who had ragged black curls, a sniffly nose. And the thickest pair of ugly black glasses you have ever seen. She looked like a ten year old boy, not a fourteen year old girl. George was far on the other side of the room whispering with Ellen Gordan. But the Dark haired blue eyed tom boy, wasn't really a girl was she? Nick managed to snag a seat next to Pina, the most beautiful girl in Slytherin and Girls Prefect. She also was skipped ahead and was only there to help out the teacher. Tom held out his arm, so she could look at his palm. She took it in her hand. Kay looked down at it, bared for the first time since he cast the healing spell. "EWWWW." She lept back in her chair. "Wow." George Potter looked up from Ellen Gordan's hand. Ellen, a jumpy boisterous tom boy of a girl, pushed him out of the way. Emily Gwydion straightened her dorky black glasses. The entire world was staring. "What is that?" Kay winced and pointed at the obvious livid red burn "Yeah. It's a seal. A Vol-de-mort, as Nick calls it "Flight from Death." Courtesy of Tom Riddle." Mung rolled up his sleeve. "Yeah we made an oath. You know how good Tom is with seals. He gave us all one." Verloc nodded. Kay cowered in her boyfriend's arms, looking at the gross sight. "Cyrille, they cut themselves with their wands. Gross." "The snake is for Slytherin." "Is the skull for Vanity? Mortis.Death?" Cyrille Lupin, a shy Ravenclaw was chattering away. He touched the scar. They nodded. Pina Proserpine nodded at Cal. "That's a really nice symbol. I'll bet it's a powerful seal" For once the over critical and snappy elder girl was impressed. She gave Cal a nod that could have been construed as admiration, maybe even attraction. "It's stupid. Why can't guys do anything normal? Men are crazy." She tossed her head. "You want to prove your friends so you just start carving each other with your wands.." Kay flapped her arm at them. "No wonder I don't date men in my own house." "Yeah and you're a bloody tart." Verloc sniggered. "Oh Cyrille. Are you going to stand for that?" she shoved him. "He didn't mean it." Cyrille defended Verloc. The boy was 6'3" at fourteen. "I demand you fight that big ugly mook for my honor or I'll never let you touch me again." 'But Cuddlelumps." Cyrille frowned. "I mean it." Kay crossed her arms. "I shouldn't be necking with you anyway." "But he'll kill me." Cyrille pointed up at Verloc "You're not willing to die for, my love. Fine. So Tom." Kay tweaked his cheek. are you free Saturday for Hogsmeade." Cyrille whimpered. "But we were going to. You aren't going to go with Tom." "I'm sorry Cyrille. But Tom is cuter." Lupin bought it hook line and sinker. To think he was from the smartest house. Those squares had no idea how to take a joke. Roo Hagrid gently nudged the mammoth Verloc out of the way. The youngest student at school and still the tallest. A gentle nudge might leave you windless. "Can I get one?" Hagrid muttered. "I don't know." "Yeah. You can make mine like a Lion and a manticore." "Ooh or an Eagle," Ellen Gordan smiled. Mung snorted "Eagles don't have anything to do with anything." The other members of the class began chattering. "Children, you are supposed to be doing palm reading. Seeing into the future. Not looking at Tom Riddle's silly arm mark. on his..." She finally got a look at it. "My heaven what did you do to your arm, boy?" "A skull, ma'am. I didn't draw it very well." The other Slytherins covered up their arms and began whistling. "Yeah Tom. That's an awfully gross burn," Cal said. "How ever did you get it?" Malfoy asked innocently "You bloody cheats," Tom snerked. "You're going to abandon your Lord Voldemort in his hour of need?" "Tom," Cal scoffed, "do you really have to ask that question?" They were still Slytherins. They began theatrically working on their divination work. "So Emily. you have a.Venus in retrograde, kind of." "Well, what does it say, Pina?" Nick asked her. *** Kay Carmicheal was buttering her bread. "Do you think Tom is going to missthe House Cup Party. It's going to be a gas. They might even have tea cake, and candy. I heard that Willy Gandywine is gonna spike the teachers Pumpkin punch." "Blast. They shoulder have sent him to Master Tourniquette. The man is a ghoul. He loved to wrap you up in bandages and just leave you ther. He's so paranoid. it's healed up. It doesn't even hurt." Pina stabbed at Cal's seal with her nail. "Stop it." Cal shoved her off. "I just think it's cool." Just then their Head of House appeared in a mustard dress, floating over Verloc's shoulder. "Mssrs Snape, Malfoy, Morgenstein. I believe you are wanted in Master Tourniquette's infirmary" "But we are okay? We aren't hurt." Mung yelped. Verloc smacked.
Tom was curled up in an angry ballinside of Master Tourniquette's infirmary as the old skinny man tried to convince him his arm was gangrenous. He stared at them. Professor Poppins only crossed her arms. This was enough to evoke her disapproval but not enough to frighten them witless. She disapproved of them all the time. Headmaster Dippet was pursing his lips to prevent any words from escaping. Professor Dumbledore was wringing his hands. "If I go down, you're all coming with me." Tom nodded. "Brothers." The boys said listlessly. "Oh I heard. How could you hurt yourselves like this. You could have.
"Albus." Headmaster Dippet cut him off. "Sorry Headmaster." Professor Dumbledore always did care to much about his students. "Normally when Teenagers do this sort of thing they don't have the forethought to heal it." Poppins said "I'll leave this all to you Master Tourniquette." "It's just a scar. It's not any magic," Tom said. "I, I should be able to do this if I want to. It's my body." "Yeah." Cal said. Ever eager to flaut authority. "Don't call my mum," Mung begged. The boys rolled their eyes at him. "You'll have to live with those scars for the rest of your lives. Even you, Tom. "There are no healing charms that will heal those scars." "We did it so we wouldn't forget . Professor Dumbledore, sir. Headmaster Dippet, sir." "Well, they will never heal all the way." Professor Poppins stared at them. Her indigo and farey light eyes, losing their spark, becoming a little more grey. Dumbledore frowned. "And we'll never be the same." Tom said. "Tom, if you are going to be the Prefect of Slytherin, you must be more careful and responsible with your housemates." Dumbledore shook his head. "I promise we won't do something like this again." Tm said. "Yeah." The other three boys agreed.
Tom walked off with his fellows towards their last night in Slytherin before the summer came. The Gryffindors were waiting around, with Myrtle and Jenny. Tom sighed I can do a lion. He pulled out his wand. The little boys looked in Terror at the hot point of the wand. "Hold still. Hold out your arm." "I thought. it was a spell." Hagrid gulped. "It is a spell. We have to use incedio to make the wand hot enough." "brand." "I'm going to go pack. We'll see you Tom." The Gryffindors scattered. "Fools rush in where Angels fear to tread." Mung saluted them. "You'd think a Gryffindor would be braver about a ritual scarification." The Slytherins walked towards their room laughing and still hot and excited from the night before. United forever in friendship.
*** "The best animal would be a snake," Tom said "We are the Slytherin Serpents," Cal agreed. "If I do get a tattoo, it should be of a snake. "You draw good snakes, Tom." "Yeah. I just normally do it in charcoal. Not fire." "It'll be much cooler than a tattoo." Tom pulled out his wand. "Incendio. " Until the point was as hot as a coal.
He looked at Verloc's arm. On it were the tiny blue numbers placed there but a few months ago. When the World Ended. "We'll put it on the left arm. To cover that nasty muggle thing." Verloc, sniffed lifting his chin. "No." "What?" Tom asked. Verloc stroked the blue number on his wrist. "I don't want to forget. Put it up here." Verloc gritted his teeth. The S of the serpent curled over his flesh. "The muggles almost killed me and my mother. My father, my uncles, were not strong enough. Kolder.Hitler, Yamato, Lenin, Saberhagen, and Grindewald. We'll never forget who they are. That's what we say when we are together."
"Nah. It's kind of small." "There is something missing." Cal Snape shook his head. "Yes." Mung put down his magazine.
"Tom, is that still hot?"
"My Father died. He was good man who brought himself up in the world. He was a clever wizard. He had a whole factory for brooms and such. But he could not fight the muggles. I remember his laugh and his fluffy mustache. He used to like going out and stealing one of his inventor's brooms to test it out. We'd go flying over the countryside around the Tatras, in the mountains. The Carpathian Mountians. with a big heavy cloak on. So high you could fly and no muggles would see you. And we'd smile. And Mama said we always went too fast."
"There is something missing."
"How about a star of David? On account of you're a Jew." "I know I'm a Jew." Verloc snapped. "I wore that damn yellow patch for all those years. I hate the sight on it on my body. I'm not going to carry it on my skin."
"Alright. How about a Chevron?" "A rune." "V is for Victory," Mung suggested. Tom began painting in fire on the arm with his wand. A simple realistic image. "A skull," Tom said. "To remind us of those dead. Those killed by the Muggles and their allies. Those we have buried this year and all those we will bury." "Never Forget," Verloc said, he shook Tom's hand. He finally covered his arm. Nick unfroze and cast a healing charm on his arm "That's so it doesn't get infected." Cal pointed to his own arm right where Verloc's seal was. Just under his elbow. "It's a brotherhood. Put it there, Tom. I want a skull too. That way it doesn't matter what you believe. Eh. Jew, Christian, pagan. doesn't matter anymore. We're all Wizards." Mung shook his head and his hardened his resolve. "Mr. Merlinsblood. He was so brave. I'm going to learn to be brave. If it kills me. I'm going to make everyone proud. I can handle a little. Shit that burns!!" "You first, then." "Suck it up, Fletcher." Cal's face was cold. He didn't even clench his teeth. The only sign that he was in pain was a faint stream of sweat. As Tom finally put the last detail on Cal's arm, Malfoy looked around the common room. His friend all wincing over their arms, knowing, growing, staring at each other. "Here. Just don't." Nick rolled back his sleeve and shut his eyes. "We have to do this. But if we get caught, it wasn't my idea." Tom readied the spell again and began drawing. "EEEEEEhh!" Malfoy cried out. Cal was already casting a healing spell on Verloc's arm. Something light, so they wouldn't get caught. They were underaged to be doing such spells. "We are with you, Tom." "I love you, guys." Tom recited the incantation one more time. The wand was very hot. Tom drew a crucifix into his arm and started the skull. Mary Mother of God, it hurt. His wand jerked at the man "Odbodkins, why didn't you mates tell me it was gonna sting like tha." Tom's voice deteriorated into pure Cockney nonsense. They all looked at Tom's serpent "That looks like crap, Tom." "Well, I'm not going to give you my damn wand to draw on my arm. You can't even draw naked stick people.
"Oh no. Mine is upside down."
"Actually yours is the right way. We're all upside down," Mung laughed through the pain. Verloc placed a healing curse on his arm. They all displayed their left arms in a kind of circle There something brilliant was born. Something wonderful in the union of that night, in the hall of Slytherin. Something that would bring great marvels, and begin a whole new world for them all. They could see a bright future of happiness.
"This is so cool." "Yeah."