Thaddius Nott was the heir to a legacy that he could not corrupt. A legacy that had been by the top from the very beginning and no matter how pretty powerful the mudblood was he could not (no matter how much he wanted to) be friends, or even be friendly with him.

When he had walked into the chilled, shiny compartment at the end of the train, dutifully following the Malfoy heir, just as he had been instructed to do, Thaddius was a little bit blown away.

He had the power to chill a room, just by being there (and glaring at Abraxas). Thaddius felt a swirl of magic surrounding him, playing with him, and choked back the noise that was attempting to escape. Having someone this powerful trying to get his attention, with what seemed like very little knowledge of how powerful he actually was- it was glorious,

"And what's your name?" the boy had cooed at him, like he was some sort of favored pet (he would deny it to his last day, but he loved it, loved every second of that boy's voice).

He had roughly responded, then bowed, just a little, to try and get across that he was not trying to be rude. Llewellyn introduced himself, and tried flirting (Thaddius did not laugh… he did not). The quick rejection almost made him smile (maybe Tom would have responded differently should it have been him?)

Thaddius knew, on some level, that he would not be allowed to talk to this boy, to be friends with this boy, to be more than friends with this boy. He knew that it was going to hurt, so much, to isolate him only because of blood status (why did it matter? The blood ran red no matter the status.) He could feel that this was a bad idea, and yet still, when Tom Riddle called his name, he said,

"What is it to you? It is not like you are going to be talking to me all that much. Mudblood." It hurt in every fiber of his being, instincts screaming at him that this boy was going to change the world. Hell, he was eleven, and had more power than many of the seventh years.

Tom gave a speech about how it did not matter what one's parents were, but what mattered was education. Thaddius agreed with every word coming out of his mouth, but there were people who would report to his father, and that could not happen,

"Nice speech. It does not make up for the fact that you are a mudblood, but trying to make up for that with fancy words and a little knowledge about blood politics might work on a few people," He paused, thinking about how to get out of the situation, "Anyway, Brax, I love you and you know I would marry you if you asked, but this new friend you were so excited about is nowhere close to our level. I'm going to find Parkinson," He grabbed Llewellyn on the way out, wanting someone to talk to, who also, clearly, had taken a liking to Tom Riddle.

He had heard through the grapevine that Tom wanted to be in slytherin, and Thaddius had no doubt that he should get into the house, but he was also slightly, just a teeny tiny, shneedle bit worried about how their relationship may be affected. He had spoken to some of the older slytherins, and all of them had given him the advice to continue treating him like less until otherwise told to, or if he displayed some sort of crazy power.

The headmaster一 Dippet一 stood, and the few voices that had piped back up silenced once more. The pure respect could practically be felt with how it rippled through the room, many students bowing their heads in difference to the man.

Thaddius was shocked. These were school children, many of them half-bloods or mudbloods and yet they somehow had enough manners to bow to the headmaster. Based on the information Thaddius had gathered, many of the people who went to Hogwarts were no better than pigs. Clearly he would have to rethink believing everything that his father had said.

As the names were called, one after the other, Thaddius began to feel slight nerves. He would have to go up in front of the entire school and get sorted, potentially having his every secret exposed to the world.

Sooner than he wanted it to, Thaddius' name was called, and he walked to the stool in the center of the hall. An overly large hat was placed on his head, slipping down over his eyes (how stupid must he look, an oversized ratty hat on the heir of the Nott family). With a few moments of blathering about sorting and irritating children, the sorting hat soon announced,

"Slytherin!", and Thaddius walked to his doom (He was fine. He had known these people since he was in diapers, which in retrospect may make this whole situation worse).

Thaddius sat with his yearmates who had been sorted before him, idle gossip about various government officials dancing between lips when he stalked to the hat, and it was placed on his head. Both Thaddius and Llewellyn watched the stool keenly, thoughts of having the pretty powerful boy in their house rattling around in their heads.

The hat rested on Tom's head for almost seven minutes, one of the longest times in Hogwarts history. The hat finally, after what seemed like very little deliberation and a lot of idle conversation shouted,

"SLYTHERIN!" and Thomas stood, a smirk firmly seated on his face. He stalked, (He always stalked. He had the air of a predator, and it scared Thaddius) to the slytherin table and took a seat directly on the end of the table, pushed out by every year.

Thaddius was in the bathroom when Thomas flung the underwear away and reached for his trunk; and it scared him. There were some nasty curses that had been placed over the thing and Thomas was a mudblood first year, he would not be able to get rid of them.

Thaddius stood corrected, shocked, as Thomas lifted the wards, using a technique that was known by many but performed by few because of the sheer magical power required to use the piece of magic, but he did it with ease. He just moved them. Like it was nothing. Like it was easy.

There was a reason after all for Thaddius to be concerned about making an enemy out of this boy.