Tom scritches him behind the ears absently. "Easy, there."

Delighted noise. "I will not stop bouncing for God or any man."

"Well that's fine then."

They arrive at the dorm. Edmund pokes his head through the door first. "Hello?"

The suite is... interesting. At a glance it seems like it could fit right in among the Slytherin dorms, as a smaller cozier alternative to the common room; but there are subtle alien touches to the design, like the couch this woman is sitting on that's modeled like an oddly shaped river pebble smoothed by long erosion into a comfy place to sit. The woman herself looks up at Edmund with mild bemusement. "Aren't universities supposed to cater to the post-puberty crowd?" she wonders. "Whatever, not the weirdest thing about this place by a long shot."

"Call me a prodigy," Edmund shrugs. "You won't be far wrong."

Tom follows him in. "Hullo," he says. "Tom Riddle. Are you some kind of inexplicably brunette Veela, or are people that pretty all on their own where you come from?"

Edmund rolls his eyes fondly. "And I'm Edmund. You wanted pubescent?"

"People are this pretty where I come from thanks to centuries of careful deliberate optimization! I'm Ysandre."

"Huh. So - breeding the prettiest of yourselves like cattle? Seems an odd thing to choose to optimize for."

"My civilization optimizes for a lot of things."

"Well, that's good! Intelligence, I imagine? Magical potential?"

"We'd be optimizing for magical potential if it existed in our world! For all I know the Empress has a secret project about it."

(There is, now that Tom and Edmund have entered the room, a new face peering nervously in past the slightly-ajar door.)

"Oh."

"Don't be mean. If magic doesn't exist in someone's world it doesn't mean they're a muggle."

Edmund notices the nervous face! He gives her a very small wave.

"What are you talking about? The only definition of muggle that matters is whether you have magic."

"Do you really want to get into this now? Be nice now on the presumption that I'll win this argument later."

"Ugh."

"Dare I ask what not being nice would consist of?" she says, ignoring Edmund's very small wave and its target because the girl at the door very strongly gives off the impression that she will pop like a soap bubble if too many people look at her at once.

Tom is clearly sulking too much to answer.

"Oh, he's got a chip on his shoulder about people without magic back in our world - not entirely without reason, they're a bit awful a lot of the time, but I've been working to soften him up. He'd probably just be slightly more rude to you than he's being already."

"Eh, I kind of like it when people are openly rude to me, I feel like it wastes less time and energy than the alternative. Then again, in what passes for polite society at home, the correct way to express your dislike for someone is to lightly imply that you think they have subpar taste while talking to someone who knows someone who knows them at a party they're not attending. I am, as you may imagine, glossing over a lot of the subtleties. It's exhausting."

Edmund giggles. "Oh, life at court. I miss it terribly."

"I don't! If the Empress wants me back after this she had better be prepared to deploy massive bribes. Which, knowing her, she will be."