Prague (PRAHG), vb. To declaim loudly and pompously upon any subject about which one has less knowledge than at least one other person present.


As Lily sat at the Gryffindor table, stirring her bouillon with the apathy of a soul in conflict, a massive shadow fell over her place setting, and she looked up to see Horace Slughorn gazing down at her solicitously.

"Oh, hello, Professor," she murmured.

"Good evening, Miss Evans," said Slughorn. "I heard about your little altercation with Mr Snape this afternoon, and I thought I might come and extend my condolences."

"Thanks," said Lily indifferently. She didn't really want condolences; what she wanted was a little peace and quiet so she could work out how she felt about Severus now. She had come within an ace of skipping dinner so she could have the common room to herself; if she hadn't smelled the blueberry pie (her one great weakness) baking in the kitchens, she probably would have followed through with it.

"Shameful thing," Slughorn rumbled. "Surprising, too, coming from young Severus. I'd gotten the impression he was quite fond of you." (Lily winced.) "Besides, such an intelligent young man – one had hoped he'd be above such parochial prejudices."

"Well, he was under a lot of stress," Mary Macdonald commented from the other side of the table. "He just wanted to look tough, I suppose. Probably he didn't stop to think what a line he was crossing." (Lily rolled her eyes; she'd never met anyone like Mary for thinking the best of people. Even when Mulciber had almost turned her to stone that one time, all she had said was, "Dear me, I do hope he'll be more careful with his wand in the future.")

"That's no excuse," said Slughorn, raising his voice slightly. (Lily had the impression that he wanted the Slytherins to hear him, so they knew what their Head of House thought of their favourite slur. Old Sluggy could be quite gallant, at times.) "Miss Evans is a fine witch, a model student, and an admirable specimen of young womanhood all round. To suggest that she is somehow contaminated by having Muggle ancestors is outrageous, no matter what the circumstances."

Lily winced again. She knew Professor Slughorn meant well, but she didn't want Severus to be publicly humiliated again – and she wasn't thrilled about being extolled as "an admirable specimen of young womanhood" in front of the entire student body of Hogwarts. She lowered her head and stared fixedly into her soup bowl, hoping that someone would call the Potions master back to the faculty table before he did any more damage.

"Actually, that's not really what it means," said a new voice. Lily looked up again, and saw Marcus Lory twisting himself around to look at them from his seat at the Ravenclaw table.

Slughorn glanced down quizzically at him. "Beg pardon, Mr Lory?"

"The M-word," said Marcus. "We tend to assume that it means 'dirty blood', but it doesn't, really. It comes from the old pure-blood legends of descent from Väinämöinen, which…"

"Descent from who?" said a Gryffindor first year about five places to Lily's right.

"Väinämöinen," said Marcus. "You know, the great Finnish wizard that they wrote the Kalevala about? Back in the Founders' time, the theory was that all wizards were descended from him, rather than from Adam and Eve – that they were actually a separate race from Muggles. That's what Salazar Slytherin believed; that's why he never trusted Muggle-born wizards."

"Indeed?" said Slughorn. "And how does this justify the use of the word under discussion?"

"Well, Väinämöinen was supposed to be the son of the sky-goddess Ilmatar," said Marcus, "whereas Adam, of course, was created from the dust of the earth. So, in mediæval terminology, pure-blooded wizards were 'Sky-borns', or 'Air-borns', while Muggles were 'Earth-borns'."

"Airborne?" said a neighbouring Ravenclaw. "As in, what Quidditch players are?"

Marcus sighed. "Yes, that's why it generally gets translated the other way," he said. "It's technically incorrect, but it's less confusing, too."

"So when I play next week's match," Petheroe, the Ravenclaw Keeper, mused, "that'll make me an airborne Air-born, yes?"

"Not if we have anything to say about it!" shouted one of the Slytherin Beaters, provoking general laughter at that table.

"Anyway," said Marcus, "Muggles were 'Earth-borns', which meant that their descendants who had magical powers were 'Earth-blooded wizards', or simply 'Earth-bloods'. And so, when Slytherin's faction had gone on the offensive and was looking around for a good insult to hurl at the Muggle-born students at Hogwarts, it occurred to them to change 'earth' to the more offensive 'mud', and… well, the rest is history." He added, thoughtfully, "I suppose we should be grateful that they didn't take the next logical step, and start talking about 'Compost-Bloods'."

Lily rather wished he hadn't said that last bit. Marcus, though a perfect gentleman himself, had an unfortunate tendency to make abstract speculations that less savoury characters were all too willing to take seriously; she could just hear Avery, the next time she and Mary passed him in the corridors, saying, "Oh-oh, here comes the Compost-Blood Convention."

"How do you know all this, Marcus?" Mary wanted to know.

Marcus seemed surprised. "It's in the preface to Nature's Nobility," he said. "You know, the 'Historical Overview of the Wizarding Bloodlines' part." He glanced around at the blank looks on his schoolmates' faces. "What, doesn't anyone else read the reference texts in the school library?"

"Unbelievable," said Petheroe, shaking his head.

It was at this point that Horace Slughorn showed what sort of man he was. Many professors, no doubt, would have gotten on their dignity if a mere fourth year had corrected their etymology in front of the whole school. Not Slughorn. He looked at Marcus with an acquisitive gleam in his eye, as though wondering how he had managed to miss this one all these years.

"I say, Mr Lory," he said, "you know, I suppose, that I'm planning a little get-together after the match next week; I don't suppose you'd care…?"

Lily rose abruptly. "Excuse me, Professor," she said, "but would you mind having one of the house-elves send the rest of my dinner up to the common room? I think I need to lie down."

"Oh, of course," said Slughorn. "I quite understand. It's been a trying day for you."

"Thank you," said Lily, and strode briskly away from the table, doing her best to avoid catching Severus's eye.

"Not at all, not at all," Slughorn called after her. "Only too happy to oblige." He lowered his voice again. "Now, as I was saying, Mr Lory…"