Summery – The Door Marked F! … When all spells are washed away, the truth may be a bit shocking.
Disclaimer – J.K. Rowling, I am not… there are some direct quotes, some mixed quotes, and some indirect quotes from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets in this, but I did try to make it fun to re-read what you've probably read before if you're reading Harry Potter fanfiction.
Segment 6 – Of Snakes and Serpents
The good news about Colin getting attacked while she was there was that people had begun to doubt Mr. Filch's claims that Jamie was the Heir of Slytherin, the bad news from Hermione was, that Jamie in fact was an heir through her Father's Grandmother, Euphemia Gaunt, who's second cousin Thomas Riddle was the last of the main line of decedents and had attended Hogwarts some fifty years before. If Mr. Riddle was no longer around, then Jamie was indeed the next in line to inherit the title. Other than Professor McGonagall, who had been there when Hermione made the discovery, the girls were keeping this little tidbit of information to themselves.
After being laid up in the Hospital Wing for two and a half weeks, Jamie was finally allowed to return to classes. She had managed to keep on top of her homework thanks to the miracle that her writing hand had not been hurt by Dobby, but some instructors (Snape) demanded that she take make-up quizzes to make sure she understood the work. Even though Snap assigned her a potion from the fourth year coursework, Jamie completed the potion nearly flawlessly thanks to her mother's notes on the subject. This infuriated Snape who only gave her potion an A (for acceptable) instead of an O (for outstanding) as she thought she deserved.
"I'd really like to get that Sorting Hat a piece of my mind now," Jamie muttered after getting hit in the back by yet another of Malfoy's hexes, this one making her shoulder length hair stand on end and turn fluorescent green.
Hermione simply waved her wand casting a quick Finite Incantatum to end the hex, then asked, "What about this time?"
"The Slytherins," the once again black haired girl stated, "It's supposed to be the house of the ambitious, cunning and sneaky indeed… more like house of the lazy, stuck up, and incompetent louts."
"Miss Granger. Miss Potter." The greasy haired Potions Master suddenly said behind them, "That will be five points from Gryffindor for doing magic the in the hallways, and another five for slandering the well-respected House of Slytherin."
Jamie waved her hand in the air dismissing the man, "See? Point proven."
Hermione shook her head as Snape said, "And a detention as well!"
"Oh, Merlin! Not more Lockhart fan mail! You can be so cruel Mr. Snape…" Jamie cried with an obviously fake, shocked voice and holding her hands to her cheeks.
"THAT'S PROFESSOR SNAPE!" He growled loudly turning red.
Jamie turned away and said just loudly for Snape to hear, "It would be… if you taught anything."
"Let's make that two more detentions and another ten points from Gryffindor then," Snape looked about ready to snap and start hexing the girl himself.
Rather than let Jamie goad the man any further, Hermione grabbed her arm and dragged the younger witch away.
The first week of December found a new notice on the bulletin board in Gryffindor Tower. It appeared that one of the teachers was going to sponsor a Dueling Club, and was holding an exhibition on Saturday evening after dinner, but it didn't say which teacher was involved. Speculation ran rampant through the school from Professor Flitwick, being a former Dueling Champion, to Headmaster Dumbledore himself, being the most powerful man in the magical realms. Jamie's former roommates however took their speculations in a wildly different direction as Seamus and Ron could be often overheard wondering if Slytherin's Monster could duel. Jamie and Hermione thought the club could be useful, so at eight o'clock they, along with practically everyone else in the whole school, returned to the Great Hall for the dueling demonstration.
When the gleaming git in plum colored robes took the stage, Jamie was all for leaving right then, but Hermione held her back.
"Maybe Professor Lockhart is better at showing what he knows than explaining it," Hermione said hopefully to Jamie quietly. She still held some hope that Lockhart knew what he was doing from all of the exploits detailed in his books.
"And what… all of his books were ghost-written or something? That man is worse at teaching than Snape is." Jamie replied just as quietly, but judging by the snickers of her fellow students, not quite as quietly as she'd thought.
A moment later Snape himself followed Lockhart onto the stage. Then Lockhart waved for silence and called, "Gather round, gather round! Can everyone see me? Excellent!" the man then bowed to the crowd with a flourish. "Professor Dumbledore has graciously granted me permission to start this little dueling club, to train you all in case you ever need to defend yourselves as I have done on countless occasions – for full details, see my published works."
"Get on with it," Snape growled snidely.
"Ah yes! Let me introduce my sporting assistant, the Great Professor Snape!"
"Well I guess that cinches it… Lockhart's a Slytherin," Jamie muttered.
Hermione looked affronted, "But in Year with the Yeti he clearly states he was in Gryffindor."
"Riiiight."
Lockhart continued, "Now, I don't want any of you youngsters to worry – you'll still have your Potions Master when I'm through with him, never fear!"
"Mores the pity," Ron said nearby.
Snape sneered irritably at the smiling Lockhart as the two faced each other. "Now as you can see, we are holding our wands in the accepted combative position; and on the count of three, we will cast our first spells." A tiny mote of nervousness entered Lockhart's voice when he finally noticed Snape's expression, "Neither of us aiming to kill of course. Heh heh…"
"Maybe you're right Hermione… Snape only looks at Gryffindors like that." Jamie said conceding the earlier point, to more snickering from the nearby students.
Lockhart twirled his wand as he counted down, and just as he said one Snape lazily drawled "Expelliarmus!" in a somewhat bored tone and with a quick flash of red light Lockhart slammed into the wall behind him to land sprawled and cross-eyed on the floor as his wand drifted lazily to Snape's waiting hand.
"Well there you have it!" The gleaming git then bounced back to his feet and quickly shook off the stunning effect of Snape's attack and stepped back onto the stage, "The Disarming Charm – yes, an excellent idea to show them that, Professor Snape, but if you don't mind my saying so, it was very obvious what you were about to do. If I had wanted to stop you it would have been only too easy."
Snape looked murderous.
"Enough demonstrating!" Lockhart cried out, "Pair off and let's see how well you do with the disarming charms."
Jamie was game to partner with Hermione when Snape's greasy voice cut in and split them up. She wasn't afraid to face Malfoy, she just didn't think much of him as a human being, and of course the slimy git decided to cast on two instead of waiting for the countdown to finish first, and as the first spell was cast the entire room erupted into chaos. Jamie dodged the silvery light of the Rictusempra, having no idea what it did, and countered with a Tickling Charm, making it very hard for Malfoy to breathe enough to cast anything else. Unfortunately she lowered her guard a little too much and he hit her with a Tarantallegra which had her dancing crazily as Lockhart tried to reassert control over the room.
To make matters worse, in Jamie's opinion, Snape then called Malfoy and herself up to the stage, "for a proper duel."
"Now Harry," Lockhart said trying to coach her as Snape was doing Malfoy, "When Draco points his wand at you, do this…" he said as he wiggled his wand funnily before dropping it. "Whoops – my wand is a little overexcited –"
The man kept talking for about five minutes but Jamie tuned him out.
Unlike their first little tiff, Malfoy actually let the countdown finish before casting hexes Jamie doubted anyone at Hogwarts had taught him. Jamie tried using the Expelliarmus spell a few times, but neither combatant could land a solid blow on the other as both continuously dodged and jumped around the stage. Finally Malfoy cried, "Serpentasortia!" firing a spell not at Jamie but at the ground between them. Even Malfoy looked startled as a large black snake erupted from the end of his wand.
Not knowing why she did it, Jamie quickly snapped her left arm forward and said, "Cuesysseth!" and suddenly everyone was staring at Jamie, including the snake.
After a moment, Lockhart fired a spell at the snake, enraging it; and as it rushed towards the closest target it could see Jamie cried out "Cuesysseth! Neissenass!" pointing to the floor at her feet, and as the snake turned to move towards where she was pointing Snape drawled that he would "take care of it" before incinerating the poor creature. Having recovered from his shock of having a snake come out of his wand, Malfoy took advantage of everyone else being distracted to fire off another curse at Jamie instantly dissolving all of her clothing. Mortified, embarrassed and pissed, Jamie just pointed her wand at Malfoy and a burst of pure force flung the blond ponce away from the stage as she crouched down trying to cover herself as best she could.
Hermione rushed forward to throw her outer robes over Jamie and quickly took the naked girl back to Gryffindor Tower.
Speculation over Jamie being the Heir of Slytherin once again skyrocketed with the news that she was a Parselmouth, with some students even calling for her to be expelled as a dark witch, with Ernie Macmillan and Justin Finch-Fletchley leading the call. What really irritated Jamie however, was that Malfoy wasn't even punished for what he had done to her in the Great Hall.
On her way to the Transfiguration classroom Tuesday afternoon at the end of her free period, to serve one of the detentions Snape had awarded her, Jamie stumbled onto a very odd scene; Sir Nicholas was floating even more lifeless than usual over the prone body of Justin Finch-Fletchley. Before she could do anything, Peeve swooped down on her and started shouting that another attack had occurred and no mortal or ghost was safe. The poltergeist made so much noise that all of the nearby classes suddenly rushed out into the hall and Ernie Macmillan, spotting Jamie standing nearby, cried that she'd been caught red-handed. Probably in an attempt to diffuse the situation, Professor McGonagall pulled Jamie away from the crowd and up to Dumbledore's office while the prefects corralled the students and the other teachers dealt with getting Justin and Nick to the infirmary.
The Headmaster's office was nothing like Jamie thought it should be, from the whimsical password of Lemon Drop, to the strange and intricate silver things emitting soft hoots, quiet whistles and puffs of different colored smoke, the only word that came to her mine was 'odd.'
On a high shelf sat the Sorting Hat, probably dreaming up yet another bad song for next year's Sorting Ceremony. Jamie briefly considered consulting with it again to see if Gryffindor was still the right house for her now that her secrets have been exposed… but she didn't want to see the disappointment on Hermione's face if the older girl ever found out Jamie doubted being in the same house as her best friend.
A burst of flame suddenly erupted on the far side of the room and Jamie turned to see a bird's ashes falling to the tray below its' perch. Just then the office door opened again and a very somber looking Headmaster walked in.
"Sir – your bird," Jamie gasped. "It just caught fire –"
Dumbledore smiled, "About time, too. He's been looking dreadful for days." He then chuckled at the stunned look on Jamie's face, "Fawkes is a phoenix, Harry, my boy; they are reborn from the ashes when they die."
"It's Jamie, sir," Jamie said with not a little exasperation in her voice, "Not Harry… and after that little exhibition in the Great Hall last weekend, I think only you and Lockhart still don't seem to get that… I'M A GIRL!"
When she left the Headmaster's office a short time later with his assurances that he did not think that she had had anything to do with the attacks, she was at least comforted to know she wouldn't be getting expelled, as Macmillan wanted, but was still rather annoyed with the old man for still refusing to acknowledge her as anything but a boy named Harry.
On the 19th, a week and a half later, most of the school's population departed, leaving Jamie and Hermione alone in the tower with the five Weasley siblings. The rest of the castle was likewise deserted with only three Ravenclaws (two first year boys and a sixth year girl), one Hufflepuff girl in Jamie and Hermione's year and a handful of Slytherins (which unfortunately included Malfoy) still in residence.
Ginny, who Jamie had noticed had looked somewhat ill recently, began to start looking better and took to sleeping in Lavender's bed at night so she wouldn't be alone at night during the break.
-Author's Notes-
Remember… this is all from Jaime's point of view… and she hasn't noticed some things JKR mentioned in the books. Magic and Magical Creatures (as well as beings that see with magical sight like Voldemort under Quirrell's turban), could all tell from the start that Jamie was a girl.
Sakura Lisel – about the Thieves' Folly… Year 1 Segment 3 Part 2 Paragraph 1 has Hermione talking about Gringott's upgrading their security at breakfast on September 2nd. Also… Squibs are born from two Mage parents (the inverse of a Muggleborn)… a Mage and a Muggle can only make either a Half-Blood or a Muggle.
To all my Guest reviewers… thank you for your comments, but again… FanFiction-Net accounts are free… so please consider making one (it'll let me answer some of your questions without cluttering the chapters with footnotes and potential spoilers).
I hung out with my family for Father's Day, so sorry for not posting that day if you were expecting something. We went to see Wonder Woman (a very good movie though the relationship between Diana and Steve could have been a little more developed).
Anyway… the Parseltongue so far translates to:
Sslissee-asslissahsss? = What's that sound?
Eesssenass! =Come with me!
Cuesysseth! = Stop!
Neissenass! = Come here!
As always… Like / Review / Whatever… till next time.
