We've waited long enough! Sorry for that massive pause but this chapter made me extremely nervous!
Edits and some revision done in the middle of chapter 33!
Thank you!
Snakeskins
Access Denied
England could go on about it as much as he wanted, Feliciano knew he was twice the gentleman Kirkland claimed to be when it came to taking women out on the town and making them feel as beautiful and worthwhile as he honestly felt they were.
But even he had to admit that going on a play-date was very very different from what he usually did. First of all, Feliciano couldn't remember the last time he'd felt like his hands were tied going into a social event, whether a private meal or a public outing.
"You're not really going to hold one of those, are you?"
"Uh- I was?"
Second, he'd never had his accessories or fashion sense questioned by a woman, nevermind a little girl like Gloria Flint. The self-waving silver streamer he'd helped a few other Slytherins charm in the common room was forced out of his hand and given to an over-eager looking first year to carry instead, leaving Feliciano empty-handed as far as Quidditch went and with just a little paper bag of the promised cauldron cakes and chocolate frogs for him and his 'date' to share from the top of the tower.
Third-
"No no no, you said I would choose where we sit!"
-Feliciano just didn't ask mean people on dates. It wasn't how he chose to go about being sociable, but he was starting to come to the sad understanding that Gloria Flint was as spoiled by her family as she was convinced of their pure-blooded superiority. She was a little princess, stubborn in a way that wasn't cute and made Feliciano want to take her by the arm when she pushed one of the second years out of the seat she wanted and tell her: no, that's not how young ladies behave in public.
But he couldn't do that, he could just obediently sit in the far back corner of the Slytherin Quidditch tower, jammed under the awning so he could barely see the pitch or the hoops for either team. Yes he was protected from the November wind, but no he didn't like the idea of being pushed into a corner by a little girl who wasn't interested in the sport at all.
"Didn't your father play Quidditch at Hogwarts?" Feliciano had made a point of not liking or being interested in the sport for two years now, but he was determined to make that the topic of conversation as the rest of the school filled their benches and his date made it ever more clear that he wasn't allowed to try looking for his friends in the crowd- not after she'd dragged him so far ahead of England and the others to get here and snag the worst seats in the tower. "I thought I saw his name on one of the-"
"Oh yes, Daddy just loves Quidditch." Maybe there would be hope for this afternoon then if she- "But I think it's positively dreadful, don't you? Malfoy's such a twit to go on about it all the time, it's a wonder you can keep your head on straight around him."
"Scorpius is my friend," Feliciano reminded her, desperately keeping half an ear open for the announcements at the start of the match. He couldn't hear anything yet… "And so this Arthur."
"Which boggles my mind, that Kirkland boy is just freeloading off the Kirkland-"
Feliciano opened his mouth with the biggest, fakest smile he could drum up to tell her to absolutely not finish that sentence, but the blessed megaphone blare of the seventh year Hufflepuff who introduced herself from the staff's observation tower stopped him:
"WELCOME, HOGWARTS SCHOOL, TO THE FIRST MATCH OF THIS YEAR'S QUIDDITCH HOUSE CUP TOURNAMENT!"
It also left him half-deaf, because with a frantic look around their corner of the observation tower Feliciano saw exactly how short-sighted Flint had been by blazing a path over into a private cranny of the bleachers. Behind the two of them on the wall and mounted just above their heads was a great big brass bowl with holes punched through it, a wizard speaker that vibrated with an excitable, radio-style voice that drummed up enthusiasm and started introducing players and changes since last year.
"REIGNING HOGWARTS CHAMPIONS: TEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAM GRYFFINDOOOOORR!" If Feliciano correctly remembered how much commentary went into every Quidditch match, then there was no way they were going to get any talking done at all. He was happier than he should have been.
But it also meant, between watching Gloria pout and clap her hands over her ears every few seconds, that Feliciano received a play-by-play description of the match after the loud roar of the Slythering team launching from inside the tower signaled the start of practice laps and aerial warm-up drills. The school had a good memory for foul plays, and the new announcer tempted the wrath of the championship house by giving a cheerful, albeit deafening, reminder:
"SLYTHERIN SEEKER SCORPIUS MALFOY PROVED HIMSELF LAST YEAR A CAPABLE FLYER IN THE SLYTHERIN-HUFFLEPUFF MATCH, WILL JAMES POTTER COUNTER WITH THE SAME AGGRESSIVE TACTICS AS THESE TWO SEEKERS FACE OFF FOR THE GOLDEN SNITCH?" Only being able to play each team once a year made for some of the fiercest Quidditch Rivalries Feliciano could remember in a long time. At least in other sports like football and racing, professional athletes could expect to go toe-to-toe more than just once a season. "WELL GET READY, HOGWARTS, BECAUSE WE'RE ABOUT TO FIND OUT: THE CAPTAINS ARE SHAKING… THE SNITCH IS RELEASED… AND ON DESFORD'S WHISTLE… THE GAME ISON!"
There were snacks to share, but the noise meant that there was little for Gloria Flint to enjoy. In order to avoid some kind of open conflict, Feliciano avoided smiling or enjoying himself too obviously. Less than ten minutes in to the blaring noise and the rocketing speed of passing broomsticks, even the nation had to admit he already had a pounding headache and a growing, desperate need for Scorpius to catch the snitch as soon as possible.
But at least, as a team, Slytherin was performing well.
"SLYTHERIN'S BACK IN POSSESSION OF THE QUAFFLE, HARPER'S DIVING AND TWISTING AS SHE- HOLD ON! POTTER'S IN A DIVE! HE'S SEEN SOMETHING- HE'S SEEN THE SNITCH! WHERE'S MALFOY?" Oh no.
As much as he wanted the match to end, he didn't want Slytherin to lose.
"TEN POINTS TO SLYTHERIN FOR THAT SCORE BUT- WAIT! MALFOY'S IN A DIVE IN THE OPPOSITE DIRECTION! SOMEONE'S FAKING AND WHOEVER ISN'T IS- LOOK AT MALFOY GO HE'S GOT POTTER SCREAMING ACROSS THE PITCH LIKE AN OWL THROUGH A THUNDERSTORM! IF MALFOY MEANS IT THEN- OH!"
The crowd gave a gasp and there was a roaring sound across the pitch from the other towers Feliciano couldn't see, the nation getting up and trying to see through the rest of the house where students were clamouring up for a better look. It was hopeless sitting here to try and see anything except the quick rise and fall of England's head several rows in front of him, but finally after a desperate pause and groaning noises, the announcer brought her mic back up.
"BLUDGER TO THE SHOULDER AND A LONG FALL FOR POTTER. HE'S OKAY, FOLKS, AND DESFORD'S WHISTLE STOPPED THE CHASE, BUT THAT WAS A NASTY BLOW FOR GRYFFINDOR'S STAR SEEKER. NO FOUL THOUGH: THE SEEKER GOT IN THE WAY OF A SMART CRACK BY SLYTHERIN BEATER NANCY CLEMENCE AIMED FOR CHASER ALBUS POTTER WITH THE QUAFFLE." It seemed fortunate enough: Albus didn't get hurt and there was no foul against Slytherin for James' injury! "PLAYERS ARE LINING UP… DESFORD'S GOT THE QUAFFLE… WE'RE BACK IN ACTION!"
And Feliciano's head was honestly beginning to pound. All he needed was another five minutes of play-by-play before finally hearing what he wanted.
"THE SEEKERS ARE JOSTLING FOR POSITION… THE SNITCH IS JUST WITHIN REACH! WAS THAT A KICK FROM POTTER-? IT DOESN'T MATTER BECAUSE MALFOY JUST ROLLED OUT OF RANGE AND WHAT A BURST OF SPEED HE JUST PUT OUT!THAT'S IT!" What's it wasn't a valid question, because every row of Slytherin students exploded in an inward wave of excitement, silver streamers and green banners, wands up high with sparks flying with the house colours, friends jumping and grabbing each other in hugs so they could scream and laugh over the blare of the voice-over:"MALFOY'S GOT THE SNITCH! ONE HUNDRED FIFTY POINTS TO SLYTHERIN! THIS MATCH IIIIIIISOVER!"
And with it went Feliciano's unwanted date!
Only good things came from the parade of cheering Slytherins roaring for their victorious team even a good fifteen minutes after their win. Slytherin let the Gryffindors slink back up to their tower dormitory to brood before leaving the Quidditch pitch, most of them waiting happily outside the team's change room to gather their heroes and usher them down to the dungeons. Feliciano lost Gloria in the push to get down from the tower, and he made the decision not to look for her once he caught up with Higgs and was given a forgiving hug and excited clap on the back.
"I didn't see a thing! Tell me it was amazing?"
"It was incredible, Vargas! You should have seen how fast he was going!" Higgs forgave him for everything and Ellie came up bouncing on her toes, her excitement giving him a genuine reason to smile as Feliciano started bouncing and then outright jumping as he fed off the happy energy and glee. He hadn't seen England grin and laugh so easily in months.
As a massive, cheering hoard the Slytherins circled and swept around their Quidditch team, clearing the way through lingering Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs to find their common room. Feliciano thought he saw David Baker at one point and spun around, walking backwards, to wave happily after him and got a laugh and a wave back from his classmate, then hurried to keep up with the rest of his house.
"You! You're still a bit of a tosser!" Half an hour later with Hogsmeade butter-beers circulating around the room and several chocolate frogs frantically leaping throughout the dungeon, Scorpius forgave him too. "But you should have seen the look on Potter's face when Desford didn't call a foul! Bloody murder in his eyes!"
Laughing, jumping, candy and songs. Saturday was forgotten and Sunday, along with the rest of November, came to a happy close.
The next week and a half of classes went by smoothly, and with Christmas fast approaching there came the usual efforts to round up friends for holiday visits.
"Scorpius-"
"Just one time can you not let your family drag you back to Italy?" Feliciano felt forgiven by this point for a bad date whose only follow-up had been Feliciano eagerly chatting to Gloria about the Quidditch match and Feliciano's friends not letting the two of them be alone again. Despite that, he wasn't really sure how to let Scorpius down easily for the third year in a row.
"I would,Scorpius, I just- can't." He didn't know what Lovino was planning for the holidays because his brother had fallen out of contact again, but he'd been shown the great danger in sending angry letters to Rome and was saving it until Christmas and his flight home.
For the moment, Feliciano and Scorpius were walking towards History of Magic after a brief detour that saw the nation chasing after David Baker on his way to a different class. There had only been one more football game after the weekend Feliciano and England had been kicked out of their common room, and he'd wanted to check and see if there would be one more before the end of term. They weren't going to be late to class, but they were going quickly.
Football had brought up Feliciano's muggle-like upbringing, and upbringing meant talking about family, and family led to Christmas break. It was actually a very logical progression for once!
"Your brother still sounds awful in my mind."
"Trust me, Lovino is much different in private! He's still mean, but a different kind of mean!" The sort to wake Feliciano up with angry yelling in the morning, not sit at his desk and conjure black clouds because he was upset. Scorpius didn't believe him, but that was okay. "And he's hardly the worst member of the family."
"That just makes it worse!"
Feliciano was laughing when they reached the History classroom and suddenly stopped, because there were fifteen students in Ravenclaw and Slytherin robes standing out in the hall, and as soon as they noticed Feliciano and Scorpius arriving there was this sudden flurry through everyone and rapid attention that turned straight on the nation.
He stopped dead, waited until he saw England frantically waving his arms trying to get the two of them to come closer, then hesitantly stepped forward again.
"What's going-?"
"Shh! Vargas get over here!"
He was seized by both arms at once, one by Arthur and the other by a Ravenclaw he half-recognized as Miss Miller before he was man-handled all the way to the classroom's shut door, plopped down and forced to stand there in confusion. He was just trying to turn around and get a proper explanation when he heard it: his language.
"Seven times!" Standard Italian in a woman's voice, her words harsh and clipped so sharply on the ends that he thought he recognized- "Seven times you have made your request and seven times it has been denied! You have asked the national wizarding galleries and the Ministry of Magic in Rome and you have been told no by all of them- if you send one more letter to the Milanese gallery then they will blacklist you for pestering them, do you not understand?"
And then he heard something almost as startling:
"No, I think it is you who does not understand." Stilted from lack of use, but functionally pure and accent impressively on point: it was Professor Huntington and Feliciano raised a quick hand to silence the person who hissed for him to translate. "The situation at this school is serious and in order to properly investigate I need-"
"Cannon fodder." Oh, if Feliciano hadn't been sure of the other speaker with her sharp tongue and the southern hint to her voice, he knew it now. "You crossed a line by bringing my husband's family directly into your petty investigation, especially with your wanton attempts to use thatbratas a way to bolster your own name. What does the Vargas Family care that you're the Venetian's teacher? You are still asking to take national, family treasures and hang them for your vandal to come and murder! You have absolutely no understanding of our Ministry's position on Hogwarts and its inability to structure and protect anything of value housed within these walls! You insult us!"
"The ministry or the family?"
"Both!"
"Then I don't know what it is with you old-world Europeans, but allowing head families to get in the way of progress for the sake of their own pride is something to be ashamed of!"
Feliciano jumped back like the door had burnt him, meaning he backed up right onto one of his Ravenclaw classmates and then kept going. He was absolutely not going to be caught dead by either woman on the other side of that door listening to their conversations: he'd rather throw himself out the high window across the hall first!
Except the students didn't agree with him, and he was caught before he got more than two Ravenclaws deep into the crowd trying to force himself away. When he started hearing whispers asking where he was going Feliciano hissed "To safety!" and struggled a little harder.
He didn't make it, and he heard the last part of the argument only because the small, fierce woman on the other side of the door dug down in herself to draw out power without volume that propelled her voice in a way that would have made Grandpa Rome proud- and a little bit scared.
"YouignorantAmerican: I have no more patience to waste on you." She didn't even shout, she barely raised her voice beyond the volume of a speaking voice, but the power Chiara of Sicily put into her words put a definite end to the argument and finally made the third years clue in that this was not a discussion they should have been trying to eavesdrop on. The class split in two and fell back away from the door, and Feliciano ended up losing his footing on the edge of his robe and the sudden loss of support from students who had been holding him up. He only hit his knees on the stone floor, but he heard the door swing open before he could get back on his feet and hide properly.
There were more than just two people in his household with the surname Vargas. Feliciano had actually been very careful to shrink the number down during his unification wars, struggling out from under Austria's foot and making the effort to take Rome from the church before unifying with his brother. In the north now adays there was only himself and his brother Seborga worth mentioning, with San Marino keeping quietly to his hill and not bothering anyone. If Feliciano wanted to see more of his immediate brothers and sisters, then he had to look south to Lovino's home instead.
And if he did, then the first nation he'd find was Sicily.
Chiara of Sicily was a beautiful woman, and she had been since the end of the Napoleonic wars. Not very tall, but stately with her petite form and strong chin forever held a little too high for Feliciano's normal tastes. She had flowing black arabesque hair that today was loosely pinned and folded back behind her head with a net of pearls that was almost antique by muggle standards, but harkened back to another era when she had stood next to queens and bid princes kiss her feet. Her dark, sun-kissed skin and the straight length of her nose, coupled with the darkness of her eyes, gave her a commanding appearance and she was dressed to the nines today to take advantage of it.
She was a province who moved like a capital, surveying the assembled students critically for a moment with her black eyes darkly shadowed by pens and brushes. When she saw him she gliding forward with three long steps under a lavish gown Feliciano mistook for black before the light told him it was an impressive shade of green. With silk brocade and gold cords along the bodice looked almost Baroque, but the fit and cut had been updated, the material lightened, and overall it was exactly the sort of thing a true sorcerous would wear to impress a lowly witch.
Feliciano made sure to back up as she came striding past him, a cold sensation creeping up his neck when he inclined his head just a little bit, clenching his jaw with the force not to snap his eyes back up and watch her. It wasn't a personal reaction, but one born strictly from political power and arrangements the nation inside this little body didn't want to see changed. He was the stronger half of the nation, and she was only a lesser member of his brother's weaker household. He did not bow or shy away from her, that wasn't the way things worked.
But the 13 year old younger brother of a powerful warlock did not boldly stand in the way of his sister-in-law, especially not after she'd just come out of a fierce argument with one of his professors.
And even though Chiara ignored him almost completely save for that brief pause, storming off down the corridor and presumably out of the school, North Italy was coming to resent this self-inflicted curse all over again.
Filtering into the heavy silence of the classroom in the immediate aftermath of the argument just made everything worse.
Professor Huntington did not like him. It had nothing to do with his grasp of history- Italian or otherwise, she simply did not like him. She ignored any questions he tried to ask, selected him to answer questions only if his was the only hand for five minutes to dare leave the desk, and made a point of underlining the seedy facts of Italian wizarding history by pin-pointing every incident of brutality and death carried out by any Vargas name, regardless of whether that so-called branch of the family was still around. If she didn't like him on a normal basis, then dealing with him after he'd just heard half her argument with a member of his family was just going to make things even worse- he just had to fret about how things were supposed to escalate.
The entire lecture was given with Professor Huntington looking more stressed and upset than Feliciano had probably ever seen her, to the point where she even stumbled in the middle of her lesson and stood there looking furious. Feliciano just knew to drop his gaze firmly to his textbook and try to take additional notes from there in order to avoid eye-contact with her.
But in the end she still called on him to stay after class.
And she told England and Scorpius off when they lingered with him.
And she took five points from England for being insubordinate when he argued again that he wanted to just stand by the door.
So Feliciano had to play meek and humble in front of a teacher who'd decided not to like him, hands behind his back and eyes down at the orange ruff along the edge of Professor Huntington's turquoise robe and over the curled toes of her red shoes. He wanted to love how much colour she wore, but was having a harder time with it.
"I suppose, Mister Vargas, that you enjoyed eavesdropping this afternoon?"
"It wasn't on purpose, Professore-"
"Professor. This is not an Italian school." Why did she have to be like that? Shouldn't she have been happy that she had someone to practice with and keep her Italian sharp? "Do you understand how deeply inappropriate your snooping was?" Huntington had her arms folded in front of her and Feliciano refused to look up at her face. For one she'd find it rude of him and for another she probably had her red lips pulled down in a horrible frown.
"I didn't really understand it."
"That is a lie."
"No!" But then he looked up when she accused him of something he hadn't meant! "I understood the words, yes, but not what you were talking about! My brother has stopped writing so often and I never speak to Chiara at all!"
"So you do know her." Professor Huntington's frown was not as severe as he'd feared, not a great big upside down U perverting her face like a terrible clown, but the angry rosebud of her tinted mouth was still angry. He tried to talk back and found himself chaffing against the fact that he had to defend himself. What was happening between Rome and this awful school?
"Of course I do: she's my brother's wife and- and…" He was trying to make a miserable attempt at peace, a withered olive branch that he half-raised and then had to let fall. He almost admitted: 'she doesn't like me, and I don't like her very much either.' But whatever the internal, hidden problems, his tongue was going to physically drop out of his mouth and wriggle away across the floor if he dared drag family business out into the sun to please a foreigner. He couldn't do it. Two hundred years of fussy relations with Sicily weren't going to make North Italy speak poorly of his sister to a stranger. "Of course I know her. But she didn't come to see me- we didn't even speak!"
"But you did listen, and for that-" Feliciano didn't even see her wand until it was pointed between his eyes, and he vowed to absolutely never bow his head in front of her again. He opened his mouth to demand to know what on earth she was doing when it hit him.
He didn't hear what she said, he just saw a brilliant orange flame with a blue core and livid outline spew from the end of the wand and slide straight into his mouth. He tried to scream and his whole body reacted to kick him away from the spell but it didn't work: he moved but the sound was backed up in his throat until he gagged, the flames completely without pain until a violent cramp gripped the base of his tongue and sank into his jaw, anchoring itself harshly until he roared wordlessly and tried to clamp his jaws shut to stop it.
He slammed into one of the desks trying to get away, bashing his arm just above the elbow and stunning the hand before he could get his wand out properly. The spell was over before he could regroup, and he didn't know what exactly his face did but he felt it burning up every part of him on the inside: how dare she.
"An over-reaction if I ever saw one." His teeth were tingling and his mouth felt numb, the pain fading quickly once the fire went out. "You're perfectly fine, Mister Vargas, but utterly forbidden from breathing a word of what passed between Missus Vargas and I to anyone else in the school, understood?"
"How dare you!" He hated the young voice that bounced back from the walls and hit him. He hated how young it sounded when he was angry, so down-right insulted that he couldn't find the will to run awayfrom it. He was so outraged he let his voice barrel straight into the language they both spoke but she somehow hated: "I am your legal charge and ward under the laws of this school! How dare you conflate me with officials in Rome and blame me for your own lack of success! How dare you hex me for your own petty sense of pride!"And then he just- "You idiot witch! Without Lovino's signature the only one who can grant you access to the Italian archives isme!"
It went without speaking that he would never, not in a thousand years, give Hogwarts that access now. He didn't know what purpose she had in asking for more art for a school that couldn't care for what it already had. He didn't know why she was making such a violent push for it that Chiara herself had been forced to come to Hogwarts in broad daylight to tell Huntington to her face that no, Italy would not consent, but he no longer cared.
Italy would not consent.
North Italy would not give his blessing.
Feliciano Vargas would cut out his own hexed tongue before even thinking about it.
"That will be twenty points from Slytherin for such a disgusting outburst." How dare she- "And ten for forgetting yet again which country you are in!" How dare she-! "And if you dare raise that wand at me, Vargas, I will have you expelled."
He hadn't felt himself draw his wand, in fact he was only aware of it because she pointed it out. There was a slim chance that, had he not been so furious at that moment, he might have been worried to find the weapon so readily in his hand. Instead he was very seriously weighing the possibility that he could call her bluff, only to understand that no, it wasn't an empty threat, and Feliciano couldn't afford to be tossed out of this school for something so petulant.
He put his wand away, straightened his class robes with a hard yank on his front, and stood straight.
And Professor Alice Huntington was standing taller than him only because she was an adult of full height and his spine was compressed and shrunk to conform this irritating little body. She stood there with her nose in the air, red hair curled and styled perfectly around the back of her head, red lips pursed and flamboyant robes glaring harshly in the glow of her classroom.
In four years he promised himself, when this ruse was done, he was going to slap that haughty look off her face without even lifting a finger.
"Will there be anything else, Professor?" But in the meantime he just had to suffer with it.
"No. You are excused."
So he bowed without taking his eyes off of her, turned sharply on his heel, and marched at double-time to leave her toxic presence behind.
He just had to suffer and wait.
I KNOW WHAT I'M DOING I SWEAR PLEASE DON'T JUMP DOWN MY THROAT THERE IS CHARACTER-BASED JUSTIFICATION FOR THIS I PROMISE.