With evening get-togethers out of the question due to increased precautions, Professor Slughorn organized a brunch for his select students. Tom was walking to the professor's office, where the social event was being held, followed by Avery and Lestrange; however, once there he would be obligated to sit beside Charlotte, who had become problematic for an entirely different set of reasons to what he had anticipated, although those expectations—that she would sometimes be too perceptive and inquisitive for his liking—did not go wholly unfulfilled either.

Entering the room, Tom saw someone whom he was not happy to find there. Although he had not previously received invitation to Slug Club gatherings,—other than the Christmas party, which had had a larger guest list under the reasoning of "the more the merrier"—Oliver Winship was present at this brunch. He was sitting beside Charlotte, with Valeria on the other side of her. Just before, he had found the prospect of having to take the seat next to his girlfriend objectionable, but this change of circumstances was arguably more unpleasant. Oliver rose from the chair when he saw him.

"I suppose I'm in your place," he said.

"You suppose rightly."

Charlotte and Valeria shared a look that he could not read and he once again wished for the ability of a legilimens. He took the seat relinquished to him; Lestrange sat beside him, with Avery next to him. Oliver now chose the available seat next to Valeria, who did not object, from which Tom concluded that Winky Crockett had been another superfluous guest for the previous party and had not been added to the regular group, as Oliver had.

Professor Slughorn bustled in followed by floating trays of food. "My apologies for not being here to greet you all," he said, directing the trays to the center of the table. "There was a matter that required my attention, but it's all taken care of now." He looked at the students assembled there. "It seems I've arrived before some of my guests at least." Taking notice of his new recruit, he happily addressed Oliver, "Good to see you here, Winship! Glad you could join us."

"Thank you for inviting me, sir." He didn't exude flattery as much as others did, who might have said something about how honored they felt to be there, but he was aptly polite.

They waited to begin until the others had arrived, and then Slughorn went through his usual rounds of posing questions to each of them—some about family members, some about future plans, some about present endeavors.

"And what have you been up to lately, Miss Lowell?" Slughorn asked Valeria.

"I've been working on some new things, but I can't tell you about them…" she answered mysteriously.

"Oho, how intriguing! And I saw your handiwork at the last quidditch match; moving snakes were a nice touch to the uniform."

"Thank you, professor. And in a way we have you to thank for that. The invitation you extended to Captain Crockett at the holiday party allowed me to meet him, and things went from there." She smiled. Valeria was one who made use of flattery.

"I look forward to seeing Madame Soleil when she is here." Slughorn turned to Charlotte now. "When exactly will she be gracing us with her presence?" There was no irony or sarcasm imposing on his words; it appeared he truly held Charlotte's mother in high esteem.

"A week from today," she answered, smiling.

"I'm sure you are all aware of Miss Soleil's father, a French representative for the International Confederation of Wizards, but I don't suppose you know so much about her mother. I attended a potioneer's conference two years ago where she spoke about the effects of magic on ingredients, very fascinating subject; she's something of a pioneer in this, if I'm not mistaken?"

"On the scale that she works at, yes. We don't imagine that her group is the first to experiment with using spells to enhance the properties of plants,—and other types of ingredients, but her favorite is plants—however, there isn't any record of others attempting anything precisely like what she is working on," Charlotte answered. "Don't ask me for any details about their experiments though; I'm not very well-informed about them."

"Top secret then, is it?" asked a fourth-year Ravenclaw girl, named Calliope. Charlotte just shrugged, the perfect way to leave them all wondering how much she knew. Tom found this infuriating. He didn't even care about her mother's experiments, but he hated secrets—unless they were his own, of course.

"Well done in the last choral performance, by the way," Slughorn said to Calliope, who was more or less the star of the school's choir.

"Thank you, sir," she replied. "I'm sorry to say the next one won't be for some time; a lot of practices have been cancelled because of… you know." She meant the attack. They all understood. A tense silence clung to the group until Calliope broke it with an apology for the awkwardness, then the conversation carried on. But in that silence, fear was wordlessly expressed and Tom reveled in it.

...

He and Charlotte, having made plans to go to the library to study after the brunch, left together.

While they were walking, he said, "You can't seem to speak to anyone without your mother's visit being brought up."

"I know. I should just wear a sign that says 'Yes, Lisabelle Soleil will be visiting us in x number of days'."

"I'm sure Valeria could get that done for you." Charlotte laughed. It felt right to him to laugh with her. "Actually though, I'm surprised you're so eager to help her—Perdita, I mean."

"Why? Because she gave me a dirty look once after you asked me out?"

"It was probably more than once… But no. Because she's a muggle-born. And you're a pureblood. I know you've said yourself you have unusual views for a pureblood; but then you also accept your higher status gladly. Helping her could show you sympathize. And if the scale of such sympathy grows, the balance will be upset; the pureblood rank will dissolve." He tried to keep his tone even so as to not give away his prejudice.

"Balance? That's an ironic term. It's inequality." After a moment's pause, she added, "You're not pureblood. Should that change how I feel about you?"

"I'm different," he said tensely. It was all he could say. He wanted to tell her; he wanted her to know that the blood of Salazar Slytherin himself flowed in his veins. Then he had to convince himself that that was not a need for her approval; it was simply based on the respect that he deserved.

She smiled, seeming to agree with him.

"Well I doubt my small action will have that effect anyway. Although…" she hesitated. "Perhaps, um, don't mention to my mother that Perdita is muggle-born."

"She would treat her differently if she knew that?"

"Yes. Maybe. I don't know if it would matter to her in this case, but—about a year ago there was an incident where she declined the application of a pureblood wizard who wanted to work with her, because it was potentially dangerous work, as experimenting with unknown magic and potions is. The reason she rejected him was... she felt his life was too valuable. He didn't mind so much once he found that out, so it didn't turn into a scandal, but she's liable to let something like that happen again, and I would prefer to have as little to do with that as possible." So Charlotte had been raised with the same ideals that he had come to take on as his own. He gathered that her concern was for her reputation, and her opinion of pureblood supremacy was still unclear to him, although she gave the impression she did not share her mother's views. "She thinks muggle-borns will be less competent, but pureblood life is too precious, so she compromises by mainly having half-bloods do the work." Tom might have expressed some interest in this being beneficial to him, were he not so rigidly opposed to making mention of his muggle heritage. "It makes sense I guess," Charlotte said.

"You guess? You don't sound very convinced."

"I'm not. Like you and your disagreement with Professor Dumbledore over the power of love." Was she trying to confront him about his dismissal of love's value? Not wanting to talk about that with her, he wasn't sure what to say at first.

"Like Dumbledore said, skepticism is a gift." He couldn't help letting a tiny bit of mockery creep into his tone as he quoted the professor. "As for me, I prefer certainty."

Charlotte's eyes met his. "So do I."

...

"Avery, didn't you ask Valeria Lowell to go to Professor Slughorn's Christmas party with you? But she said no?" Avery didn't answer, only gave Tom a mildly annoyed look. "It doesn't matter if you won't say anything; I know it's true. Doesn't that make you upset, what she did?"

"I'm glad she didn't say yes. She's not… good enough for me." Of course, Valeria was only a half-blood.

"But at the time, she stopped you from getting what you wanted."

"I suppose, yes."

"I don't think she should get away with that..."

Author's Note: Okay so something I haven't addressed yet in my commentary on the story is Charlotte's prejudice. In order to be someone Tom would want to have a relationship with, even if it's a fake one, I feel like she has to have pureblood supremacy tendencies. And be pureblood herself, which is why I made her that way. However, she is uncertain, which I've done to make her more likeable. She doesn't openly hate and oppress, but she's more likely to be complicit with oppression and she certainly is willing to overlook some degree of injustice. I think it's an important characteristic to show; it's the kind of prejudice that hides but skews our views while we may be unaware of it. Something to think about.

Sorry about the weirdly tiny scene at the end; I just needed to have that foreshadowing in there.