Chapter 2: Pride, Prejudices and Philosophical Smalltalk
"Snape was WHAT?"
"Apparently he, Professor McGregor and my mum were friends," Harry repeated to a wide-eyed Ron. They were sitting on their table in the DADA classroom as the dark-haired boy related the happenings of the previous night, trying to ignore the arrival of several chattering Slytherins who would be taught together with them. "He seemed to be really pissed off when she mentioned it, but he did not deny it either."
"That's....ugh!" His friend shuddered visibly. "I mean who in his right mind would want to be friends with that ugly, greasy bastard? Really, the man's a snake! It would take a complete insane and mad person to..."
"Ron," Harry interrupted him quietly, his green eyes flashing dangerously, "this is my mum we're talking about. Remember?"
"Uh- yeah. Sorry. Forgot for a moment...", the redhead trailed off, taking great pains to inspect the wand in his hand. "But still!" he insisted after a moment. "Still...It's bloody weird! I mean Snape has always made painfully clear to the entire world that he HATES you!"
Before Harry could return anything, the door opened and a breathless Hermione stormed in, a bunch of books in her arms. "Oh thank goodness, I already thought that I would be too late for the very first lesson!" she sighed relieved instead of greeting. Sitting down next to Ron, she flipped a strand of tangled brown hair behind her ears. "You know, I was in the...."
"Library and forgot the time", the two boys continued in unison, exchanging a short look with each other.
"Exactly." Not noticing the mockery, Hermione began to arrange the books decoratively in front of her. "What were you talking about anyway? According to your looks, it seemed to be rather seriously."
As Harry quickly filled her in, her brown eyes began to widen more and more. "Your mother and Snape were FRIENDS?" she finally squealed unbelievingly.
Ron grinned. "Yeah, that had been my reaction, too."
"Err well...", glancing towards Harry, the girl obviously tried to find a proper explanation only to fail miserably for probably the first time in her entire life. "Perhaps he isn't as bad as we always thought", she eventually suggested in a doubting voice.
The redhead snorted sarcastically. "Oh yes, when you put it like this, I cannot think how I failed to notice it", he retorted. "Honestly, Snape's a real pal. Practically perfect in every way. Except, you know, his entire personality."
"Tell me about it." Harry twisted his face in disgust, remembering the thousand times the Potion Master had already tried his hardest to get him either expelled from school or humiliated in class. Then suddenly a little grin appeared on his lips. "But you should have seen the way this Professor McGregor treated him. I didn't think I would see the day someone teases him, slaps him, calls him "Sev" and still survives."
"Sev?! She called him SEV?!" To the obvious confusion of the entire presents, Ron bursted out into hysterical laughter. "Good Merlin, what kind of person is that?!"
"Come to think about it, they were in the same term, are of the same age", Hermione speculated dreamily before -to Harry's immense horror- beginning to giggle girlfully. "Perhaps they were in love with each other."
"Finally declaring your stupid infatuation to Weasley, mudblood?"
Remaining stoically quiet (in contrast to a furiously blushing Ron), Hermione didn't even bother to look up to the grey-eyed boy who had once more managed to appear right behind them without anyone's notice. "Malfoy, if you can't say anything nice, don't bother burdening the world with your incessant droning", she shot a soothing look into Ron´s direction. "I suppose this means that he'd never talk at all or what do you say?"
A flicker ran through the cold grey eyes, like a sliver of lightning through a sea of storm clouds as the tall blond leaned closer to Hermione, eyeing her in a way at which the girl raised her head in anticipation. She knew Draco Malfoy well enough by now to tell that this expression always preceded an insult he was particularly proud of having come up with. And she wasn't mistaken. "I should have known that you would try to protect your little friend, Granger." Malfoy gave the girl a sneer that practically dripped with contempt. "He's probably the best prospect someone like you has in life."
The girl blinked in surprise, while Ron stood up to face his chosen arch-nemesis. "What the hell do you want to say with this, Malfoy?" he hissed in a voice that made Harry fear for the worst.
"Ron, he just wants to provoke you", he tried to calm down his friend's temper, but the Weasley only waved him away impatiently before turning back to Malfoy. "Well?"
"Isn't this easy to see?" A sardonic little smile appeared on the other boy's pale lips as his eyes wandered back to Hermione, not bothering to hide their disgust. "She's nothing but a mudblood but then", the smile widened. "she would fit quite well into your family, I am sure. Judging from the hut you are living in, you and your people must be quite accustomed to dirt."
Ice dripped down Harry's spine and melted into his blood as the double-insult of the words sunk in while he saw Hermione hitching her breath. Then the shock turned to burning anger bubbling forward, but before he could only think of a proper retort, Ron had already threw himself on Malfoy, his eyes more furious than Harry had ever seen them before.
"You incredible, nasty..." The incoherent rage in the Weasley´s voice made even Malfoy blink.
"Ron, NOT!" Hermione rushed after him, obviously trying to save the situation by keeping her friend in his seat, but it was already too late. Both boys had spoken their curses at the same time and although Harry didn't acoustically understand one of them, their results were damn near a new holocaust.
Hermione, hit by Malfoy´s attack, fell back to the floor with a little scream, taking the books, she had neatly placed on her desk before, with her, while Ron had somehow managed to set free a storm that sent every object in the classroom, that was lighter than a feather, into the air.
Seeing how both, Gryffindor and Slytherin students, had the hell of a time trying to avoid painful crashes with flying flowerpots and other dangerously active objects, Harry stood up frantically and rose his wand, not quiet knowing what he intended to do with it, when he suddenly heard a familiar voice behind him: "FINITE INCANTATEM!"
Abruptly fell silent; the only sound heard was the simultaneous turn of heads and gasps at the tall blonde in the door entrance, who was staring at the destruction of the classroom with dangerously shining dark blue eyes. In any other moment some student would have whistled admiringly or clapped his hands, but confronted with the sapphire coloured death of the new teacher's gaze, everybody just hold their breaths, waiting for what would come now.
While Malfoy scrambled to his seat, Ron eventually regained consciousness, and helped the bruised Hermione to sit down on her chair again, murmuring some vague apology into her direction.
"What in Merlin's name is going on here?" Professor McGregor finally demanded to know in an alarming quiet voice. Her eyes flashed through the room and finally landed on Harry. But instead of addressing him, she turned towards Dean Thomas behind him. "You over there! Would you kindly fill me in?"
Blushing at the unexpected attention, Dean nodded, obviously deciding to sum up the situation as shortly as possibly. "Malfoy has called Hermione a mudblood which was why Ron attacked him", he explained, pointing towards the actors of the earlier show. "In the process they somehow managed to demolate the classroom."
Following his gaze, the new teacher let her sapphire eyes wander from a heavy breathing Ron to a pale but controlled Draco with an unreadable expression on her face. "Malfoy, huh?", she finally asked, her tone still too neutral to be taken at face value. "And judging from your looks you are a Weasley, I suppose? Well, I think that proves the old saying of traditions that never die."
Without ever taking her eyes from them, she approached the two boys with the flawless movements Harry still remembered from the previous evening. "I recall your fathers having little wars like this going on all the time when they were in school", she continued in her casual tone, the corner of her mouth shortly quirking at the memory. "The two of them were one year under me but nevertheless they somehow managed to entertain the whole school with their childish rivalries. But this", her tone sharpened, "this does not mean that I will tolerate this sort of behaviour in my classroom. Do you two understand me?!"
"Yes, Professor", both boys muttered, throwing hateful glances at each other.
Still staring at them, she finally sighed deeply. "So what shall I do with you now?" she asked, shaking her head in slight annoyance. "I can hardly blame any of you to be responsible for this idiotic inter-house discrimination that has been running rampant at this school ever since it opened, can I?"
Pressing her lips together she seemed to think her options all over, only to sigh again in the end, this time sounding somehow defeated. "Well, if you agree to clear out this mess, I won't take any points from you, I guess. Nevertheless I'd like to remind you that many people judge Hogwarts houses from the behaviour of its inhabitants." Her eyes finally rested on Malfoy, their expression profoundly cold by now. "This goes especially to you, Mr Malfoy, so kindly try to keep back the next time you feel like insulting a Muggle-born classmate."
The boy looked up, his grey eyes widening in sheer disbelief. "You think that insulting a mudblood brings shame on Slytherin?" he repeated the sense of her words incredulously.
The sweet line of the teacher's mouth grew even harder. "Use your brain, Mr Malfoy", she advised him sharply. "It is no secret that Slytherin has gotten itself the rather dubious reputation of having brought forth more dark wizards than any other. So don't you think that your generation should try to prove that the House does still hold his old honour?"
While most of the students began to hold their breath at Professor McGregor's true but usually not loudly spoken words, Malfoy blushed, obviously not that sure about himself anymore. "My father...", he began rather unsure.
"Your father", the blonde interrupted him coldly. "I don't doubt that Lucius would have thought just like you, but then he always possessed something you failed to show us today. It's called tact."
Some Gryffindors began to giggle but instantly shut up as the professor shot a short glance in their direction. "The Serpent's House is not synonymous with malice or unfair behaviour!" she continued in a surprisingly ragged tone. "Slytherins start out the same as everybody else who passes through this school. They are not chosen for malice, but for their ambition and their capability of greatness. Never forget this, Mr Malfoy! It is not the house that makes the wizard or the witch, it's the choice one makes!"
Her attention suddenly wandered back to Ron. "By the way, Mr Weasley!"
Ron looked up. "Yes, Professor?"
The blonde's expression was unreadable. "Try to behave yourself the next time someone tries to provoke you. Mr Malfoy certainly didn't act properly but this doesn't mean that you have to overreact like a little child and to demolate my classroom." She snorted ironically. "I remember that Gryffindors use to call behaviour like this defending their honour. _I_ call it stupid."
Half the Slytherins slid off their chairs in surprise. Others were beginning to grin wickedly, obviously agreeing with all their heart - in contrast to Ron who only stared wide-eyed at the new teacher. "You mean I should simply let him insult one of my best friends?" he asked incredulously.
"No", Professor McGregor corrected him softly. "I mean that you shouldn't give him the satisfaction of acting exactly like he supposed you to do. I admire courage in any form but behaviour like this can lead to certain death."
Harry froze at this remark but his friend obviously had not gotten McGregor's point. "So you suppose that we should just let the bloody Snakes go around and insult all Muggle-born without doing..."
"I'd like you to remember the fact that I was in Slytherin myself, Mr Weasley", she interrupted him again, the bright flash in her eyes betraying her indifferent voice. "And let me take the liberty to say that I was always proud of my House."
Beginning to walk the classroom up and down in her feline way, she let her eyes wander among them all, a distant expression in them as if she did not see them but other students of another time. Then she shook her head, letting her pretty golden hair fly through the air in an elegant swift arc. "Don't think that I want to disgrace your house, Mr Weasley, I am far from it. My elder sister and my very best friends had both been Gryffindors and they had been wiped out as a symbolic assertion of the power and truth of the very Slytherin philosophy you are criticising right now", her jaw clenched momentarily as her eyes locked with Harry's for the shortest of seconds, leaving back a painfully aching in the boy's chest. "But then the Serpent's House is not the only one at fault for the current state", she finally continued firmly. "As far as I remember from my time, Ravenclaws used to persist in thinking of Hufflepuffs as slow and doddering fools with a collective house intellect in the single digits, while they themselves were seen as swotty bookworms without any talent of playing Quidditch properly by the other houses. Nevertheless it was always Slytherin who had to bear the blame for every little discrimination going on at this school."
While most of the Gryffindors looked baffled, the fraction of the Slytherins began to murmur in obvious agreement, eying their new teacher with the respect they ordinary only seemed to have occupied for their Head of House.
Professor McGregor eyes wandered to Snape's students, their expression milder by now. "Of course you can correct me if I'm wrong."
"You're not." Everybody turned round to face Blaise Zabini, a pale dark-haired Slytherin girl, all dark waves and seastorm eyes covered under the longest and thickest lashes one could imagine. Although being known as a good student, she never spoke much, always preferred to observe everything calmly, but obviously something about the new teacher's words had managed to excite her. "However that does not mean that any of these Gryffindors will understand you." She continued, sending a short glance into their direction. "It's so much easier when everything is black and white, so why should they bother to ask themselves if we're all in for the Dark Arts or if some of us just like our privacy?"
"You say it", Pansy Parkinson agreed, surprising the class with her vehemence perhaps even more than Blaise did with speaking at all. Snorting contemptuously, she glared at the Gryffindors, to nobody's surprise most venomously at Harry. "But ever since this scar-headed celebrity arrived here, even the Headmaster has forgotten that there are still other houses. 'Well done, Slytherin, well done--but wait! Here, Gryffindor, have a hundred and sixty points, you can win this year because you have The Boy who Lived!'"
"That's not fair!" A purple red Harry bursted out furiously.
A cold smile graced Pansy's lips. "There you are damn right."
Before a new tumult could break out in class, Professor McGregor suddenly began to laugh quietly, making everybody in the room turning the attention back at her. "I think you got the message", she finally explained to her stunned students with an irresistible sweet smile that lightened up her eyes as much as her lips, apparently amused about a private joke she alone could understand. "You all are more or less secretly holding a grunge against each other, the Slytherins perhaps even more than the others, because they consider themselves hated by 3/4 of the school."
"And they are damn right to do so", Ron muttered but instantly shut up as a sapphire blue flash was sent into his direction.
"And so", the professor continued as she turned back towards them, "it had been for centuries. Some students come here damaged. Taught to hate. They are shunned, then they become bitter, and pass that bitterness to their own offspring, and the hatred gets worse and worse as the generations pass. But I don't want anybody of you to forget that they're all still children, and that their choices are their own."
With this she stopped, once again glancing to Harry as if she'd like to tell him something but thought better of it in the last instant. Looking at the still silent students in front of her, she decided to ease the situation with another bell-like laughter. "And this was my first lection. You are dismissed now." Twinkling teasingly at them, she flipped back a lock of golden hair. "But don't think that we will go on like that and doing nothing but philosophical small talk in this class. Next lesson you will have to bring your books with you, understand?"
The tense silence broke as the first of the students began to gather their belongings and vanished chatting out of the door. Harry followed them in silence together with Ron and Hermione, not realizing that two sapphire blue eyes still rested on him as he left the classroom, their expression distant, as if though they were seeing something in him that no one else was supposed to know about.
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Flashback:
"I don't understand it! I simply don't understand it!" The pretty blonde exclaimed, her brilliant blue eyes flashing angrily while she walked the room up and down. "Why the freaking hell have I to be tutored by the greasiest bastard of the entire school? And if that would not be enough, I simply don't get why I'll be taught together with this arrogant Gryffindor bitch of all things!"
"I certainly did not beg to waste my precious time with two morons who are too stupid to brew even a simple shrinking solution!" the black-haired boy her outburst was partly addressed to, snapped back, his dark eyes glaring in a way that could make first years flee. "If you want to know the reason for this nonsense, why don't you simply go and ask Dumbledore?"
The blonde snorted in utter disgust. "As if this old muggle loving fool would bother to tell me!" she returned shrewdly. "Nevertheless I'd really, _really_ like to know!"
"Well, isn't this obvious?"
Both, the blond and the black-haired, turned in unison towards the third person in the room, who had by now slunken herself into the leather chair against the far wall, glowing like a little candle with her flaming hair, arms folded, obviously quite tired of both their outbursts.
"If this is so why wouldn't you let us participate in your superior knowledge, Evans?" the boy asked icily. "Somehow I fail to follow your surely brilliant train of thoughts."
Eying him coolly with her irritating sparkling green eyes, Lily Evans flipped back a strand of blood-red hair, the relaxed lines of her shoulders proclaiming that she was completely unimpressed by his sarcasm. "Well, it's quite logical, Severus", she returned in her flat teenage voice, bored by the stupidity of the others and making no confession to the marvellous. "You, this hysterical blonde and me, we are all three known to be loners or, to be more accurate, "antisocial pricks" - and we all know how highly our dear Headmaster praises the virtues of friendship and teamwork, don't we?"
While Severus´ forehead began to frown in sudden understanding, the blonde only snorted pejoratively. "Speak for yourself and Snape, Evans, but not for me!" she shot in, shaking her pretty head in unhidden contempt. "_I_ have no problem in finding friends."
"You mean brainless admirers, Morrigan", the other girl corrected her without any malice, but with the violent disregard for foreign feelings she was feared for in school. "Morons who fail to see that there is more about you than beautiful looks and a sweet smile. Whom of them would you actually call a friend?"
Morrigan opened her mouth in denial, then shut it again, obviously in spite of herself agreeing with the redhead and therefore not quite knowing how to react. "Whatever", she finally returned uncertainly, flipping a lock of tangled blond hair out of her face. "So you really guess that this silly tutoring is a futile attempt of Dumbeldore´s to create some sort of attachment between his three black sheep?"
Severus sneered contemptuously. "Come to think about it, this is so ridiculous that it might really be our precious Headmaster's idea."
"I knew there was a reason I never listened to the old fool before", the blonde stated dryly while letting herself fall in the chair next to Lily's. "Say what you want but this does nothing but prove my hypothesis of him missing a couple of screws up there."
The corner of Severus´ lips quirked. "For once I agree."
Lily's green eyes were observing their little exchange with their usual unreadable expression. "Not that I don't marvel at this historical first but since we cleared the reason for this stupid tutoring, I'd rather suggest us to begin with it", she remarked casually. "I really don't fancy the thought of failing potions again."
Severus rose an eyebrow, but before he could return whatever remark laid on his tongue, Morrigan's soft laughter suddenly shattered on the cold stones of the Dungeon. "Ambition. That much I can understand about you, Evans." She nodded, her blue eyes regarding the other girl thoughtfully. "Even if it astonishes me to find it burning so brightly in a Gryffindor."
The usual uninterest in the green eyes faded slightly for the fraction of a second and made place to a sort of bitterness no one of the two had ever expected to see in them. "You are expressing what most of my dear housemates think", the redhaired girl returned in a frightening blank voice. "´Lily Evans is such a heartless bitch that she would have better been sorted into Slytherin. The Sorting Head probably just did not cause she's nothing but a dirty mudblood´!"
The blonde blinked in surprise before regaining her composure, while Severus snorted loudly. "I have considered you brighter than to hear to what those idiots say, Evans", he told the other one rather tartly. "Muggle-born or not, you have more talent in your little finger than most of them have in their wand.- Don't take it as a compliment, just as an observation", he added quickly, while trying to avoid the astonished expression of her green eyes.
"However he means it, Snape is quite right!" Morrigan agreed. Leaning back in her chair, she absently began to play with the wand in her hands. "You are really good, you know, and therefore you will always have to face envy...And it's not like you're the only one who is prejudiced against because of her sorting", she added after a short while, her tone too casual to be taken at false value. "Take me as an example. I don't think you to be aware of the fact that my whole bloody family has been in Gryffindor?"
The green eyes stared intently at her. "So?"
"So?" Morrigan sneered, but instead of non-caring, it sounded rather sad this time. "Bloody hell, Lily, you know exactly how the other houses judge Slytherin. Ever since I've been sorted, my oh-so-perfect elder sister, former Head girl by the way, and my dear parents consider me some sort of murderous dark witch. It's like they always long to ask me how many muggles I have killed in the last term when I come home for the holidays."
Lily began to laugh, the usual uninterested expression betrayed by a sparkle of green fire in her eyes. "Just like my sister. Petunia never misses the opportunity to tell me that I'm nothing but some bloody freak."
"Well, at least your families register that you exist", Severus shot in darkly, his black eyes dimmed for a moment before he shook his head in rough denial, obviously angry about ever having opened his mouth.
The two girls exchanged quick glanced. "Not quite the perfect pure-blooded Slytherin family, Sev?" Morrigan finally purred, her tone somewhere between mockery and real interest. "Well you know the old saying: if you ever need a sheltering shoulder..."
"I'd rather die than to turn to you," Severus retorted, but the little smile appearing on his thin lips wasn't quite the usual twisted sneer his classmates hated him for. Then he shot a dark glance into her direction. "And DON´T call me SEV!"
Again, the two girls exchanged a quick look, this time underlined with a wicked little grin. "Whatever you say, Snapie", Morrigan returned sweetly.
"Although "Sev" seems to fit you quite well", Lily added, her expression matching the blonde one's effortlessly. "But if you prefer it the other way..."
The blackhaired only rolled his eyes. "Honestly, someday I will strangulate Dumbledore for this."
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PS: First of all I thank my three reviewers!!! You guys are great!
PPS: I am sorry for the delay, but the bitter truth is that my muse is an unfaithful little bitch who happens to disappear whenever I have enough time to write and only reappears when I´m busy with my studies. Nevertheless I hope you will still continue to read and to review this fic - I also hope to be faster with the following parts =^_~=!
"Snape was WHAT?"
"Apparently he, Professor McGregor and my mum were friends," Harry repeated to a wide-eyed Ron. They were sitting on their table in the DADA classroom as the dark-haired boy related the happenings of the previous night, trying to ignore the arrival of several chattering Slytherins who would be taught together with them. "He seemed to be really pissed off when she mentioned it, but he did not deny it either."
"That's....ugh!" His friend shuddered visibly. "I mean who in his right mind would want to be friends with that ugly, greasy bastard? Really, the man's a snake! It would take a complete insane and mad person to..."
"Ron," Harry interrupted him quietly, his green eyes flashing dangerously, "this is my mum we're talking about. Remember?"
"Uh- yeah. Sorry. Forgot for a moment...", the redhead trailed off, taking great pains to inspect the wand in his hand. "But still!" he insisted after a moment. "Still...It's bloody weird! I mean Snape has always made painfully clear to the entire world that he HATES you!"
Before Harry could return anything, the door opened and a breathless Hermione stormed in, a bunch of books in her arms. "Oh thank goodness, I already thought that I would be too late for the very first lesson!" she sighed relieved instead of greeting. Sitting down next to Ron, she flipped a strand of tangled brown hair behind her ears. "You know, I was in the...."
"Library and forgot the time", the two boys continued in unison, exchanging a short look with each other.
"Exactly." Not noticing the mockery, Hermione began to arrange the books decoratively in front of her. "What were you talking about anyway? According to your looks, it seemed to be rather seriously."
As Harry quickly filled her in, her brown eyes began to widen more and more. "Your mother and Snape were FRIENDS?" she finally squealed unbelievingly.
Ron grinned. "Yeah, that had been my reaction, too."
"Err well...", glancing towards Harry, the girl obviously tried to find a proper explanation only to fail miserably for probably the first time in her entire life. "Perhaps he isn't as bad as we always thought", she eventually suggested in a doubting voice.
The redhead snorted sarcastically. "Oh yes, when you put it like this, I cannot think how I failed to notice it", he retorted. "Honestly, Snape's a real pal. Practically perfect in every way. Except, you know, his entire personality."
"Tell me about it." Harry twisted his face in disgust, remembering the thousand times the Potion Master had already tried his hardest to get him either expelled from school or humiliated in class. Then suddenly a little grin appeared on his lips. "But you should have seen the way this Professor McGregor treated him. I didn't think I would see the day someone teases him, slaps him, calls him "Sev" and still survives."
"Sev?! She called him SEV?!" To the obvious confusion of the entire presents, Ron bursted out into hysterical laughter. "Good Merlin, what kind of person is that?!"
"Come to think about it, they were in the same term, are of the same age", Hermione speculated dreamily before -to Harry's immense horror- beginning to giggle girlfully. "Perhaps they were in love with each other."
"Finally declaring your stupid infatuation to Weasley, mudblood?"
Remaining stoically quiet (in contrast to a furiously blushing Ron), Hermione didn't even bother to look up to the grey-eyed boy who had once more managed to appear right behind them without anyone's notice. "Malfoy, if you can't say anything nice, don't bother burdening the world with your incessant droning", she shot a soothing look into Ron´s direction. "I suppose this means that he'd never talk at all or what do you say?"
A flicker ran through the cold grey eyes, like a sliver of lightning through a sea of storm clouds as the tall blond leaned closer to Hermione, eyeing her in a way at which the girl raised her head in anticipation. She knew Draco Malfoy well enough by now to tell that this expression always preceded an insult he was particularly proud of having come up with. And she wasn't mistaken. "I should have known that you would try to protect your little friend, Granger." Malfoy gave the girl a sneer that practically dripped with contempt. "He's probably the best prospect someone like you has in life."
The girl blinked in surprise, while Ron stood up to face his chosen arch-nemesis. "What the hell do you want to say with this, Malfoy?" he hissed in a voice that made Harry fear for the worst.
"Ron, he just wants to provoke you", he tried to calm down his friend's temper, but the Weasley only waved him away impatiently before turning back to Malfoy. "Well?"
"Isn't this easy to see?" A sardonic little smile appeared on the other boy's pale lips as his eyes wandered back to Hermione, not bothering to hide their disgust. "She's nothing but a mudblood but then", the smile widened. "she would fit quite well into your family, I am sure. Judging from the hut you are living in, you and your people must be quite accustomed to dirt."
Ice dripped down Harry's spine and melted into his blood as the double-insult of the words sunk in while he saw Hermione hitching her breath. Then the shock turned to burning anger bubbling forward, but before he could only think of a proper retort, Ron had already threw himself on Malfoy, his eyes more furious than Harry had ever seen them before.
"You incredible, nasty..." The incoherent rage in the Weasley´s voice made even Malfoy blink.
"Ron, NOT!" Hermione rushed after him, obviously trying to save the situation by keeping her friend in his seat, but it was already too late. Both boys had spoken their curses at the same time and although Harry didn't acoustically understand one of them, their results were damn near a new holocaust.
Hermione, hit by Malfoy´s attack, fell back to the floor with a little scream, taking the books, she had neatly placed on her desk before, with her, while Ron had somehow managed to set free a storm that sent every object in the classroom, that was lighter than a feather, into the air.
Seeing how both, Gryffindor and Slytherin students, had the hell of a time trying to avoid painful crashes with flying flowerpots and other dangerously active objects, Harry stood up frantically and rose his wand, not quiet knowing what he intended to do with it, when he suddenly heard a familiar voice behind him: "FINITE INCANTATEM!"
Abruptly fell silent; the only sound heard was the simultaneous turn of heads and gasps at the tall blonde in the door entrance, who was staring at the destruction of the classroom with dangerously shining dark blue eyes. In any other moment some student would have whistled admiringly or clapped his hands, but confronted with the sapphire coloured death of the new teacher's gaze, everybody just hold their breaths, waiting for what would come now.
While Malfoy scrambled to his seat, Ron eventually regained consciousness, and helped the bruised Hermione to sit down on her chair again, murmuring some vague apology into her direction.
"What in Merlin's name is going on here?" Professor McGregor finally demanded to know in an alarming quiet voice. Her eyes flashed through the room and finally landed on Harry. But instead of addressing him, she turned towards Dean Thomas behind him. "You over there! Would you kindly fill me in?"
Blushing at the unexpected attention, Dean nodded, obviously deciding to sum up the situation as shortly as possibly. "Malfoy has called Hermione a mudblood which was why Ron attacked him", he explained, pointing towards the actors of the earlier show. "In the process they somehow managed to demolate the classroom."
Following his gaze, the new teacher let her sapphire eyes wander from a heavy breathing Ron to a pale but controlled Draco with an unreadable expression on her face. "Malfoy, huh?", she finally asked, her tone still too neutral to be taken at face value. "And judging from your looks you are a Weasley, I suppose? Well, I think that proves the old saying of traditions that never die."
Without ever taking her eyes from them, she approached the two boys with the flawless movements Harry still remembered from the previous evening. "I recall your fathers having little wars like this going on all the time when they were in school", she continued in her casual tone, the corner of her mouth shortly quirking at the memory. "The two of them were one year under me but nevertheless they somehow managed to entertain the whole school with their childish rivalries. But this", her tone sharpened, "this does not mean that I will tolerate this sort of behaviour in my classroom. Do you two understand me?!"
"Yes, Professor", both boys muttered, throwing hateful glances at each other.
Still staring at them, she finally sighed deeply. "So what shall I do with you now?" she asked, shaking her head in slight annoyance. "I can hardly blame any of you to be responsible for this idiotic inter-house discrimination that has been running rampant at this school ever since it opened, can I?"
Pressing her lips together she seemed to think her options all over, only to sigh again in the end, this time sounding somehow defeated. "Well, if you agree to clear out this mess, I won't take any points from you, I guess. Nevertheless I'd like to remind you that many people judge Hogwarts houses from the behaviour of its inhabitants." Her eyes finally rested on Malfoy, their expression profoundly cold by now. "This goes especially to you, Mr Malfoy, so kindly try to keep back the next time you feel like insulting a Muggle-born classmate."
The boy looked up, his grey eyes widening in sheer disbelief. "You think that insulting a mudblood brings shame on Slytherin?" he repeated the sense of her words incredulously.
The sweet line of the teacher's mouth grew even harder. "Use your brain, Mr Malfoy", she advised him sharply. "It is no secret that Slytherin has gotten itself the rather dubious reputation of having brought forth more dark wizards than any other. So don't you think that your generation should try to prove that the House does still hold his old honour?"
While most of the students began to hold their breath at Professor McGregor's true but usually not loudly spoken words, Malfoy blushed, obviously not that sure about himself anymore. "My father...", he began rather unsure.
"Your father", the blonde interrupted him coldly. "I don't doubt that Lucius would have thought just like you, but then he always possessed something you failed to show us today. It's called tact."
Some Gryffindors began to giggle but instantly shut up as the professor shot a short glance in their direction. "The Serpent's House is not synonymous with malice or unfair behaviour!" she continued in a surprisingly ragged tone. "Slytherins start out the same as everybody else who passes through this school. They are not chosen for malice, but for their ambition and their capability of greatness. Never forget this, Mr Malfoy! It is not the house that makes the wizard or the witch, it's the choice one makes!"
Her attention suddenly wandered back to Ron. "By the way, Mr Weasley!"
Ron looked up. "Yes, Professor?"
The blonde's expression was unreadable. "Try to behave yourself the next time someone tries to provoke you. Mr Malfoy certainly didn't act properly but this doesn't mean that you have to overreact like a little child and to demolate my classroom." She snorted ironically. "I remember that Gryffindors use to call behaviour like this defending their honour. _I_ call it stupid."
Half the Slytherins slid off their chairs in surprise. Others were beginning to grin wickedly, obviously agreeing with all their heart - in contrast to Ron who only stared wide-eyed at the new teacher. "You mean I should simply let him insult one of my best friends?" he asked incredulously.
"No", Professor McGregor corrected him softly. "I mean that you shouldn't give him the satisfaction of acting exactly like he supposed you to do. I admire courage in any form but behaviour like this can lead to certain death."
Harry froze at this remark but his friend obviously had not gotten McGregor's point. "So you suppose that we should just let the bloody Snakes go around and insult all Muggle-born without doing..."
"I'd like you to remember the fact that I was in Slytherin myself, Mr Weasley", she interrupted him again, the bright flash in her eyes betraying her indifferent voice. "And let me take the liberty to say that I was always proud of my House."
Beginning to walk the classroom up and down in her feline way, she let her eyes wander among them all, a distant expression in them as if she did not see them but other students of another time. Then she shook her head, letting her pretty golden hair fly through the air in an elegant swift arc. "Don't think that I want to disgrace your house, Mr Weasley, I am far from it. My elder sister and my very best friends had both been Gryffindors and they had been wiped out as a symbolic assertion of the power and truth of the very Slytherin philosophy you are criticising right now", her jaw clenched momentarily as her eyes locked with Harry's for the shortest of seconds, leaving back a painfully aching in the boy's chest. "But then the Serpent's House is not the only one at fault for the current state", she finally continued firmly. "As far as I remember from my time, Ravenclaws used to persist in thinking of Hufflepuffs as slow and doddering fools with a collective house intellect in the single digits, while they themselves were seen as swotty bookworms without any talent of playing Quidditch properly by the other houses. Nevertheless it was always Slytherin who had to bear the blame for every little discrimination going on at this school."
While most of the Gryffindors looked baffled, the fraction of the Slytherins began to murmur in obvious agreement, eying their new teacher with the respect they ordinary only seemed to have occupied for their Head of House.
Professor McGregor eyes wandered to Snape's students, their expression milder by now. "Of course you can correct me if I'm wrong."
"You're not." Everybody turned round to face Blaise Zabini, a pale dark-haired Slytherin girl, all dark waves and seastorm eyes covered under the longest and thickest lashes one could imagine. Although being known as a good student, she never spoke much, always preferred to observe everything calmly, but obviously something about the new teacher's words had managed to excite her. "However that does not mean that any of these Gryffindors will understand you." She continued, sending a short glance into their direction. "It's so much easier when everything is black and white, so why should they bother to ask themselves if we're all in for the Dark Arts or if some of us just like our privacy?"
"You say it", Pansy Parkinson agreed, surprising the class with her vehemence perhaps even more than Blaise did with speaking at all. Snorting contemptuously, she glared at the Gryffindors, to nobody's surprise most venomously at Harry. "But ever since this scar-headed celebrity arrived here, even the Headmaster has forgotten that there are still other houses. 'Well done, Slytherin, well done--but wait! Here, Gryffindor, have a hundred and sixty points, you can win this year because you have The Boy who Lived!'"
"That's not fair!" A purple red Harry bursted out furiously.
A cold smile graced Pansy's lips. "There you are damn right."
Before a new tumult could break out in class, Professor McGregor suddenly began to laugh quietly, making everybody in the room turning the attention back at her. "I think you got the message", she finally explained to her stunned students with an irresistible sweet smile that lightened up her eyes as much as her lips, apparently amused about a private joke she alone could understand. "You all are more or less secretly holding a grunge against each other, the Slytherins perhaps even more than the others, because they consider themselves hated by 3/4 of the school."
"And they are damn right to do so", Ron muttered but instantly shut up as a sapphire blue flash was sent into his direction.
"And so", the professor continued as she turned back towards them, "it had been for centuries. Some students come here damaged. Taught to hate. They are shunned, then they become bitter, and pass that bitterness to their own offspring, and the hatred gets worse and worse as the generations pass. But I don't want anybody of you to forget that they're all still children, and that their choices are their own."
With this she stopped, once again glancing to Harry as if she'd like to tell him something but thought better of it in the last instant. Looking at the still silent students in front of her, she decided to ease the situation with another bell-like laughter. "And this was my first lection. You are dismissed now." Twinkling teasingly at them, she flipped back a lock of golden hair. "But don't think that we will go on like that and doing nothing but philosophical small talk in this class. Next lesson you will have to bring your books with you, understand?"
The tense silence broke as the first of the students began to gather their belongings and vanished chatting out of the door. Harry followed them in silence together with Ron and Hermione, not realizing that two sapphire blue eyes still rested on him as he left the classroom, their expression distant, as if though they were seeing something in him that no one else was supposed to know about.
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Flashback:
"I don't understand it! I simply don't understand it!" The pretty blonde exclaimed, her brilliant blue eyes flashing angrily while she walked the room up and down. "Why the freaking hell have I to be tutored by the greasiest bastard of the entire school? And if that would not be enough, I simply don't get why I'll be taught together with this arrogant Gryffindor bitch of all things!"
"I certainly did not beg to waste my precious time with two morons who are too stupid to brew even a simple shrinking solution!" the black-haired boy her outburst was partly addressed to, snapped back, his dark eyes glaring in a way that could make first years flee. "If you want to know the reason for this nonsense, why don't you simply go and ask Dumbledore?"
The blonde snorted in utter disgust. "As if this old muggle loving fool would bother to tell me!" she returned shrewdly. "Nevertheless I'd really, _really_ like to know!"
"Well, isn't this obvious?"
Both, the blond and the black-haired, turned in unison towards the third person in the room, who had by now slunken herself into the leather chair against the far wall, glowing like a little candle with her flaming hair, arms folded, obviously quite tired of both their outbursts.
"If this is so why wouldn't you let us participate in your superior knowledge, Evans?" the boy asked icily. "Somehow I fail to follow your surely brilliant train of thoughts."
Eying him coolly with her irritating sparkling green eyes, Lily Evans flipped back a strand of blood-red hair, the relaxed lines of her shoulders proclaiming that she was completely unimpressed by his sarcasm. "Well, it's quite logical, Severus", she returned in her flat teenage voice, bored by the stupidity of the others and making no confession to the marvellous. "You, this hysterical blonde and me, we are all three known to be loners or, to be more accurate, "antisocial pricks" - and we all know how highly our dear Headmaster praises the virtues of friendship and teamwork, don't we?"
While Severus´ forehead began to frown in sudden understanding, the blonde only snorted pejoratively. "Speak for yourself and Snape, Evans, but not for me!" she shot in, shaking her pretty head in unhidden contempt. "_I_ have no problem in finding friends."
"You mean brainless admirers, Morrigan", the other girl corrected her without any malice, but with the violent disregard for foreign feelings she was feared for in school. "Morons who fail to see that there is more about you than beautiful looks and a sweet smile. Whom of them would you actually call a friend?"
Morrigan opened her mouth in denial, then shut it again, obviously in spite of herself agreeing with the redhead and therefore not quite knowing how to react. "Whatever", she finally returned uncertainly, flipping a lock of tangled blond hair out of her face. "So you really guess that this silly tutoring is a futile attempt of Dumbeldore´s to create some sort of attachment between his three black sheep?"
Severus sneered contemptuously. "Come to think about it, this is so ridiculous that it might really be our precious Headmaster's idea."
"I knew there was a reason I never listened to the old fool before", the blonde stated dryly while letting herself fall in the chair next to Lily's. "Say what you want but this does nothing but prove my hypothesis of him missing a couple of screws up there."
The corner of Severus´ lips quirked. "For once I agree."
Lily's green eyes were observing their little exchange with their usual unreadable expression. "Not that I don't marvel at this historical first but since we cleared the reason for this stupid tutoring, I'd rather suggest us to begin with it", she remarked casually. "I really don't fancy the thought of failing potions again."
Severus rose an eyebrow, but before he could return whatever remark laid on his tongue, Morrigan's soft laughter suddenly shattered on the cold stones of the Dungeon. "Ambition. That much I can understand about you, Evans." She nodded, her blue eyes regarding the other girl thoughtfully. "Even if it astonishes me to find it burning so brightly in a Gryffindor."
The usual uninterest in the green eyes faded slightly for the fraction of a second and made place to a sort of bitterness no one of the two had ever expected to see in them. "You are expressing what most of my dear housemates think", the redhaired girl returned in a frightening blank voice. "´Lily Evans is such a heartless bitch that she would have better been sorted into Slytherin. The Sorting Head probably just did not cause she's nothing but a dirty mudblood´!"
The blonde blinked in surprise before regaining her composure, while Severus snorted loudly. "I have considered you brighter than to hear to what those idiots say, Evans", he told the other one rather tartly. "Muggle-born or not, you have more talent in your little finger than most of them have in their wand.- Don't take it as a compliment, just as an observation", he added quickly, while trying to avoid the astonished expression of her green eyes.
"However he means it, Snape is quite right!" Morrigan agreed. Leaning back in her chair, she absently began to play with the wand in her hands. "You are really good, you know, and therefore you will always have to face envy...And it's not like you're the only one who is prejudiced against because of her sorting", she added after a short while, her tone too casual to be taken at false value. "Take me as an example. I don't think you to be aware of the fact that my whole bloody family has been in Gryffindor?"
The green eyes stared intently at her. "So?"
"So?" Morrigan sneered, but instead of non-caring, it sounded rather sad this time. "Bloody hell, Lily, you know exactly how the other houses judge Slytherin. Ever since I've been sorted, my oh-so-perfect elder sister, former Head girl by the way, and my dear parents consider me some sort of murderous dark witch. It's like they always long to ask me how many muggles I have killed in the last term when I come home for the holidays."
Lily began to laugh, the usual uninterested expression betrayed by a sparkle of green fire in her eyes. "Just like my sister. Petunia never misses the opportunity to tell me that I'm nothing but some bloody freak."
"Well, at least your families register that you exist", Severus shot in darkly, his black eyes dimmed for a moment before he shook his head in rough denial, obviously angry about ever having opened his mouth.
The two girls exchanged quick glanced. "Not quite the perfect pure-blooded Slytherin family, Sev?" Morrigan finally purred, her tone somewhere between mockery and real interest. "Well you know the old saying: if you ever need a sheltering shoulder..."
"I'd rather die than to turn to you," Severus retorted, but the little smile appearing on his thin lips wasn't quite the usual twisted sneer his classmates hated him for. Then he shot a dark glance into her direction. "And DON´T call me SEV!"
Again, the two girls exchanged a quick look, this time underlined with a wicked little grin. "Whatever you say, Snapie", Morrigan returned sweetly.
"Although "Sev" seems to fit you quite well", Lily added, her expression matching the blonde one's effortlessly. "But if you prefer it the other way..."
The blackhaired only rolled his eyes. "Honestly, someday I will strangulate Dumbledore for this."
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PS: First of all I thank my three reviewers!!! You guys are great!
PPS: I am sorry for the delay, but the bitter truth is that my muse is an unfaithful little bitch who happens to disappear whenever I have enough time to write and only reappears when I´m busy with my studies. Nevertheless I hope you will still continue to read and to review this fic - I also hope to be faster with the following parts =^_~=!