After the library incident, my carefully erected self-control had
nearly crumbled again. There was something about Granger that made me
lose control; no one managed to make me as angry as she did. My hands
shook as I walked down to the Great Hall for breakfast. I'd stuffed the
list back in my pocket, not really knowing what I would do with it, and
ignored Pince's disapproving gaze on me as I stepped out of the
library. I was trembling in the effort of keeping myself walking, one
step after another, and not breaking down.
Millicent was at the breakfast table, and looked worried as I entered. A cup of coffee was placed in front of me, and I downed the lot as quick as possible, before leaning over the table and putting my head on my arms. My shoulders shook, and Millicent must have thought I was crying, because she patted my arm awkwardly. Agnes muttered something, Theo whispered to Gaspar, and Draco mumbled something about weaklings. Pansy slept in, like she always did on Saturdays. My friends gathered up around me, mumbling to each other, obviously worried.
"Alright, you can stop whispering now. I'm fine," I said, after taking a deep, shaky breath. "Lost my temper a bit, that's all."
"You lost your temper, did you?" Millicent snorted, and was followed up by Agnes, "Losing your temper doesn't cause you to come down here looking like a ghost and shaking worse than a plate of jelly."
I scowled at her, but she was right. When I lost my temper, I just got angry and then calmed down and that was that. This time it was different. Granger and her bleeding list had unbalanced me so severely that even half an hour after the argument, I still felt drained and weak. I sat up straight again and stared blearily at the other House tables. The Ravenclaws were there bright and early of course, but there were only a few Hufflepuffs. Granger, the most annoying Gryffindor in the world, was sneaking her way over to her House table, looking mighty frightened.
"Did you get a hold of Granger, then?" Millicent asked.
"I did."
"Well? What happened?"
"She ran away." I shrugged. "I frightened her a bit, and after some stammering, she ran out of the library."
"That's pretty stupid of you, really," Draco said, "She'll run straight to Weasley and Potter, and you'll be going to the cemetery in a matchbox. What'd you say to her anyway?"
"I simply asked her why my name was on a list of names under the heading ´Death Eater Suspects´." I stared at the ceiling, "A list written by Granger. I didn't insult her or anything. I just warned her that leaving things around like that might make them wind up in the wrong places."
"That's all you said?" Theo asked, disbelief in his voice, "Somehow, I don't quite think she'd run away for that. She's a Gryffindor for Merlin's sake."
"I don't know, alright? Maybe I'm intimidating or something. Ask her!" I snapped.
Standing up again and turning to leave, I thought I heard Agnes whisper to Theo, something that sounded like ´besotted´. If it hadn't been for my moral stopper that did not allow me to be violently abusive against my friends, she would have been a good way to having her funeral planned. I walked out of the Great Hall before they got any more ridiculous ideas into their heads. Snickers followed me out, but I didn't turn my head. I was much too tired and worn out to bother with dealing with them.
'
Half an hour later, I was curled up with my book in a corner of the library. The mental control was easy to re-establish, and when I got it down again, I moved on to the next chapter; actually doing magic. It was a lot more complicated than doing magic by wand; with a wand, you had the movements of it to help weave the spell, but with wand less magic it was much harder. You didn't have any movements to help you. All you had was a word and the magic in your head.
I started with the simpler spells, like Alohomora. I'd managed to get hold of an old lock, and had it on the table in front of me. It was all about concentrating and focusing powers in one place, and saying the word. But, damn it, it was hard. My concentration kept scattering when other students talked or passed by on the other side of a thin set of shelving. Giving up on succeeding, I picked up my book and walked towards the doors of the library again. The practising had worn me down, and I was much to tired to turn on the filter that I always had on, to shut out the sounds of everyone talking.
".... Rose said she'd seen Florence behind the greenhouses with a Slytherin!"
".... And then the five over there becomes eighteen...."
"...... What? Haven't you told Ron and Harry yet?"
The last sentence made me stop and listen. It was Weasley's little sister talking, and she sounded upset and amazed at the same time. Stopping and leaning against a bookcase casually, flipping my book open, I eavesdropped on the conversation transpiring on the other side of the bookcase. Fortunately, I managed to fool a couple of Ravenclaws passing, so I didn't have to explain what I was doing.
"No, I haven't. If I did, they'd go crazy, and I don't want a murder on my hands."
It was Granger and Weasley's sister, then. Wonder what they were talking about; maybe Granger lost something else she should have kept track of. Must have been something very important, since she was talking about insanity and murders. Not that I would put it past Weasley. Potter, maybe, but Weasley wouldn't be above it at all.
"But seriously, you should. I mean, he threatened you, didn't he? And everyone knows Zabini's dangerous." Weasley's sister went on. I looked up from my book in shock. They were talking about me? "I think you should tell them; this definitely proves you were right about him. Come on, please Hermione; it would make me so much calmer if you told them."
"Ginny, if I just leave it alone, and don't bother him, it will be perfectly alright. Even if he is a Death Eater, he wouldn't attack me; I'm too close of a friend to Harry." Granger pointed out logically. She was wrong, but logical. "He might be evil, but he isn't stupid."
Well. It was common knowledge that when you eavesdrop, you only hear bad things about yourself. I'd proved that wrong; it wasn't good to be called evil, but at least Granger realised I wasn't stupid. I leaned closer, careful not to disturb any of the books. Granger knew the library better than anyone but Pince did, and if she noticed the books moving, she'd get suspicious and go to investigate, and I'd be discovered.
"But Hermione..." The little Weasley sighed.
"Now, come to think about it, he did have a right to do that; it was kind of an insult." Granger prattled on, "Besides, I'm not even sure he is a Death Eater. He's the most likely, aside from Malfoy, but you have to admit it is a bit extreme."
Could she make up her mind? First she though I was a Death Eater, and then she didn't. That seemed to be the end of the conversation, because Granger shuffled about behind the shelf, followed by Weasley's admonishments. Granger ignored them, and I was just about to leave when I realised that the only way out of the library was through them. I froze in panic, but as I didn't want to make anyone suspicious, I snapped my book shut and started slowly towards the corner around the bookshelves. Gritting my teeth, I kept walking.
We smashed into each other just as I stepped around the corner. She tumbled to the floor, or would have, if I hadn't caught her arm. It wasn't something I'd planned, it just happened. As soon as she saw it was me, I let her go, and glared at her darkly, before stepping past and walking away. The little Weasley glared at me, but I ignored her. I had had it with all self-important Gryffindors and all suspicions about Death Eaters and conspiracies. I didn't care any more. Pince must have gone crazy when I slammed the door behind me, but I just pushed my way through the group of students outside.
I needed to find some place where I wouldn't be bothered by Gryffindors or meddlesome friends.
'
The end of November was unusually cold, and snow was already starting to fall. From the top of the battlements, the grounds looked as if they were already covered in snowdrifts. I crawled up on top of the wall, and opened my book again. Up there, I would finally get some peace and quiet. Maybe I would even manage to open the damn lock without trouble. I wasn't supposed to bring books outside when it was snow, but it wasn't a library book and therefore Pince couldn't punish me for anything. Besides, the battlements was the only place where I could get some peace and quiet.
"Alohomora," I pronounced clearly, staring at the lock.
It flopped, and lay still again. But still, it was progress. In the library it hadn't even flopped. Grinning slightly, I tried again. Something clicked inside, but it didn't open. Even more progress, and I was delighted. A few more tries, and it clicked open. If I hadn't been sitting on the battlements, inches from falling down, I would have jumped up and down like a madman. I had accomplished my first magic without a wand. It was just as wonderful as my first magic with a wand. Just for good measure, I tried again.
"Alohomora." And the lock opened.
"No taking library books outside in the now, you know that Zabini." Filch growled, as he appeared beside me.
"How good for me that I haven't then, wouldn't you say, Mr Filch?" I answered, without looking up from my lock. "This is a book I owled from home, so I can take it anywhere I want to."
Filch grumbled, but was slightly mollified that I'd given him the title of ´Mr´ instead of just his last name. Muttering to himself about cats and libraries, he turned around and disappeared the way he came from. Now, this was a good day; learning one spell without wand, and getting on more friendly terms with Filch. Surely that ought to outweigh the bad stuff, like the library thing with Granger. I still wasn't sure what that had been; I hadn't really told her anything, except that her list was ludicrous. But she'd begun to doubt the correctness of that list. That was one accomplishment. Not a big one, but it was there nonetheless.
One wand less magic accomplishment was definitely enough for one day, and I needed lunch anyway, so I packed up my things and started down the stairs again. The stairs were enough to make anyone cower; seven sets of staircases, with between fifty and a hundred stairs in each one. It was needless to say, easier on the way down than on the way up. My knees didn't hurt as much. The things I did for a bit of privacy were amazing. Millicent would, in true Millicent-fashion, berate me for going out in such cold weather without my winter cloak, but it was worth it.
But worry later; now food was my highest priority. The words of Anja's when she first saw me had stuck in my head; I really did need to eat more. I just hadn't been hungry with my constant headache. Before that, I had been hungry; it was just that then I had been growing so much vertically that it was hard to put on weight. Maybe it was time to catch up a bit; being able to hide behind a pole lost its appeal after a while.
'
Millicent's face was a study in shock when I sat down at the table with a huge grin on my face and started eating like crazy. Theo even went as far as to pinch his arm to check that he wasn't dreaming. Today's lunch wasn't bad; my constant favourite of mashed potatoes and sausage, and a glass of pumpkin juice to go with it. Gaspar arrived late, looking harried, but when he saw that I was eating with enthusiasm, he experimentally picked up a pea and bounced it off my nose, judging my reaction. I looked at him, smiled and waved, and went back to eating. Agnes said what they were all thinking.
"Blaise, are you ill?"
"Nope. Insane, yes, always have been, but not ill no." I shook my head. It felt good to tell someone about my confirmed insanity, even though only through a joke, and I grinned. "Anja told me that if I didn't eat, she'd force me to, and she's scary, so I eat."
"Anja?" They chorused.
"Bird who works at the ministry," I gestured with my fork, "Downright frightening she is. Really shouldn't talk though; she smokes like a chimney, and I've never seen her eat anything."
"Never seen her – Blaise, have you been there before?" Pansy broke in.
"Well," I was caught, and did my best to come up with a good way out of it. Telling the truth was the easiest and most painless way, "Remember my detention after the fight with Weasley? Afterwards, I didn't go directly back to the castle. Lucas took me to London and the Ministry."
Only half the truth, but good enough for now. They seemed to believe it, and I opened my mouth to embroiderer some on the truth when the double doors of the Great Hall were thrown open and Granger came marching in with a black look on her face. Weasley was running after her, but being hindered by his sister who tried to knock him out, apparently. Potter wasn't with them, because he was already sitting at the Gryffindor table, looking pleased with himself. That expression changed as soon as he set eyes on Granger. The holy rage of Hermione Granger wasn't something to joke about.
The slap echoed through the Great Hall. It would leave a bruise that Pomfrey would have to take care of, certainly. It took a moment for reality to sink in; something unthinkable had just happened. Hermione Granger had just slapped the living snot out of Potter. Everyone was deathly silent. Weasley's sister clapped her hands over her mouth, and Weasley himself dropped his jaw so low it looked as it would never come up again. Not even the teachers dared to breathe. The unthinkable had just happened, so why not follow it up with something even more unthinkable. I raised my hands and started clapping. In the utter silence, it was impossible not to hear me, and everyone's attention turned from Potter and Granger to me. I kept clapping.
Even Granger turned her head and stared at me. Slapping Potter deserved recognition, and a good one at that, so I stood up and kept clapping. Cain followed me hesitantly, and after him, Millicent stood up, soon accompanied by Agnes and Theo. Gaspar noticed we were all standing and scrambled to his feet. Pansy started clapping, but didn't stand up until Draco did as well. That was the sign for the rest of Slytherin to stand up and applaud Granger's actions.
Never in the history of Hogwarts had that happened before. Since Salazar Slytherin left the castle, Gryffindor and Slytherin had been enemies, and for one House to stand up and applaud the other was unimaginable. Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws looked at us as if we were slobbering maniacs, while the Gryffindors looked absolutely flabbergasted. Weasley had stopped for certain, and Potter, after recovering from the slap, was staring at us as if we were Voldemort and his army applauding Granger. For all he was concerned, that was what we were.
The clapping continued for about five minutes, before I abruptly stopped and picked up my book bag and walked out of the Hall. No good giving the Gryffindors too much of a boost of confidence. The clapping stopped gradually as I left the table. Over the utter silence, the applauding could be heard even with the doors to the Hall shut tight. Whistling as I went, I walked towards the Defence classroom. I would have to drop by Lucas and tell him of my progress. He'd want to know.
Lessee ...... three flights of stairs, about twenty stairs in each, made close to sixty stairs. Coupled with the stairs counted on the way to the battlements, both up and down, that made around eight hundred stairs. No wonder I stayed as thin as I was. I worked off all my food the second I ate it. Hogwarts really needed lifts, like the Ministry had. Preferably without grinning Russians, but lifts all the same. Maybe there was some way of asking for that. Maybe I'd put my suggestion down with Dumbledore and see how he reacted.
"It is not every day one sees a Slytherin whistling Muggle songs and counting stairs under his breath." Lucas sounded highly amused, "But since it is you, Zabini, I'll just pass it off as you being you. But how, pray tell, did you find out about such Muggle things as Metallica?"
"Split-second Muggle terror," I replied cryptically, "Only ever listened to it once, but it stuck. Rather hard to get rid of, it appears. I have to talk to you though, about other things than Muggle music."
"Come on then," Lucas turned on his heels and began walking back up the stairs to his office. "Since it's Saturday and no one in their right mind would try to seek out teachers, there's no one in my office at the moment. I was just organising my bookcase."
"Oooh, sounds incredibly interesting. Have you found any ancient mysteries yet? They usually turn up in bookcases." I asked, "At least in mine. But they turn out to be leftover sandwiches most of the time."
"Zabini, have anyone ever told you you're insane?" Lucas questioned as he pushed the door to his office open.
"Four people already, if you don't count Draco and Pansy and Millie and Agnes and Theo and Gaspar. Cain has gotten around to it yet, but he will." I shrugged, "And I've got a certification on it as well, hidden somewhere in my dorm, if you want to read."
"No, that is perfectly alright." Lucas shook his head, "What was it that you wanted to tell me?"
"I did magic today!" I sounded like a little girl, squealing, but I didn't care.
"Very good, Zabini. It is a great accomplishment for a Hogwarts sixth year." Lucas dead-panned.
"And all sixth years do magic without a wand, do they?" I snapped. "I managed to open a lock half an hour ago, and my wand is still under my pillow."
Lucas raised his eyebrow. I plopped myself down on a chair and inspected his rather messy office. There was no doubt that he was in dire need of either a live-in maid or a radical book-burning. There was books everywhere; it seemed he was using every available flat surface as a filing cabinet as well. His office was rather like that of the Department of Mysteries in that respect; but with less paperwork. Kind of like chaos, but less organised. Heaps, piles of Dark Arts books cluttered up everywhere, along with some obscure Muggle novels.
"Do you need help organising, or shall I merely lend you a matchbox?" I ventured. Lucas sent me a look.
"I'm perfectly fine, thank you. What has happened while I've been locked up in here?"
"Aside from my marvellous progress in the field of wandless magic?" I raised an eyebrow mockingly, "Not much. I had a fight with Granger in the library this morning, scared her up a fright. She ran away. Drank breakfast. Eavesdropped on Granger and the littlest Weasley in the library. Climbed the stairs to the battlements and did the magic. Climbed all the way down again. Ate lunch. Granger slapped the hell out of Potter. Applauded her decision. Left. And that's all so far."
"Granger slapped Potter?" Lucas made a disbelieving noise.
"That's what I thought," I replied, "But when the wrath of Granger descends on the enemy, why protest? I'll find out why later though."
"How?"
"The amazing intelligence system that is the Slytherin-Hufflepuff cooperation." I grinned, "Based mostly on intimidation. You have no idea of how much people talk around Hufflepuffs. I'll find out, and if I don't, Millie or Agnes or somebody else will, and they'll tell me."
"The system has not changed one bit since I graduated, it seems." Lucas smiled widely. "Tell me, do you still keep books under the floorboards in the sixth year boy's dorm? And is the picture of William the Scarred still handing out battle-tactics-advice to first years?"
"The floorboards sound about right, but I've yet to meet the William fellow." I shrugged. I leaned my head to one side and inspected him silently for a moment, "I know you were in Slytherin, but I've gone through the yearbooks with enough thoroughness to scare anyone away, and I haven't found one mention of you yet. How come?"
Lucas blinked. He stared at me with those uncomfortably unreadable red eyes and said nothing for a while. My question seemed to have unsettled him. Or maybe it was the way I asked it; he couldn't be used to students going around looking him up in yearbooks just to find out who he was. I was a bit odd in that way; all teachers and students from all years turned up in the yearbooks, but Lucas hadn't, neither as a student nor anything else. Some yearbooks were missing of course, but those were around fifty years old, and that was only a small gap. Besides, Lucas didn't look a day over thirty- five. Of course, he looked like a demon with those eyes and that hair too, but I was pretty sure about his age. Suddenly, he spoke.
"That has its explanation, Zabini. I was probably removed from the yearbooks by Dumbledore himself, if not by someone else. I can't blame them; I must have been an incredible disappointment to them." He gave me a look and sighed, "I suppose everyone would find out sooner or later, given your track record with Defence teachers. It was Granger who first found out about Lupin, was it not? And Quirrel. And Lockhart, now that was an embarrassing fellow. That was Potter, and Weasley, right? And then Dumbledore himself with fake-Mad-Eye."
"Get on with it." I interrupted.
"I was stricken from the records most likely." Lucas shrugged, as if being erased from history didn't matter, "Not many have been, and in cases where the person was in too many of the pictures, the books were removed entirely. Unfair really, considering what everyone else has done and what I have done. By all rights, Lucius Malfoy's pictures should have been burned. But I am digressing. Due to certain things I did during my tenure at Hogwarts, and the things I did afterwards, I was taken out of the pictures in the yearbooks."
"What did you do? Kill a unicorn?" I snorted. If Lucius Malfoy hadn't been taken out, I couldn't see what for a sort of crime he could have committed that was bad enough for him to earn that fate.
"No. Never have, don't think I ever will." Lucas waved it off. "There was never a need for it, even though they are vicious beasts. No, I didn't kill a unicorn. I didn't rob a bank, I didn't commit homicide, genocide or fratricide, and I do not, so unlike many of my classmates, have a scull and snake on my forearm."
"Then what?" I interrupted again, impatient with his slow re-telling.
"I found some Dark Arts primers while going through the library in my fourth year. I read them, became fascinated and it went from there. By my seventh year, I could have duelled Dumbledore and stood a fighting chance, even though I would never have won. I wasn't the most powerful in my year, and certainly not the smartest. But I had a near-photographic memory. I can still remember every curse and every spell and every hex I've ever learned." He flashed a proud smile, which looked out of place on him. "Practising was obvious, and when Dumbledore found out three days before my graduation, he suspended me, but did let me graduate. He was disappointed in me, I fear. Throughout my years in the darkest den of pre-Death Eaters in Britain, he had some twisted faith in me not to go dark as well."
He stopped and took a deep breath. I was too deep in the tale to even wonder why he was telling me all this, and stared at him silently. Not even from my father had I gotten a full account of his years in Slytherin, so I was incredibly interested in what Lucas had to say. After a short pause, he continued in his slow, quiet voice.
"I didn't, I suppose. I was merely tarnished by them. Grey, if that's what you want to call me. Inevitable, really, with the company in those times. Parkinson, Malfoy, Lestrange and the Blacks, all three of them. Snape was a year below us, and the only Black in my year was Bellatrix. Mind you, Andromeda wasn't all that bad; just followed her sisters, but broke that up after Hogwarts to marry Tonks. Graduated some three years before me." His eyes glazed over as he spoke about his classmates. "I was always in the corner, with my books. They nagged me for that, but while I learned Dark Arts, they were stealing it from me and testing them on the Hufflepuffs. Never got in trouble for it; they were too much of Slytherins for that. I used to practise in the Forest, after dark. That's where Dumbledore caught me, hexing the leaves off a tree. I have never seen him so angry." The voice turned into a whisper, and I could see he was far away in his mind, "Or so disappointed. Though Severus could probably tell you more about that."
Silence descended again, and I scarcely dared to breathe in fear of startling him out of his story telling mood.
"I left school disgraced, and with Dumbledore's disappointment. I couldn't find a decent job, since the only classes I had above Poor in was Defence, Charms and oddly enough, Arithmancy. I needed at least three more N.E.W.T's to get a job, so I made my own profession. After rigorous training, I placed an ad in the Prophet, asking for anyone who needed the help of a Dark Wizard. Despite hopes of the opposite, someone answered, and it all went downhill from there. My skin paled, my hair grew even darker, and my eyes slowly but surely turned red. I was marked. Dumbledore found me a month before term, in a pub in Albania, trying to drink my liver into corruption. I'll never know why he asked me to take the job."
"So you were....." I trailed off, wondering if my eyebrows would ever come down again.
"A Dark Wizard, yes."
'
Ending Notes; crickets chirp Not entirely what I planned from the beginning, but hopefully good. The slap appeared while writing, and I have no idea where it came from.
Millicent was at the breakfast table, and looked worried as I entered. A cup of coffee was placed in front of me, and I downed the lot as quick as possible, before leaning over the table and putting my head on my arms. My shoulders shook, and Millicent must have thought I was crying, because she patted my arm awkwardly. Agnes muttered something, Theo whispered to Gaspar, and Draco mumbled something about weaklings. Pansy slept in, like she always did on Saturdays. My friends gathered up around me, mumbling to each other, obviously worried.
"Alright, you can stop whispering now. I'm fine," I said, after taking a deep, shaky breath. "Lost my temper a bit, that's all."
"You lost your temper, did you?" Millicent snorted, and was followed up by Agnes, "Losing your temper doesn't cause you to come down here looking like a ghost and shaking worse than a plate of jelly."
I scowled at her, but she was right. When I lost my temper, I just got angry and then calmed down and that was that. This time it was different. Granger and her bleeding list had unbalanced me so severely that even half an hour after the argument, I still felt drained and weak. I sat up straight again and stared blearily at the other House tables. The Ravenclaws were there bright and early of course, but there were only a few Hufflepuffs. Granger, the most annoying Gryffindor in the world, was sneaking her way over to her House table, looking mighty frightened.
"Did you get a hold of Granger, then?" Millicent asked.
"I did."
"Well? What happened?"
"She ran away." I shrugged. "I frightened her a bit, and after some stammering, she ran out of the library."
"That's pretty stupid of you, really," Draco said, "She'll run straight to Weasley and Potter, and you'll be going to the cemetery in a matchbox. What'd you say to her anyway?"
"I simply asked her why my name was on a list of names under the heading ´Death Eater Suspects´." I stared at the ceiling, "A list written by Granger. I didn't insult her or anything. I just warned her that leaving things around like that might make them wind up in the wrong places."
"That's all you said?" Theo asked, disbelief in his voice, "Somehow, I don't quite think she'd run away for that. She's a Gryffindor for Merlin's sake."
"I don't know, alright? Maybe I'm intimidating or something. Ask her!" I snapped.
Standing up again and turning to leave, I thought I heard Agnes whisper to Theo, something that sounded like ´besotted´. If it hadn't been for my moral stopper that did not allow me to be violently abusive against my friends, she would have been a good way to having her funeral planned. I walked out of the Great Hall before they got any more ridiculous ideas into their heads. Snickers followed me out, but I didn't turn my head. I was much too tired and worn out to bother with dealing with them.
'
Half an hour later, I was curled up with my book in a corner of the library. The mental control was easy to re-establish, and when I got it down again, I moved on to the next chapter; actually doing magic. It was a lot more complicated than doing magic by wand; with a wand, you had the movements of it to help weave the spell, but with wand less magic it was much harder. You didn't have any movements to help you. All you had was a word and the magic in your head.
I started with the simpler spells, like Alohomora. I'd managed to get hold of an old lock, and had it on the table in front of me. It was all about concentrating and focusing powers in one place, and saying the word. But, damn it, it was hard. My concentration kept scattering when other students talked or passed by on the other side of a thin set of shelving. Giving up on succeeding, I picked up my book and walked towards the doors of the library again. The practising had worn me down, and I was much to tired to turn on the filter that I always had on, to shut out the sounds of everyone talking.
".... Rose said she'd seen Florence behind the greenhouses with a Slytherin!"
".... And then the five over there becomes eighteen...."
"...... What? Haven't you told Ron and Harry yet?"
The last sentence made me stop and listen. It was Weasley's little sister talking, and she sounded upset and amazed at the same time. Stopping and leaning against a bookcase casually, flipping my book open, I eavesdropped on the conversation transpiring on the other side of the bookcase. Fortunately, I managed to fool a couple of Ravenclaws passing, so I didn't have to explain what I was doing.
"No, I haven't. If I did, they'd go crazy, and I don't want a murder on my hands."
It was Granger and Weasley's sister, then. Wonder what they were talking about; maybe Granger lost something else she should have kept track of. Must have been something very important, since she was talking about insanity and murders. Not that I would put it past Weasley. Potter, maybe, but Weasley wouldn't be above it at all.
"But seriously, you should. I mean, he threatened you, didn't he? And everyone knows Zabini's dangerous." Weasley's sister went on. I looked up from my book in shock. They were talking about me? "I think you should tell them; this definitely proves you were right about him. Come on, please Hermione; it would make me so much calmer if you told them."
"Ginny, if I just leave it alone, and don't bother him, it will be perfectly alright. Even if he is a Death Eater, he wouldn't attack me; I'm too close of a friend to Harry." Granger pointed out logically. She was wrong, but logical. "He might be evil, but he isn't stupid."
Well. It was common knowledge that when you eavesdrop, you only hear bad things about yourself. I'd proved that wrong; it wasn't good to be called evil, but at least Granger realised I wasn't stupid. I leaned closer, careful not to disturb any of the books. Granger knew the library better than anyone but Pince did, and if she noticed the books moving, she'd get suspicious and go to investigate, and I'd be discovered.
"But Hermione..." The little Weasley sighed.
"Now, come to think about it, he did have a right to do that; it was kind of an insult." Granger prattled on, "Besides, I'm not even sure he is a Death Eater. He's the most likely, aside from Malfoy, but you have to admit it is a bit extreme."
Could she make up her mind? First she though I was a Death Eater, and then she didn't. That seemed to be the end of the conversation, because Granger shuffled about behind the shelf, followed by Weasley's admonishments. Granger ignored them, and I was just about to leave when I realised that the only way out of the library was through them. I froze in panic, but as I didn't want to make anyone suspicious, I snapped my book shut and started slowly towards the corner around the bookshelves. Gritting my teeth, I kept walking.
We smashed into each other just as I stepped around the corner. She tumbled to the floor, or would have, if I hadn't caught her arm. It wasn't something I'd planned, it just happened. As soon as she saw it was me, I let her go, and glared at her darkly, before stepping past and walking away. The little Weasley glared at me, but I ignored her. I had had it with all self-important Gryffindors and all suspicions about Death Eaters and conspiracies. I didn't care any more. Pince must have gone crazy when I slammed the door behind me, but I just pushed my way through the group of students outside.
I needed to find some place where I wouldn't be bothered by Gryffindors or meddlesome friends.
'
The end of November was unusually cold, and snow was already starting to fall. From the top of the battlements, the grounds looked as if they were already covered in snowdrifts. I crawled up on top of the wall, and opened my book again. Up there, I would finally get some peace and quiet. Maybe I would even manage to open the damn lock without trouble. I wasn't supposed to bring books outside when it was snow, but it wasn't a library book and therefore Pince couldn't punish me for anything. Besides, the battlements was the only place where I could get some peace and quiet.
"Alohomora," I pronounced clearly, staring at the lock.
It flopped, and lay still again. But still, it was progress. In the library it hadn't even flopped. Grinning slightly, I tried again. Something clicked inside, but it didn't open. Even more progress, and I was delighted. A few more tries, and it clicked open. If I hadn't been sitting on the battlements, inches from falling down, I would have jumped up and down like a madman. I had accomplished my first magic without a wand. It was just as wonderful as my first magic with a wand. Just for good measure, I tried again.
"Alohomora." And the lock opened.
"No taking library books outside in the now, you know that Zabini." Filch growled, as he appeared beside me.
"How good for me that I haven't then, wouldn't you say, Mr Filch?" I answered, without looking up from my lock. "This is a book I owled from home, so I can take it anywhere I want to."
Filch grumbled, but was slightly mollified that I'd given him the title of ´Mr´ instead of just his last name. Muttering to himself about cats and libraries, he turned around and disappeared the way he came from. Now, this was a good day; learning one spell without wand, and getting on more friendly terms with Filch. Surely that ought to outweigh the bad stuff, like the library thing with Granger. I still wasn't sure what that had been; I hadn't really told her anything, except that her list was ludicrous. But she'd begun to doubt the correctness of that list. That was one accomplishment. Not a big one, but it was there nonetheless.
One wand less magic accomplishment was definitely enough for one day, and I needed lunch anyway, so I packed up my things and started down the stairs again. The stairs were enough to make anyone cower; seven sets of staircases, with between fifty and a hundred stairs in each one. It was needless to say, easier on the way down than on the way up. My knees didn't hurt as much. The things I did for a bit of privacy were amazing. Millicent would, in true Millicent-fashion, berate me for going out in such cold weather without my winter cloak, but it was worth it.
But worry later; now food was my highest priority. The words of Anja's when she first saw me had stuck in my head; I really did need to eat more. I just hadn't been hungry with my constant headache. Before that, I had been hungry; it was just that then I had been growing so much vertically that it was hard to put on weight. Maybe it was time to catch up a bit; being able to hide behind a pole lost its appeal after a while.
'
Millicent's face was a study in shock when I sat down at the table with a huge grin on my face and started eating like crazy. Theo even went as far as to pinch his arm to check that he wasn't dreaming. Today's lunch wasn't bad; my constant favourite of mashed potatoes and sausage, and a glass of pumpkin juice to go with it. Gaspar arrived late, looking harried, but when he saw that I was eating with enthusiasm, he experimentally picked up a pea and bounced it off my nose, judging my reaction. I looked at him, smiled and waved, and went back to eating. Agnes said what they were all thinking.
"Blaise, are you ill?"
"Nope. Insane, yes, always have been, but not ill no." I shook my head. It felt good to tell someone about my confirmed insanity, even though only through a joke, and I grinned. "Anja told me that if I didn't eat, she'd force me to, and she's scary, so I eat."
"Anja?" They chorused.
"Bird who works at the ministry," I gestured with my fork, "Downright frightening she is. Really shouldn't talk though; she smokes like a chimney, and I've never seen her eat anything."
"Never seen her – Blaise, have you been there before?" Pansy broke in.
"Well," I was caught, and did my best to come up with a good way out of it. Telling the truth was the easiest and most painless way, "Remember my detention after the fight with Weasley? Afterwards, I didn't go directly back to the castle. Lucas took me to London and the Ministry."
Only half the truth, but good enough for now. They seemed to believe it, and I opened my mouth to embroiderer some on the truth when the double doors of the Great Hall were thrown open and Granger came marching in with a black look on her face. Weasley was running after her, but being hindered by his sister who tried to knock him out, apparently. Potter wasn't with them, because he was already sitting at the Gryffindor table, looking pleased with himself. That expression changed as soon as he set eyes on Granger. The holy rage of Hermione Granger wasn't something to joke about.
The slap echoed through the Great Hall. It would leave a bruise that Pomfrey would have to take care of, certainly. It took a moment for reality to sink in; something unthinkable had just happened. Hermione Granger had just slapped the living snot out of Potter. Everyone was deathly silent. Weasley's sister clapped her hands over her mouth, and Weasley himself dropped his jaw so low it looked as it would never come up again. Not even the teachers dared to breathe. The unthinkable had just happened, so why not follow it up with something even more unthinkable. I raised my hands and started clapping. In the utter silence, it was impossible not to hear me, and everyone's attention turned from Potter and Granger to me. I kept clapping.
Even Granger turned her head and stared at me. Slapping Potter deserved recognition, and a good one at that, so I stood up and kept clapping. Cain followed me hesitantly, and after him, Millicent stood up, soon accompanied by Agnes and Theo. Gaspar noticed we were all standing and scrambled to his feet. Pansy started clapping, but didn't stand up until Draco did as well. That was the sign for the rest of Slytherin to stand up and applaud Granger's actions.
Never in the history of Hogwarts had that happened before. Since Salazar Slytherin left the castle, Gryffindor and Slytherin had been enemies, and for one House to stand up and applaud the other was unimaginable. Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws looked at us as if we were slobbering maniacs, while the Gryffindors looked absolutely flabbergasted. Weasley had stopped for certain, and Potter, after recovering from the slap, was staring at us as if we were Voldemort and his army applauding Granger. For all he was concerned, that was what we were.
The clapping continued for about five minutes, before I abruptly stopped and picked up my book bag and walked out of the Hall. No good giving the Gryffindors too much of a boost of confidence. The clapping stopped gradually as I left the table. Over the utter silence, the applauding could be heard even with the doors to the Hall shut tight. Whistling as I went, I walked towards the Defence classroom. I would have to drop by Lucas and tell him of my progress. He'd want to know.
Lessee ...... three flights of stairs, about twenty stairs in each, made close to sixty stairs. Coupled with the stairs counted on the way to the battlements, both up and down, that made around eight hundred stairs. No wonder I stayed as thin as I was. I worked off all my food the second I ate it. Hogwarts really needed lifts, like the Ministry had. Preferably without grinning Russians, but lifts all the same. Maybe there was some way of asking for that. Maybe I'd put my suggestion down with Dumbledore and see how he reacted.
"It is not every day one sees a Slytherin whistling Muggle songs and counting stairs under his breath." Lucas sounded highly amused, "But since it is you, Zabini, I'll just pass it off as you being you. But how, pray tell, did you find out about such Muggle things as Metallica?"
"Split-second Muggle terror," I replied cryptically, "Only ever listened to it once, but it stuck. Rather hard to get rid of, it appears. I have to talk to you though, about other things than Muggle music."
"Come on then," Lucas turned on his heels and began walking back up the stairs to his office. "Since it's Saturday and no one in their right mind would try to seek out teachers, there's no one in my office at the moment. I was just organising my bookcase."
"Oooh, sounds incredibly interesting. Have you found any ancient mysteries yet? They usually turn up in bookcases." I asked, "At least in mine. But they turn out to be leftover sandwiches most of the time."
"Zabini, have anyone ever told you you're insane?" Lucas questioned as he pushed the door to his office open.
"Four people already, if you don't count Draco and Pansy and Millie and Agnes and Theo and Gaspar. Cain has gotten around to it yet, but he will." I shrugged, "And I've got a certification on it as well, hidden somewhere in my dorm, if you want to read."
"No, that is perfectly alright." Lucas shook his head, "What was it that you wanted to tell me?"
"I did magic today!" I sounded like a little girl, squealing, but I didn't care.
"Very good, Zabini. It is a great accomplishment for a Hogwarts sixth year." Lucas dead-panned.
"And all sixth years do magic without a wand, do they?" I snapped. "I managed to open a lock half an hour ago, and my wand is still under my pillow."
Lucas raised his eyebrow. I plopped myself down on a chair and inspected his rather messy office. There was no doubt that he was in dire need of either a live-in maid or a radical book-burning. There was books everywhere; it seemed he was using every available flat surface as a filing cabinet as well. His office was rather like that of the Department of Mysteries in that respect; but with less paperwork. Kind of like chaos, but less organised. Heaps, piles of Dark Arts books cluttered up everywhere, along with some obscure Muggle novels.
"Do you need help organising, or shall I merely lend you a matchbox?" I ventured. Lucas sent me a look.
"I'm perfectly fine, thank you. What has happened while I've been locked up in here?"
"Aside from my marvellous progress in the field of wandless magic?" I raised an eyebrow mockingly, "Not much. I had a fight with Granger in the library this morning, scared her up a fright. She ran away. Drank breakfast. Eavesdropped on Granger and the littlest Weasley in the library. Climbed the stairs to the battlements and did the magic. Climbed all the way down again. Ate lunch. Granger slapped the hell out of Potter. Applauded her decision. Left. And that's all so far."
"Granger slapped Potter?" Lucas made a disbelieving noise.
"That's what I thought," I replied, "But when the wrath of Granger descends on the enemy, why protest? I'll find out why later though."
"How?"
"The amazing intelligence system that is the Slytherin-Hufflepuff cooperation." I grinned, "Based mostly on intimidation. You have no idea of how much people talk around Hufflepuffs. I'll find out, and if I don't, Millie or Agnes or somebody else will, and they'll tell me."
"The system has not changed one bit since I graduated, it seems." Lucas smiled widely. "Tell me, do you still keep books under the floorboards in the sixth year boy's dorm? And is the picture of William the Scarred still handing out battle-tactics-advice to first years?"
"The floorboards sound about right, but I've yet to meet the William fellow." I shrugged. I leaned my head to one side and inspected him silently for a moment, "I know you were in Slytherin, but I've gone through the yearbooks with enough thoroughness to scare anyone away, and I haven't found one mention of you yet. How come?"
Lucas blinked. He stared at me with those uncomfortably unreadable red eyes and said nothing for a while. My question seemed to have unsettled him. Or maybe it was the way I asked it; he couldn't be used to students going around looking him up in yearbooks just to find out who he was. I was a bit odd in that way; all teachers and students from all years turned up in the yearbooks, but Lucas hadn't, neither as a student nor anything else. Some yearbooks were missing of course, but those were around fifty years old, and that was only a small gap. Besides, Lucas didn't look a day over thirty- five. Of course, he looked like a demon with those eyes and that hair too, but I was pretty sure about his age. Suddenly, he spoke.
"That has its explanation, Zabini. I was probably removed from the yearbooks by Dumbledore himself, if not by someone else. I can't blame them; I must have been an incredible disappointment to them." He gave me a look and sighed, "I suppose everyone would find out sooner or later, given your track record with Defence teachers. It was Granger who first found out about Lupin, was it not? And Quirrel. And Lockhart, now that was an embarrassing fellow. That was Potter, and Weasley, right? And then Dumbledore himself with fake-Mad-Eye."
"Get on with it." I interrupted.
"I was stricken from the records most likely." Lucas shrugged, as if being erased from history didn't matter, "Not many have been, and in cases where the person was in too many of the pictures, the books were removed entirely. Unfair really, considering what everyone else has done and what I have done. By all rights, Lucius Malfoy's pictures should have been burned. But I am digressing. Due to certain things I did during my tenure at Hogwarts, and the things I did afterwards, I was taken out of the pictures in the yearbooks."
"What did you do? Kill a unicorn?" I snorted. If Lucius Malfoy hadn't been taken out, I couldn't see what for a sort of crime he could have committed that was bad enough for him to earn that fate.
"No. Never have, don't think I ever will." Lucas waved it off. "There was never a need for it, even though they are vicious beasts. No, I didn't kill a unicorn. I didn't rob a bank, I didn't commit homicide, genocide or fratricide, and I do not, so unlike many of my classmates, have a scull and snake on my forearm."
"Then what?" I interrupted again, impatient with his slow re-telling.
"I found some Dark Arts primers while going through the library in my fourth year. I read them, became fascinated and it went from there. By my seventh year, I could have duelled Dumbledore and stood a fighting chance, even though I would never have won. I wasn't the most powerful in my year, and certainly not the smartest. But I had a near-photographic memory. I can still remember every curse and every spell and every hex I've ever learned." He flashed a proud smile, which looked out of place on him. "Practising was obvious, and when Dumbledore found out three days before my graduation, he suspended me, but did let me graduate. He was disappointed in me, I fear. Throughout my years in the darkest den of pre-Death Eaters in Britain, he had some twisted faith in me not to go dark as well."
He stopped and took a deep breath. I was too deep in the tale to even wonder why he was telling me all this, and stared at him silently. Not even from my father had I gotten a full account of his years in Slytherin, so I was incredibly interested in what Lucas had to say. After a short pause, he continued in his slow, quiet voice.
"I didn't, I suppose. I was merely tarnished by them. Grey, if that's what you want to call me. Inevitable, really, with the company in those times. Parkinson, Malfoy, Lestrange and the Blacks, all three of them. Snape was a year below us, and the only Black in my year was Bellatrix. Mind you, Andromeda wasn't all that bad; just followed her sisters, but broke that up after Hogwarts to marry Tonks. Graduated some three years before me." His eyes glazed over as he spoke about his classmates. "I was always in the corner, with my books. They nagged me for that, but while I learned Dark Arts, they were stealing it from me and testing them on the Hufflepuffs. Never got in trouble for it; they were too much of Slytherins for that. I used to practise in the Forest, after dark. That's where Dumbledore caught me, hexing the leaves off a tree. I have never seen him so angry." The voice turned into a whisper, and I could see he was far away in his mind, "Or so disappointed. Though Severus could probably tell you more about that."
Silence descended again, and I scarcely dared to breathe in fear of startling him out of his story telling mood.
"I left school disgraced, and with Dumbledore's disappointment. I couldn't find a decent job, since the only classes I had above Poor in was Defence, Charms and oddly enough, Arithmancy. I needed at least three more N.E.W.T's to get a job, so I made my own profession. After rigorous training, I placed an ad in the Prophet, asking for anyone who needed the help of a Dark Wizard. Despite hopes of the opposite, someone answered, and it all went downhill from there. My skin paled, my hair grew even darker, and my eyes slowly but surely turned red. I was marked. Dumbledore found me a month before term, in a pub in Albania, trying to drink my liver into corruption. I'll never know why he asked me to take the job."
"So you were....." I trailed off, wondering if my eyebrows would ever come down again.
"A Dark Wizard, yes."
'
Ending Notes; crickets chirp Not entirely what I planned from the beginning, but hopefully good. The slap appeared while writing, and I have no idea where it came from.