I don't own Hellsing or Harry Potter, and I'm not making any money from this.
Being a Slytherin provided one many advantages over other students at Hogwarts.
The first and most obvious thing was that other houses avoided them like the plague. Mihnea found that to be incredibly useful at times. Especially where the younger students were concerned, if they knew a Slytherin was around, they would stay out of their way. If someone saw them doing something they had no business doing, the Slytherins were far less likely to be reported to the teachers than a member of one of the other houses. Most of the student body seemed to labor under the mistaken notion that Professor Snape shielded his students from being punished. Nothing could be further from the truth.
He remembered how the Potions Master payed a visit to the Slytherin common room at the beginning of his first year at school. He did that for all of his new students. They received a stern lecture about the way they were expected to behave during their school career. Slytherin was a house of pride and distinction, he told them. If you received the honor of being grouped with them, you were expected to display and uphold the tenants of the house. If one stepped out of line, the whole lot of them caught hell for it. As such, the Slytherins had a particular system of 'self-policing' themselves that was unique among the four houses. Someone outside the magical world would say it resembled some of the things done in the muggle military. If any Slytherin got caught breaking the rules, their fellow house members would wait until the offender returned to the dormitories, then would proceed to beat the ever living shit out of them for making the rest of them look bad. There was no 'house unity' or solidarity of any sort. Not really. Every single one of them were out for themselves. Slytherins didn't make friends, they forged alliances. When two or more of them needed each other to achieve a particular goal, they would work together only as long they needed to. The alliance would be broken and discarded the moment it outlived its usefulness. Survival was the name of the game within their ranks, and it was an environment Mihnea found he flourished in.
He point blank refused to play the mind games and superiority contests the others indulged in. Growing up under his father's influence had taught him well. If someone was strong, they didn't have to rub everyone's nose in it to ensure they knew it. They could simply walk into a room and everyone would be able to feel their strength. A powerful person didn't raise their voice or yell to get people's attention. They could speak in a whisper, and everyone would strain to hear what was being said. Those who were too ignorant or prideful to recognize these characteristics of greatness could easily be pushed – or forced- to the side if they got in the way.
Perhaps that difference in behavior was why he was one of Snape's favorites. Whereas most of the other members of his house spent all their time informing the rest of the school of how much better they were than them, he kept to himself and only got involved in things when he had to. Much like the incident with Draco, any verbal altercations or fights were over quickly and it was extremely difficult to prove he had actually been involved in it. That was the other thing about Slytherin house. Rules could be pushed to the breaking point and they could do just about anything they wanted as long as no one found out about it. It was just like his parents' rule at home: if you can't do something without getting caught, then you have no business doing it at all. Young Bassarab put that to the test constantly. He knew almost every nook and cranny of the castle from his after-curfew explorations. During the afternoons, he was allowed to assist with stocking the potions storeroom with supplies. Mihnea primarily used it as an excuse to stay out of his dormitory, but it also provided the perfect opportunity to listen in on conversations no one else got the chance to hear.
He was sorting through shelves lined with bottles to make a list of ingredients that were running low when his acute sense of hearing picked up on one such conversation. Snape, Dumbledore, and McGonagall were in his head of house's office arguing about something.
"The man is up to something." he heard the Potions Master hiss. "You don't find it odd that the troll just happened to come in through the section of the castle he was patrolling at the time?"
"Severus, if we were to follow that line of thinking, someone could easily claim that you or any one of your students could have let it in." the headmaster replied calmly.
The boy paused in making his list and cocked his head to the side in interest. What happened on Halloween had been deliberate? He moved a bit closer to the wall that separated the storeroom from Snape's office to continue listening.
"You know that Potter and his merry band of followers have been stalking the halls at night." the man went on. "With that damn dog on the third floor, they're going to get themselves hurt or killed. You should have taken care of that by now."
"You act as though it's unusual for students to sneak around after curfew." McGonagall piped up. "I have it on good authority that one of your Slytherins is quite adept at 'stalking the halls' himself."
Mihnea had the distinct impression she was talking about him. Snape cleared his throat.
"Can you prove that, Minerva?"
"Of course I can't." she replied. "Just as you can't prove that Potter and his friends are doing it. We can't discipline students on suspicion alone, and we can't accuse a fellow teacher of something this serious without evidence."
"I agree." Dumbledore's voice responded. "The stone is well protected, Severus. You yourself created one of the challenges barring access to it." he paused momentarily. "I've already spoken to Nicholas about it. If any attempt is made to steal the stone, he agrees that it should be destroyed."
Severus sounded like he didn't like what he was hearing. "I don't like it, Albus. If you had given the position to me, none of this would be..."
"You know very well that if I gave you the DADA position, you wouldn't be able to remain at Hogwarts for long." the headmaster interrupted. "I need you here, Severus. I have a feeling that with Mr. Potter's return to our world, I will have to call upon your particular talents in the near future."
The boy sensed that the conversation was coming to an end and he should probably get back to his job before they realized he'd been listening. Without making a sound, he stepped over to the far side of the room and went back to examining the shelves for anything he might have missed. The bottles of powdered unicorn's horn were almost empty, and Snape was nearly out of dried valerian root. He hastily scribbled them down.
"You're taking an unusually long time to go through my storeroom, Mr. Bassarab." A deep, silky voice commented behind him.
Damn. Snape had a sixth sense about people doing things they shouldn't. But as long as there was no proof, Mihnea was in the clear.
"I apologize, sir." the boy said, pretending not to catch on to the statement's meaning. "There are a lot of things that need replacing." he held up the slip of parchment. "I made a list."
The professor glanced at it, then jerked his thumb toward the door. "Leave it on my desk, then get out of here before I'm tempted to find a reason to give you a detention."
Yep, he definitely sensed that Mihnea had been spying. He quickly finished writing out the last few items he had to put on his list, then went to do as he was told.
"Okay, wait a minute." Constance said, making sure she was hearing things correctly. "Dumbledore has some kind of stone hidden in the castle, and Snape thinks Quirrel is trying to steal it?"
"That was the impression I got, yeah." Mihnea replied.
Hmmm... Well, she'd always thought Professor Quirrel gave off a creepy, distrustful sort of vibe...
Her cousin had found her after supper and pulled her off for 'target practice' in the forbidden forest. Which was basically just an excuse to go to a place no one could follow so they could talk without having to worry about someone listening to them. There had been a good bit of sneaking involved, and Mihnea warned her to stay close to him to avoid the spiders. Constance wasn't particularly afraid of spiders, but when she saw the enormous cobwebs in the trees, she understood. Only an arachnid the size of a small car could build webs that huge.
Mihnea raised his gun and fired a silent shot at the target set up about a hundred meters away. She couldn't really tell from this distance, but he'd probably hit it dead center again. He was an excellent shot. Connie, however, didn't have his acute sight or night vision, so her shots weren't nearly as accurate as his. In fact, in the low light, it was miraculous she was able to hit the target at all. She shot him a sideways glance when she saw him sipping red fluid through a straw stuck down the neck of a dark tinted bottle.
"You've been drinking blood more often." she commented.
He shrugged. "Dad said I should start drinking every day."
It had taken a few weeks of prodding, but he'd finally broken down and told Connie what was bothering him so much. He implied that it was something gross she didn't want to know all the details of, but she gathered that smelling people's blood was making him hungry.
"Does it help?" she questioned.
"Some." he replied, not taking the straw from his mouth. "It takes the edge off."
Constance hummed, then turned her attention back to the target. Thank God their parents had been thoughtful enough to give them silencers. There would have been no way to practice without them. The breeze was picking up and blowing her hair into her face. She wrinkled her nose and shoved it behind her ears before lifting her gun to fire two shots. Mihnea held his hand up to his eyes.
"Well, you're getting closer." he announced. "You actually hit the edge of the circle that time."
He looked as though he was trying not to laugh at her. Connie made a face.
"Shut up, you." she said, giving him a kick to the shin. "I think that's pretty damn good with it being as dark as it is."
"I suppose you're expecting to shoot at vampires in the middle of the day then?" he teased.
She grit her teeth. "Ooohhh... just go down there and get the bloody thing before I use you for target practice!"
He bit his tongue between his teeth and snickered before rushing off to collect the parchment they had tacked onto a tree. Twilight was quickly fading to full darkness. Mihnea wasn't afraid of anything out there, but it was best for them to get back to the castle. All sorts of nasty, creepy-crawly things came out at night and neither of them wanted to deal with them.
With the target retrieved, they began heading back to the castle. As they walked amongst the ancient trees and twisted branches, Connie thought of something.
"What was the name of the person Dumbledore said he talked to?"
Mihnea glanced at her sideways. "He didn't say the whole thing." he told her. "All I heard was Nicholas."
Constance stopped walking. Hermione had been researching the name 'Nicholas Flamel' for the boys for weeks now. Why it was so difficult to figure out who that was, she didn't know. She thought that was a pretty easy name to recognize. She shared her suspicions with her cousin and he blinked at her.
"The philosopher's stone?" he asked, then paused thoughtfully. "That... actually makes sense, given how much they're putting into protecting it..."
The girl nodded and frowned. "But I don't get it. If someone wanted a philosopher's stone badly enough, they could just make one themselves. I mean, Aunt Syn has a copy of every book ever written about it..."
Mihnea's expression changed and he looked at her like she said something incredibly stupid. "Most of mom's books are ancient and there aren't many copies of them left anymore. Certain types of alchemy border on being black sorcery. There aren't many wizards who'd be willing to use it and they probably wouldn't be able to make it work anyway. It's easier to steal a stone that already exists than to make a new one from scratch."
Oh, right. She thought, feeling foolish. I knew that. She coughed.
"You know, I've heard the boys talking about how they think Snape is trying to steal something."
Her cousin actually looked offended by that. "You don't honestly believe that do you? You should know better than that!"
"I didn't say I believed it, I just said that's what they think..."
Her words were cut off when Mihnea went still and held up a hand to stop her. His nostrils flared as he sniffed the air.
"I smell blood." he told her in a low voice.
Connie looked around at the trees surrounding them. Had someone followed them out there?
"Human blood?" she asked.
The boy shook his head. "Not human. It's some sort of animal." he grabbed her hand and veered to the left. "This way."
It didn't take long for them to pick up a visible blood trail. Constance wouldn't have thought it was blood at all if Mihnea wasn't certain of the smell. Rather than red smears on the foliage and ground, they were following a train of silver droplets. What sort of animal had silver blood? It had to be a magical creature because no ordinary animal had blood that color.
They came upon a small opening in the trees and saw a large, white shape laying on the ground in a massive pool of silver. Neither of them had any idea what it was until they got close enough to make out the horn. It was a unicorn. A beautiful, pure white mare with her throat ripped out. But judging from the strangled breath sounds, she was still alive.
"Oh my God!" Constance gasped, running over to it. "What would do something like this?"
The unicorn's pale blue eyes peered up at her when she ran her palm down it's nose. The beasts had a preference for the touch of female virgins, and the mare seemed somewhat soothed by it. Mihnea frowned, looking disturbed.
"Nothing natural." he replied. "Unicorns don't have any predators. Nothing would touch one except for something very bad."
Connie looked up and understood his meaning. The unicorn tail hairs and horns used by the magical world were taken from animals that died naturally. They were too pure and noble to be hunted down and killed... and this one had obviously been savagely attacked. Left this way, the mare would bleed out – enduring the suffering of a slow, painful death. The girl gave the unicorn a final pat on the nose, then stood and drew her pistol.
"I'm so sorry." she whispered.
The mare studied her with intelligent eyes then closed them, almost serenely, when she pointed her gun at it's head. She fired a single shot, putting the animal out of it's misery. The moment she saw it was dead, Constance started shaking. Persephone slipped from her fingers as she fell to the ground to vomit up everything she had eaten for supper. Her sandy brown hair spilled down around her, blocking out the light and giving the impression that she was isolated in her own little world. What had she done?
She had killed a unicorn. Connie knew it was the right thing to do. Killing the mare quickly was a merciful act. But it still made her sick. These animals were symbols of purity and innocence. No matter what the circumstances were, it felt so... wrong to be responsible for the death of one. Mihnea didn't say a word about her reaction. He just knelt down and held back her hair as she emptied the contents of her stomach.
"It would have died anyway." he told her quietly. "It's better this way."
She nodded, thinking that she was through throwing up. But the motion made her sick all over again, and her body didn't seem to recognize there was nothing left in her to come out. She retched until even bile couldn't come up anymore. God, this was awful. Her sides were going to be sore for a week.
"Are you going to be okay?" he asked when she finally finished.
Constance slowly pushed herself up off the ground and wiped her mouth. She still felt nauseous and shaky.
"I'll be fine." she said. She said it more to assure herself than him. But when she attempted to take a step, she wobbled and tripped.
"Whoa!" Mihnea exclaimed, lunging forward to grab her before she hit the ground. "You are not okay." he told her, examining her. He paused and looked around at the darkness surrounding them. "Whatever did this may still be out here. We need to leave."
The girl slowly inclined her head. They didn't need to be out here with some monster running around. Mihnea fished her gun up from the ground and handed it to her. He then turned for her to climb onto his back so he could carry her back to the castle.
"Please don't take me to the hospital wing." she said quietly as he ran.
"Do I look stupid?" he replied, then glanced at her over his shoulder. "I hate hospitals too. I'll take you to your room."
Of course he hated hospitals. He'd been through too much when he was a baby that had probably scarred him for life.
"How do you intend to get in there without getting caught?" she asked.
"You're going to give me the password." he told her. "And I never get caught. We'll be careful."
Constance felt too sick to argue. All she wanted was to curl up in her bed and not come out for a long, long time.