Chapter 27

"You know why the Death Eaters have so much support, don't you?" said Lily, as the Marauders lounged by the lake.

"Because they don't like the erosion of tradition," said Narcissa.

"Yes, and I think it would be a jolly good idea if muggleborns like us were contacted as soon as we exhibited accidental magic, and were offered association with established families, and education in wizarding tradition," said Lily. "Like it used to be in the old days."

"I suppose there are so many muggle born now," said Narcissa. "But if you ask me, any sensible pure blood family would jump at it, to build up a power base."

"Slytherin to the last," laughed Remus.

"Certainly; nothing wrong with a quid pro quo," said Narcissa. "We do, however, have a problem."

"What's that?" asked Lily.

"Dumbledore. I get that he wants to extend the wizarding world to anyone who can cast spells, but he's totally opposed to any tradition and he favours muggleborn over pure bloods, and makes it plain that he hates all Slytherin and favours the more boorish of the Gryffindors. He couldn't drive a rift through wizarding society more efficiently if he was doing it deliberately, because he's making pure bloods choose Tommy Riddle, who promises a return to tradition.

Severus sat bolt upright.

"Hold on, Cissy, are you suggesting he's doing it on purpose, that he's a secret agent of Riddle?"

"No, I … Merlin, that never occurred to me!" Narcissa was aghast. "No, I don't think he is, I think he's just too keen to snowplough ahead on full steam to integrate muggleborn that he hasn't thought about the implications. I don't think the arrogant old fool has any concept that other people might have ideas that differ from him, or if he does, they must be 'wrong'.

"Then he's a threat to the peace of our world, even if he is well-meaning," said Petunia. "He seems kindly enough, but he's quite ruthless."

Narcissa looked at her in surprise.

"What makes you say that?"

Petunia blushed.

"Before Mr. Prince awakened my magic, I wrote to Dumbledore and asked if I could come to school with my sister and at least study theory. He wrote me a letter which was kindly enough on the surface, but it was a definite and firm brush-off. You'd think he'd be keen to have muggle relatives understand the wizarding world, wouldn't you?"

"It is one of the things that causes divisiveness," said Narcissa. "The muggle born have a choice of two worlds, and their loyalties are seen to be torn between their family and their art."

"Then the sensible thing would be to involve the muggle parents more, and find, where it is possible, jobs for them within the wizarding world," said Severus. "Or at least to join social groups inside the wizarding world. My mum got my dad interested in Quidditch, and I know they aren't the most ideal parents to cite, it's only because he hasn't been welcomed by wizarding folk that has made him scared of the whole world."

"That's a good point," said Narcissa. "Many muggleborn, they say, though as 'they' often are a nebulous group, it may be wrong, are alienated from their families as their parents see their offspring able to do things that frighten them."

"We need more dialogue. Perhaps Granddad can invite your parents and the Evans family to a garden party."

"I'm not sure how well my parents would accept that; I'm afraid they are quite prejudiced. If Andi hadn't run off with Ted Tonks, I would have been as prejudiced. In fact, I was almost ready to hate muggleborn because he stole my sister. But you two had exquisite manners and it cut through my preconceived ideas. Though to be honest, none of us have been that influenced by our parents as we were raised by House Elves, as many pure bloods are, which is how Andi was able to break free. And …" she grimaced, "How Bella managed to make herself into the school broom once she'd met Tom Riddle. She'd have preferred to marry him than Rodolphus, but he won't take an official consort so she's relying on Rodolphus to turn a blind eye to her having an affair with her adored Master. Not even the familiarity of Tom, she calls him 'Master' and revels in grovelling to him." Her voice dripped with distaste.

"Ughh," said Lily.

"Exactly," Narcissa agreed. "But right now, my family wouldn't be ready to consider such a new concept. Though they don't like Bella's attitude any more than they like Andi's, and I haven't been reproved for calling her 'Tommy's little house elf', and she got into trouble for casting the cruciatus curse on me."

The others gasped. For one's own sister to do something like that was horrific, and Petunia and Lily found themselves holding hands, and silently vowing that nothing would make them hurt each other.

"Well, perhaps one day they will open up," said Severus. "When we've reminded people that muggleborn used to be adopted by pureblood families to learn the traditions. But in the meantime, the more muggleborn who learn the traditions, the better, because they wouldn't hardly like it if we turned up in their society, insisting on their customs."

"That really puts it into perspective, Sev," said Lily. "I was reading about marriage customs, and the reason there's not usually divorce in the wizarding world is because traditional marriages come with unbreakable vows, because before anyone gets married, heaps of divination is done to check compatibility. If wizards lived in muggle society and pointed and giggled because muggle women don't have the revellaspell cast to check they are virgins when entering a betrothal, and started passing remarks about scarlet women over people who choose to live together not marry, or who have relationships before marriage, they'd be scragged. And there's no difference between that and those of us who are muggle born who disrespect wizarding custom. When in Rome, do thou as the Romans."

"Though it's hard to change completely. Which is why Mum was disowned and yet has never divorced Dad, because to her, it's improper even if she lives apart from him," said Severus. "But if he asked for a divorce she would probably give him one, because though it would mortify her, it's part of his custom."

OoOoOo

Tiberius disappeared over the next weekend, and looked a little grim when he returned.

"I've got bad news for Myrtle," he said.

"She was cremated?" said Narcissa in dismay.

"No, I have her bones, but her parents were … not co-operative," said Tiberius. "I'm going to break it to her, but you girls might be nice and go chat to her, will you?"

"Certainly," said Narcissa, and the others nodded too.

Tiberius made his way to the toilet on the third floor.

"Myrtle?" he called.

Myrtle's head popped out of a sink.

"Hello?" she said.

"Myrtle, I have good and bad news," said Tiberius. "I have your bones."

"And the bad news? My parents are dead?"

Tiberius grimaced.

"Not that simple," he said. "A few years after you died, they adopted a war orphan, and they have convinced themselves she is their only daughter. Your father called me a charlatan fraudster trying to re-open old wounds and play upon their loss, and that even if I had found some, er, young woman prepared to pretend to be his daughter, he would never accept such an imposter."

Myrtle stared for a moment, and then burst into noisy sobs. Tiberius reached vaguely towards her to pat the region of her shoulder but she disappeared back down the sink and suddenly all the toilets started flushing and overflowing. Tiberius beat a hasty retreat. Teenage tantrums made him nervous even when there was a good reason for them. Better to send the girls down when Myrtle had had a chance to regain some equilibrium. He grimaced. Hopefully she would not be as lacrimose when she had a body and a new family. It was well known that ghosts tended to be stuck in a loop of the emotions they had been undergoing at the moment of their death, Nick de Mimsy-Porpington being an exception to this, in managing to be cheerful most of the time, his natural Gryffindor effervescence overcoming the agony of a botched beheading. Tiberius found himself humming the Gilbert and Sullivan song from the 'Mikado' about how the eponymous Mikado had decreed in terms succinct that those who flirted, leered or winked, unless conubially linked should forthwith be beheaded. Whilst a little harsh, the immediate corollary of seduction or false promise being thus punished did satisfy his Slytherin sense of order. But it would be tactless to be singing such a song if he ran into Nick, and really he needed the castle ghosts in agreement that a little girl used to make a horcrux should be returned to life if at all possible. The Bloody Baron would agree as Salazar Slytherin had suggested it, and he planned to get Phil Lovegood to debate it with the Grey Lady. Nick and the Fat Friar were at least good natured.

At least the rejection by Myrtle's parents made the ceremony easier in some respects. He had planned to ask for blood from Myrtle's parents, but as he was going to be adopting her as a Prince, it meant he could use his own blood. He would need a blood ritual to adopt her as his kindred anyway, and that was why the old ways were being eroded. That idiot Dippet had somehow managed to persuade everyone but the most traditional of families that blood magic was somehow tainted with darkness.

He scowled as he heard faint moans, and swept round the corner.

The huddle on the floor was Lucius Malfoy, and there were sounds of running feet.

Tiberius knelt beside the boy.

"Who?" he asked.

Malfoy groaned.

"The Lestrange brothers, Rosier and Mulciber primus," said Lucius. "Because I refused to go with them to meet their precious dark lord."

"Good lad," said Tiberius. "Is he so contumelius as to come into Hogsmeade then?"

"Yes, but not without bodyguards," said Malfoy. "Don't go after him, sir, he'll kill you, and I might not like your grandson but I owe you for showing me how to stay out of this farce."

"You might not like him, but you are going to have to work with him," said Tiberius, inscribing runes of healing around Lucius. Lucius glanced at them.

"I'm not getting married, sir," he said.

Tiberius laughed.

"Runes of fertility, renewal, binding and strength are just as valid for healing as they are for binding a marriage and ensuring offspring," he said. "If you had learned ancient runes you would have known this."

"Will you teach me?"

Tiberius hesitated.

"Yes, I will," he said. "But only on the understanding that you will listen to me when I tell you that runes can awaken the suppressed magic in squibs, and can draw out the hidden heritance of muggles who hold blood of wizarding lines to awaken them to magic if they are close to being muggle born; and that thus the muggle born are of our blood as much as half-bloods."

Lucius Malfoy gasped. It helped that the jangling nerves tortured by the cruciatus curse were starting to dull to an ache, the pain dissipating as Tiberius drew out the runes. Tiberius chanted, and Lucius sat up straight.

"What are you saying, sir?"

"Something that your father is a trifle too limited to accept, but that you might just have the brains to understand," said Tiberius. "My grandson made friends with a muggleborn witch. He asked me to see if her sister's magic was suppressed. It was. And I have made the discovery that those two witches are descendants of Slytherin himself, through a Gaunt squib a century ago. Which proves that squibs pass on their heritance."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Because you owe me, Malfoy. And you can repay me by studying heritance along with runes, and backing me up when I am ready to try to re-institute the custom of the great houses adopting the muggleborn and teaching them proper tradition and ways. It's fallen into disuse because of the insistence that all blood magic is dark. You are a clever lad. Consider how much more powerful House Malfoy would be if you only had muggleborn allies too, who would give their all for their kin because their kin gives them everything. What more sensible than to have holdings in muggle businesses as well as wizarding ones?"

Lucius considered.

"I've been a fool in the last few years," he said. "My father is a traditionalist, which I respect, but I thought that Lord …"

"Not his name, boy, he can hear it," Tiberius warned. Malfoy nodded.

"That the dark lord offered a return to the old ways. That it would remove the muggleborn and we would go back to being pure and hidden. But Dumbledore has built himself an army of trained and loyal muggleborn, hasn't he? And what better than to subvert, train and own them, rather than to kill them. Especially if they do bear our heritance."

"Now, my boy, you are thinking like a true Slytherin not like a spoilt brat who wants to lash out at those whom you see as less than you. I mean, really, kicking a cat? A man does not do that."

Malfoy was suffused with a dull flush.

"Or a squib, I suppose," he muttered.

"A man knows what he should do," said Tiberius.

Malfoy pulled a face.

"It will be hard making an apology to Filch," he said.

"Easy things are not worth having," said Tiberius. "Filch is a great ally. He knows what goes on in the castle, and it isn't just his cat. He listens to the portraits, and the statues, and the house elves. As does the headmaster, but Filch knows it first."

"Do you side with the headmaster, sir?"

"Against Tommy Riddle? Yes. But never make the mistake of thinking that I trust him. He is not fair to Slytherins, because he is as full of prejudice in his own way as you have been, and that means he is a dangerous old fool because he has not grown up and shed his prejudices. But he is a very powerful dangerous old fool. Keep that in mind and keep smiling at him."

"Yes, sir, I will. Thank you." Malfoy nodded, dusted himself down and went on his way.

Tiberius reflected that this had been an unexpected but fortuitous development.