Chapter Seventeen

Thank You, James

"Why…?" Albus was saying. He was on the ground, not even bothering to fight back his tears. "I didn't even bother to ask then… Why would Dad tell me it was okay to be in Slytherin, and then just turn around and tell me to choose Gryffindor instead?"

"We bought into it," Lynne finally said. "We all heard that Slytherin was the house of evil, so we believed it without ever wondering why we needed it. But Slytherin… we all thought he was this bad guy because he started the blood purity and didn't want Muggleborns in Hogwarts, but he had a point. If kids are raised by Muggles - Muggles who hate wizards - then they're a threat to everyone in the school."

"But Muggleborns aren't a problem anymore," Courtney muttered. "My Da, he's a Muggle. And when he found out Mum and I were witches, he had no problem with it at all. Muggles have changed, so Muggleborns have changed. Maybe back then, Slytherin was right, but if he were around now… We see him as the villain because today his actions would be wrong."

And if Muggles have changed enough that Muggleborn prejudice was wrong… Maybe they've changed enough that the Statute of Secrecy was wrong and the Light Magic Movement was right.

"But wait," Lynne remembered. "What about the facts? Slytherin still produces more Dark wizards than any other House… Voldemort, Grindelwald, Comiporcus, Tel-Marius, Kevin, Eraz-"

"Did you…" Albus asked. "Did you actually pay attention in Binns's class?"

Lynne shrugged. "Sometimes." Coming from a Ravenclaw, admitting that she didn't always pay attention said a lot about Binns.

"But you're right," Courtney said. "Maybe there is something evil about Slytherin that turns people into Dark wizards, even if Salazar wasn't that bad."

They opened the door and started walking out of the Room when a familiar face turned up. James.

"You found this room?" James asked when he saw them. "Way to go, Albus, I didn't find it until my second year…"

"Thanks, but Lynne here is the one who actually found it…"

"Nice job," James said, more quickly. "But seriously, you're all about to be late for your classes. You have, like, five minutes."

Shoot! They'd actually gone a couple hours before class specifically so they wouldn't miss anything… But they were too caught up in Slytherin's memories that they hadn't noticed the time passing.

"You can thank me later," James called to them as he walked into the Room. Courtney made sure she remembered that as she darted toward the Potions classroom.

"There you are," Carroway said when Courtney got inside. "That makes all of us, and just in time, too." Courtney sat down, and Carroway moved on to the lesson.

"Now that we've learned the recipe for Draught of Living Death - and now that Professor Longbottom has assured me you all know how to handle the sopophorous beans - you are now ready to actually begin brewing the Draught. You have until the end of class, and this does count for a grade."

After class, Courtney hurried over to the Hufflepuff common room to take a look at the schedules… Yes! There was information about the third-year Gryffindors… James would be in Professor Digrattus's class right now…

Courtney left the common room and wandered up the flights of stairs. She had a general idea of where the Divination classroom was, but she had never been there herself, seeing as the class wasn't available to first-years.

When she got there, she waited outside the room for the class to end. When it did, and the Gryffindors started leaving, Courtney approached James. "Hey, James?"

"Hey," he said when he saw her. "What's up?"

"I just wanted to say thank you." Seeing his blank expression, she continued, "For getting Lynne and Albus and I from the Room. There's no way we could have made it to class in time if you hadn't." Come to think of it, Courtney hadn't actually checked to see if Lynne and Albus had made it to their classes.

James nodded slowly. "No problem. Later."

Courtney looked for Lynne and Albus at the Great Hall. She found them sitting across from each other, beside Rose and a few Ravenclaw and Gryffindor kids that Courtney didn't recognize.

"Hey, Courtney," Lynne called. Courtney sat down next to her.

"Hey," she said. "So did you two manage to make it to class in time?"

"I did," Albus said. "Barely. Good thing Longbottom's class was so close by."

"I was a couple minutes late," Lynne admitted. "But I doubt Binns noticed."

"That's good." Courtney let out a sigh of relief. "I found James and thanked him for helping us out there."

Author's Note: Yeah, this is a pretty slow chapter. Sorry. The plot should be getting back in motion by the next chapter, though.