Monday, 6 September – Friday, 10 September 1993
Hogwarts
The first week of classes, in spite of, or, more likely, because of the fact that Mary had more commitments than ever, had gone incredibly quickly. The second week went even faster, with only the briefest of pauses on Sunday to attempt to catch up on sleep and homework.
None of the Conspirators seemed keen to talk about their detentions, either the first one or the ones to come, for a variety of reasons. Mary was thankful for this. She was filled with a sore sense of betrayal at Snape's drugging all of them, and thought she rather needed more time to process the fact that no matter how much she might want to, she was wrong to have trusted him so strongly (though it did, at least, settle the question of whether she ought to put more time and effort into finding something to call the man other than 'Snape' or 'sir' with a resounding no). Hermione seemed to be embarrassed about having been tricked into thinking she was deathly ill, and Lilian's frank admiration for what she considered a fitting punishment was met with utter scorn by the others, who felt it was in one way or another unfair.
Slytherin as a house seemed to be holding its breath on the issue of its one resident muggleborn (which Mary began to suspect over the course of her Monday and Wednesday detentions might have more than a little to do with her intervention on his behalf). The first and second-years had made no more obvious attacks on Rhees, and none of the upperclassmen had defied the Prefects to attack Mary herself.
Classes continued smoothly, and there were Quidditch trials to look forward to at the end of the week (and another Conspiracy Detention, and Hermione's Muggleborn Student Association's first meeting), but for the most part, the difficulties of the first week seemed not to require any further action for most of the second, leaving a void which was filled with different minor social problems which, Mary felt, disproportionately originated with Lilian.
In hindsight, actually, it might have just been the fact that Mary spent so much time with Lilian that made it seem like most of the highlights of the week had to do with the other Slytherin. Really, she only had two major issues, and one of them involved Hermione, too, but she was so loud and persistent about both of them that it seemed they were larger and more all-encompassing than they really were.
The first problem that Lilian would not shut up about was the fact that Malfoy had apparently ruined Creatures forever with his little hippogriff stunt – the class was still focusing on flobberworms, a fact which did not seem likely to change any time soon. Mary was now even more relieved that she had dropped it. The older Slytherin ranted about it for nearly all of lunch on Monday and breakfast on Tuesday as well, arguing with Draco at cross purposes for nearly half of that time, each of them willfully ignoring the other's points. (By Friday, however, after their fourth lesson, Lilian was ready to establish a truce with the blond, and join his crusade to get rid of the giant 'professor,' if only to move on to something more interesting. Mary was certain that nothing good could come of such an unholy alliance. The entire dinner period was filled with scheming.) For the most part, Mary dealt with this by considering the drama good entertainment, and changing the subject to Quidditch when Lilian got too repetitive.
The second issue was more difficult to ignore: Lilian was convinced there was something wrong with Hermione, or else that she was up to something again – possibly something bigger than the Catgirl Incident.
Mary, as seemed to have become her role by default, somehow, over the past two years, was roped into playing Devil's Advocate, arguing that Hermione wasn't up to anything, and it was perfectly reasonable for her to be as exhausted as she obviously already was, what with taking twelve classes and having lost all of Saturday's study time to detentions.
"That's so not the point, Liz!" Lilian had grumbled. "How is she even getting to all of the classes?! Ravenclaw has Muggle Studies with Gryffindor at the same time as our Runes class, and she never misses Runes, but Daphne says Dunbar says that she never misses Muggle Studies either. It's impossible!"
"She said she was doing some classes with the other sections, and some independent study," Mary pointed out. "Maybe Daphne and Dunbar are just messing with you."
Lilian dismissed that explanation at once, however. "Why would they bother to lie about that? It's too easy to check. Roper and Longbottom are both in Muggle Studies, too."
Because the older girl had taken a far more rational number of hours than their Ravenclaw friend, and had not managed to get two weeks' worth of detentions (condensed into four days) in the very first week of school like Mary, she had plenty of time to pursue her suspicions while the others were otherwise occupied. So far as Mary could tell, from Lilian's sporadic meal-time reports, she was largely using her free time to question all of their mutual friends and see if they had noticed anything odd going on, either.
Ginny hadn't, but Lilian discounted her opinion, since she had been possessed for most of the previous year, and therefore didn't have a good baseline reference against which to compare this year's behavior. The fifth-year Slytherins had informed the third-year in no uncertain terms that they had better things to do with their time than to keep an eye on 'that troublemaking Ravenclaw' – it was their OWL year, and the professors were already gearing them up for it. And Luna, it transpired, was as unhelpful about this as any other topic on which one might want a straight answer.
"'I expect if any of her need help with anything, they'll let you know,'" Lilian quoted during their free period on Thursday, while Mary was scribbling away furiously at their Transfiguration homework, due the next morning. "Any of her?" she repeated. "What the bloody hell is that supposed to mean?"
"Hmmm… You need better informants?" Mary answered idly. "What did you put for the one on naming and its role in the mouse to gerbil versus mouse to bat transformations?"
"Umm… that mouse to gerbil should be easier since they're more closely related taxonomically, but since the word for bat literally means flying mouse in German, if you use veranderumng instead of transmutatio, mouse to bat is easier. And I have better informants, it's just they aren't being very forthcoming," Lilian pouted.
The older Slytherin was convinced that her sister actually knew exactly what was going on, she just didn't want to say.
Mary made a non-committal noise. "What about the one for cross taxa power inputs?"
"Increases by one level of magnitude for each taxonomic level and arithmetically between, like, different orders in a class, or different families in an order, and also becomes, oh, what was the word… expotentially? Exponentally? More unstable, so it lasts less time if you turn, say, a mouse into a lizard than a snake into a lizard."
"Because the snake and the lizard are both reptiles, while the mouse is a mammal?"
"Uh-huh," Lilian sighed. "I think I'm going to have to talk to the twins."
Mary finally looked up from her parchment, but only long enough to wrinkle her nose at that suggestion. She was still not happy with the twins, and neither was Hermione. So far, she was pretty sure the Ravenclaw was responsible for at least two of their back-to-school pranks backfiring on them. "Weasleys? Why? And more to the point, why would they tell you anything, even if they knew?"
"Yes, Weasleys, and because no matter how much we hate them on principle at the moment, they have made it their business to know about any weird stuff going on in this school, and they'll tell me because it's obvious Hermione's trying to hide something."
"Well, yeah, but they like her more than they like you."
Lilian shook her head. "If they don't already know she's behind the sock-spoon incident, and the dungbombs they tried to sneak into Filch's office making their way back up to Gryffindor tower, I'll tell them. They'll roll over on her."
"How'd she pull that one off, anyway?" Mary asked. She knew the Gryffindors had replaced Morgana, Perry, and Adrian's spoons with socks-transfigured-into-spoons at dinner on Tuesday, and Hermione had switched them with the twins' and Lee Jordan's normal spoons, so that when they cancelled the spells, it was their own mouths suddenly full of soup-soaked wool. But that was in the Great Hall. She had no idea how Hermione had managed to get into Gryffindor tower, let alone the twins' dorm.
"I'm pretty sure she just summoned them out of Filch's office and asked Ginny to plant them under the twins' beds. The Gryffindor dorms don't have our security. And when the timer-triggers went off, well…"
"Huh. Somehow I would have thought it would be more complicated than that."
"Well, that's how I would have done it. I guess there's no reason to assume she took the easy route."
"It's probably safer to assume she wouldn't."
Lilian rolled her eyes. "I'll talk to them after dinner."
"M'kay. Keep me posted. I'll be here or in my room, working on that Herbology essay." Honestly, it seemed like she never did anything but homework and detention anymore.
Saturday, 11 September 1993
Quidditch Pitch
As it turned out, the twins did know what was going on, but Lilian didn't manage to track them down until Friday, and then, due to their usual class schedules, Snape's extra class, and Mary's last detention for the whole fighting/Dave Rhees/Truce/trial thing, they didn't have a chance to talk alone until half past seven on Saturday morning, as they made their way down to the Quidditch pitch. The trials, much as they had been the previous year, were held in the morning, directly after breakfast.
It was probably a good thing that they were outside and well away from anyone when Lilian shared her news, because Mary's response was to shout, "WHAT?" much louder than would be considered unobtrusive or even reasonably polite indoors.
Lilian, who had already had a full night to come to terms with the revelation, smirked. "Yep. A time turner. They said their brother Percy had one – doing twelve OWLs is the excuse they use for the Department of Mysteries Mentee Program to authorize their use – and I guess there's some way they can tell on that Map of theirs."
"Time. Turner."
"Little enchanted hourglass necklace filled with the Sands of Time. Yeah. Time turner."
"So she's not doing the extra classes independent study, she's…"
"Travelling back in time one hour at a go, so she can literally be in two places at once."
"And Percy Weasley had one?"
"Yeah, but he didn't need it for his NEs, and the twins don't think he has it anymore."
"That's just… Really? Time travel. To take extra classes?!"
"That's what I said. But they said it's more than that – it's like a whole program, to vet potential recruits for the Department of Mysteries. You have to get the recommendation of your Head of House and the Deputy Head before they'll even consider you."
Mary walked in stunned silence for a few very long seconds before she responded. "Wish I'd known about it."
Lilian snorted. "I think they have to come to you – you can't volunteer. Plus, d'you think Professor Snape would've signed off on something like that after last year? I bet he's right pissed that Jeanie's got one. Just imagine how much more trouble she can get in if there's two of her running around. Like having her own Weasley twin."
"Oh, Circe's tits. There's got to be like, rules, or something, though. They don't just give these things to any thirteen-year-old who seems smart enough to handle it… right?"
"Ha. Wizards haven't any common sense, remember?" Lilian trotted out the watch-word that had ruled the second half of their first year. "The twins said the best they can figure, she's allowed to be in three places at once, as long as they're not the same place."
"Suppose that makes sense. The Gryffindors have three of their electives at once, so if that's their excuse…"
"Yeah, Hufflepuffs, too. And they said they've been keeping an eye out for her since she started sabotaging their pranks. They totally already knew it was her. Weren't a bit fussed at ratting her out. They think she's adding in an extra three or four hours to her day, but so far as they can tell, she's using all that extra time in class or the library."
"No wonder she looks so tired all the time," Mary thought aloud, "if she's up and doing stuff, like, twenty hours a day, instead of sixteen."
"I know, right? So you know what I'm thinking?"
Mary turned to look at her taller friend. "What?" she asked, the word drawn out with caution.
"We need to have an intervention!"
"Why?" The second question was equally drawn-out.
"Don't you see?! She has this amazing resource! She could live every day, three times over, and have all the free time in the world for sleeping and studying whatever she likes and still have a social life, but she's just wasting it and wearing herself out with this three-extra-hours dragonshite!"
Mary stopped in her tracks to look at the other girl. "You're serious?"
Lilian turned back as she realized Mary was no longer beside her. "Of course I am. It's just criminal to have this thing and not use it. At the very least, she should use it to get in a few more hours of sleep. She looks awful."
"Okay, yeah, but just think for a second. You said it yourself that Snape was probably pissed she had one, because the last thing we need is a Hermione who can break the laws of time and space at will. Can you imagine what she would do with all those extra hours? I can't even… Catgirl would be nothing."
Lilian's expression took on a slightly more cynical cast. "Yeah, but… she's our friend. Our ally. It's pretty much guaranteed that she's not going to use it to goof off. I can't see that happening. Experimenting, yes. Breaking laws and sneaking into the restricted section after forbidden knowledge, yes. And probably even yes to trying some dangerous things that she's not quite ready to handle yet. But, I know she's got a list of things she wants to look into as long as her arm, and at least half of those have to do with… Tom Riddle, and whatever happened back in 1981. A Hermione with more time to research is a more valuable ally in the long run."
"Are you seriously suggesting that we should convince our friend to casually mess with the fabric of reality because it will benefit us in the long run?" Mary made a disgusted face at the other Slytherin. "I can't believe you'd use her like that."
Lilian smirked. "I wouldn't ask her to do anything specific, just point out that she could have a lot more time if she wanted it… and then let her do what we both know she wants to do anyway. Do you really trust Professor Snape to come up with the answers for us?"
The younger girl hesitated. A week ago she would have said yes, but a week ago, he hadn't yet poisoned her and seven of her closest friends (and the Weasley twins). "He's been very forthcoming so far."
"It can't hurt, though, to have independent confirmation. I trust Hermione absolutely. I'm… not sure about Snape."
Mary bit her lip as she considered. She suspected that Lilian might be trying to manipulate her, as well as Hermione, but she couldn't imagine what the other girl could possibly be getting out of it. "I'll think about it," she said after a long pause, then changed the subject. "Hurry up, we're going to be late!"
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Quidditch trials commenced in much the same fashion as they had the year before, though Mary felt it was quite different, to be defending one's position, instead of competing to take it over. There was more pressure, but at the same time, she felt much more confident from the very beginning.
There were more second-years to try out this year, and more positions open, especially in the reserves. Fetch had graduated, and Chess, their former reserve, had decided he needed to focus on his OWLs and his new prefect position, so finding a new keeper and reserve was the most important goal of the day. Monty, one of their starting beaters, had decided to retire in favor of focusing on his NEWTs, as had one of the reserve beaters, Matt Bannan. Warbler and Snark were both sticking around, but they would need reserve beaters. All of the starting chasers (Flint, Bole, and Draco) were returning, and Lilian was determined to take Bole's or Draco's starting spot if she could. This suited Draco just fine, because, as he had done the year before, he was trying out for the seeker's position, as well as defending his place with the chasers. Envy, Lilian's fellow reserve chaser, had decided, like Chess, to focus on her OWLs. This meant that they needed at least one more reserve chaser, regardless of whether it was Lilian or Draco who made the starting string.
It was very rare that a fifth or seventh-year who wasn't already on the team would try out, due to the academic challenges of those years. It was therefore somewhat of a surprise to see seventh-year Stewart Podmore join fourth-years Sadie Rosier and Sabine Kilberthal (who had tried for chaser the year before) and second-years Blake MacDougal and Travis Young in the group of potential keepers.
Vinnie and Greg, along with the now-familiar fourth-year Claudius Burke and second-year Ignotius Carmichael were having a go at the beaters' positions, though Mary doubted they were expecting to beat out Warbler or Snark to start. Vinnie and Greg, at least, were definitely aiming for the reserves.
There were two second-years challenging Mary for her position, along with Draco: Melinda Lestrange and Edward Rowle, who was not, in Mary's opinion, built for the position at all. He finished well behind the others in their warm-up/speed test, despite having the latest Comet, which beat out the Nimbus' top speed by a solid margin.
Finally, it seemed half the second-year class was trying out as chasers. This was a smart move, considering that if they managed to get even into the reserves, they would have a much better chance of making the starting team when Flint graduated. Courtney Avery, Melisandre Flint, William Higgs, and Artie Seran joined that group after the initial race around the pitch, along with a fourth-year, Johnathan Corner, plus Lilian, Draco, and Bole, who, even as a sixth-year, was not exempted from the house rule that everyone had to defend their position but the captain.
The trials proceeded more or less as Mary recalled from the previous year, though there was somewhat less confusing switching of chasers in and out of the goals, since they did have five potential keepers to test. They started with the simple race, which Mary won, though not by much. She and Draco had been flying against each other for two years now, and were fairly evenly matched, despite his broader shoulders and correspondingly greater wind resistance. Melinda Lestrange, too, was very fast, and Blake MacDougal, though he seemed to have rather less control, almost running into Draco as he tried to stop.
The race was followed by scrimmages incorporating all of the potentials, intermixed with diving contests for the seekers, live-bludger beater-seeker drills, and straightforward chaser-keeper drills. Mary cheekily pulled off a Suicide Dive in the first diving contest (accelerating straight down, then pulling a front-flip fast enough to give her whiplash, close enough to the ground that her now-very-long braid swept the grass as she shot back up, silver practice-snitch in hand). Flint, who had forbidden her to do Suicide Dives in practice, lest she actually kill herself, glared at her and Draco called her a show-off, but the second-years were very impressed.
The beater-seeker drills were, for the seekers, basically a dodging exercise. The beaters paired off, each with a single seeker. One beater targeted the seeker, the seeker would dodge, and the other beater would intercept the bludger and send it back at the seeker. The beaters moved closer together over the course of the exercise, so that all three of them had to react faster and faster. They hadn't done these at the previous year's trials because there were no beater candidates, but Mary and Draco had both done them in practice over the previous year.
Draco was, Mary would admit, slightly better at the game than she was. He seemed to have a sixth sense for exactly how the beaters were going to strike, moving almost before they did to effortlessly avoid their bludgers, while she resorted to the more acrobatic trick flying Envy had taught her to avoid the murderous metal balls. Edward Rowle was eliminated in the second round by default, as he was knocked off his broom by Vinnie, and had to be taken off to Madam Pomfrey by one of the spectators. Lestrange made a solid effort, but was neither as nimble as Mary nor as graceful as Draco. Carmichael was eliminated as a beater soon after Rowle because he let one of the bludgers escape and had to go chasing off after it down the pitch.
The seekers and beaters had a brief respite while the chasers took shots at each of the keepers straight on, as though practicing penalty shots. Travis Young was by far the least talented of the potential keepers, missing twenty of the thirty shots aimed at him over three rounds. Kilberthal had obviously put in a good bit of work on her keeping since the previous year's trials, and managed to stop about half of the shots, but she had a tendency to guard the center hoop too closely, leaving the sides vulnerable. MacDougal had a similar score, racing about to intercept each attempt, then back to protect the other hoops rather haphazardly. Stewart Podmore, Mary thought, was a lazy keeper. He was tall, with long, gangly limbs, and almost didn't have to move to cover a hoop in its entirety. He hovered rather far in front of the hoops, attempting to intercept before the Quaffle came anywhere near the goals, and stopped about twenty of the thirty. Sadie Rosier, though, was fantastic. She only let in three of the thirty, obviously calculating trajectories and intercepting with a grace that reminded Mary of Draco's dodging, and weaving a guarding pattern between shots as though anticipating a threat from any direction despite the fact that they were working on penalties. Of the three she let in, two were Bole's and one was Draco's.
After three rounds of scrimmage and drills, the hopefuls were narrowed down and they played their annual half-field game, the stands filling with betting spectators. Rosier, Podmore, and MacDougal took turns in the rings, keeping for both sides. Bole called plays for one team, made up of himself, Draco, Melisandre Flint, Snark, Vinnie, and Lestrange. Lilian led Higgs, Corner, Warbler, Greg, and Mary against them. Mary caught the snitch easily after about half an hour of wreaking havoc on Bole's formations. Lestrange, trying to copy Mary's style and therefore terribly distracted by the other players, never stood a chance.
After that, Flint apparently decided he had seen enough. "Pull it in, people!" he bellowed, directing them to the Slytherin stands, well away from the majority of the spectators. It hardly mattered. While they had mostly disappeared the previous year, due to the fact that Flint had insisted on more chaser exercises after the half-field match, this year, the spectators had no such boring display to suffer through, and so migrated closer as Flint gave his speech about the Importance of Quidditch and the Slytherin principle of putting their best players forward.
"Oh, just tell us, already!" one of the watchers called from the reassembled crowd.
Though he looked like he would quite like to refuse on principal, the captain acquiesced. "Potter, you're staying on as seeker," he announced, as though this was a surprise to anyone who had watched the seeker trials. "Malfoy, reserve seeker."
Both Mary and Draco nodded. Watching the trials, Mary would be very surprised if Draco didn't keep his position as chaser as well. She could tell that Lilian, sitting on her other side, knew this, too. She had been snappish since the first scrimmage, when it became clear that Draco still worked better with Bole than she did with either of them.
"Warbler, Snark, you're our starting beaters. Crabbe, Goyle, you're reserves." Vinnie and Greg fairly well beamed. Mary couldn't imagine what would have happened if one of them made it on the team and the other didn't, or even worse, if one of them was starting without the other. They were almost as inseparable as the Weasley twins. Flint's insistence on cross-pair training would probably be good for them.
"Starting Keeper will be Rosier," Flint declared, with a glare at Podmore and a tone which brooked no argument. "Podmore, you'll be our primary reserve; MacDougal, secondary reserve."
Mary raised an eyebrow as the spectators murmured. It was odd to take on a specifically secondary reserve. MacDougal would likely never get to play in a match, but Flint must have thought he was worth training up a bit, since he was only a second-year. Someone cheered from the back of the crowd of spectators, "Called it! Pay up, Chess!"
"And finally, for our chasers, it'll be myself, Bole, and Malfoy to start, with Moon and little Higgs as reserves."
Lilian grumbled something under her breath that Mary wasn't sure she wanted repeated. Melisandre Flint looked murderous. Mary would be willing to bet that her older brother was going to get an earful as soon as they were in private. Mary herself was more concerned that she would have to deal with Higgs on the team. He was one of the ones who had been beating on Rhees, and she was sure he was going to be a pain to practice with.
With that, and a reminder to keep an eye on the notice board for practice times, the team was dismissed, and they trooped up to the castle along with the spectators, thankfully with plenty of time for showers and lunch before yet another Snape-filled afternoon. Mary knew better than to try to talk to Lilian for a while. She had worked really hard trying to get on the starting team. Unfortunately for her, Draco and Bole had apparently been doing the same. Now she was just glaring at the boys – Draco, Bole, and Flint, too – furiously. She couldn't truly complain – Slytherin Quidditch was a meritocracy, and Flint was scrupulously fair about choosing the best players (they couldn't be the best if they didn't have the best players) – but it didn't take a genius to see she wished she could. Mary decided to leave her be until dinner, at least.
When Snape's detention consisted of eight solid hours (with only a short break for cold sandwiches at dinnertime) of copying passages from law books, which Mary was certain were simultaneously the most complicated and most boring texts she'd ever read, she revised the period over which she was inclined to avoid her more outspoken friend up to Monday breakfast. It was, she thought, a hideous detention (almost as horrible, in its way, as the Suggestivity Solution), and she hadn't just spent the morning failing to make the starting string. Lilian would probably need all of Sunday to restore her usual good-tempered equilibrium.
Sunday, 12 September 1993
Hogwarts
Sure enough, Lilian spent Sunday with the third-year Slytherins who weren't on the Quidditch team. Mary saw her at lunch with Daphne and Blaise, and at dinner with Pansy, Tracey, and Millie. They spoke in passing, but it was clear enough to Mary that the older girl was a bit disenchanted with both her and Draco at the moment. At least the boy had had the good sense not to rub it in that he was starting, as Mary vividly recalled him doing the year before.
Mary spent most of her Sunday in the library with Hermione, finishing her homework for the coming week and attempting to catch up on her correspondence. She normally liked to do her homework as soon as it was assigned, or on Saturday, so she could have a whole day off of a Sunday, but thanks to her detention schedule the previous week, that hadn't been possible. (And now it was the beginning of the Quidditch season again, so she was fairly certain it would continue to be impossible until after the first match, at least.)
As far as letters went, she had just been accumulating them, since the homework was generally more urgent, but it was bordering on rudeness now not to answer. Some of them she'd had for over a week. Emma and Dan, who had taken to writing separately as they pursued different projects over the summer and into the term, and who now each had an owl of their own, as well as Catherine, were owed a nice long update on everything from the train ride to Quidditch trials. She had also gotten letters from a healer at St. Mungo's; her caseworker, Mr. Fulton; and a Gringott's representative who all seemed to think she had some sort of business to take care of since she was now thirteen. Why it had taken a month to get the letters to her, she didn't know, but she suspected she should talk to the Professor before she answered any of them. At least Remus was in the castle now, and so wouldn't be expecting proper letters, but they were almost through the second weekend, and she still hadn't found time to drop by his quarters and see how he was liking the new teaching position.
She sighed loudly, prompting Hermione to comment, randomly, as she often did when thinking about things, that it was odd how the library used torches, while the Ravenclaw Common Room used light globes.
"You'd think it'd be a fire-hazard, with all the books," Mary agreed idly.
"Hmmm… Maybe they're not real fire."
The Slytherin looked up from her History essay to see the Ravenclaw eyeing a nearby torch speculatively. "Whatever you're thinking, don't," she said with a grin.
"Huh? What – oh! I wouldn't experiment on the ones in here!" the older girl sounded both appalled and offended. "Madam Pince would probably chuck me out and never let me come back. They don't give off any smoke, though, have you noticed?"
Mary had noticed. The dungeons had less natural light, after all, and less ventilation, even with the occasional enchanted 'window' and air-freshening charms. "Mmm. And the candles in the chandeliers never drip."
"Really?"
The Slytherin nodded. "They get all dribbly, but they never actually drip outside the holder."
"Huh. I'll look it up."
Mary sniggered, because of course she would, and let the conversation die. She briefly considered asking Hermione about the Time Turner, but decided not to, since she still wasn't sure what she thought of the whole thing, and wanted to talk to Lilian again first.
Instead she let her mind wander. She was supposed to be writing about the differences between Catholic Inquisitions and Anglican Witch Hunts in the sixteenth century, and their influences on the development of the Statute of Secrecy in the following centuries, but it was very dry stuff, and far less relevant to her daily life than, for example, Snape's detentions.
Before this year, the only time Snape had given Mary detention, it had been delegated to Filch, and then Hagrid. She was now aware that he did this for most curfew-breakers and mischief-makers, especially Slytherins, since he avoided taking points from his own House like the plague.
Detentions for faffing about in Potions inevitably involved potions – either dissecting something particularly awful, or, if the student couldn't be trusted to do that properly, scrubbing cauldrons. Slytherins hardly ever got those (they knew better than to mess around in their Head's class), but she'd heard tales from the other houses, especially Gryffindor.
It was rare for Snape to actually supervise detentions himself. Probably, Mary thought, because he was busy. He gave more detentions than any other Head of House, but he certainly didn't have more time to supervise them. Less, maybe, given the extra classes he held for third-years and prefects. This made it rather outstandingly odd that he had assigned the Conspirators almost a hundred hours of detention, which he obviously intended to attend to himself. That, though, she might have dismissed as a special case – they had obviously gone far beyond the bounds of normal rule-breaking, and she could see his making an exception for that. But then he had decided to take on her extra ten hours in person as well.
After two weeks and twenty-five hours' worth of detentions, she had decided that he must be trying to make a point with them. It was the only explanation. She was even fairly certain she knew what the point was: to make them actually think about what they had done – and it was working on her. Despite the fact that she still hadn't talked about the detentions to anyone, even her fellow Conspirators, she couldn't help dwelling on them.
The one where he had poisoned them all was clearly meant to say 'see how it feels, having someone dose you in secret?' and probably 'this is what could have happened' for the ones who had brewed the potion. (Plus 'you can't trust anyone, even Snape,' though Mary didn't think that was an intentional lesson.) The one where they copied out lawbooks was probably to hammer home 'you should be in Azkaban, not detention.' The twins had mentioned on their way out the door that he'd made them do something similar in their detentions for kidnapping her.
She was beginning to question whether it really had been worth it, to catch the Heir. (In truth, she had been questioning that since they had actually found the Heir, but had managed to largely ignore the feeling over the summer.) But surely it was just as wrong for Snape to slip them potions as it was for them to question the school, and to let them off with just detention for their crimes? Not that she wanted to go to Azkaban, but…
The detentions where she tediously copied and then translated Latin were easier, if only because the things they made her think about were easier. Not that they made her think any less, they just didn't involve any moral dilemmas. The chapter he had made her translate – and she did get through most of it, in the six hours of her detention – was about patronage in the wizarding world, and how a pureblood family could basically sponsor a muggleborn, bringing them into magical society. It sounded not entirely unlike the fosterage system, but for adults, and if she was right about Snape using detentions to teach her lessons, then the thing with Dave Rhees might not actually be resolved.
It was something she definitely needed to ask Catherine about when she finally got to writing letters, because she wasn't sure exactly what Snape was hinting at (did he want her to be Rhees' patron?), and suspected that she might have inadvertently advertised to the older Slytherin students that she was offering her protection as the Heir of Potter to David Rhees, First of His Name. And if that was the case, she should probably figure out what that meant in a modern context, and tell Rhees about it, so he could decide whether he actually wanted it. It was the least she could do.
But before she could do that, she really needed to finish her essay for Binns and the rune-drawings Professor Babbling had assigned for Monday, track down the Professor and ask about the official letters, and then she could finally get to writing personal letters, of which Catherine's, Mary decided, would be first. She cast a quick tempus charm, and frowned. If she really buckled down, she could finish the essay and start the runes before lunch, then catch the Professor after, and hopefully get everything else done before dinner.
After dinner, as Hermione had brightly reminded her, she was to attend the first-ever Muggleborn Students' Association meeting. While she did not object on principle to being involved with such an organization, Mary wasn't particularly looking forward to spending an hour making small talk with a mass of people she didn't know, most of whom were firsties and second-years, when she could be doing something much more useful with her time, like the algebra exercises she hadn't managed to start yet for Tuesday's Arithmancy class.
Right, she thought, focusing on the book in front of her, and the fifteen inches she still needed to fill with words. Witch hunts. Churches. Statute. Powers, could this be any more boring? She corrected herself almost at once, however: of course it could. Binns could be lecturing about it. With a small, private smile, she began to write.
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After dinner, Mary dutifully followed Hermione to the second-floor classroom where the new club had been assigned to meet. The older girl talked her ear off all the while about how she had managed to get the Head Girl involved (apparently Penelope Clearwater was a muggleborn), and they had made the club official, with Professor Burbage as their faculty advisor. All of the Ravenclaws were very excited to meet muggleborns in other houses – there were only a few of them, compared to Gryffindor and Hufflepuff.
Mary, for her part, was still more interested in getting started with her Arithmancy homework. Meeting with the Professor and dealing with her 'Professional Correspondence' (so-called by Professor McGonagall) had taken longer than she had hoped, and she had had to cut her letters to Emma and Dan frightfully short in order to get up to the Owlry before dinner. She had managed to get a nice, long catching up letter to Catherine, though, complete with all the questions she now had about patronage. So at least that was something.
Mary and Hermione were among the last to arrive, just a few minutes before the official meeting time. The room was fairly full – Mary guessed that there were about thirty kids, most of them firsties and second-years. Hermione, as the organizer of the new club, had to stand up in front of everyone and talk about its purpose and how it was meant to proceed. She did so much more confidently than Mary thought she could have done herself, but aside from that it seemed the Ravenclaw had no public speaking skills at all.
The Slytherin had to work very hard to suppress a wince as the older girl babbled about getting to know one another and supporting each other in the strange new world that was Hogwarts. The tendency toward wordiness that served her so well in disguising a lie was not particularly conducive to a good introductory speech. The younger children seemed very bored, and the older students – there were only a few – gave each other rather concerned looks.
Mary, for her part, shared their uneasiness, though she couldn't have said why. Maybe it was because she wasn't really a muggleborn, and hadn't had a normal experience even being muggle-raised, but she just wasn't very enthusiastic about the idea of a Muggleborn Students' Association.
Finally, Hermione turned the lectern over to Clearwater, whom Mary was sure she had met before, even if she couldn't remember when, and came to sit next to her friend, practically humming with excitement. "I think that went quite well, don't you?" she whispered.
Mary made a non-committal noise. She had honestly stopped listening about halfway through, in favor of watching the other students, but from their reactions, she would have said that it hadn't exactly gone well. But she didn't want to contradict her friend, especially not in front of her new club.
Clearwater was talking at the front of the room, outlining what she called an 'icebreaker' activity: "So we'll go around and each of us give your name, year, house, where you're from in the muggle world, and one fun fact about yourself, yes? I'll start.
"I'm Penny Clearwater. I'm your Head Girl, in case you didn't know, which makes me a seventh-year, and I'm a Ravenclaw. My parents lived in Tipperary County, in Ireland, and I like trekking and tenting. Lee?"
The twins' fellow prankster was sitting in the front row, all the way off to one side. He shrugged. "I'm Lee Jordan. I'm a fifth-year, Gryffindor." He paused for the young lions to cheer a bit. "I'm from Brecon, Powys, in Wales. I like a good laugh. Thinking of working at Zonko's next summer."
The next three students were Hufflepuff second-years Mary had never spoken to: Gita Kaur, who moved to England when she was seven, and twins Jenna and Jessie Reynolds, who liked swimming and playing the piano, respectively. Justin Finch-Fletchley went next – his 'fun fact' was that he had been petrified the year before, which Mary didn't think was very fun at all, and rather in poor taste to mention.
Then there were several first-years from Gryffindor, whom she recognized from the Shopping Trip – Amy Hallinan (who had a twin who hadn't come), Hannah Murray (who wanted to be a vet when she grew up), and John Shaw (who couldn't think of anything fun and interesting about himself when put on the spot) – and Colin Creevey and his little brother, Dennis. To absolutely no one's surprise, Colin's fun fact was that he liked photography… followed by a request to get a shot of the whole club before anyone left. Dennis liked skateboarding.
When it was Mary's turn, she got a few weird looks – almost all of them, including the new first-years – had already heard her name and knew she wasn't actually a muggleborn, plus she was the only Slytherin in the room (Dave Rhees was nowhere to be seen, which was probably a smart move on his part). She forced herself not to roll her eyes while telling everyone that she grew up in Surrey and could talk to snakes. Hermione said she liked skiing, which Mary hadn't known about her.
Then there were several first and second-year boys who all liked to play football (they de-railed the introductions slightly in their excitement about possibly starting a team), and a Ravenclaw first-year girl who was into ballet. Mary started to tune them out after that, taking real notice only of Chelsea Lewis and Eric Bennett, the only other older students present.
She wasn't sure, but she thought that Bennett, Lewis, Jordan, Clearwater, Finch-Fletchley and Hermione might be all the upperclassmen muggleborns in the school, which was… kind of disturbing, really. She definitely recalled Lilian telling her that the Death Eaters had targeted muggleborn babies toward the end of the war, but if there should have been fifteen or twenty in every year, like there were for first and second-years… she shivered. That was a lot of dead kids, and somehow a lot more real when they were all in a room together, and not just numbers on a page.
Finally the introductions ended, with second-year Gryffindor Helen Puckle, who wanted to be an actress, and the Head Girl directed them to mingle and talk to anyone whose fun-fact they found interesting. The older students – Mary and the six older muggleborns – gravitated toward one another as the football boys started a loud conversation and the rest of the room formed little trios and pairs.
"Good work, Penny!" Lee Jordan congratulated the seventh-year.
She flushed slightly. "I'm just glad they're talking, and they'll be there for each other," she said quietly. "I, well… I'm sure they're not going to have the same problems we did, but it's still good that they're coming out of their shells early, you know?"
Jordan, Lewis, and Bennett nodded seriously. "This was a good idea," Lewis added, turning to Hermione. "I mean, now that there's more of us, we kind of need it."
Hermione snorted. "I think we could have used it a few years ago."
"Right?" Finch-Fletchely agreed. "It would've been nice, you know, if there'd been anyone around to show us the ropes when we started. Not that you didn't do a good job, Eric," he hastened to assure the older Hufflepuff, "but, well…"
"Yeah, there should be a class or something," Bennett said with an understanding grin.
"What do you mean?" Mary asked.
"You know, Lizzie," Hermione said. "Like some sort of wizard studies class on how to not make a complete arse of yourself in front of everyone?"
In point of fact, her fellow Slytherins (once they had accepted her as one of them) had made a concerted effort to point out when Mary was making such mistakes. Sometimes this had been done in ways obviously intended to make her feel like an idiot (Draco, Pansy, and Tracey, mostly), but she had quickly learned to conform to the standards of her House. It hadn't been that difficult (aside from the part where they had tried to haze her to death). "Oh, right – that," she said noncommittally.
Hermione didn't seem to notice her lack of enthusiasm. "I can't believe no one told me to stop raising my hand until you and Lili pointed it out last year!"
Mary sniggered. Even by non-Slytherin standards, Hermione had been an awful attention hog in class. Thankfully she was capable of learning to control herself, especially when Mary and Lilian spent a whole month of shared classes poking her with a sharpened quill every time she raised her hand.
Clearwater winced. "Percy, fifth year."
"Percy Weasley?"
"Yeah, he's my boyfriend," Clearwater said with a grin. "We've been going out for a while, now."
"Did I… um… help bury you two in a snow cave, like, two winters ago?"
The Head Girl and Lee Jordan burst out laughing. "You never told me that!" Hermione exclaimed, just as Jordan said, "Oh, God, the twins told me about that!"
"They said Percy didn't even take points from them or anything because he got a good snog out of it," he informed the younger students, waggling his eyebrows teasingly at Clearwater.
She went very pink, but refused to let the younger boy get to her. "It wasn't a snog, just our first kiss. Very romantic… once the body bind jinxes wore off."
There was a bit more giggling at that, but then the conversation trailed off, long enough that Mary felt it began to become awkward. Bennett and Lewis wandered away to check on a couple of kids who had managed to exclude themselves from the other conversations and make them feel welcome. Jordan thanked Clearwater for the invite, but excused himself – "OWLs, man – McG's lost her freaking mind, all the homework she's assigning."
The Head Girl gave him a look of false-sympathy. "You think it's bad now, just wait 'til your NEWTs!"
He groaned and headed for the door, only to be intercepted by Colin Creevey and his camera, which led to everyone being herded up to the front of the room for a group photo. There was much shoving and shuffling and several calls of "A little to your left! Your other left!" as everyone tried to get in a position to see the camera. Thankfully, the photo-session took up most of the remainder of the hour-long meeting.
By the time all the younger students had gone, and Mary felt she was able to leave herself without offending Hermione, she had come to a decision on the club: while it wasn't the worst way she could think of to waste an hour, it was still tedious and she had almost nothing in common with most of the members. Hermione, Clearwater, Lewis, and Bennett seemed to think that it had been, on the whole, a success and were chatting eagerly about what they should do at the next meeting, but Mary was thinking that if she could think of a reason to avoid attending, she probably would.
She wasn't sure, never having been a member of a club before, but she thought one shouldn't feel more isolated and left out of things after joining one.
In a rather strange mood, she bid her friend and the older students farewell, and made her way back to the dungeons to finally get started on her maths.
Monday, 13 September 1993
DADA Classroom
Mary
Monday was significant for Mary for exactly one reason: DADA. Of course, there were other things that happened that day, too, but they were all other people's problems, so far as Mary was concerned. She truly didn't have anything to say about Hermione's reaction to the morning paper (She was suddenly and inexplicably pissed about an anonymous letter apparently written by her mother, which hinted that Hogwarts' standards were clearly slipping and called its safety standards into question.) or the fact that Lilian still wasn't speaking to her or anyone else on the Quidditch team with anything other than the bare minimum of politeness.
She had decided, sometime between leaving the Muggle Students' Association and arriving back in the Slytherin dorms the night before that she would quite like to start a club of her own (preferably with as little investment of her own time as possible). It had begun with wondering exactly what she could do to get out of attending Hermione's club, and then she had realized that the only thing she would actually be willing to make more room in her schedule for would be learning how to fight properly.
While she had learned plenty of spells on her own, with her friends, and with Catherine's help over the summer, she still felt that she was missing out on a key aspect of learning how to really fight – the actually dueling other people bit of it. And she couldn't help think that, regardless of what Catherine might have to say about the patronage system, Mary was likely to be getting into a lot more fights this year, or, hell, over the course of her life in the magical world. She couldn't count the number of times she had been attacked, by students, professors, and magical creatures since she arrived at Hogwarts. If the underclassmen had had any sense at all, the little beat-down she had given them in defense of the Truce (and Rhees) could have gone much worse. Learning how to properly defend herself seemed like a better idea the longer she thought of it.
And in order to do that, since she was fairly certain it was frowned upon to ask one's friends to come to an abandoned classroom and hex the crap out of each other, it only made sense to attempt to re-start the dueling club.
Thus, she was looking forward to DADA because it presented her first opportunity to draw Remus' attention to the fact that the third-years, and probably every other class as well, were woefully behind in Defense. This was the first step in her plan to get him to do what Lockhart had failed at so spectacularly. After all, who else should teach dueling besides the DADA professor? (Actually, she knew that Flitwick had been a champion duelist, but she knew Remus better, and therefore suspected she had a better chance of convincing him to do it.)
Unfortunately it seemed the new Defense Professor was more resistant to her hints than she had hoped. After a full ten minutes of questions on what they ought to have learned in their previous two years' courses, during which the other Slytherins and half of the Hufflepuffs kept giving her odd looks, doubtless wondering why she was apparently intentionally attempting to derail class, Remus had snapped.
"Miss Potter," he had said rather irritably, his temper obviously not improved with his health, "you may remain after class if you wish to discuss the curriculum further. Now, today, we are meant to be discussing the Powrie or Red Cap. Write that down, it will be on the exam. The Red Cap is native to the old world, including Europe and our very own island. I've arranged for one to be delivered for our observation, but it's been delayed in transit and won't be here for another week or so, unfortunately. So! Instead we're going to be taking a look at this."
He whipped a sheet off of a small cage with iron bars. A creature the size and shape of a small dog, with patchy brown fur and a bear-like head lunged at them, recoiling when it came in contact with the metal. "This is a Blood-Sucking Bugbear. They're not native to Britain, but they were introduced in order to try to control the native Pixie population by the Romans, so they've been here quite a while. Alone, it's not much of a threat to an armed wizard, as it's susceptible a simple stunner or freezing charm, but the bachelor males tend to travel in packs…"
Remus
There were fifteen-minute passing periods between Hogwarts lessons, and though underclassmen only attended each class for about three hours each week, the core subject professors taught 36 hours of lessons. This meant that, regardless of whether Mary had a free period next, Remus had another class arriving shortly, and therefore a limited amount of time to get to the bottom of whatever was bothering her to the point that she had repeatedly interrupted his lesson.
He liked to think that he was a fairly intelligent man – when he was a student, he was always the bookish one, called upon by his friends to find the spells they needed to pull off their pranks – and living out in the world, first with the werewolves during and after the war, then as a travelling adventurer, had driven a certain amount of social awareness and 'street smarts' into him as well. He was certain this would be construed by most of Magical Britain as 'Slytherin-ness,' but in his mind it was just good sense and people skills. He also liked to think that these skills helped him to be a good teacher, but on days like this, he was fairly certain that endless patience was far more important.
For example, it was taking a great deal of patience not to snap at the girl who was now standing before him, rocking rather nervously from her heels to her toes, hands locked behind her back, avoiding his eyes. He sighed and took a seat at one of the student desks, rather than continue to loom over her. "Have a seat, Mary," he invited.
She sat, but failed to raise whatever question she had. Perhaps that was only to be expected. They had only spoken in person and informally twice, and he was now in a position of relative authority over her. He was beginning to believe that children, like werewolves, reacted instinctively to shifts in power-structures, even if they were not consciously aware of the reasons for their reactions.
"I'm not angry with you," he offered, watching her pick at her nails and avoid his gaze. "We only have a few minutes, but perhaps you'd like to tell me what you were thinking earlier?"
Mary apparently decided that honesty would be, in this case, her best option. There was no scent of deceit about her as she explained: "I thought that maybe if I made it clear how much we missed out on the first couple of years, you might be more willing to sponsor a dueling club. Lockhart tried, but he was a worthless ponce. But you could really do, like, a good job with it. You've actually done the kind of things he said he had. But I think I might have, um… I overdid it," she ended, flushing slightly, clearly embarrassed by her failed, childish attempt at manipulating him.
Remus sighed. While it was, on the one hand, flattering that she wanted him to teach her how to fight, it was also rather disturbing. He, along with all of the other professors (except perhaps Trelawney), had heard about Mary's recent altercation on behalf of the muggleborn Slytherin. The snakes in general had been fairly close-mouthed about the whole thing, but Minerva had gotten wind the assigned hours of detention as Deputy Head, and questioned Snape as to the reason behind the punishment of her ward in the staff room, and Pomona, who had overheard, was, as Remus was quickly discovering, an inveterate gossip. He didn't like to think that Jamie and Lily's little girl was already facing enough troubles and pressures that she was actively looking for someone to teach her how to defend herself. And what was worse, he actually felt that dueling was the aspect of DADA that he was least qualified to teach.
"Why didn't you ask Professor Flitwick?" he asked, "Or Professor Snape? I know he was involved with Lockhart's club last year."
"I, um… that is… I thought that, well… I just wanted to learn from you, that's all." Remus could smell the embarrassment rolling off the girl. Great. Now he felt like a cad. She trusted him to teach her to protect herself, and he was letting her down.
"Listen. Mary. It's not that I don't want to teach you," he said, thinking fast. "I just don't think I'm the best professor to start a club like that."
"Why not?" she asked. "You're the Defense professor! And you're the best bet to actually do it. Professor Snape hates teaching. He was only there to make Lockhart look bad. And Professor Flitwick already has Charms Club to supervise."
Remus groaned. "That's the problem: I am the Defense professor. I'll be gone by the end of the year, you know. And dueling isn't my strong suit. If you wanted to start a club looking at defensive enchantments or Dark Creatures, strategy, or even counter-curses and jinxes, I would be all for it, but I don't have the right experience for a dueling club. I've never been a one-on-one, front-line fighter. Even in the war, I was a negotiator, not a warrior." Not to mention he was struggling to drag himself through just basic lessons one week out every four.
"You could still teach us the basics. Anything would be better than nothing," the girl pointed out, crossing her arms stubbornly.
Well, he couldn't really argue with that. "Tell you what, how about you ask Professor Flitwick if he'd be interested, and if he's not up for it, I'll do it." Worst case scenario, he could find some of the NEWT Defense students who had been trained in dueling over summers and offer them extra credit to teach the underclassmen.
"Really?" the girl's whole face lit up as she grinned, reminding Remus strongly of Sirius, a thought he quickly quashed. He was desperately trying to avoid thinking of the dog since he had escaped Azkaban, apparently to hunt the girl before him.
"Yes, really. But talk to Professor Flitwick first," he insisted. "He really does have the kind of experience you need to learn from."
"Okay, I will." Excellent. And Remus would be sure to mention it to the Charms professor as well.
"Alright, then. My next class will be coming in any minute, but do try to find the time to come visit me next weekend, alright? I'll be here most of Saturday, and I'll leave a message with the portraits outside if I step out."
"Sunday might be better," Mary muttered, suddenly and inexplicably nervous.
"Oh?"
"It's, um… Quidditch. We still don't know the practice times, yet."
Remus' curiosity was piqued. For a Slytherin, Mary was not a very good liar. He didn't even need to smell her anxiety to know that, regardless of whether Quidditch practices had been scheduled, it wasn't the real reason her Saturdays were booked. But the first of the sixth-years arrived, so he couldn't really pursue the issue. He simply gave her a disbelieving look and said, "Sunday is fine."
"Great!" She sounded relieved, he thought, not to have been called out on her lie. "See you later, Remus!"
She bolted for the door, and several of the sixth-years laughed at him as he called after her, "It's Professor Lupin, you little scamp! Kids these days," he muttered for the upperclassmen's benefit, shaking his head morosely. "No respect for their elders, I tell you."
This, of course, garnered more laughter as the older students settled in their usual places. For the younger classes, he had made a point of presenting himself slightly differently to each house: Adventurous for the Gryffindors, taking them to the teacher's lounge to deal with their boggart, or telling stories of his travels to illustrate the use of different spells; knowledgeable for the Ravenclaws, demonstrating advanced techniques and referencing obscure texts; reliable and protective for the Hufflepuffs, emphasizing that every one of them could and would succeed, and that the things he was teaching had real-world applications that could help their friends and families; and overwhelmingly competent for the Slytherins – the third-years weren't the only ones who had thought to test him on the first day of classes. (That first week of classes was the most exhausting full moon week he had had in years, even with Snape providing Wolfsbane for the transformation itself.)
For the NEWT students, however, he had taken a different approach: treating all of the sixth and seventh-years like responsible adults, rather than catering to their individual house prejudices. It seemed to be working. According to Pomona, he was already known as 'the cool teacher,' and the older students were quick to respond and open up to him, both with questions and in discussion.
"Alright, you lot, settle down," he called, as the last of the sixth-years filed in. "As you may recall, we're still working on the Patronus Charm this week. We'll move on to new things next week, but I expect you all to know the theory behind this spell well enough that you can practice it outside of class…"