Disclaimer; I own nothing, etc etc...

The Accidental Slytherin: Chapter Three

The Slytherins were still in an uproar by the time Snape made it to their common room that night, and it was several minutes before any of them noticed him standing near the portrait that hung over the doorway. When they finally did see him though, they were immediately quieted, and respectful of his presence.

"Professor Snape," one of the prefects taking his NEWTS class asked, "to what do we owe this honor?"

"Thank you, Avery," he said, acknowledging the mannerly seventh year, "I'm sure I don't need to tell you. Is everyone here in the common room?"

After sending one of the girls to gather anyone from their dormitories, Avery nodded. "All here, Professor."

"Good. Now let me make myself clear because I'm going to tell you only once and expect that to be more than enough to be understood. We have a new student joining us..." he placed his fingertips together for emphasis, "and the unofficial report of the moment is that she is a half-blood. I'm sure we all have a hard time believing this, but frankly I don't care what she is, the sorting hat has placed her in Slytherin and unfortunately that's where she's going to stay. I've been informed that anyone slandering her will be expelled, and I will not tolerate such behavior from my own house. You don't have to like her, for all I can imagine she doesn't like you either considering the welcoming you gave her at dinner, but know this, any student unable to tolerate her can pack your bags and be known as the pure blood who let a muggle-born deprive you of your magical education. Dismissed."

"But Professor, isn't there anything you can do?" asked several of the older students at once.

Irritated, Snape turned back from the door. "Believe me, if I had any say in the matter she would be on the train home this moment. I said dismissed."

There were murmurs of discontent, but the Slytherins knew well enough that their head of house's word was final. No one asked any more questions as he left the room, and he didn't wait for any.

…...

Though Cécil didn't know it, Snape's words had held at least some degree of weight with their house and her first week of school turned out to be relatively uneventful. Well, uneventful compared to the sorting ceremony. There was a great deal to understand about this new world, and more new sights then she thought she could absorb in a single school year, but she was willing to learn and give it her best shot.

The Slytherins seemed to regard her as an evil they could do nothing about, and took to ignoring her completely. Cécil was used to this sort of treatment, so it didn't exactly bother her, but she did find it somewhat unsettling when all of the other first year girls scooted their beds to one side of the dorm room so they were as far away from Cécil as possible. She wasn't sure what they thought they might catch from her, but she didn't make it an issue. Being avoided was always better than being tormented.

As for her classes, all except one were unlike any she had taken in the muggle world. Strangely, the subject, or at least the idea of the subject she was most familiar with was the one she was doing the worst in so far. History of Magic was turning out to be her daily nemesis and she attributed this to her complete lack of knowledge of the magical world prior to coming to Hogwart's. Next was transfiguration, which she also found difficult, but more enjoyable than history, and charms which she felt similar about. She hated to admit it, but she seemed to be one of the very last students in just about every class to get the hang of whatever spell was being taught. It had taken her all the way to Thursday to leviosa that damned feather and even then it had fallen back onto her desk after only rising an inch. She was seriously beginning to consider that though magic apparently existed, it did not within her.

There had also been a flying lesson that had scared the living bejeezus out of her, (again she considered the broom to be magic, not herself) and defense against the dark arts which she didn't know enough about yet to form a real opinion of, except that she had formed a great many new fears since attending.

The only two classes she seemed to be doing any kind of okay in were potions and herbology.

It was commonly known that Slytherins were good at potions, in part because their head of house taught the class and was a favoring prick (or so rumor said), but she couldn't possibly believe his favoritism extended to her.

What Cécil liked was that she found it to be almost the same as cooking, which she had done quite a lot of in the muggle world. Instead of stews and cakes though, she was cooking weird stuff like... draught of waking dreams. She enjoyed herbology as a counterpart because she knew it was merely the skill of gathering ingredients to then be used in potions. In her mind, she lumped the two classes together, and took pleasure in noticing the connection between the subjects. For all she knew, every time she went to Professor Sprout's class, she was merely visiting the spices section at the grocery store.

…...

On the last day of her second week, Cécil was stunned to receive a letter during lunch. Unsurprisingly, it managed to land in her glass of water, but she removed it as carefully as she could and smoothed it out on the table. There was no name on the front, and she stared at it, wondering if her mother had randomly decided to write. It didn't seem likely.

"Scared of owls? Open it stupid," The boy sitting next to her whispered.

She wanted to, really, but... the thought of someone caring about her existence enough to write was almost as scary as it was thrilling.

"Are you deaf, stupid? I said open it," the boy repeated louder, making the kids around him laugh. "That's what people do when they get letters."

Undecided, Cécil peeled her letter off the table and left the great hall, figuring she would at least rather look at it alone. She really hadn't explored the school much so far, mainly for fear of getting lost, but today she headed up an unfamiliar staircase to investigate her ominous treasure.

After turning down only a few hallways, she found a fairly deserted area, and climbed into a windowsill. She stared at her letter another moment before finally just opening it.

Cécil, it started. The rest was so smudged from the water it was unreadable until the very bottom which said something about meeting after class and, Sincerely, Professor Sprout.

Was she in trouble? Cécil wondered, beginning to panic. Surely, she'd done at least average in that class, unlike her sloppy performance in every other. Squinting, she scanned the letter again, looking for anything at all legible.

'become aware of your performance in my class' and 'unsatisfied' were all she could make out, and her heart sank. Was she going to be dropped? Without herbology, she wondered if she might never have a moment's peace. Upset, she slid off the windowsill so she could head to her next class, which was (unsurprisingly) potions.

She knew she was jumping the gun, and being childish to boot, but it was hard not to drag her feet dejectedly as she made her way to the dungeons. Or... someplace that looked exactly like the way to the dungeons but wasn't!

Shit! She cursed to herself, knowing she was going to be ungodly late, before breaking out into a run in the opposite direction.