"Sorted Too Young"
Dumbledore tells Snape, "Sometimes, Snape, I think we sort them too young."
CHAPTER 9 – CHANGE
Draco now had a wand, his mother's wand. He had the freedom to go wherever he pleased, whenever he pleased. He just had nowhere to go. The Weasleys once again took him in, of course. Able to move about better with the cane, he joined them for meals. His manners differed greatly from theirs. He never compromised them, except that he did start to engage in some of the dinner table talk.
In his home, his father bid such a thing at the table. Draco was to be seen and not heard. When I am dead, Draco, then you can talk at this table. Draco considered this a moment while listening to the political discussion between Arthur and Bill and Percy. As far as Draco was concerned, his father was dead. He threw in his opinion.
Draco had a keen grasp of politics, finance, and business. Better than even some of the adults at the table for he had insight from a very different side of those playing fields. On the nights that some guests came for dinner, the talk sometimes shifted to dark magic and how to deal with it. There, too, he had insight that proved very helpful. Draco knew more about dark magic than most were comfortable with, and he grew keenly aware of their discomfort.
On and off during the summer weeks, little Teddy joined the chaos of the Weasley household. Sometimes it went well. Often it did not. Teddy was very emotional, scared and angry. At the full moons he was out of control. At the dark moons he seemed barely alive. He was more than a handful for any couple and sometimes for even this whole huge family. More often than not he ran through the house smashing things and growling and screaming for his mom or dad. He refused to listen to anyone. On the days he went back into one institution or another, he was worse. He started to bite people. On his quieter moments, he would curl up in only Hermione's lap.
Today was not a good day for Teddy while he visited. A specialist was due in town in three or four days. The family had been talking about it. The child had turned four on July 12th and Draco was certain the boy totally understood he would be shuffled off yet again. He remembered understanding things at the age of four. And so Teddy was especially out of control this full moon.
In one of his part shifted to wolf run and snarls through the house, Draco had enough with the lack of discipline. If the child was going to behave like a dog, he was about to get treated like one and learn that there are acceptable and unacceptable limits. As teddy tore past Draco, who was on the sofa, Draco's hand shot out as fast as if he were catching the snitch. He gripped a fistful of fur, hair and an ear. Teddy yelped and screamed and cried. "SHUT IT! SIT!" When teddy snapped and tried to bite Draco, he got firmly cuffed. And Draco held the child thus till the struggling stopped. Molly was practically beside herself, but Bill prevented her from interfering. "Teddy Lupin, you will learn manners if I have to beat them into you. You want someone to be nice to you. EARN IT! Calm down."
The child sank to the floor sniffling. "Are you calm?" asked Draco with a heavy warning in his tone that there would be more firmness if the answer was no. Teddy scrubbed his nose with his sleeve. Draco wrinkled his nose at how disgusting that was. Teddy sniffled more and shifted back into human form, his small hand plucking weakly at Draco's grip. He let out a small whimper. "Better." Draco let him go and stroked the boy's hair gently to reassure him he was not mad. Teddy watched him with stormy blue eyes. "Molly? May I please have something to wipe his nose? It is gross."
That one second of distraction was all Teddy needed. He climbed into Draco's lap and clung there. Draco threw his arms up in surprise. He wrinkled his nose at the wet nose that now rubbed into his shoulder. "This would be a good time to hug him back," suggested Molly as she came to clean up Teddy's face. Draco held the boy who protested. A warning look from Draco kept teddy in check, just barely. The forced timeout in Draco's lap soon found Teddy dosing off. The warm snuggling boy in sleepiness seemed contagious as Draco too dosed off on the sofa.
Bill, who had been taking pictures of Fleur in the garden with her pregnant glow, snapped a shot of this adorable scene. After all, no one would EVER believe Draco could be caught like this. Also, no one would ever believe teddy to be this good and quiet.
Over the few days, there were several repeats of such displays of needed discipline. Teddy started to learn the limits and boundaries, at least around Draco. Hermione too tolerated little bad behaviour. Teddy knew he could and would get spanked by her. He guarded his bum carefully when she was around.
At the dinner table, Teddy learned more discipline. Here Draco and Molly cross forks over how to handle the boy. "Molly, he is old enough to not starve from a missed meal or a cold one. He will learn to be civil at a table or he will be hungry."
"Draco, this is my home and I will not have a single soul in it going hungry for any reason."
Draco countered her, "Then he will never learn what is right and wrong at a dinner table. Because clearly, they have treated him like an animal and encouraged that behaviour in those… those… institutes." The words sounded like a curse, as if he said mudblood.
Molly could not argue with that. They all often suspected that he was often in a room with no one, nothing, and a plate of food on the floor. But no one would or could take him in. And even the Weasleys reached their wits end with him after a couple weeks.
The next morning, the new specialist from Germany came for teddy. He was interning at a local institute here in England and decided to accept studying the child. Draco watched from the window as the screaming child was dragged away. His grip on his cane was white knuckled. His lips pursed in fury while a hundred dark magic hexes flitted through his thoughts.
"Draco, dear. You cannot change this." Molly tried to comfort the angry blond.
"Why not! My mother bade me be the change. Why can I not change this?" He thought about how influential he had started to become over the weeks as he re-established himself and the Malfoy name in society. It just didn't seem like enough. They still regarded him as a child in some ways and didn't entirely take him seriously. He knew Molly was right. He could not change Teddy's situation. Not yet anyways.
"Draco, you can't change this, but there are other things you can change. Things that could help you make those changes you want to see." She combed her fingers through his hair.
He wanted to shrug her off, but turned to look at her, demanding with his eyes to know what she was about to suggest.
"Hogwarts is almost finished. Why don't you go back and redo your seventh year."
He blinked in shock at the ridiculous suggestion. He knew enough to pass the exams now. He didn't need to take the classes and said as much.
"Everyone knows that. But you would be starting a change that is really important. If you, who everyone knows can pass this without redoing it goes back, then it says you have faith and realize there is something yet worth learning. It will encourage others who really do need to go back to go." She meant people like Harry and Ron whose grades sucked and who desperately needed to redo that seventh year.
"And I thought you were sorted into Gryffindor," he mused at her. She smiled sweetly back. "If I am the first, others will follow. And by doing this I build up a more positive reputation based on my conduct there. And that reputation will help snowball changes I want to see. And it gives me somewhere to be that is not here." He relaxed as the ideas started to roll through his conniving mind. "Not that you are trying to get rid of me and not that I want to shirk your hospitality, which has been incredibly. But I'm bored here and have nothing I can do. And at Hogwarts, I might be able to do a lot."
"You could be a role model for many in the other years."
He looked out into the yard. Teddy and the German specialist were gone. "Who is headmaster?"
"Minerva MacGonegall."
A/N: Please review. Reviews keep writers writing.