Summary:
In which Hermione Granger is much less Muggleborn than first believed, and does indeed devour books. Quite literally. [creature!hermione] [drabble-series]
Disclaimer:
I don't own Harry Potter, or the cover picture.
It's always amusing to see how each first-year class reacts to the 'absence' of a teacher, and the replacement of a cat.
It's not as amusing to see how a first-year very carefully doesn't react, instead walking through that door with a walk that was merely a thinly-veiled stalk, turning those too-wide eyes with those too-thin pupils onto her, and, other than a meaningfully amused upwards quirk of her lips, turning reactionlessly back away to take a seat.
And isn't this interesting?
Minerva leans back, slightly, involuntarily twitching her whiskers with unease when the Boy Savior himself sits next to the girl who's only human in appearance, and begins a light, stilted, awkward conversation with her, but still a conversation with her, as if he didn't know how inhuman she was.
Probably he didn't, actually; Albus had always had a bit of a soft heart for those with a cause and a burden, even if that cause was unneeded and that burden was something they were quite capable of carrying.
Half-giants, werewolves, part-veela, even a very helpless and uncertain fraction-vampire... Hogwarts had accepted them all, hid them all, covered for them all.
But those were all mixed-breeds, not genuinely dangerous creatures; even the werewolf was human most of the time.
Minerva thought herself to be a rather liberal witch, in most respects, with an attitude more open than 99% of the Ministry and probably at least half of Wizarding Britain, but when it came down to accepting a draconic creature who could transform and kill students with a snap of their snout, liberalness didn't really matter much.
There had to be a line drawn somewhere.
Granted, like Albus had reiterated with stern emphasis to the gathered faculty during the traditional before-school meeting, Hermione was simply a juvenile for her species, and could be subdued easily by such professionally trained good folk like themselves, yes?
"So long as we get to her before she snaps out a round of that silencing roar or whatever it is that they do," Snape had muttered dourly, with many of the staff hesitantly (or not so hesitantly) agreeing with him for once.
Even Minerva had nodded, loathe though she was to agree with that smug bastard who kept rubbing Slytherins' House Cup victories in her face.
"Now, now, Severus, and the rest of you, I'm really quite shocked and disappointed at your unwelcoming attitude so far," Albus sighed in return, pinching the bridge of his nose and shaking his head slowly and rhythmically, like some old antique Muggle grandfather clock.
She knew him well enough to recognize a ploy for pity when she saw one, but she had to admit his act was a convincing one, and perhaps, just perhaps, part of that age-old weariness wasn't actually an act.
'Shocker if I ever heard one, then, of Albus Dumbledore not putting on a fine show for those always watching.'
"Bookwyrms, as wizarding kind has unoriginally named them, are a rare and amiable if private breed, judging by the few past recorded interactions. Intelligence on par or greater than your average wizard, constantly 'eating' the intent and meaning of words around them, thus constantly gaining knowledge to add to their encyclopedic mental libraries. They hoard works of literature, as you know, or rather, simply words in general, and can divine much about a person and their purpose just from 'eating' their words. Quite impressively long-lived, if we are to believe they die like they say they do, an assortment of unknown powers, a pacifist culture tempered by norms where battle is done through wits and mere words when provoked . . . And, when fully mature, large enough and similar enough to contend for the title of a 'dragon' by those unfortunately less educated. Can't you see what a golden opportunity we have been handed here?"
Here, he grew quiet and distant.
Surely another act, but one of his more impressively emotional ones to date.
"We all know the Dark Lord . . . no, we all know that Voldemort has not been so easily defeated. He will be back. And if you do not believe me," Albus added pointedly, a sliver of his hidden steel spine sliding into his speech, perfectly cutting off the sudden rise of protests, "then think on this. The next time a Dark Lord rises, for as definite as human nature can get, humanity will produce another Dark Lord, would you rather face them with a race of word-centered veritable dragons, or without a race of word-centered veritable dragons? Or even, worst coming to worst, and they are somehow bribed or coerced or otherwise swayed from 'reacting' to 'attacking,' facing a Dark Lord with a race of word-centered veritable dragons on their side?"
Having half-rosen from his seat somewhere in his passioned, deadly quiet speech, the Headmaster dropped back into it, and kneaded the bridge of his nose more thoroughly, as if warding off a headache.
"Words are very important. We communicate with them, we cast spells with them. Do you really want a race of sentient, possibly dangerous, magical beings running around with that sort of power to maybe take away words? They have no ties, no obligations to us other than as a food source-"
He made another sharp gesture to quell the agitated murmurings.
"-of words, thank you very much. We have established that much, at least, when what we know as the Grange-dwelling Bookwyrm tribe contacted us about a young wyrmling who wished to explore our library and lessons. They are about as likely to eat a human as a human is likely to eat a bug; in other words, some tribes might consider them perfectly viable, following the philosophy of 'the source of words,' but the European-nesting Bookwyrms are largely in agreement that we're too, and I quote, 'squishy and warm and messy. We will take the crisp and clean words that you produce, perhaps, but no more, although certainly we are capable of sustaining ourselves on magic and such foods as fruit and vegetables and meat and grain.'
"This Hermione Granger is their first hatchling in over half-a-century; they have also remained tight-lipped about their rate of reproduction, or methods of such, which only adds to the mystery surrounding their species as a whole. The Wizarding World probably knows more about Nundus than we do about Bookwyrms. We don't even know what they call themselves. As your Headmaster, I implore you, keep an eye on her, if not to protect her, than to at least protect the students while knowing the possible repercussions if we betray this trust they've given us. The Grange Bookwyrms were kind enough to leave me with another one of their sayings. 'The elephant may never forget, but we live longer and have much sharper teeth.' I consider that sound advice. Don't you?"
And with that last, grim echo of a memory in her mind, Minerva McGonagall jumped off her desk as a cat, landed as a woman, and locked eyes with the monster smiling blandly at her without showing any teeth.
'What kind of teeth would you show, anyway, in that mouth of yours?'
The smile grew progressively blander with every passing second, with every concerned nudge from Harry Potter next to her, as if very much aware of what she was thinking.
'Can they pluck words from our heads, as well? That is, I suppose, what we're supposed to find out.'
Not removing her gaze, she began the class.
Never let it be said that Minerva McGonagall ever ran away from a challenge so publically bared.
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Shout-outs to turtlehoffmann2251, and Lyanah.