"What did it say?"
Harry listened to Neville's paraphrasing with raising eyebrows.
"What kind of condition did you suggest for it to say that?"
Neville opened his mouth to respond but the sound of the common room's entrance stopped him. As his friend covered him hastily with the cloak, Tracey whispered with a mischievous smile, "how about we keep it a surprise for your coronation? Since he chose the rule with you in mind."
The Potter heir shook his head in disbelief. Neville shrugged. It didn't really matter to him. He said as much to his friend. "It's nothing bad anyway. I think you'll like it."
Harry snorted and made a slight sound of agreement. "Fine. Let's go," he murmured as professor Snape stepped into the room. The man cursed the Weasley twins under his breath. The three students had to bite their lips to avoid laughing.
They walked backwards toward the dormitories, intent on reaching the secret room Harry had told Neville about. The potions master would probably be at it for a while. They knew from experience that dispelling dung bomb smells was not easy; worse, the twins' recipe changed frequently to make it even more of a hassle.
As they reached the corridors, Neville could swear he felt Snape's dark eyes following them.
The door was warded silent, yet Blaise still thought he could hear Malfoy's whining from behind it. He picked up his pocket watch from his trousers, twirling the magical artefact so it would show the time instead of the state of his family's magical cores. Daphne watched him with some interest. The Italian prince remembered watches weren't given to British wixen children before their majority. It was an interesting cultural difference, but also utterly baffling. Did they expect students to rely on their parents until then? It wasn't an issue at Hogwarts where the bell rang every hour —and sometimes when the castle felt like it, though it used a different melody then— but he could see so many ways it could pose problems outside of school.
He didn't mention his thoughts on the subject out loud. Now wasn't exactly the time for a lecture from Terence on how the wixen burnings and the proximity of British magical settlements with muggle cities had impacted the way the magical population of Great Britain cared for their young. While he understood that Mezzogiorno and its magical floating cities had left their wixen children less at risk and thus had evolved differently, he still thought that this behaviour should have stopped after the implementation of the Statute of Secrecy.
Eh. Not his cage, not his pixies.
Blaise was interrupted in his boredom-induced musings by the welcome arrival of his two wayward friends.
"How did it go?" asked Tracey breathlessly as she burst into the corridor, Harry in tow. They looked like they'd run there, probably anxious about what had happened on their side.
"They're all in there," replied Theo, looking up from his book. "Except Goyle and Parkinson. We're letting them stew for a while."
At Harry's inquiring noise, Blaise explained the earlier confrontation with Padma. His best friend whistled at his retelling, impressed with their Ravenclaw friend.
"That's a really cool spell. The only animal transfiguration in my family grimoire is an antler-growing spell," Harry mourned, coming back to Padma's curse.
Aspen frowned. "Anteoculatia? Why is it so widespread if it's a Potter spell?"
The Potter heir grinned, rubbing the back of his neck.
"Not exactly. Anteoculatia is the version my ancestor sold to the department of Mysteries for fair use. It's in our grimoires as an introductory explanation to another spell." He grimaced. "Aubrey Potter thought it was too tame."
Blaise wasn't sure he liked what it implied about the other one. Who was he kidding? He almost wished Harry was given a reason to use it and show him. But knowing him, he wouldn't try until he knew how to heal the effects of it. That was the reason why his best friend rarely tried Dark spells. They tended to be more difficult to counteract. That sense of responsibility was a healer's burden, he supposed. Not Blaise's style, but he respected it.
Terence leaned forward. Next to him, Safaa was pacing restlessly, disengaged from the conversation. Adrian rose to talk to her as their history-obsessed friend asked. "Aubrey, as in Roman Potter's sibling?"
Harry nodded. "Yeah. Their portrait was destroyed along with the manor, unfortunately," he said mournfully. "Having a spellsmith in the family is pretty cool, I wish I could have talked to them."
"Especially a Dark spellsmith," sighed Aspen, just as disappointed. "Maybe their maternal family had a portrait too?" he suggested.
The Potter heir brightened. "I hadn't thought to ask. I think their mother was from the Sinclair family, maybe I could write to the head of that house?" His brows furrowed. "Is it Alma Sinclair or Rafael?"
"Alma. Rafael's her son," said Safaa absently. "What happened on your end?"
Harry let Tracey tell them of their little adventure in the Slytherin common room. A tension Blaise hadn't realised had settled on his shoulders loosened. He didn't think their effective ban from the common room and regular dormitories would bother him so much but his relief told him otherwise. They hadn't neutralised the throne completely but they had gotten rid of its most difficult weapon. That was good.
Everyone seemed to think so; Theo especially, as the most introverted of all of them. None of them had loved sharing a dorm and a bathroom with twenty others but they had more or less made peace with it. Still, a return to normal would be appreciated.
"You sure about letting the lion cub keep you in the dark?" asked Adrian.
Tracey pouted. Blaise guessed it had been her suggestion.
"I am. I trust Nev'," Harry said like it was the only thing he needed. Maybe it was.
They spent some time discussing their plan for the takeover of Slytherin House. Terence suggested giving them duelling lessons. Harry agreed, aware that his healer training wouldn't suffice to challenge the next rex. Ideally, Terence would have declared Harry his heir at his graduation but circumstances had changed.
"Don't assume you know who will rule when it's your time to make your claim. It might be one of our allies." Terence looked doubtful at that and rightfully so. The muggleborn older students who had thrown their lot in with them weren't duelling specialists, and their other allies hadn't had the guts to stand with them during the House divide. The purists were likely to come back in power even if they clipped their wings now.
"Then I'll just wait until it's not. It doesn't matter when I challenge them, right?"
"For our peace of mind, I'd rather hope it will be sooner rather than later," said Daphne, her nose wrinkled.
"Do you think Parkinson and Goyle will be a problem?" asked Harry, coming back to their more pressing concern.
Blaise snorted. "Even if they knew where we were, I doubt they'd be able to do anything. At best, they'll try to gather Slytherin house in the common room to denounce us. It won't do much since we already asked the firsties to do that anyway."
His comment had Safaa fully focused on the conversation again.
"Can we take care of Spen— Rowle and his idiots now? We've waited long enough, surely."
They all exchanged looks.
"Sure," exclaimed Adrian, "let's have some fun, shall we?"
Blaise smirked with an edge he hadn't needed since the last time he was in his palace's court.
He couldn't wait.
"Wait," said Theo suddenly, "is that smoke?"
Marcus didn't even like politics.
It was tedious for very little reward and asked for manipulation skills he didn't have. He was good at strategising on a quidditch pitch but the types of manoeuvres little Malfoy seemed so fond of bored him at best. His cousins Euclio and Pontia were decent at it but they went to Durmstrang. He would have gone with them if his Lord father hadn't insisted on keeping at least one of them on British soil. It apparently was bad form for a Noble and Ancient family to not have a generational presence at Hogwarts.
Marcus didn't like politics but they went hand in hand with power and he wanted that. He liked the respect his position on the team gave him. He wasn't planning on forgoing that after graduating. He knew his father thought Euclio was more suited to the heirship so he needed a position that would grant him respect before people learnt he was being passed over.
A professional quidditch career could have been promising but such positions were fleeting and he wasn't arrogant enough to believe he had as bright a future in that field as Oliver Wood. So he'd set his sights on the Department of Magical Games and Sports where he could boss people around and use the expertise he gained leading the team. Ludo Bagman's right-hand man, a respectable Slytherin alumnus had promised him a position if he could hold the Argentum throne for at least a month. He didn't plan on disappointing him.
So he'd thrown his lot in with the little peacock and so far it had gone well. He didn't particularly care for Potter's clique's challenges to their authority. Though they were annoying, what mattered was the fact that Rowle had the throne and soon he would inherit it. But Draco was greedy; he'd wanted to root out the little rats and let them find out what happened when rodents mingled with snakes.
Marcus had agreed, not exactly against the idea of tormenting Fawley's mudblood boyfriend and his ilk. The more stable he could make his rule, the better.
He hadn't planned on Zabini double-crossing them.
"I told you so!" shrieked the whiny girl with a forgettable last name who followed the Parkinson heiress everywhere.
"Shut up, Sally-Anne!"
The exclamation was followed by a strangled noise after one of the shadows got too close to Draco. The little tyke was perched on Crabbe's shoulders and could be heard whimpering in a high-pitched voice at regular intervals. To be fair to him, the only one who had managed to stay unbothered was Morgan. The girl was more preoccupied with retrieving her useless brother's wand after he dropped it. Marcus' cousins were a pain but at least they weren't as stupid as Gerald Avery.
The shadows weren't painful per se but every touch from them made Marcus feel like his skin was going to crawl off his flesh. That added to the complete darkness was maddening. He didn't think they could hold on for much longer. Crabbe sounded like he was about to cry and Marcus was pretty sure his House had done some kind of fucked up spell to mute their emotions.
"What spell is that anyway?" panted Morgan after she'd seemingly retrieved her brother's wand. He could tell despite the obscurity because she immediately used it to wack him over the head with it. Marcus let out a pained snort when the sound rang out, followed by Gerald's quiet thank you.
"Umbras Animae. House Nott's signature spell," replied Rowle, who'd been trying to expand a bubblehead charm to keep them all out of the shadows' reach. So far he hadn't been able to fit more than himself in. He probably hadn't tried too hard. They might need as much magic as they could get for the next part of their rivals' plans.
"Do you know a counter?"
"There isn't one. Light spells strengthen the shadows and Finite Incantatem doesn't work. Some rune sequences work apparently but…"
But none of them knew any runes, Marcus completed silently, all too aware that it was useless to specify. Rowle took Arithmancy and Care of Magical Creatures while all the others had chosen Divination instead of the former for the easy grade. Morgan took Runes, he remembered, but she'd dropped out after a few months.
"So we'll have to wait for these bastards to come to get us? What's their plan anyway?" asked Gerald.
"To keep us away, probably," murmured Rowle.
"From what?" asked Draco, flinching all the while.
They traded possible answers but aside from the reasonable guess that they were doing something in the common room, it was difficult to tell. Their reflection was interrupted by Crabbe's whimper and a stuttered charm.
"Crabbe, don't!" yelled Draco.
The moron had set off a fire spell. In a closed, windowless room.
They were doomed.
"What in the Cailleach's name…," uttered Tracey, incredulous.
Their so-called rival faction was huddled at a side of the room, encased in what seemed to be layered bubblehead charms. The rest of the room was on fire. While Daphne and her best friend were staring at the wreckage with fascinated horror, the others were quicker to act.
Adrian put out the fire with the practised ease of someone used to set them, Harry cast a diagnostic charm and the others set off successive Expelliarmus, catching the wands as they jumped to the other side of the room.
"Vinculum com lego," intoned Blaise. Daphne recognised the spell as the Italian version of Incarcerous, though the ropes seemed to be made of some type of metal.
Safaa held Malfoy at wand point with unconcealed glee.
"Did you have fun?"
"You little—"
"Ah, ah," she tutted. "That's not what I asked. Try again."
"Safaa," said Aspen, rolling his eyes.
She pouted. "Right. So. We talked about what we wanted to happen next. Ideally, the answer would be obvious. You," she pointed her wand at Rowle, "would abdicate and swear to never look in my direction again. And you," turning back to the others, "would swear a Vow to leave us the fuck alone and stop being bigots. Now, we both know it doesn't work that way. Or rather, some of us are too good to let it work that way," she added with an exasperated look at Harry and Terence, though she did a really bad job of hiding the underlying fondness behind it.
It was Terence who had vetoed the idea. Permanent Vows of this kind were illegal and it was guaranteed that Lord Malfoy would make a fuss about it. They could have found another solution but the prefect reasoned that although blackmailing an Argentum rex to make them abdicate might perfectly conform to the rules, it would make things more difficult for Harry in the long run.
Having the leadership of their House decided by duelling sounded like something Gryffindors would do at first glance, but in truth, the act embodied the most prised values of Slytherin House as surely as it did the lions'. Powerful duellists were not simply good at Defence; they had the ambition to win, boasted the most versatile spell repertoires and were the most resourceful of wixen. And that wasn't even touching on their innate magical power.
Blackmail was what the other Houses expected them to do to achieve their goal but only assholes like Malfoy resorted to such means.
Harry had agreed with Terence. It was beneath them.
Their friend was intent on doing things properly and that meant earning his title in a way that would make it impossible for anyone to question his legitimacy. Daphne privately thought he was still smarting over the events with the quidditch team. She couldn't blame him for being scared they would pull this from under him too.
"So we've decided to compromise," said Adrian, picking up where Safaa left off. "You — Rowle, that is — are going to keep your title but you'll Vow to revoke the rex Bellator decree. You wanted this throne: take responsibility for it. I don't expect things to do any better considering you have as much spine as a flobberworm. But at least you'll have no one to blame but yourself. Whether you choose to keep your court is none of our concern. However..."
He trailed off, summoning a document from his pocket.
"We've written down a two-year-long contract of non-aggression you'll have to sign if you want to get out of this room in one piece. Hopefully, it will be enough to keep you in line."
"And if it isn't?" challenged Gerald Avery.
"Then you'll find yourself beholden to the House of Fawley," smirked Harry. "You took advantage of the attack on my cousin to start your reign of terror, we'll see how you enjoy being her vassals."
"What makes you think we'll accept this? You can't keep us here forever," snarled Flint, incensed at the idea of having to serve Gemma's House.
Daphne wondered why he hated the prefect so much. The animosity hadn't seemed so bad during her first-year. They'd been ignoring each other for the most part, nothing like Harry's relationship with Malfoy had been.
"Can't we?" asked Theo. "Spring break is at the end of next week. Do you truly believe we won't be able to come up with a reason for your absence? I'm sure I can summon enough shadows to keep you company."
Safaa bounced impatiently on her feet. This was taking too long. She could see them trying to think themselves out of this and it had her stomach souring in anger. They'd been a lot more magnanimous than the situation called for. A simple defanging was the least they deserved after the chaos they'd put their House through. Terence still raged over Slytherin's drop from the Inter-House rankings. They had no hope of redressing the situation, even if Malfoy somehow pulled a win against Diggory during the last match of the season.
"Your signature, Malfoy."
"My father will hear about this," he hissed, signing the document. He bit his lip to keep himself from whimpering when a shadow stirred beside him.
She didn't particularly feel charitable towards him but she was still too old to laugh in a twelve-year-old's face. His rival yearmates had no such qualms. Safaa suppressed a smile at their antics. It eased down her anger, though she could still feel it simmering under her skin.
"No, he won't. If you'd read the contract before signing instead of acting like an idiot, you'd have noticed there's a non-disclosure agreement clause. Maybe read it over to check you haven't promised us your first-born child?" snarked Blaise.
Safaa snorted. Her firstie looked like his birthday had come early. The Italian prince had been one of the few who had backed her up when she'd suggested doing more than scaring the group. The nicer members of their court had won the argument by saying they wanted this whole drama over before Gemma was meant to wake up. They'd had a point so she let it go.
Tomorrow, she reminded herself. Tomorrow she'd see her best friend again.
She could see Spencer's hopeful expression from this angle, but she kept her eyes trained on the bratty heir. She didn't want him to think this mercy came from her. It really didn't.
"Well, that's done," said Terence, clapping his hands. "Let's announce the good news to our fellow snakes, shall we?"
The walk to the common room was awkward. Safaa had been the one to insist on at least humiliating Rowle's court by delivering them tied up to the Slytherin headquarters but having to use stinging hexes to make Crabbe walk wasn't exactly pleasant. Still, they went through with it.
Parkinson and Goyle were by the Argentum throne, encircled by the group of firsties who had thrown their lot in with them. She noticed the second-year girl had an oozing snake bite on her hand, undoubtedly caused by an ill-advised attempt to use the throne to enact some revenge. Sensing the changing tides, other students had bracketed the members of the purists' group. They were all staring at each other in tense silence when they entered, which made their arrival all the more dramatic. Gemma would have loved it.
The tension kicked up another notch to the point where it was getting hard to breathe.
She listened with a distracted ear as Harry explained the agreement they settled on and let herself enjoy some satisfaction at the exchanged looks of derision from the other students. Spencer might keep his throne but he'd have very little of his dignity to go along with it.
"Does our king have anything to add?" asked the Potter heir in a sweet voice, unable to keep the concern out of his tone. It stung all the more for it.
"I do, actually."
Her eyes snapped back to her ex-boyfriend.
Safaa watched him as he took a deep breath, his hands trembling at his sides. His face was pale as chalk as he gathered his courage.
"My first edict," — and the irony of that wasn't lost on anybody, though Safaa was more preoccupied with how familiar this phrasing was. Where had she heard it before? — "will be to crown a queen."
Ah.