Severus could not remember a better summer holiday. That was not saying much, of course, but at the same time, it was everything. Yes, part of him was grieving his mother. Part of him would always be grieving Lily and the horrors he had both witnessed and partaken in. But the rest of him was... happy. Minerva kept her promise to help him clean out the house on Spinner's End. The whole process was strangely cathartic. He might not have enjoyed it so well if he were not able to retreat to Little Whinging when the oppressiveness of his parents' house became too much. He frequently took tea with Petunia on weekday afternoons, sometimes staying a few hours, sometimes popping in for only fifteen minutes or so.

His visit for Dudley's birthday was kept brief and just in the morning, officially because he and Minerva were deep in renovations, but mostly in order to avoid Marge who was arriving that afternoon. It amused him to tell Vernon he was leaving to meet with his "contractor," and amused him more when the older man merely tapped the side of his nose as he settled into his car to go pick up his sister from the train station.

One week later, Spinner's end was officially done. It was still nothing special, but it was different, and it was his. They had taken out two of the upstairs walls, and the main room downstairs was lined with bookshelves. Everything he hated was gone. Everything that was broken was either gone or fixed. The vast majority of the gobstones and other games his mother had manically hoarded as her one shred of individuality to survive the immolation of her marriage were gone, mostly into Minerva's care. The garden was replanted exclusively with potions ingredients. The wards on the house were updated and now included a muggle-repelling charm. The few reminders of his parents Minerva had talked him into keeping were small enough he was able to lock them in a drawer and forget about them, although he did find himself toying with the key now and then. It was a completely non-magical key, unnecessary should he actually want to open the drawer, but he appreciated the existence of a symbolic barrier. It made it easier to restrain the urge to look at the old photos, the expensive set of gobstones made from citrine, the marriage license, his father's clay pipe, the wedding rings.

He celebrated the completion of the project with a quick trip to Hogwarts to check his annual orders for the student potion supply cabinet were safely arrived. They were. It took him less than an hour to unpack, sort, and shelve them, the ritual having become subconscious habit by now. He returned through Hogsmeade and Diagon Alley to splurge on new books for his new bookshelves. They joined the collection of astonishingly boring administrative, leadership and quality-improvement-related tomes he had picked from Vernon's unwanted stock. He did not spend all that much time at the house reading, though. No, he spent most of the remaining summer days in Little Whinging, and he spent most of the remaining summer evenings brewing potions.

Severus joined Petunia for the whole day for Harry's birthday. It was a Wednesday, so Vernon remained at work, but he and Petunia took the children out to the park to meet up with a few friends. Robin Polkiss was fine. Piers Polkiss was a rat-faced and rat-spirited little boy. He clearly had some innate bullying tendencies, but he did not seem clever enough to pull off anything diabolical on his own. So long as he failed to latch onto someone like Dudley as his muscle, he would be fairly toothless. Piers' and Robin's baby sister Alena, fourteen months old, was a precious cherub with red hair, blue eyes, and a delicate laugh that made all the adults coo, including him, much to his bother and Petunia's amusement. The other day-school acquaintances, Billy and Roger, were blandly normal and inoffensive. The best thing watching them all was that Harry and Dudley were clearly best friends. He had wondered, given the odd squall Petunia still wrote to complain about. The four of them went to a café for lunch, then back to the house, where Severus entertained the boys while Petunia puttered in the kitchen. He was taught to play "Jedi versus Stormtroopers," although he had no idea what that meant, and Dudley's and Harry's enthusiastic explanation did not help. He suspected this was because their information was obtained second-hand from their next-door neighbor Emily. Petunia was almost as clueless as he was and assured him the boys had not actually seen the movie Star Wars when it came out last year. When Vernon returned, the dinner was good, the boys were peaceful, Harry loved his presents, and Severus stayed for cake.

August passed too quickly. It passed even faster after the letters from and then meetings with Albus and Petrus, the days screaming by at the news of Petrus' retirement. He wasn't prepared. He had rarely paid much attention to the students outside of the potions classroom before, thinking he had a few more years at least, and now he was paying for it. He stopped his daily visits to Little Whinging in order to read up on every single Slytherin's student file as well as re-acquaint himself with their family backgrounds, whatever was publicly available. He became more concerned the more he read. Apart from three halfbloods, the single muggleborn, and the entitled Sacred Twenty-Eight heirs and heiresses, few of the upper year students met his expectations. Petrus' notes from career counseling sessions were all over the place. Where was the ambition that characterized the house? The determination, the resourcefulness, even the manipulation? No, the only thing most of these students seemed to have in common was blood purity and chips in their shoulders. It was like their families' loss of the war had beaten the ambition right out of them, which was a frightful prospect indeed. How bad could their home lives be to break so many of them so badly? It suddenly made so much more sense that the Slytherin-Gryffindor potions classes were such a pain. He hadn't been imagining it. It was worse from when he was a student, and not just because all the Gryffindors thought he was a Death Eater.

When he was done with the current Slytherins, he obsessively read through all the incoming first-year files too, trying to figure out which were most likely to be sorted into Slytherin, and how damaged they were all likely to be. It was a tragically small class, just twenty-three students. Not surprising, he supposed, as they would have been conceived in the first big wave of the war, when most people were afraid to bring children into the world. Later as the war dragged on there was something of a baby boom, as folk became more afraid of never having the chance to procreate. He compiled his summarized predictions and observations into a single list. It would be interesting to see how well it lined up with the actual Sorting. His final tally was 3 likely Slytherins (all of whom could be big problems), 4 likely Ravens, 4 likely Hufflepuffs, 1 likely Gryffindor (bravery was a hard thing to read between the lines, especially at this age), 2 tossups between two houses, 7 complete unknowns:

1-5. Muggleborn and therefore unknown: Badeea Ali, Ben Copper, Marina Sanchez, John Hanson, Cheryl Jarvis
6. Thorin Abbot: clear Slytherin, and one of the Sacred Twenty-Eight, though not of the main Abbott line. He had joined every Ministry-sanctioned bairn league that existed and was president of the English Wizardling Chess Club despite being a middling player himself even for that age group. Three of his older cousins had been killed in the war as "blood traitors."
7. Diego Caplan: Hufflepuff. Father in Azkaban.
8. Andre Egwu: unknown, one uncle dead (the Death Eater who had been in Gryffindor), one uncle in Azkaban (the Death Eater who had been in Hufflepuff)
9. Corey Hayden: likely Raven, possible Gryffindor or Slytherin. Half-blood. Aunt and uncle died in the war, noncombatants.
10. Penny Haywood: Hufflepuff. Younger cousin killed by Fenrir Greyback.
11. Tulip Karasu: Raven or Gryffindor. Entire family survived the war unscathed.
12. Victor Ketsueki: either Slytherin or Gryffindor. Pureblood, older brother was a squib and murdered in the war. Lucky the rest of the family survived.
13. Rowan Khanna: Ravenclaw with a sprinkling of Slytherin. Pureblood with muggle great-grandmother. Mother had worked in the Ministry and died in the war.
14. Wilfred Kidd: Hufflepuff, with another uncommonly lucky family
15. Jae Kim: likely Slytherin, possible Raven or Gryffindor. Immigrant pureblood family from Korea who had simply returned to Korea during the war, with no casualties, but they wanted Jae to come to Hogwarts for its reputation which suggested ambitions for him.
16. Barnaby Lee: horrible pureblood family, parents both Death Eaters in Azkaban, grandmother a veteran of Grindelwald's war, currently living with an uncle. All Severus could tell about the child from the records was he had learned to keep his head down. If the hat had any pity, he would go to Hufflepuff.
17. Chiara Lobosca: bugger, another werewolf. (Was Albus planning on springing this on him at the last moment? Thank Merlin the full moon of September was towards the end of the month. He had time to collect ingredients for and brew the tricky and brand-new Wolfsbane potion for her. He couldn't tell which house she might end up in, but he hoped it wasn't Slytherin. She would be a target the moment her secret got out, from strict blood purists but also from non-Slytherins who tarred her with Fenrir Greyback's brush.)
18. Ismelda Murk: a Gryffindor of the Sirius Black ilk. Provocative and contrary, with an older sister already in Gryffindor of the more traditional variety. Surprisingly, although she was a pureblood, her closest relation to have died in the war was a third cousin once removed.
19. Merula Snyde: a mess. Parents both in Azkaban for murdering fifteen squibs, raised by an aunt her parents would have considered a blood traitor, with multiple reports of problematic accidental magic requiring Ministry Obliviators. He recognized the pattern; Merula and her aunt hated eachother. Their relationship wouldn't have been helped by the multiple cursed packages sent to the house when Merula first moved in, the parents' victims taking their revenge on the helpless six-year-old daughter. He had little doubt she would be sorted into Slytherin; no matter her other talents or how she felt about what her parents had done, her burning ambition would be simple recognition.
20. Nymphadora Tonks: honestly, he had no idea. Not enough information. He hoped she didn't end up in Slytherin just because that would be a mess, with her relation to the broken Black family. She'd either be shunned as a blood traitor or shunned as a murderess in the making
21. Elizabeth Tuttle: not a lot of data, and most of it screamed Hufflepuff, but a curious comment in a Prophet article about her family's business breeding quality rats for magical use suggested an independence streak that could send her to Gryffindor or Slytherin, and obsessiveness that would do well in Ravenclaw or Slytherin. Father was halfblood, and his parents were killed in the war.
22. Charlie Weasley: the only other representative of the Sacred Twenty-Eight this year, likely Hufflepuff, can't rule out Gryffindor because of family clumpage. Two uncles dead in the war.
23. Talbott Winger: definitely a Raven. How was he already a registered animagus? Both of his parents had died in the war... one of whom had also been an animagus. Poor child.

Severus stopped brewing potions in the evening and instead resumed the Occlumency exercises he had abandoned at the end of the war. They were calming, sort of. Mostly, they allowed him not to submit to his dread. Fortunately, Petunia invited him for a family dinner the last week of August. It was a life-line, a pressure-valve, the one thing keeping him sane in the mad scramble to prepare for what was coming his way as of September first.

"So, what's new with you, Sev?" Vernon asked as they all settled into the parlor. The roast needed a few more minutes, apparently. He nimbly moved his feet out of the way as Dudley and Harry ran past, ducking between chairs.

Severus' presence was no longer so novel and treasured as to disrupt an important game of tag, he thought wistfully. At least there was that silver lining of going back to work; Harry would definitely be excited the next time he visited. He grimaced and answered Vernon's question. "I've been promoted. I'll be head of House Slytherin starting this term."

"Oh, congratulations," Vernon said.

"You don't seem happy about it," Petunia observed.

"No, not really. It's not something I was looking for, but Petrus is retiring. He's been teaching astronomy for decades at the school and can't tolerate the stairs up to the tower observatory anymore. Can't even take the stairs in his own house, as of this summer, which was why he decided to retire now rather than later. I vaguely knew this would be coming eventually, just not so soon." He shrugged, trying to mask his anxiety. "It's more administrative work than I've ever done before, but I'm the only other Slytherin on staff. Petrus, Albus, and Minerva - she's the Deputy Headmistress - all thought that was the most important consideration."

"Isn't the House basically just which dormitory you sleep in as a student?" Petunia asked. "That's what Lily said at least. Why should that matter? Not to say you wouldn't be qualified, of course."

"It's much more than that. The students in different Houses live in different dormitories and have different class schedules, but they also have different sports teams, compete for House Points throughout the year based on academic and behavioral performance, and have rather intense inter-House rivalries. And those unfortunately tend to extend beyond graduation."

Vernon snorted. "Oh, come off it. I heard Cambridge even hired that Oxford physicist fellow, and they're about as big a school rivalry as it gets. Remember when he was in the news getting a CBE, Pet?"

"Yes, dear. Severus, I do tend to agree with Vernon. I think we're misunderstanding something about the, er, significance of the Hogwarts Houses still, and I'd really like to understand it. Since Lily... well, since Harry will go there."

Severus sighed. "The Houses all emphasize particular core values. The students are sorted into their Houses magically rather than via lottery, with the goal of selecting students who will best fit those values. It's an old tradition dating back to the foundation of the school, when there were only four great masters selecting apprentices, rather than having the coursework divided by subject. The idea at the time was that the students would match with their teacher and learn more effectively, and it carried on even after the first apprentices started taking over and they began adding more instructors. Anyway, House Slytherin... historically has encouraged ambition, resourcefulness, achievement, respect for tradition, and familial loyalty. However, the recent civil war in our society fractured ideologically along the lines of tradition and familial loyalty, in an extreme and ugly sense of course. As a result, upwards of nine-tenths of the current Slytherin students are closely related to someone who died in the war. And about half are related to or personally know someone who was imprisoned for, well, war crimes. That is a higher rate than any of the other houses. Petrus thinks the students would resent any of the other staff taking over even for administrative purposes."

Both the Dursleys looked alarmed at this revelation. Harry and Dudley ran past again in the momentary silence. "So, you're going to be a counselor more than an administrator."

"Pretty much."

"Ouch."

"Now you see why I'm not thrilled to be promoted."

"At least the pay is good?" Vernon asked hopefully.

Severus considered this, then nodded. "The pay is good. It would have taken me a decade to be making this much otherwise."

Vernon grinned weakly. "Well, those teenagers will be aging you so fast, you might as well be paid for it, eh?"

"Your deep concern is appreciated," Severus said sarcastically.

Author's note: Severus pessimistic instincts lead him to exist in a constant state of anxiety lol. I've been breaking canon from the beginning letting Petrus Parkinson be head of house instead of Severus. In my defense, even knowing Dumbledore's interesting hiring practices, it doesn't make a lot of sense for Severus to be head of house the year he takes the job unless there's literally no other Slytherin around. Severus had quite enough to deal with at the time, after all. Thanks as always for the lovely reviews, and next update will be Friday.