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THIRTY-FIVE: Slytherin!

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Hermione didn’t dare do research in Professor Snape’s class, but during Charms she kept Hogwarts: A History open on her desk the entire lesson. She still maintained enough attention to snatch Trevor as he passed her on the desk, handing him back to Neville with admirable patience.

She cornered Harry and Ron after class, on the way to Defense. “I don’t know why I didn’t see it before,” she murmured as she strode along, full of characteristic nervous energy. “I’ve read the book at least a dozen times. The fairy tale is about Salazar Slytherin and Godric Gryffindor.”

“But which one’s which?” Harry inquired.

“Obviously the creepy one is Slytherin!” Ron exclaimed.

“I don’t think so, Ron.” Hermione looked bothered, attempting to slide her hair behind one ear and failing miserably. “Slytherin is Evening Brother.” She opened Hogwarts: A History, and Harry crowded her on one side, Ron on the other. “Look,” she continued, opening to a page very near the beginning. “Slytherin is the one who left. Disappeared, really.”

“...old Slytherin departed, and though the fighting then died out, he left us quite downhearted,” Harry recited slowly. “Or something like that. It was in the Sorting Hat’s song last year that Slytherin was the one who – left. Or was killed,” he realized, thinking on the nature of the story.

“No, Draco’s right, he wasn’t killed,” Hermione countered excitedly. “He had to write the story."

Ron was unconvinced. "Couldn't Gryffindor have written it?"

Hermione tsked. "Honestly, Ron. Why in the world would anyone leave clues about a murder they had committed?”

“Guilt?” Ron suggested.

Hermione turned exasperated eyes on him. “No, Slytherin wrote the book. It’s his. So is the room and so are the traps. We honestly should have known a Slytherin did it. It’s all remarkably clever.”

“So why not a Ravenclaw?”

“It’s also remarkably sneaky,” Harry interjected. “Those corridors, shaped so you couldn’t see ahead or behind. The room, and the weird Floo powder.”

“Not just clever,” Hermione proclaimed. “A little bit paranoid, if you ask me.”

“Well, he was right to be concerned,” Harry pointed out. “He got kicked out of Hogwarts! Maybe his powers were removed.”

“By Gryffindor,” Ron put in incredulously. “The brave one.”

“It’s only the books that say he was brave,” Harry said, his eyes narrowing suspiciously. “Books have a way of telling the story of the person who won.”

Hermione paled, looking down at Hogwarts: A History, as though it had personally betrayed her. Perhaps she felt it had. “The book never says what the Founders argued about, only that it had something to do with – with allowing Muggles into the school. I always assumed that Gryffindor wanted them in, and Slytherin wanted them out. We can’t take anything for granted, though. Regardless, it’s obvious Slytherin had a secret and he trusted Gryffindor with it.”

Harry’s eyes flashed. “Yes, and he probably tried to explain many times, but Gryffindor didn’t believe him or wasn’t ready to listen. In the story, he was too busy to pay any attention.”

“And when he finally did manage to convince Gryffindor, Gryffindor removed everyone from the school.” Hermione pointed down at the book in her hands. “The book says so right here: Gryffindor told everyone to leave, because he feared they’d be harmed by the battle between he and Slytherin. But it could really have been because he was afraid others would hear Slytherin’s secret and believe him. He sent Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff away as well.”

“The two women in the story,” Harry said, “who took the children away.”

“Exactly. So they started to duel.”

“Gryffindor won,” Harry said. “And then...”

“...Slytherin disappeared, and the secret with him,” Hermione breathed.

Ron was watching the two of them with a slightly dumbfounded expression on his face. “You don’t really think – Gryffindor did all that?”

“Gryffindor was in charge of the history books, but Slytherin wrote Harry’s poetry book,” Hermione mused. “The truth is probably somewhere in the middle.”

Ron sighed heavily. “Well, all right, I suppose we have to find out what this secret is, then, same as Harry’s.”

Hermione turned to stare. “Ron – what if it is the same secret?”

“A secret so big that no one could know it,” Harry mused. “Well – it would explain why Dumbledore is making certain that neither Snape nor myself know about it. You’d think, though, of all people, he’d trust us with it.”

Ron frowned. “I reckon it’s not you he’s worried about.”

“Honestly Ron,” Hermione sniped, “will you leave off of Snape?”

“No,” he said, “I won’t. Don’t look at me like that, Hermione, I don’t think he’s a Death Eater for real, I don’t think he’s about to run off and change sides or anything. But, well, the thing he and Harry have in common is that they’re both connected to You-Know-Who, aren’t they? I mean, mentally. It’s probably him Dumbledore doesn’t want knowing. The Headmaster can’t chance it that he could find out from Snape or Harry what’s going on... Dumbledore’s probably the only one now who knows for sure, because he’s the only one who can really stand up to You-Know-Who.”

There was a small, shocked pause.

“Ronald Weasley, I could kiss you,” Hermione proclaimed.

Ron turned bright red and muttered something incoherent, but Hermione pecked him on the cheek anyway. “Bless you, Ron, and your good sense,” she murmured, bobbing back to her previous position, clutching the history text to her chest.

---

The next several days were spent in a flurry of research, on Slytherin, Gryffindor, and the castle itself. Hermione was in her element, and Harry, at least, found a tidbit of information to interest him once in awhile, but Ron was miserable. Books were not his province; he was much more comfortable in discussion, reasoning out the bits and pieces of information that Hermione and sometimes Harry had painstakingly collected. After his third interruption to talk Quidditch in so many minutes, he was summarily banished from the library by a harassed Hermione.

“See if you can’t find out if Harry was really here over the summer,” she suggested in a tone that made it quite clear that she was not suggesting.

“I’ll just ask the bloody portraits,” Ron said, irritated.

Hermione blinked, then meandered over to kiss him on the cheek again.

Meanwhile, Harry was distracted for his own reasons, reasons that did not involve Quidditch. Draco had now been gone for three days. Although he hadn’t noticed it in the excitement, it had later occurred to him that Draco’s letter had been completely devoid of personal details.

So had his, really, but he’d expected Draco to say something like: despite my sudden capture by my mother, I am doing rather well. I intend on staying here until this punishment nonsense is over, Potter, so you oughtn’t to expect me until four days have passed.

Or something.

Instead, Draco had answered his questions, carefully and thoughtfully – and that was really all.

He was getting worried enough to consider composing another letter, one that read: where the hell are you, Draco?! Are you all right? Do you need help? When are you coming home to Hogwarts?!

Hermione grabbed his wrist. “Harry,” she said, “Draco isn’t a pixie. No matter how many times you clap that quill against the table, he’s not coming back.”

Harry laughed, taken aback by her ability to read his mind. “Sorry, Hermione. Maybe I’m being distracting, too?” He was hoping against hope to be banished from the library. As self-destructive as he now quite well knew it was, he wanted a place to be alone and mope.

“Listen, Harry, the first Gryffindor-Slytherin game of the season is two days from now. He can’t stay away for that,” she replied solemnly. “He simply lives for that game, the same way you do.”

Harry offered her an apologetic smile, because he knew that Hermione did not understand what it was that made people live for any game, even Quidditch. “You’re right, Hermione.”

“Yes,” she replied airily, and he rewarded her with another smile, wider this time.

“So,” she said in a firmer, more businesslike voice. “How are your lesson plans coming?”

Harry took a shuddering breath. “I think I’ll be able to manage with the first through third-years, no problem. And even fourth- and fifth-year is all right. It’s the sixth- and seventh-years I’m worried over, now. I’m going to have to teach Slytherins, you know. Slytherins older than me.”

“Yes, Harry,” she said. “Just think of them as people, all right? Not as Slytherins. They need Defense just as much as anybody. Maybe more than most.”

Harry nodded thoughtfully, and bent back over his parchment.

---

The next morning, Harry woke even earlier than usual and meandered down to the Quidditch pitch to make last-second changes to his lesson plans. He was cold, tired and feeling more than a bit pessimistic about his chances. He’d spent hours huddled over the sheets of paper in his hands, and yet he was afraid they would not be enough. He had slept only fitfully, staring wide-eyed at the red bedsheets hanging off of Ron’s bed above his, adrenaline racing through his system, making him feel stupid and slightly sick, suppressing another sudden urge to communicate with Draco.

Merlin, it was just plain stupid, he thought, kicking at a small bit of dislodged turf. He’d gotten along fine for years without Draco Malfoy’s assistance; he should not need it now. Harry supposed it had something to do with the fact that they had been in rather constant company for so long that had created this definite sense that Draco was gone. It was as though he could literally feel that Draco was nowhere near; but that was ridiculous.

Yes, really stupid, Harry told himself quietly, although you were reading his mind just a week or so ago. Cautiously, he felt for that absence, that feeling of Draco-is-not-here, examining it at a distance.

He had a vague feeling of Draco’s being-alive, of his existence, somewhere... somewhere to the west. His eyes fluttered closed, searching for detail.

“Harry!”

Harry flinched at the sound, blinking at Rae Thomas. The small redhead was gazing up at him frankly. “You okay?” she inquired.

“I’m fine. How’re you, Rae?”

She smiled shyly. “Okay, Harry. You’re teaching us today!”

“I am,” he replied, his voice measured and solemn.

Rae threw her arms around his neck and pecked him on the cheek. “I’m glad.” Then she ran for the doors that led to the Great Hall, her robes flapping jerkily behind her.

Harry couldn’t keep back a smile. She looked a lot happier than the girl who’d arrived at the start of September, silent and shy. Ewan and Lilac seemed like they had been good for her. Grinning and ruffling his hair anxiously, he followed the redhead into the Great Hall and then to the Gryffindor table, where Hermione was yawning over Hogwarts: A History.

“Really, professor,” Ron was saying earnestly to Professor McGonagall, “you’ll have it by the end of the week.”

“Ah, Mister Potter,” she greeted him crisply. “All ready for today?”

Harry nodded, placing his bag under the table.

“You’re to sit at the dais this morning,” she tacked on casually, “at Professor Lupin’s usual spot.”

Harry’s eyebrows climbed. “Are you sure?”

“Quite,” she said. “Come along then.”

Harry trailed after McGonagall, half-turning to show his incredulity to Ron and Hermione, the latter of whom had her mouth open wide in a silent scream of incredulous joy. Ron pounded his fists against the table, an excited drumroll.

Harry took the seat of the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher with trepidation. “Are you sure it isn’t the chair itself that’s cursed?” he inquired nervously, getting a laugh out of Professors Dumbledore and Flitwick, along with an indulgent smile from McGonagall. He felt slightly better. Harry nudged his bookbag farther under the table, anxious to hide evidence of his youth, although he was relatively certain that his inexperience was written on his face, then turned to gaze out across the Great Hall.

The Great Hall looked quite different from this perspective, Harry realized. The elevated dais gave an excellent view of the entire room; from here, a teacher could see any disagreement that broke out before it became a cause for concern; a teacher could also note the overall mood of the students, he realized when they stiffened slightly as Professor Snape swept dramatically into the room. Harry could see Ron’s brilliantly red hair beside Ginny’s, and Hermione’s bushy, short curls. Lilac slid in next to Hermione while Ewan made for the Slytherin table and sat with Yolande. Rae looked for him, found him, and made an incredibly enthusiastic thumbs-up.

Harry felt his heart climb into his throat as Professor Snape shifted past him and sat to his left. He was suddenly aware that the large gold chair seemed too big for him, and he did not know where to put his hands.

“Potter,” Snape greeted him.

“Professor,” he replied cautiously.

“Come now, Potter,” Snape countered. “Surely, now we are colleagues, you need not stand on formality.”

Harry goggled at him before realizing slowly that the man had surprisingly adopted Lupin’s favorite ‘kill them with kindness’ routine; he offered his professor a slow, slightly ill smile.

Flitwick was apparently too good-natured to catch on to this little bit of sarcasm. “Why, Professor Snape!” he exclaimed delightedly. “How kind of you to make Harry feel so welcome. Or perhaps I ought to call him Professor Potter, now?” He grinned.

“Oh, please don’t,” Harry muttered under his breath.

Snape caught the whisper and tossed Harry a cat-that-ate-the-canary grin. “Certainly, Professor Potter,” he replied, his voice saturated with false admiration. “By all means, let us show our new professor every bit of the respect he has earned.”

Harry thought this was going a bit too far. “I suppose the other Defense Against the Dark Arts teachers were far more qualified,” he replied, as if conceding a point. Of course, one was possessed by Voldemort, one was a pretty-boy fraud, one was a Death Eater, and one was a Ministry flunkey, he silently added.

Snape seemed to hear what he did not say, and take offense at Harry’s silence. “Their fitness for the job is not in question,” he said sharply.

Meaning they were unquestionably lacking, Harry decided with a snort. Their banter – yes, banter, Harry suddenly realized – was interrupted by Dumbledore standing up from his chair at the centre of the dais and clearing his throat. Harry and Snape turned identical expressions of slit-eyed wariness on the Headmaster.

Slowly, the breakfasting students paused, one gaining the attention of another until the entire Hall was silent.

“Before we get to the business of the day,” Dumbledore intoned with a small twinkle down at the food on his plate, “there are several necessary announcements.

“Indubitably you have noted young Mister Potter up at the dais this morning. That is because Professor Remus Lupin is currently indisposed. Mister Potter will serve as your professor until such time as Mister Lupin can resume his post, and I expect you shall show him all the respect of a full-time Professor at Hogwarts.”

The Slytherins booed rather loudly, and Harry’s cheeks heated in embarrassment. “Oh, this’ll be fun,” he intoned.

He wasn’t certain which was worse, the boos from the Slytherin table – and some from Hufflepuff – or the cheers from Gryffindor and Ravenclaw, trying to drown them out. Snape shot him an amused glance that nonetheless contained a great deal of self-satisfaction. When Harry muttered something derogatory under his breath, the older man leaned towards him and intoned, “now, now, Potter, that’s hardly the sort of language a Professor employs...”

Harry wanted to hit him.

Then, Dumbledore raised his hands in the air for silence, and the noise diminished, then disappeared.

“Will all of the Unsorted House please stand?”

Harry frowned at Dumbledore, wondering what the Headmaster had planned, then turned to face the rest of the Great Hall. Hermione was on her feet, as was Yolande, but Harry watched in surprise as a handful of others at the Slytherin table stood as well – Crabbe rose and glared at his seated peers while Yolande patted his arm absently. A handful of third- and fourth-years stood as well at Slytherin, followed immediately by a knot of Hufflepuffs, including Justin Finch-Fletchley, looking frightened but defiant. A shout arose from the Ravenclaw table before Cho Chang pulled herself away from a group of girls obviously attempting to cajole her into remaining seated; she was followed by a respectable handful of younger girls. Then, of course, there was all of the original Unsorted House: Ewan with Slytherin, and Rae and Lilac with Gryffindor, along with a smattering of other small heads popping up at various places. Hermione remained the only Gryffindor standing.

They all wore Yolande and Hermione’s hand-stitched Inter-House badges. Harry scanned them rapidly and was startled to find that, if the Unsorted House were actually a house, it would have been a respectable size, just a bit less than half the size of Gryffindor.

The teachers looked startled; Snape said “well well well,” under his breath, and McGonagall looked wrong-footed.

Dumbledore, of course, smiled serenely at them all. “Thank you. Now, will everyone who is not a first-year, please be seated?”

Harry, who had been wondering whether he ought to get to his feet just to support Hermione, was relieved at this command. Slowly, the other students began to rearrange their robes as they sat, turning alert eyes back to the Head Table once they were done.

“First-years,” McGonagall said, and the children rose and moved to the dais, where she placed a familiar-looking stool.

“We have accomplished the very difficult if not impossible,” Dumbledore went on, “and re-made the Sorting Hat.”

The reaction to this news was mixed. The Gryffindors hooted and slapped hands; the Hufflepuffs relaxed in their chairs. The Ravenclaws frowned disapprovingly, and Harry would swear that the Slytherins looked – well, disappointed. Put-out. Ewan was glaring up defiantly at McGonagall, his dark hair in anxious disarray, his eyes flashing; Lilac looked angry, Rae uncertain.

“Amos, Jessica,” McGonagall read.

A small girl with white-blonde hair rose from the Hufflepuff table and tottered over, with much encouragement from the elder Hufflepuffs. A new, freshly starched witches’ hat was placed upon her head. There was a moment of silence, where everyone leaned forward in their chairs, even the teachers, anxious to see whether the new Hat would work.

“Enough time dawdling with Hufflepuffs!” it exclaimed. “RAVENCLAW!”

Jessica Amos lifted the hat up and placed it back on the small chair with exaggerated care. She took two steps before she burst into passionate tears.

Justin Finch-Fletchley popped up from the Hufflepuff table, shot a poisonous glare at the professors, and swept the younger girl away from the dais, obviously muttering sympathies; Harry watched the small girl gaze at the upperclassman earnestly and nod, once, before traveling slowly to Ravenclaw, where she was accepted with lukewarm sympathies at best. Most likely, the Ravenclaws had never seen a child burst into tears at the prospect of being placed into their House, which had an excellent reputation. The blonde looked miserable, shoulders hunched as she squeezed in between two third-years.

“Avery, William,” McGonagall rapped out, sounding slightly discomfited.

William Avery, a small, dark-haired boy, rose from the Ravenclaw table. Harry saw him squeeze Jessica’s hand before dashing up to the front.

“Ah,” the Hat said, “another RAVENCLAW!”

And so it went. Some of the Unsorted House were disappointed, some relieved. Very few children were placed where they had hoped or expected – that much became apparent after the third child had been sent away in tears.

“Jones, Ewan,” the Deputy Headmistress intoned.

Ewan rose from Yolande’s side and nodded smartly at them both before climbing the dais to scramble onto the stool.

The Sorting Hat was placed upon his head; the moment it touched his brow, “SLYTHERIN!” it rapped out.

Ewan shook his head no.

“I assure you, young man,” Snape intoned, warning inherent in his voice. “There is nothing the matter with my House.”

Ewan tugged the Hat away and placed it on the stool, turning to face the professor. “I know that,” he said. “But I’m plenty besides sneaky, and I don’t want to be judged on that alone.”

“I know, Ewan, and I’m sorry,” Harry said.

“If you’d have stood up, Harry,” Ewan said, “and if Draco were here to do it, too, I think this might not have happened.” His voice was low and solemn; Harry could not tell whether Ewan were accusing him of being a coward, or merely stating a fact. Before Harry could reply, the black-haired boy had wandered off to the Slytherin table, where Crabbe ruffled his hair and Yolande tickled him.

Harry watched with an oddly helpless feeling as McGonagall called for “Johansen, Lilac.”

Lilac looked as though she were about to explode in a million different directions at once as she snatched the Hat off of its stool and placed it over her twin braids. For a whole minute she sat there, her eyes squeezed shut, bunching her freckles together.

“HUFFLEPUFF!” the Hat finally exclaimed. Lilac took the Hat off very slowly, placing it on the stool behind her and meandering in the direction of the Hufflepuff table; but in order to do so, she had to walk by Gryffindor. When she reached Hermione, she launched herself into the older girl’s arms, sobbing loudly.

“Erm... Klempf, Adrian,” McGonagall continued, flushing and looking upset. Harry understood why; the woman had to be feeling like a villain just now, already having made a handful of eleven-year-olds burst into tears.

When she finally came to Rae Thomas, the redhead looked up at Harry with terror in her wide eyes. She grabbed the Hat and slammed it down over her ears, holding on to each side for dear life.

“SLYTHERIN!” it exclaimed almost immediately.

Harry gaped as the redhead moved to Slytherin in a daze, gripping on to Ewan Jones in utter desperation.

“You’ve got a faulty Hat,” he said darkly, once Dumbledore had sat down.

“You think so?” the Headmaster inquired.

“What’s the trouble, Potter?” Snape demanded. “Not enough of a crop for Gryffindor this year?”

Harry blinked, looking at the Gryffindor table, where six new faces were arrayed. He hadn’t realized it, but both Slytherin and Hufflepuff seemed to have made out with the lion’s share – so to speak. “It’s not that. It’s... it’s Rae Thomas. She’s no Slytherin. They’ll tear her to pieces.”

“And yet you seem to have no sympathy for the young man who pleaded not to be placed there,” Snape said.

“It’s Ewan, Professor, and he is a Slytherin. I mean, he’s sneaky and clever and very manipulative–”

“In other words, you do not like him, but you are fond of this Rae girl–”

“I’m quite fond of them both!” Harry snapped. “What I’m saying is that Ewan would do best in Slytherin, it’ll allow him to hone those skills, become even more clever and strategic, but Rae? Rae is – emotional, and shy, and – and recovering from a tragedy! She’s not ready for Slytherin, she’s not strong enough!”

Snape seemed taken aback by this left-handed compliment.

“Look, I’ll prove the bloody thing’s faulty,” Harry said. “Watch!” He leapt down from the dais and slammed the Hat on his head.

This time around, the Hat didn’t bother with saying a single word other than “SLYTHERIN!” both loudly and immediately, gaining the attention of nearly everyone in the Great Hall.

“Look, if this stupid thing had its way,” Harry said, placing the Hat back down on its stool, “I’d have been in his House instead of Gryffindor.” Harry jerked a nod towards Snape. “Can’t we just leave the Unsorted House as it is? They’re all miserable, look at them!”

Dumbledore’s brows raised as he regarded Harry. “Mister Potter,” he said softly, “perhaps you’ve forgotten what you told me at the end of your second year?”

Harry groaned. Of course Dumbledore already knew about what House he was meant to be in...

Oh, Merlin – everyone heard that, didn’t they? And now I can’t say it was the Hat making a mistake, because Dumbledore will contradict me... Briefly, Harry argued with himself, wondering whether he ought to deny it anyway, see who they believed... but he still trusted Dumbledore, still liked Dumbledore...

“Aw, hell,” Harry muttered, slumping back into his seat and crossing his arms over his chest.

“Mister Potter!” McGonagall gasped.

“I suppose you have become a true Slytherin, Harry,” Dumbledore said wryly. “At least, every bit as much as you are a Gryffindor. That was quite clever, as well as underhanded. And despite your... oversight,” he added with a smile, “you’ve convinced me to reconsider. I will discuss the matter with the staff in a week and decide on whether the Houses ought to be dissolved.”

“Thank you, sir,” Harry said, flushing. He wondered if he ought to apologize to the Headmaster for attempting to fool him; but, as the man had just complimented him on his efforts – and, as the man had just pulled one over on Harry himself, not too long ago – he bit his tongue.

“And,” Dumbledore said, with a truly mischievous twinkle, “until then, you, Harry, are a Slytherin. You have been Re-Sorted, after all.”

Harry was beginning to realize that, while Snape’s punishments were cruel and vindictive, Dumbledore made a habit of hoisting him on his own petard.

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