Friday found Harry at the Gryffindor table soaked with pumpkin juice.  Bodmin had knocked over the entire pitcher onto his lap when she delivered his mail.  Ron snatched the newspaper the bird carried away from her and glanced at the headline while Bodmin tore into his scrambled eggs, and then into his hand, which sat next to the plate.  "Arrrrg!" Ron cried, shaking his hand before sticking the side of his thumb into his mouth.  "Bloody horrible owl!"  When he took his hand away from his mouth, a rivulet of blood ran down his wrist.

Hermione plucked the paper from his other hand, ignoring his discomfort.  "Ooh, Harry, you have to see this," she insisted, passing him the front page.

Malfoy Couple Get Slap on the Wrist
Narcissa Found Innocent, Lucius Given a Fine

The Malfoys, the wealthy pureblood family well known for their connections in the Ministry and more recently for their involvement in the Death Eaters, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named's chosen followers, have reason to celebrate.  Yesterday afternoon, their trial concluded with one verdict of innocence for Narcissa Malfoy, the sister of the infamous Bellatrix Lestrange, and conviction on the charge of belonging to a proscribed organization for Lucius, for which he was sentenced to pay a fine of one thousand Galleons.

Evidence presented during the trial proved that both had given house space to He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named during his takeover of the Ministry as well as to their fellow Death Eaters and that both had colluded with their fellows on several occasions.  The pair were also suspected of Death Eater involvement at the first fall of He-Who Must-Not-Be Named, but claimed to be under the Imperious curse, and therefore not responsible for their actions.  As the use Imperious curse is impossible to prove or disprove except with the administration of Veritaserum, character witnesses are used when the Ministry does not approve its use.  Both Narcissa and Lucius gave their testimony under Veritaserum at their second trial.

While both Malfoys are admitted Death Eaters and Lucius was among the Death Eaters who broke into the Ministry of Magic in June of 1996, and their son, Draco Malfoy was the Death Eater who let his fellows into Hogwarts in the attack that resulted in the death of Albus Dumbledore, The Wizengamot chose to treat the pair with leniency because of the tearful testimony of their son, and the testimony of the boy hero, Harry Potter, who testified that Narcissa Malfoy saved his life by lying to the erstwhile dark lord on his behalf.

"I hope this trial has helped close the door on a very ugly chapter in Wizarding history," Kingsley Shacklebolt said in a statement to the press immediately following the verdict.

Critics of the verdict however, feel that no door has been closed at all.  "Lucius Malfoy should be treated as any other Death Eater," Arthur Weasley, a longtime opponent of Lucius Malfoy and high profile member of the Order of the Phoenix, the order Dumbledore created to combat the Death Eaters, stated.  "Whatever his wife may have done to help Harry, she did it for her own ends, not Harry's, and Lucius certainly had nothing to do with it.  They should both be sent to Azkaban."  Mr. Weasley and other critics claim that the Malfoys escaped prosecution the first time and have received such a light punishment this time because of their wealth and connections inside the Ministry.  Some even allege that they may have bribed several members of the Wizengamot to once again escape imprisonment.  Other critics claim they needed a sacrificial lamb, and that they are heroes of the war.  Whatever the truth of either of the allegations, very few in the Wizarding community will be satisfied with this verdict.

"A thousand bloody Galleons?" Harry roared, "They could pay ten times that and not even notice!"

"Did they actually use the phrase ‘boy hero'?" Ron asked, disgusted, reading the article.  "Wait, you testified for them?" he raged, shoving the paper down onto the table, covering the sausages.  "I thought you went to testify against them!"

"I thought so to," Harry fumed, ripping the article in half and then into quarters.  "But the Wizengamot wouldn't let me, they kept cutting me off!"

"At least your father wasn't misquoted," Hermione whispered to Ron, patting his uningered arm in what she hoped was a soothing manner.

"Yeah, but it made it sound like he wanted them in Azkaban because he had some kind of vendetta against them!"  Ginny jumped away from the bench, shaking.

"Well it's not like we aren't used to the Prophet being slanted," Hermione said philosophically.  She stood up and Harry, Ron, and Ginny followed her out of the Great Hall. 

"I still can't believe they just got a lousy fine," Harry grumbled.  "I agree with your dad, they should go to Azkaban and stay there."

"Hey Potter," drawled a familiar voice, and something long and blunt jabbed him between the shoulder blades.  Harry turned around and backed up very quickly.  "Awww, does ickle Potty want my nasty mean parents in jail?"

"Yeah, that's right, Malfoy," Harry said loudly, reaching for his own wand and pointing it at him.

"Remember, Potter, it was your testimony that got them off, no moaning about it now."  For the first time in months, he gloated, smiling widely, looking unpleasantly like his old self.  "Some people even think they're heroes because of you."

"Yeah, well I don't, I think they're scum sucking Death Eater murderers who should rot in Azkaban."

Malfoy's pale pointed face contorted, "Brave words, Potter."  That was all the warning he gave.  He jabbed his wand at Harry and yelled, "Confing-"

"Expelliarmus!" Harry cried before Malfoy could finish the blasting curse.  The wand flew out of Malfoy's hand, and Harry reached to grab it, but before it could sail over to him, it landed in the hand of someone else.

"Detention, Potter," Snape hissed, passing Malfoy's wand back to him.  Harry groaned silently.  He could feel rather than see Hermione folding her arms behind him.  Snape glanced at her.  "And you Malfoy.  Get to class, all of you."  Harry did his best to turn his smirk into a grimace.

~*~

Bodmin arrived on Saturday morning with the date and time of his detention and a sharp nip to his wrist when he didn't get it away from her fast enough.  "I think she likes you," Hermione said gravely, "You aren't bleeding."

Harry ignored her.  "Ron, could you tell everyone that I'll miss Quidditch practice today?" he growled.

Ginny peered over at the slip of parchment.  "Git," she exclaimed sympathetically.

So, in the afternoon, Harry dragged his feet to Snape's classroom.  "The desks are already clean," he said as soon as he was inside, as politely as he could manage, which wasn't polite at all, "so what am I supposed to do this time?"  He didn't notice the open window in the corner, and as Ginny Weasley thought, he deserved his conversation to be overheard if he were so careless.  He knew better after Rita Skeeter.

Snape handed him a ledger and a stack of marked essays.  "You will enter the scores into there, potter, legibly if it isn't too much to ask."

Harry snorted, reflecting that it was almost but not quite amusing the way the man took everything and turned it into an insult.  "Are you actually out of disgusting detentions," he asked, wonderingly.  "You're really down to having me enter marks?"  It was only one step away from having him do lines.

Some ten minutes into the detention, Harry looked up.  "Where's Malfoy?"

Snape glowered at him from behind his desk.  "His head of house requested he serve his detention with him."  Professor Stalk's crusade to reform the Slytherin children of Death Eaters was fast becoming legendary.

"It won't work," Harry said, bending over the essays again.  "Malfoy's too much of a prat."  Snape growled in warning, and Harry muttered under his breath just to spite him, "slimy little Slytherin."

It had its calculated effect.  Snape leapt to his feet to loom over the still seated Harry.  "I could always give you another detention for insulting my house."  It was amazing, Harry thought, the way he barely moved his lips when he spoke.

"I didn't say anything that wasn't true," Harry shot back rebelliously.

Snape's head snapped back.  "You saw fit to use my house name as an insulting term!"

Harry stabbed the quill against the table and glared into Snape's own glare.  "Well he's definitely following in the footsteps of his house founder; purebloods are the only true wizards and all."  He shouldn't have said it, shouldn't be deliberately provoking him he knew, but it was almost comforting to insult Snape and be insulted back.

"Do you honestly think that in the middle of the dark ages, anyone knew whose blood was pure and whose wasn't?" Snape hissed.  "All we know about Salazar Slytherin's beliefs are that he didn't want to teach the children of Muggles!  There were perfectly sound reasons he would have not wanted to accept them into the school!"

"Name one," Harry challenged, baring his teeth derisively.

Severus smiled cruelly at the response.  He would fulfill that dare with relish.  "Perhaps he didn't want to have his young students discovered by their family and neighbors and executed, or perhaps he didn't want one of them turning traitor and leading a mob or an army to the castle gates?  Even if every last student were loyal, how could the founders be sure they would hold up under torture?"

There was something joyful in Snape when he was lecturing, when he thought he had won an argument or when he was pressing his advantage, a fierce poisonous sort of joy.  Harry supposed it might be the friendliest he would ever be.  "He could have just taught all the Muggleborns fire freezing charms," Harry shot back, remembering the essay he had to write in the summer before third year, "and I thought the castle was warded against Muggles."

"I doubt the wards would hold up if several thousand Muggles attacked en mass," Snape retorted, leaning over the table.  "Besides, the castle wasn't even finished until almost a hundred years after the last of the founders died."

Harry pushed himself away from the table and shot to his feet.  "Oh yeah, then how did Slytherin build the Chamber of Secrets if the castle wasn't complete?"

"He built it into the foundations, Potter, those were obviously completed first," Harry bristled as Snape spoke to him as if he were an incompetent.

"He shouldn't have built it at all," Harry spat, "He left a monster under the school waiting to kill Muggleborns; doesn't sound like he cared much if they were burned at the stake."  He wished it didn't come out so resentfully.  He had a good point.

"Each of the founders left something to protect the school.  Hufflepuff left the plans for the secret passages and hiding places, Gryffindor left the wards, and Ravenclaw left the moving staircases and trick doors.  They're more prone to changing if one walks over them feeling militant."  Snape folded his arms.  "Most scholars assumed they left their gifts after Slytherin left, but I think his protection was the Chamber."  Snape smirked, a particularly unpleasant expression when he used it.  "It was meant to be let loose on the school's enemies.

"Well it wasn't let loose on the school's enemies, was it?" Harry raged.  "It was let loose on the school."

He shrugged eloquently, "Enemies have used the secret passages to sneak into Hogwarts.  The wards don't protect against most real dangers.  Perfectly innocent people have been stranded by the moving staircases."

"Yeah, well, why should a Muggleborn student be any more danger than a Pureblood?  They could both be caught."

"Because wizards aren't going to turn their children over to their neighbors if they find them working magic, you fool."  Harry scowled back at him, wishing he could find just one question Snape didn't have an answer for.  "And Wizarding raised children were raised to be careful!"

"I still say they could have taught them all fire freezing charms their first year."

"I forget that's the garbage Binns teaches.  The buffoon is convinced that hearing the truth would terrify his delicate students."  Harry listened, almost mesmerized as Snape gathered momentum.  "Burning at the stake was never terribly popular in Britain anyway.  Hanging and drowning were the preferred method, and there are no concealed ways to hide those.  Oh, and Potter, during the height of the witch hunts, Muggleborns and Halfbloods were barred from admission.  The professors didn't like sending children home to die each summer."

Harry felt vaguely ill as Snape spoke.  The man looked so pleased with himself, even as he talked about children dying.  "Well, you said yourself it wasn't the height of the hunts.  It's not like Slytherin knew what was coming."

"There were lynchings and killings of witches and wizards before the height, Potter; it just wasn't systematic until Inquisition."

Harry curled his lip.  "You make Slytherin sound as if he were some kind of protector of the Muggleborn."

Snape leveled him with a frustrated scowl.  "I'm just trying to make clear to you that there were perfectly legitimate reasons for not wanting to admit children who could be killed because he admitted them, or worse could be used to destroy the school and everyone in it!"

"Yeah, but they probably weren't Slytherin's reasons!  The whole house is full of people who want to see Muggleborns and Halfboods taken out and shot!  Look at Voldemort!"  Harry was nearly shouting before he finished.

Snape's eyes widened and then narrowed.  "I do not appreciate having my house judged solely on the ravings of a pathological murdering tyrant!"

"Yeah, well look how many of your housemates followed him."

"The Dark Lord built off beliefs that began to take hold in the eighteenth century Potter, the time in which Muggleborns began to return to Hogwarts after the witch hunts.  That's when the pureblood mania began, not in the tenth century with Salazar Slytherin!"

"How do you know what he believed any better than I do?" Harry muttered petulantly.  "He lived over a thousand years ago."

"The Sorting Hat sorts students according to which founder would have offered to teach them, and it sorts Halfbloods and Muggleborns quite happily into Slytherin.  If Salazar Slytherin thought they were inferior and not worth his time, it wouldn't sort them that way."

"He had awful taste in students then."

"Ten points from Gryffindor."  Harry forced down a hysterical giggle.  "My mother was a Slytherin, Potter, I don't think you thought she was slimy, or do you just have awful taste in women then?"

Harry flushed.  "Eileen is an exception, Snape, you aren't."

"The Sorting Hat almost put you in Slytherin."  He twisted his mouth into a smug grimace, as if the argument pleased him but the facts didn't.

Harry's head snapped around and he bared his teeth.  "Who told you that?"

"The Headmaster, fifth year," Snape eyed him contemptuously, "to convince me to teach you Occlumency."

Harry nodded.  It didn't surprise him.  "He knew."

Snape stared at him blankly, "About the Hat? Obviously."

Harry's hands clenched against each other.  If he whispered, it would be cowardice, he convinced himself, speaking clearly, "That I'm your father.  I met him in the past, coming back."

It didn't surprise Severus any more than Dumbledore's meddling had surprised Potter.  The headmaster had always known much more than any reasonable person could be expected to know.  It had been one of his most annoying habits to inflict choice bits of knowledge onto his subordinates whenever it struck his fancy.  "I suppose he hoped we would get along," he snarled sarcastically.

"You make him sound like an idiot!" Harry exclaimed indignantly.

Severus shook his head sharply, "Merely perpetually optimistic."

Harry gritted his teeth and bent his head back to the ledger in an effort to ignore Snape.  He might have made an effort to get along with Snape, just to prove him wrong and for the sake of Dumbledore's memory, if it weren't outright impossible.  The quill tip crumbled against the parchment as he wrote.

When he inked in the last mark, he hesitated a moment before pushing it over to Snape, to delay any more words between them.  Snape plucked it distastefully from the table and glanced over it.  "I will make the effort to find you something suitably disgusting to do next time I give you detention."

Harry stared at him and wondered if the man were possibly making a very unpleasant joke.  "You do that."