Deathly Green Eyes

Chapter 19

The twins tell Tom, in hushed tones, what happened with their families and the Dark Lord. A wizard made the wizard mad, and now they were being persecuted.

Abraxas retells his summer break, Tom already knew some of it as they had met just days ago, and Tom was on the verge of interrupting him and begging Adrian, who was short on what he said to continue, but some of the elements mentioned by the blond were interesting. The way his family was cleared distanced from the wizard war, not rejecting or supporting the cause, and still showing how they leaned towards it, especially in the case of the muggle-borns. Tom wonders how it could have been for him in the case that Grindelwald had done this earlier if he was raised in a world where his existence was wrong, and he, formulating his question less sentimentally, ponders out loud. The others shared a glance, and it was quickly decided that Abraxas would be the one to take the word.

The blond carefully starts the talk in a low enough voice to not disturb the sleeping Slytherin leaning on Tom.

"He is not planning on exterminating the muggle-borns, he just wants... how do I...?" He takes a deep breath, his eyes drifting from a spot on the floor to another one, before nodding to himself and continuing with the explanation. "He wants muggle-borns to come to the magical world all the way or not. So, if they decide that they want to study magic they don't need to forget their culture, but accept and celebrate ours. The problem that we have with muggle-borns, well, that I now realize that I have is not their blood." The others, especially Adrian, seemed to disagree, by the way, he recoiled and avoided his stare for a second. "Why would it matter? The problem is that they enter our world and expect us, purebloods, that come from long and ancient magical bloodlines, to not accept, no, but to follow and celebrate their practices and celebrations. They want us to drop OUR traditions and heritage and accept theirs." Abraxas snorts. It didn't feel like it was about what Adrian sputtered, but most of the fact that it was Adrian who said it.

"That's not it. The sole idea of someone combining pure and ancient blood with... a new lineage, I guess, is disturbing. You are dirtying and dishonouring your family for no reason. There are some exceptions to the rule that all mudbloods or half-bloods have a weak magical power," this seemed was only said due to Tom's presence, "but, to me, doesn't make sense. Where does their magic come from? Is it taken from us? Are they somehow ripping us of our magic?"

"Adrian, we are not talking about that!" Abraxas interrupts angrily with a deep blush on his fair skin. "We are talking about Grindelwald."

"Yeah, so, witchcraft is feared by muggles, right? It's inculcated in their lives, with their weird religions and beliefs since they're kids. So, when they come, they must be confused as to what to believe: what they are told since they're born or what they're told as soon as they get here."

"Also, they can believe in their weird stuff, and celebrate whatever they want to celebrate, but just don't bother us with our traditions, and let us perform rituals."

"The rituals being forbidden to not scare the muggles pisses me off."

When Adrian seems like he is about to say something else, Tom steps in.

"What does he exactly want with muggles, then?"

"I'm not exactly sure. Father has spoken about how Grindelwald wants to put an end to the International Statute of Secrecy, for us to live without hiding, but that will never be possible if we are visible. If the secrecy is broken, then we'll have to do something drastic about muggles. He wants to create a hierarchy in which we are above Muggles, those are, I think, are the exact words that were said to me when I asked."

"They could be used as house-elves," Adrian mumbles with a dark grin.

Tom snorts and it's about to respond when a voice comes from under his arm, making them jump.