Weighed & Measured {HP}

9. slytherin house

"Okay," he said agreeably. The ghost smiled. It was a bit disturbing, but it was better than him looking so depressed.

"Well, perhaps we'll speak again, Mr. Potter," the Bloody Baron said, before floating off to speak to a few third years.

Harry shrugged off the odd encounter as he buttered a roll. Ghosts were strange, yes, but no stranger than anything else he had encountered since Professor Snape had come to call.

"He was a bit creepy," Draco muttered, and Pansy nodded vigorously, her face pale.

"I suppose," Harry said. But after first living in a cupboard full of spiders, and later watching his snake hunt for her meals, he had a hardy constitution.

Persephone, perhaps sensing that he was thinking of her, chose that moment to peek out from his shirt collar, scenting the air with her flicking tongue.

"Food?" she asked, winding around his neck. "Mouse? Rat?" She was always more than a bit incoherent when she was half-asleep, as she was now.

"That's a snake," Zabini said, but he sounded more fascinated than anything, so Harry let his imminent comment about stating the obvious go.

"This is my pet, Persephone," he said, stroking her head as she slowly woke up. It still felt wrong to refer to her as his 'pet,' but he wasn't prepared to tell everyone about the familiar bond. Not yet. "I have permission from Professor Snape to have her," he added defensively.

"Very cool, Potter," Zabini said, approvingly. "You might fit in here, after all."

A reedy looking boy sitting across from Harry, Theodore Nott, snorted into his food.

"We'll see about that," he muttered.

"Do you have a problem, Nott?" Draco asked, sounding about ready to fight. "Harry belongs here just as much as any of us."

"No, not at all," he said sarcastically. "After all, he's just the Boy-Who-Lived, defeater of the Dark Lord. Why wouldn't he belong in the Dark Lord's house?"

A hush fell over the first years. No one had dared mention the Dark Lord yet, even though many of their relatives had served him. Many of whom were in prison, or worse.

Harry watched Nott, intently. He was wary of having another Dudley on his hands, another bully. But things would be different this time, if so. He had his wand, he had Draco and his new friends, and he had Professor Snape. Not to mention Persephone. He wouldn't be cowed.

"Whatever happened that night," he said quietly, interrupting Draco's anger, "it wasn't my fault. I was only a year old. How could I defeat one of the most powerful wizards in the world? It just doesn't make any sense."

"Even if you didn't defeat the Dark Lord, how many of our parents did your father put in Azkaban?" Nott demanded. "My mother-"

"That's enough!" One of the older years had gotten up from the table to investigate the commotion coming from the first-years. "Nott, cool off. Potter isn't at fault. We don't blame each other for what our parents did."

Nott looked sulky, but he ducked his head, nodding. Whatever Nott's problem with him was, it looked like he would keep quiet about it for the moment.

The first-years quieted down, only to cheer up when dessert appeared. Harry allowed himself to be distracted by the sweets, not dwelling on how many of his classmates might be his enemies, if he sided against the Dark Lord like his parents.

But he didn't have to worry about that now. He was only eleven, after all. And while he very much hated the person who had killed his parents and landed him with the Dursley's, Harry was smart enough to know that he didn't know everything.