Beta: Cloudy
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"Good morning Miss Potter," said a pretty blonde Ravenclaw who approached me at breakfast. I shifted in my seat at the Slytherin table to get a better look at her. Her hair was long, straight, and neatly pushed back by a blue and black headband. She had a nice smile which made me reflexively smile back at her.
"Good morning," I greeted pleasantly.
"I'm Penelope Clearwater," Penelope introduced herself. "I was told you want to learn Latin?"
"Oh!" I brightened. "Yes. Actually, all of us would like to. Would that be okay?"
Penelope's cheeks reddened and she looked over at the other second-year Slytherins in surprise. "All of you? I suppose I could. Are you guys free, say, Sunday evenings?"
"We'll make time for it. The library might not be big enough to accommodate all of us, but there's an empty classroom near the potions room," I said. "Would it be okay to meet there?"
"Sure," Penelope said sweetly. "I'll see you all next Sunday."
"Thank you," we politely said on cue. A snake should never initiate malice without reason. Penelope was doing us a favor, so we had to treat her courteously. Doing anything less would be... bad.
And if a snake was being bad, that meant they needed to be disciplined.
Which sounded awful on its own, but I didn't see it any different from a parent scolding a child for misbehaving. I wasn't about to raise these babeh snakes to start wailing in public at the slightest issue.
(≖‿‿≖)ノ⌒●~*
October rolled into November without much fanfare. Latin tutoring started up without fuss. When Theodore mentioned it to Hermione on our run, Hermione, Harry, and Neville requested to tag along. Penelope was flattered to have so many people who wanted to learn under her, but since the group had gotten so big she had to enlist the help of a second helper. She had talked to Professor Flitwick and Professor Flitwick recommended Cedric Diggory.
What. A. Coincidence.
Hermione, Pansy, and Tracey certainly weren't complaining about Cedric's involvement. The three girls were not-so-subtly swooning over the fourth year, much to the chagrin of the boys.
All the other classes were progressing well enough except for DADA.
Since the disastrous episode of the pixies, Professor Lockhart had not brought live creatures to class. Instead, he read passages from his books to them and sometimes reenacted some of the more dramatic bits. He usually picked Harry to help him with these reconstructions. He did pull me up once, but I "accidentally" kept sneezing fireballs at him and "tripping" in such a manner I ended up kicking his shins three times.
He stopped calling on me.
Unfortunately, my brother was too kind for such tactics. It greatly amused me to see him suffer a bit so I hadn't stepped in on his behalf. Already, Harry had been forced to play a simple Transylvanian villager whom Lockhart had cured of a Babbling Curse, a yeti with a head cold, and a vampire who had been unable to eat anything except lettuce since Lockhart had dealt with him.
Harry was hauled to the front of the class during another Defense Against the Dark Arts lesson, this time acting a werewolf. Harry hated to act like a werewolf. We both found Lockhart's perspective on werewolves to be deeply insulting to our favorite uncle.
"Go ahead then Harry, give us a nice howl," Professor Lockhart said encouragingly.
Harry stared at Lockhart for several seconds then turned to me and said, "Rosie, please."
I rubbed at my nose. "Oh, no! Professor Lockhart I think—I think I've got the fireball sneezes again."
Professor Lockhart let out a feminine yelp and I "sneezed" a fireball where his feet were. The magic fire I conjured was harmless—a heated illusion, really—but Lockhart did his best to not find out first hand. I continued to "sneeze" at him until he fled into his back office and shrieked, "Self study, children!"
"I hate this class," Theodore bemoaned.
"C'mon, he'll be gone by next year."
"Bet he trips and breaks his neck down the stairs," Draco muttered.
"He's too agile," Daphne disagreed. "I bet he'll drown himself."
"How?" Theodore was incredulous.
"Don't know. But that's where my money is."
"I want in. I bet Rosie sets him on fire," Pansy jeered.
"That's far too messy of a cleanup," I disagreed.
"And illegal," Harry added.
I coughed and looked away.
Harry's eyes narrowed. "And wrong."
I started to whistle innocently.
"Rosie..."
"Think we should start a betting pool?" Draco mused, ignoring how Harry was glaring at me and I was pretending to play innocent to his glares.
"That might be a bit much," Hermione put in. "He's still a person."
"Then you want to bet he'll simply be let go?"
Hermione pursed her lips. "I don't want to bet anything. If I must make a guess on his future, then he'll simply be called away from Hogwarts. Likely to save another village."
"How dull," the Slytherins sighed.
"I bet he'll get maimed," Draco said, pulling out a parchment paper and starting to write down what we were betting.
"Sticking with drowning," Daphne firmly stated.
"I bet he'll be perfectly fine and choose to leave to write another book," Harry put in.
"I bet he'll be fired," Neville quietly added.
"Sticking with Rosie driving him off somehow," Pansy stubbornly said.
"Well, then," I chewed on my bottom lip. "I bet he'll be arrested and dragged out by aurors while deliriously shouting about how he's secretly been Obliviating the real heroes behind the stories and taking credits."
"Again: that's oddly specific."
"That's really specific," Harry commented with a frown.
"Write that down, Draco," I said, neatly sidestepping Harry's unspoken question of why.
Instead of studying, we spent the entire class period coming up with ways we hoped Professor Lockhart would get sacked. Only when the bell rang did Professor Lockhart step out of his office to try and grab Harry.
"Ah—Harry, won't you stay for a moment—?"
Harry literally sprinted out of the room before he could finish.
"Say, Tom. Wanna brew a completely illegal veritaserum potion over Christmas with me?"
"You're going to use it on Lockhart?"
"Yep."
"Sounds fun."
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Veritaserum was a difficult brew, but not the hardest potion to make. A letter home had Kreacher purchasing all the supplies I needed to brew one in my own Slytherin bedroom. Granted, I had to lose my desk for a solid month because of how it needed to be set up but it was a price worth paying. Professor Lockhart was such an aggravation, and his insistent prejudice against my furry babehs made him Unforgivable™ in my book.
It was only a matter of seeing exactly how much he pissed me off.
Setting him on fire wasn't completely off the table. Wouldn't kill him, but it'd definitely hurt.
I wasn't—I wasn't inherently against murder. I felt no discomfort for the thought. Simple death did not bother me. Only death with regrets perturbed me.
No. My beef with murder wasn't the morality of it, or something equally silly.
If I had to kill someone, that meant I wasn't smart enough to come up with a way to deal with them. I wasn't cunning enough to use them, nor charming enough to manipulate them. I lacked the foresight and knowledge to turn the situation into an advantage. It was a mark against me. A failure.
A regret.
I had worked hard over the past decade to become something I could have only dreamed about in my previous life. I was a thief, a witch who used Light and Dark magic, and someone with enough reckless curiosity to try out things others wouldn't consider. I worked hard to hone my skillset to achieve the ideal me.
Tom's manner of manipulation was something I admired and I wished I could replicate it for myself. If I could, imagine the changes I could bring about without needing to resort to violence. The game of wits I could play! The life of a silver tongue, what a fascinating life it must be.
Maybe a werewolf country wouldn't be so out of reach.
Such a thing would require someone of high intelligence, cunning, wit, and the ability to foresee long term issues and solutions. Someone smart enough to make a werewolf country shouldn't be so stupid to need to literally kill someone in their way.
On the morning of the first Quidditch match of the year I set up the copper cauldron and began brewing veritaserum. The potions had to be slowly added over an entire lunar cycle. Better to start as early as possible.
Once that was done, I got dressed in my warm clothes and headed out to the Quidditch field with Daphne, Pansy, and Tracey. It was a muggy day with a hint of thunder in the air.
"I hope it doesn't rain," Pansy said, peering up at the sky.
"We can practice our umbrella charms if it does," I said.
"Do you know the incantation and wandwork?" Daphne asked.
"Yeah. Not very good with it, though," I said as I tucked behind a stray curl that had freed itself from my bun.
Madam Hooch, the Quidditch teacher, asked Flint and Wood to shake hands, which they did, giving each other threatening stares and gripping rather harder than was necessary.
"On my whistle," said Madam Hooch. "Three... two... one... "
With a roar from the crowd to speed them upward, the fourteen players rose toward the leaden sky. Harry flew higher than any of them, exchanging nods with Draco as the two Seekers began their hunt for the snitch.
There was no time for chit chat because a heavy black bludger came pelting toward Harry; he avoided it so narrowly I almost thought it actually hit him.
"Close one, Harry!" said George, streaking past him with his club in his hand, ready to knock the Bludger back toward a Slytherin.
Harry saw George give the bludger a powerful whack in the direction of Adrian Pucey, but the bludger changed direction in midair and shot straight for Harry again. Harry dropped quickly to avoid it, and George managed to hit it hard toward Draco who did a quick maneuver to dodge. Once again, the bludger swerved like a boomerang and shot at Harry's head. Harry put on a burst of speed and zoomed toward the other end of the pitch.
Fred Weasley was waiting for the bludger at the other end. Harry ducked as Fred swung at the Bludger with all his might; the bludger was knocked off course.
"Gotcha!" Fred yelled happily, but he was wrong; as though it was magnetically attracted to Harry, the Bludger pelted after him once more and Harry was forced to fly off at full speed.
"It's focusing on your brother. That's odd."
"It's been tampered with."
"Why?"
"Could be any number of reasons. A lot of people want us dead."
"Why? What did you do?"
"We're hailed as saviors for vanquishing Lord Voldemort."
Tom's magic violently lurched, as if his heart had stopped beating. Alarm, anger, and disbelief seeped out of his magic and into my own.
"We didn't vanquish," I admitted to him. The power behind his anger was startling. I knew he would be upset when I told him the truth, but I had not expected the violent tidal wave that battered against my mind. Even unintentionally fighting me, Tom's magic was a force to be reckoned with. "He's not dead, merely gone. We were only a year old when it happened."
"How?"
"How indeed? He made a terrible mistake, Tom. He acted foolishly and got caught."
"That's not possible."
"And yet it's the truth. Lord Voldemort has been defeated so soundly that his Death Eaters fled him. It's why, despite it being over a decade since, he has not been resurrected. He has no one to turn to."
Tom's magic recoiled as if struck. His rage was dark, and it physically made me nauseous to feel it inside me. It made my own magic ache in ways I couldn't put into words. My hands started to tremble as I had to consciously focus on calming my own magic to try and soothe his. I had to make it look natural enough that Tom wouldn't pick up on the fact that I felt his magic. His mania outburst was staggering, his magic churning violently like a raging ocean.
But beneath that madness there was a glimmer of something else.
Of hurt.
Such a tiny little speck so deeply shoved down beneath the rage it would have been easy to miss.
I kept my magic calm, warm, and gentle as I further intermingled it with his. Like a friend reaching out and grasping his hand in comfort.
"Are you okay, Tom?"
"I—I am fine, Rosie," Tom said charmingly, his voice like melted caramel despite the torrent of fury his magic had become. "I'm so terribly sorry to hear how people want to hurt you, though. Are you okay?"
"I'm fine," I reassured him confidently as I continued to watch Harry try to dodge the Bludger. Although I had to suppress my wince at the sharp spike in nausea when his dark magic dipped down from fury to pure hatred. "It doesn't bother me at all."
"Even though he tried to kill you?"
"I was angry that he killed our parents, but anger doesn't do me any good. I would have done the same in his place. It'd make me a hypocrite to dislike him over something like that."
Which was accurate. If I viewed someone as a threat to my family and could not think of a way to deal with them, I would kill them. As for how I felt on Voldemort? There was no hatred, or intense dislike anymore. Time had taken care of that, and I wasn't so petty of a person to hold onto that anger for over a decade. Even my intense disdain for Peter dulled down. I would still violently murder him if given the chance, but I wasn't going to lose sleep if the stupid rat died of natural causes before I got the chance. Voldemort was insane; a rabid dog. He was a threat, he would be dealt with accordingly.
I was admittedly scared of him and those maddened red eyes, but that wasn't going to slow me down.
"You would have?" His magic paused at that, surprise rippling across it. The intense, sharp hatred in his magic cooled back down to anger.
"Sure. He thought we were a threat. I guess he couldn't come up with a way to deal with us outside of killing us, so he tried to kill us. A bit Gryffindor of him, but maybe he was in a rush."
His magic fluttered, my words surprising him enough that the storm had come to an abrupt pause. "What do you mean 'Gryffindor of him'?"
"Well," I started to explain, "if a Slytherin has to kill someone that means they're too stupid to come up with another way to deal with them."
Oof.
I offended him.
I definitely offended him.
"Sometimes there is no other way," he sharply pointed out, blatantly irritated.
"That you can think of," I agreed.
His magic whirled in annoyance. I kept my magic around his own, wanting to help soothe the torrent of fury he had felt before.
It had started to rain, so we practiced our umbrella charm. It took me a couple tries to get it right—both because of lack of practice and Tom's anger made me nauseous—but once mine was up I taught it to the other students. We all got to enjoy the Quidditch match without getting soaked.
Daphne, in an oddly concerned tone said, "That bludger really likes Harry."
"Yes," I agreed. "He's very charming, you know. Not nearly as much as I am, but still very good."
The girls giggled.
I didn't pay much attention to the match, my gaze focused on Harry and the obsessed bludger that chased after him. When the rain had started to pick up much harder Harry literally jumped off his broom—thankfully he was near the ground—to grab at what I assumed to be the snitch.
The thud on the muddy ground made my heart leap, and I jumped out of the stands with my wand whipped out. It had been a purely instinctive reaction, some ingrained maternal instinct coming to life when I saw my little Harry tumble to the ground awkwardly.
As I neared the earth I pointed my wand down and quickly performed, "Pulvinos."
The ground beneath me became as springy as a trampoline, catching my fall. After years of using that maneuver to escape Muggle police, I had come up with a technique to roll forward when it launched me back up so it wouldn't actually bring me skyward.
Within seconds, I had rolled across the mud and jumped back up onto my feet. I had reached Harry just as the rest of the Gryffindor team arrived.
Uncanny, I thought as I stared at Harry's plainly broken arm.
"Aha," Harry said, his eyes unfocused and glazed over from the pain. "We've won."
He fainted. I conjured my umbrella again to hold it above him while I kneeled at his head. Professor Lockhart and the Gryffindor Quidditch team had arrived as Harry came back to.
"Oh, no, not you," he moaned.
"Doesn't know what he's saying," said Lockhart loudly to the anxious crowd of Gryffindors pressing around them. "Not to worry, Harry. I'm about to fix your arm."
"No!" said Harry. "I'll keep it like this, thanks."
Harry made a move to sit up, but my hand on his shoulder kept him still. The sound of clicking drew my attention to a small boy with curly blond hair who held up a big camera and started to take pictures.
The Slytherin team had arrived, a few of them peeling off from the group to help Fred and George shove the rogue Bludger back into place.
"I don't want a photo of this, Colin," he said loudly.
"Lie back, Harry," said Lockhart soothingly. "It's a simple charm I've used countless times—"
"Why can't I just go to the hospital wing?" said Harry through clenched teeth.
"He should really, Professor," said a muddy Wood, who couldn't help grinning even though his Seeker was injured. "Great capture, Harry, really spectacular, your best yet, I'd say—"
"Stand back," said Lockhart, who was rolling up his jade-green sleeves.
My eyes narrowed at Lockhart. "Stop right there, he's already told you no. Cast a single spell on my brother's head and I'll bust your kneecaps before you can even beg for forgiveness."
Professor Lockhart gaped. "Come now, such a thing isn't necessary—really, I've done this countless times."
He then twirled his wand and directed it at Harry's arm.
"I warned you," I snarled, standing up. With a quick jump and spin I did a hard roundhouse kick into Lockhart's face. He sprawled onto the ground with a keening wail like a baby. I took that opportunity to point my wand at his knees and his out, "Novis Genu."
A neat little spell Remus had taught me to use against Sirius. It turned the knees backward. Not painful... unless he tried to walk.
I would have pulled out one of my hammers I kept in my bag if I had thought to bring it. I thought Lockhart would have heeded my warning, but apparently he was too stupid to do so.
"What is going on here!" Madam Hooch thundered as she reached the team—she had to collect the other balls first.
"This pompous idiot assaulted my brother," I said, kicking Lockhart in the jinxed knees. He cried out in pain, and apparently the pain was so intense he passed out.
"Pathetic," I thought, and I could feel Tom's magic agree with me.
"What?" Madam Hooch.
"Professor Lockhart wanted to cast a spell on Harry, Rosie warned him not to but he did it anyway," Draco stepped forward in my defense.
"That's classic assault," added Adrien.
"We all saw," one of the Gryffindor chasers said. "Harry and Rosie told him not to."
"I felt my brother was threatened and took appropriate action to defend him," I said as Professor McGonagall and Professor Snape reached us. They had taken the stairs down, after all.
"What's the issue?" Professor McGonagall asked.
"This," Harry said as he tried to raise his now boneless arm. "Lockhart did it to me."
"What?"
It took several minutes of explaining before the professors took Harry and Lockhart up to Madam Pomfrey, and I was escorted by Professor Snape to Professor Dumbledore. Professor Dumbledore's office was as suffocating in magic as it was the last time, so it was with a grimace that I entered it.
But I beamed when I saw my favorite old schemer. "Hi, Professor Dumbledore!'
"Hello, Miss Potter. What's the issue, Professor Snape?"
"Miss Potter thought it best to knock Professor Lockhart out and jinx his knees backward," Professor Snape carefully said.
"And why is that?"
"Harry broke his arm. Lockhart wanted to cast a spell to try and fix it, but we all know he's garbage so I warned him not to. He did it anyway. I deemed him a threat to my brother's safety and took him out," I said with a shrug. "Classic self-defense. Do I need to press charges?"
"That shouldn't be necessary," Professor Dumbledore said. "Miss Potter, assaulting a professor is not something to be done lightly."
"If anyone attacks Harry or me I will defend us," I sternly rebuked, my eyes narrowed. "Should I have continued to let the man cast spells on my brother—spells that could have potentially killed him?"
"No, but you should have sought out a teacher."
"They were already too slow to stop the first one. Seeking out help could have meant a second spell would be cast against him and that spell could have been fatal. What if he vanished the bones inside his skull next?" I paused. "That being said I do understand that I can't go unpunished for what I did otherwise other students might try to manipulate situations where they can claim self-defense. So how many detentions will I be receiving?"
"A month," Professor Snape suggested with a chilly tone. "I need an extra set of hands preparing potion ingredients."
Given that Professor Snape still didn't like me—I couldn't tell if I was in the actively dislike or neutral camp—I had a feeling it was going to be some pretty nasty ingredients. Urk.
"That sounds perfectly reasonable," I agreed with a wince, looking from Professor Snape to Professor Dumbledore.
"So glad we could come to an arrangement," Professor Dumbledore mused.
"'Course. I already know Lockhart won't last the rest of the year, no need to make too big of a fuss," I said with a big smile. "We've got a running pool on how we think the DADA curse will get him, either of you want to participate?"
"Has drowning been suggested?" Professor Snape inquired, but cleared his throat when Professor Dumbledore gave him a warning look.
"Wow. Actually, yes. How the dilly dally heck do you and Daphne think he'll drown?"
(≖‿‿≖)ノ⌒●~*
"You are... not incorrect," Tom told me as I left Professor Dumbledore's office. "To take a life because they are in your way is... very brutish."
His anger had cooled down completely. It helped seeing me kick Lockhart, but Tom really just needed time to process the information I had given him. It was a lot to take in, I understood that. He had high expectations of himself—or perhaps high hopes would be more apt. Being told he met failure had to hurt.
Although it was when I told him that Lord Voldemort had no one that his anger truly spiked.
Lonely boy. No experience in making friends, he probably deluded himself into thinking what he had with his followers was equally valuable or perhaps of greater value than friendship.
The hurt that I felt underneath the anger was... good. It was good that he was able to feel hurt at all, his emotions weren't limited to anger and apathy.
His world wasn't so monotone, and I felt genuinely happy for him.
No one deserved to live life experiencing only rage and indifference.
"Obviously it's completely different to take a life when you need to do a ritual or something," I told him.
"That goes without saying."
"But... you agree?"
"I... cannot find fault with your logic."
"Thank you, Tom. It makes me happy we agree on something."
"Why?"
"Because it means we're one step closer to being friends."
Unintentionally, Tom's magic shyly curled into mine.
(≖‿‿≖)ノ⌒●~*
Bucket List Completed:
34. Is Lockhart a genius at politics? I need to know how tf someone so seemingly stupid is able to manipulate the press. Might be good to befriend him to prepare for the upcoming political climate. Note: DUDE'S AN IDIOT. NOT WORTH THE TROUBLE.
ƪ(˘⌣˘)ʃ
Answer: Japanese and/or Korean
Question: What position would you want to play in Quidditch?
Reviews are love!