Chapter Eight of 'That Glorious Strength'- Days of Firsts (Part Two)

[lomonaaeren]

Chapter Seven.

Chapter One.

Title: That Glorious Strength (8/?)
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Pairings: Background canon couples, otherwise gen
Content Notes: Massive AU (no Voldemort), blood prejudice, mentorship, angst, drama, violence, torture, gore
Rating: PG-13
Summary: AU. Instead of becoming Voldemort, Tom Riddle established a school of “secondary importance” for Muggleborns, half-bloods, and Squibs. Since the school frees Hogwarts to continue drifting more towards the purebloods’ whims and wishes, they haven’t raised any large fuss. Besides, everyone knows that half-bloods and Muggleborns don’t have any real power. Just look at Riddle, who had ambitions that outpaced his magical strength. They don’t see the revolution coalescing under the surface.
Author’s Notes: This is a story idea I’ve been brewing in my mind for a long time, and finally decided to write. I don’t have any idea how long it will be at the moment. The title is a twist on “that hideous strength,” used as a title by C. S. Lewis and from a poem by David Lyndsay.

Thank you again for all the reviews!

Chapter Eight—Days of Firsts (Part Two)

“If you will escort the first-years into the Great Hall, Minerva.”

That was the chore Headmistress Carrow always assigned her. Minerva knew why. It did the young purebloods good to see that a half-blood witch was assigned to a place of service. And it presumably did the others good, as well, if they had any illusions about their place in their new world.

“Yes, Headmistress,” was all Minerva said, and she dipped her head a little as she went down from the Grand Staircase to meet the young students that Wilhelmina had guided in on the little boats. Some traditions of Hogwarts were still observed, although the group of students this year, at seventeen, was smaller than most had been in Minerva’s youth.

She met Severus on the way, which was unusual. Most of the time, he would already have been sitting at the Head Table, as distant from the students as he could get.

“Minerva,” Severus said in a slow drawl. “On the way to bring in the little darlings?”

“As the Headmistress asked of me, yes,” Minerva said, and brushed past him.

She thought she felt something cling to her robes for a second, but when she stopped and glanced down at them, there was nothing there. She shook her head and kept walking. Hogwarts was so full of small tricks—notches in the steps that weren’t always present, the ghosts of mice, lingering effects of prank spells—that she didn’t try to deal with them unless they caused a visible effect.

And speaking of visible effects…Minerva rearranged her face in the stern, welcoming smile that she was known for. She must let no true sign of what she felt escape her vigilance, lest she be driven from the post where she could do the most students the most good.

*

Severus stared at the colors rotating over the smooth globe that Riddle had given him. It looked to be made of obsidian, although it was faceted and had a heart that could be seen into if one turned the ball enough. Riddle had said that Severus wouldn’t have to touch someone with the globe to measure their strength, but Severus hadn’t trusted that appraisal, not fully, so he had brushed the globe against Minerva’s robes as she passed.

This was a test only. Severus wanted to see how the globe functioned, to make sure that he could use it in the Great Hall as Riddle had demanded.

The colors snapped together after a long moment of rotating, which had seemed to create a second globe above the first. Severus saw the unmistakable figure of a gryphon there, which wasn’t a surprise. With Minerva’s strength in Transfiguration and her earth-like stolidity, she would undoubtedly have been Sorted into the House of the Gryphon if she had gone to Fortius.

Severus slipped the globe into his robe pocket and turned to sweep towards the Great Hall.

*

“Welcome to Hogwarts,” Minerva said, and continued the familiar speech describing the strengths of the Houses and some of the ancient traditions of the school, while her gaze slid critically over the students standing in the anteroom in front of her.

Red hair—the second set of Weasley twins, of course. Minerva concealed a sigh. She could only hope that they were less mischievous than their older brothers, and wouldn’t cause her too many troubles in her position as Head of their House.

Blond hair. Minerva gave a semi-deep nod to the Minister’s son. Young Malfoy looked at her with a pinched, superior expression that made him resemble the worst combination of his parents.

She let her eyes roam over the other children, all expected. Pansy Parkinson, standing with her nose halfway up an invisible arse. The Crabbe and Goyle sons, behind Draco with the kind of stolid implacability that attended their families as they attended the Malfoys. Another blond head, deeper in color this time, that marked the latest Smith.

Many of them would go to Slytherin. There was only one Muggleborn and two half-bloods among them.

Maybe that was for the best. Maybe it would be for the best if those children accepted the shadow the pureblood world would cast over them early on, and accepted, too, that they would have to get their inferior education from the Fortius Academy instead of Hogwarts.

Merlin knows, Minerva thought, as she turned and opened the doors into the Great Hall with a wave of her wand, we have little enough to offer them.

*

Severus tapped the obsidian globe resting in his lap, out of sight beneath the table, with two fingers the minute the first of the disorganized jumble of eleven-year-olds stepped into the Great Hall.

There was a long, soft hum, which Severus was fairly sure he was the only one to hear. The Hall was more silent than it was most of the time, but no place filled with this many children could be entirely so. There were whispers zipping back and forth from mouth to mouth, and the clink of coins changing hands, as people bet on how many Slytherins there would be this time, and how many Gryffindors.

The number of the latter shrank from year to year.

Severus sneered a little when he caught sight of two gingers trailing along at the back of the pack. Well, there will be two more this year, anyway.

His eyes found those of Draco Malfoy, who was staring at him with the kind of expectation of deference that his father regularly did. Severus made sure to nod a little. He had a lie all prepared about why he couldn’t be more open when they were in front of an audience, but Draco didn’t seem to be interested in Severus, instead turning back to the Sorting Hat sitting on its stool with a look of expectation on his face.

The Hat began its latest song, one Severus didn’t bother paying any more attention to than he usually did. The idea of tradition and the like that the Hat supported was one he had ignored for years because he despised it, and that he ignored now because he had a more important task.

The students of Hogwarts would not be Sorted by magical affinity as those of Fortius were. But the globe that Riddle had given Severus could still discern what those magical affinities would have been.

And record them, so that Riddle could have a better idea what strengths his future enemies had.

It was so ingenious that Severus wondered why Riddle hadn’t tried to get someone on the inside in Hogwarts so that he could find out before. Perhaps the magic that could do the recording hadn’t been perfected yet.

Perhaps he had simply not known whom he could trust.

Severus picked up his goblet of water and brought it to his lips, wetting them only, as the first girl, a Bones, went beneath the Hat, and was assigned to Hufflepuff. He approved of the slowness of Riddle’s pace, and not only because the man had once been a Slytherin like Severus.

It meant the revenge would be slower, too, and to be savored.

Severus wanted them to suffer.

*

Draco had thought the Hat might speak to him, the way it seemed to have spoken to some of the others, especially Longbottom, whom it had hesitated over for a long time before it sent him to Gryffindor. But the Hat only touched his head briefly and squealed, “SLYTHERIN!”

Draco smiled a little as he sat down at the table politely clapping for him. He had known he would be in Slytherin, the way all his ancestors had been, the way Crabbe and Goyle were. The way the majority of their year would be. Daphne had gone there, too, and Pansy would come, and Theodore, and Blaise. Millicent Bulstrode seemed to have been hoping for it, but the Hat had sent her to Ravenclaw. Draco was viciously, silently pleased about that. Bulstrode was a half-blood. No point in aspiring beyond her station.

His eyes went to Ron, though. Draco thought their conversation on the train had had an impact, but was it enough of one?

Ron’s face was pale, which made his freckles stand out like dots of blood. He darted one glance at Draco, then away again, as if he didn’t want anyone to see where he was looking. Draco raised his eyebrows a little. Perhaps Ron had better political instincts than Draco had thought.

“What are you looking at, Draco?”

That was Pansy, sitting beside him now, looking as happy as she ever got. Her older sister, sitting down the bench, gave her one cool, thoughtful glance, and looked away. Draco lamented that he wouldn’t get to know Cygnet Parkinson well before she left Hogwarts, since she was already a sixth-year. From what his parents had said, she was better company than Pansy.

“The people who might get into Slytherin,” Draco said truthfully.

Pansy sniffed. “I can’t imagine there’s going to be many surprises. The worthy purebloods will come here—”

The Hat shouted Smith for Hufflepuff, and Draco raised his eyebrows at her. “You were saying?”

“Well, Smith is descended from a Founder, of course he’ll go to the Founder’s House.” Pansy flicked her fingers and dismissed the contrary evidence for her theory. “And of course it’s no surprise where the Weasleys will go.”

Draco bit his lip, and looked up as Ron walked forwards and settled under the Hat. There were only him, his twin sister, and Blaise left.

Come on, Ron, Draco thought, narrowing his eyes. Show me what you’ve got.

*

Slytherin, Ron thought the instant the Hat settled on his head.

There was a long pause, during which Ron thought he felt someone moving around in his thoughts. It was bloody disconcerting. But the Hat didn’t shout anything one way or the other, so Ron squared his shoulders and did his best to accept the sensation.

You would do well in Gryffindor, the Hat murmured, its voice ancient and creaky. That is where your family expects you to go, I believe. And a pureblood might usually do well in Slytherin, but you might also encounter prejudice because of the policies that your family supported until recently.

Ron felt something freeze in him. Does everything have to be about my bloody family? he demanded. Am I not allowed to have anything I want? Or do you just do what people’s parents want?

The Hat gave a chuckle that bounced off the sides of Ron’s skull. I suspect that I have made many decisions that students’ parents would not approve of.

Then you can make this one. I want Slytherin. I want a place that my ambitions can thrive. Where I can do what I need to do to distinguish myself.

Another silence, and Ron could hear the rising murmurs that were the voices of people wondering what the hell was happening, and why the Hat was taking so long to Sort yet another Weasley. Ron’s spine grew stiffer as he thought about that. He would prove that he wasn’t just another Weasley. He would prove that he was different.

You should know, the Hat said abruptly, that if you want to go to Slytherin because of the interaction on the train I can see in your memories, then young Mr. Malfoy was not telling you to enter that House out of mere concern for your welfare.

Ron grimaced. I didn’t think he was. I know that he probably wants to use me somehow. Dad says all the Malfoys are like that. But it’s perfectly possible to get along with the Malfoys and still do what you want. It’s what Fred and George do.

The Hat gave a chuckle that was aloud this time, and Ron heard more than one person jump. He wished he could see it, but the Hat’s brim was too low over his eyes, and he couldn’t look up or see anything on their faces.

Very well. I think that you are better-suited to your new House than any other Weasley I’ve seen recently. Do well in—“SLYTHERIN!”

*

Severus felt his eyebrows fly up as the Weasley boy put the Hat on the stool and stood to face the audience. The silent audience. If any other Sorting had caused this level of consternation at Hogwarts, Severus couldn’t remember it.

Minerva was staring with her lips parted, which was the equivalent of a dropped jaw for her. She shook her head sharply a second later and actually turned and addressed the Sorting Hat. “Have you gone senile?” she demanded.

The Hat gave a long, wheezy-sounding chuckle. Severus let his eyes pass back and forth between it and the Weasley boy, who was marching towards the Slytherin table. They sat stunned, not clapping, but Weasley didn’t look stunned. Neither did Draco, who was smiling in the self-satisfied way of someone who had achieved something he wanted.

Draco. Severus held back his sigh. Of course he would tamper with something like this, in the name of collecting allies.

Draco had just begun to clap lightly when the Hat said, “I am the Sorting Hat. I know where to send students.” It flapped its brim up and down. “And I have two more of them to Sort, so bring them to me.”

Weasley slid into the seat next to Draco, and exchanged a bright, secret smile with him. Severus wanted to groan, seeing it. Just the thing he needed, a Weasley under his watch and conspiring with the Minister’s son.

“You’re wrong!” That was the older Weasley twins, yelling as one, standing up at the Gryffindor table. Severus spared them a single glance, more to monitor the position of the two other Weasleys in the room than to see what the twins were doing. Percy’s mouth was narrow and lined. The girl, Ron Weasley’s twin sister, simply seemed stunned. “No Weasley—”

“Has ever been in a House other than Gryffindor! Put our—”

“Brother back, now!”

Minerva’s back went up, probably because she found students yelling in the Great Hall more offensive than the thought of losing a “guaranteed” Gryffindor to Slytherin House. “Mr. Weasley, Mr. Weasley, sit down, now! The Hat makes the final decision.”

“Thank you, Professor McGonagall.” The Sorting Hat sounded smug.

Severus snorted under his breath as he saw the look of loathing Minerva gave the thing, but she turned her back on it and gestured the other two students left in line, Victoria Weasley and Blaise Zabini, forwards. Luckily, there were no surprises there. Weasley-Ella went to Gryffindor, and Zabini to Slytherin, as expected.

Nine new Slytherins, the same count as Severus had anticipated, although the members were a bit different. He had thought Millicent Bulstrode would be the ninth, not Weasley. He sipped at his water as Minerva swept the Hat off the stool and Headmistress Carrow rose to her feet, eyes glittering.

All the students immediately shut up and paid attention. You did, when Hogwarts’s Headmistress spoke. She had been known to torture those who didn’t.

Severus mentally contrasted it to the way Headmaster Dumbledore had handled matters when he was a student here, and snorted to himself again. Well, yes, Dumbledore had been less intimidating, and he would never have resorted to torture—except for the cute little speeches he liked to give that students would spend hours trying to riddle apart later. Severus had known there was no meaning behind them from the time he was a second-year student, but precious little could convince other Slytherins of that.

“Welcome to your future,” Carrow said, her dark eyes passing slowly back and forth across the tables, as if marking the way every student sat or tilted their heads back to look up at her for signs of sedition. “You should take your schooling seriously. That means adhering to the rules of courtesy and pride, among other things. Take pride in your heritage. Understand it. Take pride in the heritage of your House.” She leaned forwards, hands resting lightly on the table. “And know the rules.”

The words sank into a silence as deep as a pool at the foot of a waterfall. There was no applause as Carrow sat down and gave the nod that would signal the house-elves to begin serving the feast. That was the way Carrow liked it, though. She thought too many signs of enthusiasm, other than for torturing Mudbloods, meant people were planning something against the regime.

Severus glanced down at the obsidian sphere in his lap again, and smiled slightly as it flashed the image of a dragon. So it had recorded the magical affinities of all the students Sorted today, and agreed that Blaise Zabini would be Sorted into the House nearest to Slytherin if he was attending Fortius Academy.

Severus expected to see Riddle tonight, and to receive another sphere that he could carry around to analyze the magical affinities of older students. Know your enemy.

“What are you looking at, Severus?”

He turned to face Filius, slipping the obsidian sphere into his robe pocket with a slight motion of his hand. “My future, with the most students Sorted this year under my care,” he said, with a slight grimace. “And a Weasley to boot. Who knows what mess that is going to cause?”

Filius sighed and nodded. “And I will have a half-blood to console,” he said, turning to look at Millicent Bulstrode. Severus saw that she was sitting at the edge of the Ravenclaw table, her arms folded and her shoulders turned to those of her Housemates who were trying to talk to her. “I hope, in time, that she can accept what happened is for the best.”

Severus returned some light answer, and began eating. It took him more time than it should have to realize that Minerva had not returned.

*

Minerva stared at the Sorting Hat as she held it, turning it around and around in her hands. Technically, she should have returned it to the Headmistress’s office right away, and then gone to the Feast. But she didn’t know how to bypass the new ward Headmistress Carrow had set at the end of the corridor, and although she could have guessed, or gone and asked the Headmistress before she left the Great Hall, standing here until the Feast was done would both outline her dedication to the task and convey the impression that she was a half-blooded idiot to Carrow—something particularly good to convey right now.

The main benefit, of course, was that she didn’t need to go back into the Great Hall and stare at the paltry three first-years she would be nurturing this year. For the first time in the school’s history, there would be a bedroom with a single student in it. Victoria Weasley, in this case.

“Why did you do it?” she whispered, her voice breaking. “Why did you—why have you gone along with what they asked you to do, these last few years?”

She knew she could be in danger if the Sorting Hat reported this conversation to Headmistress Carrow. But the Hat had never willingly spoken to her. Minerva was as safe as she could be.

“I Sort where students belong,” said the Hat, and yawned with a noise like a Muggle student’s satchel being zipped. “I Sort what you give me. And the majority belong in Slytherin. Mr. Weasley went to the right House for him.”

Minerva closed her eyes. She knew, of course, that purebloods like Lucius Malfoy would like to see Gryffindor House, and probably Hufflepuff, destroyed altogether. The traditions that flowed from Godric Gryffindor and Helga Hufflepuff were both inconvenient for them and more likely to turn students against Minister Malfoy’s administration.

But eliminating them completely would risk the wrath of older purebloods who had been in those Houses. Starving them of students, however, was acceptable.

“Has it occurred to you,” the Hat abruptly demanded, “that I can do nothing else with the quality of students I have?”

Minerva looked at it again. It was the first time she could remember the Hat saying something that wasn’t in response to a direct question. “I don’t know what you mean. All of our students have the magical strength and marks to attend Hogwarts.”

“Perhaps I should have said quantity,” the Hat said. “Perhaps I should have said blood.”

And then it closed its brim, and no matter what other questions Minerva asked, it wouldn’t answer her.

In the end, she did stand there until Headmistress Carrow came back to the gargoyle, but it didn’t matter. She wasn’t hungry anyway.

*

Tom stood at the window of his office, gazing across the expanse of Fortius’s grounds, and noting the softly glowing lights behind many of the windows. He smiled a little. Classes would begin later than usual tomorrow morning, both to give time for a tour of the school for those who might not have seen everything yet, and to give some recovery time for those who stayed up late tonight, chattering to and learning the names and natures of their new Housemates.

Tom stepped back and reached for the jar of Floo powder on his mantel. It was time to go to Hogwarts and exchange obsidian orbs with Severus. At least, it was if the man had done as Tom had instructed. It would be interesting to see how well he fared in this first test of his loyalty.

A low noise sounded from behind him. It was the thready edge of a growl, and Tom halted, his fingers digging into the jar’s sides. The wards on Fortius should have held every threat out that could produce a noise like that.

“Don’t move, Riddle.”

Tom continued gazing straight forwards, but he reached out with his mind to touch a connection he usually didn’t call upon. Although their natures and magical affinities were not close enough to bond as wizard and familiar, he did have a tie to Belasha because of his Parseltongue magic. She would come if she sensed he was in danger.

The noise didn’t repeat itself, but the man slowly circled in front of him. Tom was grateful for the lack of speed, in fact. It gave him more time to reach out to Belasha and stir her from the sleep that had consumed her this afternoon after she’d devoured two oxen.

The man finally came to a halt in front of Tom, close enough for Tom to see his face—or he would have been able to, if a deep cloak hadn’t shaded it. The man’s fingers played lightly across the wood of a rowan wand. That made Tom blink despite himself. Rowan wood, deeply involved in protection against Dark magic, normally wouldn’t answer the will of a wizard who had broken in wanting to harm the children or torture someone.

But the sight of the unusual wood, combined with the noise from beforehand, made Tom reach out and send a soothing emotion to Belasha, asking her to halt without the words that he couldn’t send from this distance.

“Do I have the pleasure of addressing Mr. Remus Lupin?” he asked.

The man started, and the thin growl Tom had heard before broke out again. Then he lifted his left hand and swept back the hood of his cloak, keeping the wand in his right hand trained on Tom.

Tom had thought he’d known what to expect, since he had relatively recent photographs of Lupin from some of his Ministry spies, but it turned out that he hadn’t after all. Lupin’s hair had gone entirely silver, an odd metallic color that didn’t look like the grey of age, but like the fur of a wolf in winter. His eyes, likewise, were entirely golden, as if he stood permanently in a flow of light that touched only them, and his ears slightly pointed. He reminded Tom of pictures Muggles painted of elves.

“How did you know?” Lupin demanded in a voice several octaves lower than a human wizard’s.

“It’s rare that someone who could growl would manage to pass through the wards without alerting me,” Tom said, keeping his eyes on Lupin’s. His hand tingled with the urge to grasp his wand, but he kept it still. At the moment, reaching for any weapon would be one of the stupidest things he could do, and he knew it. “And I knew that once I removed Harry from the home where the Ministry had placed him, I would probably be seeing you.”

Lupin continued to stare at him unwaveringly. “You might as well say it.”

“Say what?”

“Say something that could growl like that. And call Harry by his last name. I know that’s what people like you do.” Lupin’s lips pulled back so that Tom could see teeth he thought had been deliberately sharpened for the intimidation factor.

“No, I do believe that werewolves are people,” Tom said. He kept his voice as mild as possible, and stared mostly at Lupin but partially off to the side. “And Harry is Harry to me, although of course I’ll have to call him by his last name in class. He reminds me a lot of myself in childhood.”

Lupin sniffed visibly. Tom controlled any reaction, and waited. Then Lupin said, “You aren’t lying.”

Tom shook his head. “I am not. I found that Harry had been placed with the Muggle relatives of his mother, and they had abused him. They—”

Lupin flowed towards him, so fast that he looked like a current of visible air instead of a person. Again, Tom kept his hand away from his wand, and let Lupin grip him around the shoulders and slam him back into the wall.

He also kept to himself the doubt that he might not have been able to compete with Lupin’s speed even if he’d wanted to.

“You’re lying this time,” Lupin said, his voice near enough to Tom’s ear to remind him of nightmares he’d had as a child, of something snarling beside his bed in the dark. “I know it. The purebloods knew what I’d do to their children if they harmed Harry.”

“They probably thought you would never find out,” Tom said, tilting his head back a little to get his windpipe as clear as possible. Sharpened nails rested against his neck, enough to create dents in his skin. “And they thought Harry would go to Hogwarts this time, and be so grateful for the magical rescue that he would never mention his time with his relatives.”

“You believe that. You don’t know for sure.”

Tom hadn’t known that a werewolf’s nose could pick up subtleties like that, which irritated him. Had the people reporting to him not known it, either, which would mean a failure of their diligence, or had they left it out of their reports because they didn’t believe it was important, which would mean a failure of their intelligence?

Lupin snarled softly, and Tom reminded himself that he would figure it out later. He sighed and said, “No, I don’t know it for sure. But there isn’t any other reason I can think of for someone who plays the game like Lucius Malfoy to have left him with abusive Muggles when he knew about your threat.”

A long moment passed in which the loudest sound was Tom’s heart in his ears and the panting of what felt like a large beast next to him. Then Lupin released him.

Tom let his feet settle on the floor and spent a moment smoothing out his robes. Then he looked up to see Lupin prowling back and forth in front of him. There was the slight rasp of nails on the floor that meant Lupin was probably barefoot underneath his robes. Tom didn’t bother trying to confirm it.

“Why did they want to control Harry that way?” Lupin asked, his voice a tired rasp without the growl.

“He has power,” Tom said. “He didn’t believe magic existed, but he used my own wand to throw me across the room when he was simply willing it to happen. I think that Malfoy and whoever else was in charge of the placement wished to control him and his magic in the future. Perhaps for a marriage, perhaps for a harvesting.”

Lupin’s mouth opened, and yes, his teeth had definitely sharpened, although perhaps by his transformations rather than magic. “I see,” he said. “That will not happen to Harry.”

“No, I agree. Legally, he’s a student of Fortius now and he won’t be able to be removed—”

“No, it will not happen because Malfoy will be dead.” Lupin turned towards the fireplace.

“Consider something, Lupin,” Tom said, and he knew it was his bored tone that made the werewolf glance back at him. If he had sounded angry or anxious, Lupin would probably already have vanished through the flames. “If you murder Malfoy, or infect his child, then the British purebloods will unite against you more than you already have. You won’t be able to play the role that I hope you’ll play.”

“What do you mean?”

“The role in Harry’s life that I’d hope and think he wanted you to play, as a dear friend of his parents. And someone who can help him, and other students if you’re agreeable, prepare for a future life as participants in this war we find ourselves fighting.”

Lupin’s nostrils flared again. “You’re a manipulator to your core.”

Tom shrugged, although it annoyed him that his mannerisms and deflections presumably wouldn’t work on Lupin unless he learned a charm to conceal his scent. “True enough. But what I said is still true. Malfoy placed Harry in an abusive household, he is safe here now, and I think he would prefer you alive and in his life than on the run.”

Lupin tilted his head, making it look like his neck was longer than normal and conveying the air of a wild predator at the same time. “And I suppose that you would manage to house someone who is still a fugitive in most of Britain without running into legal issues of your own?”

Tom snorted. “We can conceal that you’re you from everyone but Harry and perhaps some of the professors. We’ll create an alternate identity for you that you can interact with the other students in.”

Lupin studied him slowly. Tom didn’t think it was his imagination that Lupin’s eyes lingered on his throat and the curve of his neck, but he tried not to let it bother him.

“Will your other professors go along with this? Will the other students of your school feel at ease being taught by a werewolf?”

“My professors are as committed to the battle as I am. And we’ll introduce our students one by one. But you should remember, Lupin, that most of our students are Muggleborns or Muggle-raised half-bloods. They often didn’t have the chance to learn the prejudice against werewolves that you’re worrying about.”

Lupin studied him for a moment longer, and then nodded. Some essential tension fled from his body when he did, and although Tom could still see the pointed ears and the silver hair and the golden eyes and the sharp teeth, he looked more human than he had.

“I’d like to see Harry again,” Lupin said quietly. He paused. “And Sirius.”

Tom smiled. “It will take more work to free Mr. Black from his house arrest than it does to accept you here. But I have thought of some plans. He could have much to contribute to us.”

“Besides a way of keeping a powerful half-blood enamored with your school?”

“That, too.”

Lupin gave a laugh that sounded like the yelp of a rabbit caught in mid-leap. “Well. Fine, Riddle. I don’t like you, but compared to the simmering hatred that I feel for the majority of wizards and witches, that’s practically a compliment.”

Tom took that in stride. He knew that the only people Lupin might feel differently about were Harry and Black, but both of them had reasons to be on his side.

And if Lupin was agreeable later, and Tom could let it be known that he was the only one who stood between magical Britain and the possibility of a werewolf on the rampage against their children…

Fear was such a useful tool.

*

“Have you the orb for me?”

Severus swallowed and turned around. He had rehearsed what he would do when Riddle came for the obsidian orb, how he would stand tall and firm, how he would speak important words about the Sorting that would make Riddle pay attention to him—

But all the words crisped to a stop against the floating wall of Riddle’s power, and the amusement in his eyes as he stared at Severus.

Severus slid to a knee and held out the obsidian orb he had used to record the students’ Sortings and magical affinities. Riddle took it from him and spent a moment running his fingers over it. Severus looked down further lest he be tempted to stare and see if the fingers had claws.

“Were there any surprises in the Sorting?”

“The Weasley boy went to Slytherin,” Severus murmured, dropping his head further. He had forgotten what it was like to have that magic focused on him. If he could think about throwing Riddle at his enemies, it was bearable, but this man would also turn on Severus if he didn’t serve the cause of Muggleborns and half-bloods well enough, and Severus knew it. “There were only three Gryffindors.”

Riddle sighed. “I believe at one time I would have rejoiced to hear it. But now, it only shows how successful they have been in creating children who think like them.”

“Will you—will you want me to take on a more active revolutionary role here, my lord? Sir?” Severus didn’t know for sure what title he should use, but Riddle corrected neither.

“Husband your efforts to speak to the half-bloods and Muggleborns,” Riddle said, with a shake of his head. “Your place is too fragile, given your own blood status, to attempt to openly influence the young Slytherins right now, unless one of them comes to you. You have Draco Malfoy under your care, don’t you?”

“Yes,” Severus said cautiously, his brain suddenly in turmoil. He would prefer it if Riddle didn’t ask him to harm Draco.

Riddle laughed, having apparently noticed Severus’s hunching shoulders. “Relax, Severus. I make war on children’s brains, not their bodies. I only wanted to know. And how powerful did his magic seem to you?”

“I don’t think I know how to interpret that part of the orb, sir. My lord.” Severus paused. “Which one would you prefer?”

“Which one would you prefer?”

“Sir,” Severus said at last. That gave acknowledgment of Riddle’s greater power and standing without acknowledging that he had some kind of rightful dominance or inherent power.

Even though he does, whispered a traitorous, buried part of Severus.

“Very well. I will interpret the results of the orb myself.” Riddle turned as if to leave, and then turned back. “And Severus?”

“Sir,” Severus said, biting his lip against the “my lord” that still wanted to leap out.

“I’ll be sending you a book of some of the spells that I use myself soon, to bind my power and make myself seem weaker than I am. Use them. No one should question you, but if they do, explain that your power is shrinking with age. Some of them believe that of half-bloods. They should accept it.”

Severus breathed through his own resistance to the idea of being thought weaker than he was, and nodded. “Yes, sir.”

As Riddle vanished in a flash of bending light that was not Apparition and did not disturb the protections on the school, Severus consoled himself with the thought that pretending weakness was for such a short while. In the end, he would be on the winning side.

He hoped that he would be permitted to drop the protections in front of Lucius on that far-distant day, and laugh in his bloody face.