lomonaaeren

Thank you again for all the reviews!

Chapter Ten—Loss of the Crown

“Grayson.”

The voice was unfamiliar, which was enough by itself to make Harry turn towards it, curious. He blinked when he realized that Granger was staring at him with a handful of books clutched to her chest and a stubborn set to her mouth.

Harry nodded. “Granger.” They’d never spoken outside the very few times in class a professor assigned them to work on a spell together.

She marched over to him and dropped her books on his table. “I want to study with you.”

“Why?”

Granger blew hair out of her mouth and flopped into the chair. Harry narrowed his eyes. She was trying to act casual, but there was something about her motions that screamed tension. It was the way that Dudley had acted when he was trying to get Harry in trouble by lying to their primary school teachers, instead of just beating him up.

“You’re really smart in Potions, and I’m not doing well enough.”

“That’s because you spend all of Slughorn’s class fawning over Longbottom and Weasley.”

“I am not fawning over them!”

“You do half their potions for them, Granger. It doesn’t give you enough time to perfect your own potions. So here’s my advice. Let them fail for one class, do your own work, and watch how your marks rise.”

Harry turned back to his essay, sure that he’d offended Granger enough to chase her away, and then jumped as Granger slammed her hand into the middle of the table.

Harry raised his eyes, hating the way that his heart raced, and pinned Granger with the kind of cool stare that had made a few people in Slytherin back off. Granger paled, but she didn’t retreat.

“What do you want?” Harry hissed. “You cannot force me to study with you.”

“I want to talk to you because you’re a Muggleborn in Slytherin, so you must want to know the truth as much as I do.” Granger leaned forwards so that she looked as if she were trying to shove the table into him. “What have your Housemates said about the Heir of Slytherin? What do you know?”

Harry blinked at her. Then he said, “Nothing, and why do you think I would tell you if I did know anything?”

“We’re both Muggleborns!”

“So what?”

“So the monster could target you just as much as it could me! Maybe more! There must be Slytherins who think that you sully the House or something, right?”

“That’s my private business, Granger. And I’ve taken precautions.”

“What precautions?”

“Also my private business.”

“I don’t think you care at all about other Muggleborns.” Granger had her arms folded, her face caught in a furious blush, as she stared at him. “I think you’re just taking advantage of the fact that you’re in Slytherin to act like you’re safe. But you’re not!”

“You don’t care about me, either, so the feeling’s mutual.”

“I want to know what the monster is and who the Heir of Slytherin is so I can stop it!”

Harry shrugged. “You can find out about it some other way than interrogating me.”

Granger stomped her foot and said some other things that Harry didn’t pay attention to. In the end, he picked up his books and moved pointedly to another section of the library. Granger said that he was mean, but Harry was used to that kind of thing. It wasn’t as though Dudley’s friends hadn’t said it all the time, and lied about it to other people.

Harry nearly ran into Marcus Flint, who had appeared in front of him exactly as though he was supposed to be there. Harry nodded respectfully and started to ease around Flint to the side.

Flint didn’t appear interested in letting him go, though, turning so that he could stare down at Harry. Harry bent his head and kept his eyes on the floor.

Weak. Pathetic. Submissive. He was none of those, and sometimes he burned to tell the purebloods that.

But if he did, he knew he would lose the advantage of surprise.

“What was Granger going on about?”

“She wanted me to turn spy on Slytherin so that she can figure out what kind of monster is in the Chamber of Secrets and why it’s Petrifying Muggleborns.”

Harry didn’t look up, but he could picture the kind of disgusted look that would be flashing across Flint’s face. Flint remained silent for long enough that Harry nearly turned in the direction of the common room, but then the Quidditch Captain grunted and spoke again.

“What did you tell her?”

“I said that I had taken precautions.”

“Walking everywhere with other people or Malfoy and Nott?”

“Yes.”

“Tell her that?”

“She could figure it out on her own.”

Flint laughed, abruptly. His voice was low and gravelly, and Harry shifted back and looked up into Flint’s face after all. Maybe he didn’t have anything to fear from the Quidditch Captain—not right now, anyway.

Flint was grinning with what looked like real enjoyment. “You’re different from the others, Grayson. I’m going to have a word for Nott and Malfoy, the next time I see them.”

Wondering what that word would be, Harry inclined his head. “Yes, Captain.”

Flint guffawed, slapped him on the back, and walked him to the common room. Harry wondered, as he entered, what exactly he’d said that had made the difference to Flint.

Maybe his Quidditch skills, rather than his words?

Or my demonstration of loyalty to Slytherin House. Plus the Quidditch skills.

*

“Nott.”

Theo lifted his chin. He was, at the moment, standing outside the classroom where Harry was brewing his potions, ensuring that he wouldn’t die and they could walk back to the common room later. But for some reason, Marcus Flint had decided to approach him.

Flint’s family wasn’t as wealthy as Theo’s, and he wasn’t nearly as smart or magically skilled as Theo. But his position on the Quidditch team meant that Theo had to incline his head in respect.

“Flint.”

“Came to have a word with you. About a word.” Flint chuckled as though that was supposed to make sense.

Theo managed to retain his polite expression. He thought. “Yes? What word?”

“Mudblood.”

Theo blinked. He’d heard Flint say that word more than once, and it wasn’t as though the Quidditch Captain had any Muggleborn acquaintances or friends in other Houses who would have made him get upset about people using it. Theo thought he didn’t really have friends at all, only teammates. “Why?”

Flint’s eyes flickered past Theo, proving he knew exactly who was in the dungeon room Theo stood outside. “Saw Grayson in the library the other day refusing Granger’s request to help her find the Heir of Slytherin. He doesn’t have any loyalty to people like her just because of his blood, and he defended the House. He’s one of us. No more calling him a Mudblood.”

Theo paused. He had only done that a few times. He thought it far more often than he said it. Surely.

“Going to defy me, Nott?”

Theo shook his head at once. Even more than the sheer amount of spells Flint would have to know as an older student, he could probably beat Theo up physically and make it hurt. “No. Only—it’s kind of strange, Flint, that you care about it now when you didn’t before.”

Flint shrugged. “Had my doubts about Grayson even after he joined the team. Thought he’d turn on Slytherin after the Heir thing started, or Finch-Fletchley being Petrified for sure. But he didn’t. Don’t call him a Mudblood. He’s not one.”

The last words had a snarl along the edges, and Theo nodded hastily. “Is Draco going to get a similar talk?”

“Already had one.” Flint grinned and tossed Theo a bone as if he knew the depths of their rivalry. “Didn’t half-snivel, he did.”

Theo half-laughed in response, and Flint turned and stomped away. Theo stood there and thought for a bit, or longer than a bit, because it was long enough for Harry to emerge from the classroom, tucking away a vial of chalk-colored potion that Theo didn’t recognize.

“Why did you get Flint to interfere for you?”

“What do you mean?” Harry tossed him a frown as they started to walk back to the common room.

Theo paused, then decided he didn’t know whether that was a lie or not. “I mean that Flint came up to me just now and told me to stop calling you a Mudblood. Something about you refusing to help Granger or betray Slytherin in the library.”

“She said that she wanted to investigate the Heir of Slytherin, and she wanted me to pass her any information I’d heard, and tried to appeal to our common heritage as Muggleborns to help her. So yes, I refused.”

“I didn’t know you were bothered by the word.”

Harry paused, and then turned and faced Theo. Theo felt as if he were seeing him for the first time. Harry’s chin was lifted the way Theo had lifted his when he was facing Flint, and he was breathing a little faster than normal.

“I haven’t said anything,” Harry said, “because I know you have the power here, not me. But how could you think that I would be fine with it?”

“It’s just a word.”

“If you thought that, you wouldn’t say it as often.”

“I don’t say it often!”

“Two or three times a day, and most often in the Slytherin common room when we’re studying together and you’re upset that I did better than you in Potions again. Enough for other people to notice.”

Theo stared at him. Harry stared back. He had been looking away, looking down, looking off to the side, quiet and giving in as long as Theo had known him.

How had Harry hidden this from him?

“It’s just a word,” Theo repeated finally, his lips numb. “Words don’t hurt anyone.”

“Oh?” Harry’s eyebrows went up. “Death Eater.”

Theo flinched. “My father was acquitted—”

“Imperius coincidence.”

That was the term muttered among some people for the large coincidence that the Dark Lord had used Imperius on all his top Death Eaters, despite its being a curse that could damage the mind.

“Where did you even hear that?”

“In the common room.”

Theo bit his lips and reined himself in, hard. Father had taught him self-control, so Theo ought to fucking show it. He wrestled with something that wasn’t his conscience and wasn’t his temper, while Harry just watched him with eyes the strange murky blue color of twilight.

“All right,” Theo said finally. “I won’t call you a Mudblood anymore. As long as you never even hint that my father wasn’t rightfully acquitted.”

“Why would I need to hint that?”

Theo stared at him. Harry smiled, if you could call an expression that was just a lift of the top lip a smile, and then waited. Theo shook his head and resumed the journey to the common room.

It struck him that what he’d wrestled with was most like a sense of astonishment.

He had to be more careful around Harry. That was clear.

*

Harry lifted his head and watched in curiosity as the great grey owl stooped down towards him. It wasn’t Sirius Black’s owl, nor the one that Draco’s parents had used to send him a few polite, stiff messages. The people he knew in Slytherin would just have talked to him directly.

It landed in front of him and hooted at him softly, extending a rolled-up piece of parchment. Holding the scroll shut was a single dab of red wax.

It looked like a scarlet eye.

Harry exhaled slowly. The Dark Lord had talked about having Harry send him word of events at the school, but Harry hadn’t thought it would be this soon, or perhaps ever. Harry was of value for his Potions skills, but other than that, he was just a schoolboy.

He opened the scroll with steady fingers, and ignored the way that Draco and Theo stared at him. They wouldn’t lean in to actually look at the scroll. That was crass, or something.

Professor Potter was also watching from the High Table. Harry ignored her more thoroughly.

My dear correspondent,

I regret to inform you that I have need of newt’s eyes and will not be able to send you all the potion ingredients that you were asking for. However, I will likely have some more by next week.

Yours very sincerely,
Everett.

Harry nodded. This was according to the code they had worked out, where the Dark Lord would use eyes to reference Harry’s spying capabilities and set a date when he expected to receive Harry’s report back. The “Everett” pseudonym was evidently one he’d used in the past, and which owls would be able to find him by.

“What’s that, Harry?”

Draco had sounded more respectful in public, at least, since Flint had gone after him. And he hadn’t said the word “Mudblood,” either. Harry held the scroll out to him, confident Draco wouldn’t see past the code. “Just about ingredients.”

“Oh.”

Theo glanced at the letter, shrugged, and went back to eating.

Professor Potter was still watching. Harry ignored her and nodded to the owl. “Thanks. You can go to the owlery. I’ll reply in a little while.”

The owl hooted, snatched up a hunk of the bread Harry held out to it, and skimmed out of the Great Hall with the rest of them. Harry settled back with the last of his own porridge and thought about what he would include in his return letter to the Dark Lord, encoded skillfully enough that the man would realize what was going on.

Well.

He should probably report on the Heir of Slytherin. Maybe one of the Dark Lord’s relatives had decided to unleash havoc. And they must be suppressing news of it, or Harry would have expected to see at least one article in the Prophet by now.

Yes. That would be a good beginning.

*

Lord Voldemort opened the scroll that had returned to him with a flicker of magic which left it hovering in the air at eye level. He expected little from the Grayson boy’s report, but he had decided to send the letter anyway, to remind the boy of who held his leash.

The letter began with a polite acknowledgment of the lack of newt’s eyes, and continued as a discussion of potions, one of the codes they had worked out. Grayson would mark relevant or important words with a small tick at the beginning of them that resembled a natural ink blot. This seemed unusually intricate, granted. Lord Voldemort leaned back in the comfortable chair of the safehouse dining room and skimmed the first few paragraphs, which were about some of the doings of Slytherin House and the people who were currently the most popular.

Then his spine snapped straight as he read the fourth paragraph.

Professor Slughorn has talked to me about brewing a heritage potion, which would supposedly reveal famous wizards and witches, and which family one was heir to. I told him that I didn’t think I would have any, since I’m Muggleborn, but he insisted. Sure enough, however, the parchment remained blank, with no message from any ancestors. That’s all right. My blood is not the most important thing about me.

I am also interested in the Mandrake Draught, necessary to reverse Petrification. It’s a rare potion with rarer ingredients, but I would be interested in them if you can source any. If I work with beasts or monsters in the future, especially ones confined to chambers or tunnels or other tight quarters, it would be useful. Perhaps I could prove myself an asset to Slytherin early if I could begin brewing it now. I am interest in plumbing the potion’s secrets, at least.

There were two more paragraphs after that, but Lord Voldemort was unable to read them in his churning rage. He slammed the letter back on the table and stood again, his robes snapping around him with the force of his anger.

It sounded rather as though one of his errant Horcruxes had been let loose on Hogwarts. The diary would be focused on opening the Chamber of Secrets and ridding the school of Mudbloods. Lord Voldemort had made it at the height of his passion for that particular idea.

Lord Voldemort had not yet revealed his return to all his associates, but Lucius Malfoy was one of them. What he had been thinking to release the Horcrux—or perhaps he had done it before Lord Voldemort had made his return known?

It did not matter. Disloyalty would not be tolerated. Lord Voldemort would first confirm the diary’s whereabouts with Lucius to be sure that it was not at Malfoy Manor, and if it was not…

Well. He had been promising himself a trip to Hogwarts.

It looked as if one were in the offing.