{ Harry Potter Book Starters }
“Short, if you’re bloody stupid about it,” Helen returned, taking hold of a second pair of protective gloves and handing them quite firmly to Mr. Longbottom. “I won’t be having any Gryffindor nonsense here – these animals require patience, not recklessness, and I’ll have you right back to Augusta if you cause them any distress, you understand?”
“Keep” they called it. This was their word for theft, their word for attacking setts and hauling good nifflers from their kin. To keep. Rising to his feet, he approached this human – he had always considered him a herd sort, but now that it appeared he was pack, Trouble wondered if this sun would be the one under which he died.
He did not know how to fight in this form – as the lone bull, it was his job to protect his kin from danger. He had never seen this human as a threat before, but seeing kin grasped with intention of keeping, his view had shifted sharply.
“No.” His human words were not good, and humans did not growl or bark well. The best he could do was make the word low and gravelly, as much warning as this body could manage. “No keeping. She is kin. Release her.”
“I’d ask why you care, but we really don’t have time for that,” Millicent bit out, still gripping her leg where that cutting curse had caused her to crumple – she was damned lucky Longbottom had shot a stunner moments later, or the masked bastard advancing on her might have been able to wipe her off the playing field once and for all rather than disapparating when the odds seemed tougher.
Later, some part of her would look back on this and wonder if that had been an old “friend” of her dad behind the mask, but for now the only thing that mattered was keeping this area contained and making sure whoever that was didn’t cause any real trouble.
“If you really want to help, you should report this to the Ministry – I think we both know they won’t believe shit from me.” A Slytherin reporting an attack from a Death Eater, two days before the commemoration of the fallen fifty? She’d probably be arrested for breathing.
“I can handle this, but whoever that was, I can’t imagine they’re going to stop here, so go.”
“Mister Longbottom,” Rowena interrupted this before it could form into a pattern, “As forgetting one’s remembrall is counter intuitive to possessing one in the first place – and those who own them are indeed forgetful – how has it not occurred to you that the swiftest means of returning it would be to summon it back?”
He was still just a boy – no older than her Draco, with absolutely no right to be playing these sorts of wicked games. How terrible it was now, to be a mother and see the effect of war on young faces – she understood now, her own mother’s strange and decided indifference. The fever in Bellatrix must have been as terrifying to her as the tragic determination in Draco now was. Narcissa wondered if this boy’s quiet determination to stand by his friends was as terrible for Augusta to witness – it shouldn’t be THEM.
War was no theater for children, and that the Dark Lord was so determined to make it so only forced her hand farther from the loyalty her husband required of her. With Lucius in prison – in no small part thanks to this very child – she found herself swaying on a most delicate precipice. Her son would not dream of leaving, even if the cost of staying was his own life, his own soul – and they had done that. They had placed him in this position – as surely as they had set this child in opposition to him.
“To lack fear is not bravery – surely being in Gryffindor, you recognize that bravery comes from what we face when we’re afraid, even if wisdom dictates it might be better to retreat.” The terrible element of this conversation was not being entirely certain who she was advising at the moment, but it would not benefit her now to be uncivil. She would need allies on the other side set in place for her Draco, in the event the Dark Lord and his minions forced her hand to drastic measures to protect him.
“You can’t mean me darling,” Druella was quite certain the boy had no idea who she was – his tone was not nearly sarcastic enough – and yet there was no sign of anyone else. He didn’t even have a chaperone ( where was Augusta? It had been ever so long since their last little talk ) and in this climate that was rather dangerous for friends and playmates of little Harry Potter.
Curious – insatiable as ever – she stepped a little closer to examine him. He’d grown of course, children had the most lamentable habit of turning into adults and the young Longbottom was certainly shaping up to be a fine one. He had the dawnings of his father’s build ( sturdy, never quite fit but always strong, always rooted to the ground and the earth, stable as stones ) but that face oh, she knew that determined look quite well, though the burn of it was a distant memory from a long ago time, and an earlier chapter of war.
“My my, I can see why Lucius struggled ever so – to be brought down by teenagers is shameful, but you have war in your veins, don’t you? You wont be standing down at all – it’s not in your spirit.” She had seen the photographs – the haunted look in the Potter boy’s gaze, the eyes of a man too old for this world trapped eerily in the features of a child. The Daily Prophet hadn’t run photos of the other children involved – doubtless some minor counter measure to protect them – but she would wager this one would not have looked as dead inside.
He’d have had the fire of his mother burning through, fierce as any flame and held steady by that frank solidity from the other side of his family tree. It made her wonder what the others looked like – what warriors were being forged in the crucible before the war even declared itself. Her eldest wanted this one – wanted to finish what she started all those years ago – but her mind had slipped. Madness nested inside of her very core, twisting her wits and her magic to such a degree Druella wondered if her darling would be able to win against this one, if he had the chance to grow. If he had the strength to channel his mother’s flame and the will to hold fast like his father had – would he be the one to end the cycle? It would be curious to witness, but Druella was not yet driven to any action – everything resided on Narcissa. Her word, would be the one to determine where Druella would fall this time – but it didn’t hurt to have a little head start in the game.
“Do you want silver linings?” Her question this time, required a response and lacked the air of rhetoric that came before. “Or would you prefer to play in gold percentages.”
There were times when her students truly did manage to rock her to the core – and it was very rarely the ones with true sight that pulled it off. Longbottom was not the best interpreter nor was he the worst – in truth his were the average scores of someone who had chosen a bird course in Divination – unremarkable, but clever in seeing an opportunity for an easy enough O.W.L. to add to one’s overall achievements.
Setting down her tea lest she end up choking on it, Sybill considered the observation before her in light of present events. Oh, it would have been easy to keep herself sequestered away in her tower, locked above all the violent bustle and lending the whole business to the centaur that – for strange reasons nobody saw fit to question – Headmaster Snape had not seen fit to discharge. ( And how interesting, that none of them questioned the fact he maintained a position set by Dumbledore to spare the life of one the Dark Lord had little use for? ) Yes – it would have been easy to disappear into the cloud of smoke and incense that served as her shield from these people – but the future ahead was not built for those who took the easy road and it seemed even the children could see it. A sight they should never have had need to become so intimately familiar with.
“The causeways of what is to come are not for us to pave, Mister Longbottom,” What future was left to them laid most tragically in the hands of a boy no older than the one before her now, and his path alone would lead them to the end for better or for worse. “It is the present that we must keep ourselves in when the future is unclear – for it is the choices we set down now that will dictate how useful we shall be, when the time comes.”
“Only just the few?” Severus inquired, admittedly lacking his usual venom – and indeed, if Longbottom dared to look up, he might notice that there was an unusual expression on his features. Whatever it was the boy had done, the result was enough to force the typically dour Potions Master to restrain himself from laughing.
He really should take house points for this. An astronomical amount of house points in fact. That, however, would draw Minerva’s attention to this and place her in the precise position he now wobbled precariously upon. To look the other way – to enable this kind of rampant destruction of school property solely to harass the pink-clad monstrosity that haunted the Hogwart’s halls was teetering damn near to acts of sedition these days.
Frankly, the school needed its matriarch far more than it did he. Raising his wand, Severus slid a tapestry over what had been done ( it hid very little on close inspection, but would do from a distance, at least briefly ) “I suggest you find a way to fill those gaps Mister Longbottom, if you’ve any hope of repeating this process deliberately.”
The one benefit to his reputation was even if Longbottom told someone he had said this, the idea he would not only condone a Gryffindor’s rulebreaking, but suggest he improve upon them would be so outrageous, nobody would think to believe it.
“The thought that there was a limit with you never actually occurred to me Longbottom, I assure you.” Though the quip was swift, Severus was admittedly taken aback by the glib remark, which had – ( very secretly ) – amused him considerably. Which is probably the only reason he forgot to take housepoints on account of cheek, really.
It is on the tip of his tongue to demand how before it occurs to Severus that this is Neville Longbottom, who of the many denizens of Hogwarts was easily ranked among the most vexing of all time, stalled from the top only by Peeves and a few particular predecessors from Severus’ own school days.
Longbottom angered a suit of armor because of course he did. Sighing, Severus waved a hand and ushered the boy toward the dungeons. “It won’t follow you into class,” He pointed out flatly, “If it remains a problem afterward, we shall manage it then – though it may behoove you to apologize at some point, you may be better off just avoiding this one.”
Severely Archived 