Nagini, the Eternal Poet…and the Consequences of the Not-Rat-Thing’s Incompetence
Drabble 2: Nagini, the Eternal Poet…and the Consequences of the Not-Rat-Thing’s Incompetence
“Terrible news, sir.”
“Dear Heavenly Me, what is it now, Wormtail?”
“It’s Harry Potter, sir.” Nagini watched in slight amusement as the Not-Rat trembled pathetically before her lord. What a lack of tact. Everyone knew to get the go-ahead before mentioning that name in the compound, lest they find themselves on the business end of the great green light in the sky.
“Get on with it.” scowled the Dark Lord. Nagini settled about her master’s feet like a cat. She knew immediately that this announcement would only annoy the Dark Lord and dearly hoped to comfort him.
“Despite our best efforts sir, he’s failed yet another Transfiguration exam and has apparently done quite poorly on an essay in Potions.”
One would almost think the boy was purposely being obtuse just to irritate him. What sort of victory would it be to defeat a dunderheaded knapsack masquerading as a human youth? He’d be damned if his “equal”...his one obstacle against world dominion… would be a bloody idiot. He could handle the stupidly unsymmetrical symbol on Potter’s forehead, but even Voldemort could only be asked to debase himself so much (that year he spent as a moist headdress notwithstanding).
“What am I to do with that child? Has he even bothered to look at the ancient texts I’ve left in his satchel? The last time, I wondered if he’d lost the damned thing.”
“Unfortunately, sir, the young Mudblood confiscated said text and returned it to Madame Pince after a thorough dressing down of the boy for stealing and the importance of social responsibility.”
Voldemort’s eyes flashed and Wormtail cowered quickly behind a stack of bones. “That insufferable girl!”
“Quite,” replied a bored-looking Lucius.
“... though I do enjoy a good dressing down. Were you able to capture it?”
Wormtail smiled and pulled the memory from his already scrambled mind, “Wouldn’t dream of missing it, my Liege.”
After the entire entourage had a hearty laugh, including the blood traitor who was currently being tortured for Voldemort’s amusement, the Dark Lord finally wiped the blood-tears from his eyes. Waving a hand at the general assembly, he brought them all to attention.
“Assemble the academic battalion. Ensure that the boy is given adequate resources. Kill McGonagall if you’re able. I tire of her long-winded lectures and convoluted scoring rubrics clogging the memories in my pensieve.”
“It will be done, my lord.”
“Any good news?”
“He’s received a month’s detention for back talking Snape,” Lestrange called out before Wormtail could get a word in.
Voldemort smiled.
Three weeks later…Possibly. Nagini finds the passage of moments a futile march towards oblivion, (or she would if she was arsed enough to think on it).
All the assembled Death Eaters flinched as their lord incinerated Potter’s quarterly score report before he promptlyundid the procedure...most likely to torch the poor paper all over again.
The mission to kill the cat had been most unsuccessful and the boy had not even bothered to open the enchanted tome he’d been gifted that would have transported him to a place outside of time where he would have been tutored indefinitely by a scholar owl.
“Wormtail?”
The man had the sense to shiver as he approached the dais. The man had a parchment in hand that Wormtail hadn’t seen since boyhood but remembered with shame and disappointment.
“My Liege?”
“Care to explain why I have Harry Potter’s current marks in hand only to find that he is still barely passing Transfiguration? I recall setting you to the tome opening task.”
“Sir---The child has been under undue stress with the wizard tournament and with that dreadful cat afoot, please understan-”
“Are you ordering me?”
Nagini, who had been watching the proceedings with the usual zeal (which was to say, none) perked up as her tail began to shiver. Finally! Excitement! And if she were lucky, a beheading!
“No sir, I would neve-”
“I will not tolerate a lazy boy as my equal. If I have told you all this once, I’ve told you one hundred times. You have until the end of the quarter to improve his grades or I will find a creative use for this parchment I have in hand. Are we understanding one another?”
Gulping pitifully, the Man-who- is- also- a-rat, replied, “Very, my lord.”
Three months after that or so Nagini assumes. Time is irrelevant…
I"t has come to my attention that our academic battalion has failed in the simple task of tutoring a young boy on the simplest of topics. There will be an intensive retraining program that you each will pass with flying colors or your protruding appendages will be turned into shovels. I’ll even have the house-elves use your shovels to dig your graves."
Quiet assent, with much appendage clutching, was heard.
Three days before the semester’s end? Nagini cannot be obliged to confirm. Her newest heat chamber has been erected. Marvelous invention…
“That’s it! Since there is no one competent enough, I will be single handedly tutoring the boy myself. Wormtail, prepare my Polyjuice potion. Ensure the Weasley boy has an accident and is taken to his simpering mother a day early. I will make Potter stay at the castle over Christmas and he will be given intensive tutelage if I have to carve the information into his empty skull.”
“But who will you be my lord?”
“I will go as Lucius and he will be confined to his bed chambers for the duration of the holidays. He’s still in the doghouse for that monthly mankle business. The sod.”
No one bothered to let their lord know it was in fact called a Mankini.