The Education of Slytherin
Severus Snape was having a celebratory glass of firewhiskey – the full glass rather than a fingerwidth – after his second House meeting.
The students of Slytherin had done the assignment given and done it well. They were coming to understand that true cunning only recently (within the last two and a half centuries) implied or involved deceit. The origin of the world showed the true basis of cunning: Knowledge. Know your friends. Know you enemies. Know all factors.
They were also startled to find that ambition and cunning were operating standards and supremacy (pureblood or other) was a goal. It was a valid political goal for those who believed but in itself had nothing to do with the basic tenets of Slytherin.
He had given a second assignment, due in one month. They were to report on the parentage of three powerful wizards or witches of their choice. After the general acknowledgement that Albus Dumbledore, the Dark Lord, and Harry Potter (he had internally cringed when bringing that one up) were considered powerful, he had added that they were to learn as much as possible on the parentage of those three in addition.
The visiting Harry had explained exactly where Voldemort had come from. He had also pointed out that Kendra Dumbledore would have been, within today's parlance, a muggleborn. Severus had been surprised at that revelation. Dumbledore did not hide it – but it wasn't widely known.
He was curious himself about the Founders. He'd have to ask the Sorting Hat (a casual comment from Gary had put it within his head as a route to obtain the information).
He considered his next move. Gary had told him about his godson's future and the other Malfoys. He pondered how to move the threads of fate for them.
Gary Seven (as he was currently calling himself) was working on the remaining horcruxes. He had given Severus the assignment of getting Malfoy to turn over the Diary. He had also made a few suggestions as to how to begin to reeducate the remaining powerful purebloods. Severus, being a half-blood himself, had acknowledged the possible efficacy of the methods.
He made his way to St. Mungos to visit a recovering Sirius Black.
Sirius Black was bored. It would be two more days before they would let him out after treating him for dementor exposure.
He had almost made a break for it, but had been convince by Remus to remain. He didn't know what he was going to do with his life. But he knew he needed to find Harry.
Out of the corner of his eye he saw a figure appear from under a disillusionment charm. He turned his head, about to call out to attract the attention of the St. Mungo's staff when he saw exactly what his visitor looked like.
In barely a whisper he said, "James?"
The figure walked over and sat down. "No. My name is Harry Potter, also known as the Lone Traveler. We're here to talk about a few things: Your family, Severus Snape, Albus Dumbledore, my local dimensional brother Harry, the Weasley family, and finally getting rid of the wanker who calls himself Voldemort."
Sirius was suddenly very confused.
Harry paused in thought for a moment and added, "Actually? I don't know if he even left enough of himself human to have urges which would require that he wank. Huh." Harry shook his head to clear it and then looked back at Sirius. "I guess we'll just call him the Dork Lord."
Severus Snape casually made his way through the floo to Malfoy Manor. He had put his more enlightened prefects in charge of the House and told them he would be unavailable. Luckily, the students of Slytherin House were coming around to his way of thinking and were far less likely to cause a ruckus without constant adult supervision.
He was greeted by his godson's mother at the entrance. "Severus! Welcome to Malfoy Manor. We will be dining in just thirty minutes. My husband is within his study."
"Thank you, Narcissa. And where is Draco?"
She considered that for a moment. "I think he's within his room being watched by Dobby. Why do you ask?"
Severus smiled slightly. "As much as I like to visit my friend and his lovely wife, my main reason for visiting is to see my godson."
Narcissa smiled. "Well, after dinner you can spend time with him to your hearts content. Lucius was curious as to the goings-on at Hogwarts."
Severus bowed his head briefly. "Very well. I will see him then. I know the way."
Narcissa nodded and turned to do whatever the Lady of the House did whenever she wasn't greeting guests and spending time with their husband.
Severus walked to the door to Lucius' study and rapped three times. "Come in!"
Severus walked in. Lucius stood and extended his hand. "Severus. Welcome to my home. How are things at Hogwarts?"
With a dry expression he replied even as he shook the man's hand, "Oh. The same as it ever was: Slytherin plotting, Gryffindor bravado, Hufflepuff toil, Ravenclaw obsession, and a veritable sea of teenage angst and emotion."
Lucius laughed as he sat back down, motioning Severus to a seat across from his own. "Yes. Horgwarts was always predictable that way. How are you settling in to the Headship of Slytherin?"
Severus considered that even as he poured himself a small glass of wine that Lucius had on the desk. "Well, I find it interesting." He paused as he put the cork back on the bottle and picked up his glass. "It will take much work to overcome Slughorn's shortcomings." He watched Lucius' face as he sipped his wine.
Lucius looked surprised. "Shortcomings? Slughorn was quite adept at nurturing influence."
Severus had to consciously avoid rolling his eyes. "Yes. He was. However, he was piss-poor as a Slytherin Head of House."
Lucius looked slightly intriqued. "How so?"
Severus sat his glass down. "What does it mean to be Slytherin? What are the traits that are espoused every year by the Sorting Hat for our house?"
"Well. Cunning. Ambition. Power. Slytherin is for those that wish to achieve great things."
Severus nodded in acknowledgement. "Yes. And for the last several years, we have seen Slytherin alumni accumulating much of the power. Why?"
Lucius looked surprised. "We were led well by certain powerful figures, of course. You know of whom I speak."
"Yes. Slughorn, Slytherin Head for several decades, demonstrated personal power and influence and the graduates of Hogwarts have used his methods to do so. But, in doing so, we have almost doomed our society."
Lucius looked faintly outraged. "How can you claim that?"
Severus paused and then considered the Malfoy lord. "How are you with conjuration?"
Lucius, if he was a muggle, would have shrugged. Instead he briefly cocked his head. "Passable."
Severus motioned the almost empty desk (the papers and other items were off to the side). "Conjure as many chess pieces as you can – no need for animation. I only need objects to make my point."
Looking a little confused, Lucius did as requested. After a couple of minutes, there were almost a hundred pieces of various types and colors. There were, unsurprising to Severus, many more Sorcerer-Advisors (bishops) than almost any other non-pawn pieces. Malfoy considered himself a power behind the throne, not the power himself.
"Excellent. Now. First we separate them out." At this Severus made two lines. "These pieces, the pawns, will represent the general wizard and witch. The whites will be the muggleborn and half-bloods. The blacks will be the purebloods." Lucius nodded. "The other pieces will represent those in power. The whites will be the muggle-lovers and those that espouse equal treatment. The blacks will represent those that believe in the power of purebloods." Lucius nodded again.
Very soon, the table was aligned as Severus described. It was not a traditional chess setup.
"This is NOT chess. Notice that we did not align it as a game of opposites but as a conglomeration of factions. Note that the white pawns are on the outside, and the black pawns are closest to those with power, whatever their color. The black pawns align with both black and white leaders, the whites mostly align with the whites in power or are on the outside. Are you following?"
Lucius contemplated the setup and nodded. "Now. Grindenwald and the Dark Lord both wished to achieve political power. And they did so by backing the pureblood faction." Lucius nodded. "So, in order to centralize their power, they did this." He took a black queen and rushed it around the desk, knocking over white power pieces, white pawns, and black pawns aligned with the white power pieces. He also allowed a few of the other side to be knocked over. "Those black pawns with the white leaders are, of course, blood traitors, right?" Lucius nodded.
"Now. Look at the desk. What's left?"
Lucius looked slightly vindicated. "The white non-pawns are few. The black pieces dominate. The blood-traitor pieces are also vastly reduced."
Severus nodded. "Yes. This," he motioned the tableau, "represents the political realities of magical society. If you wish to achieve power, you need to reduce the number of your enemies. And the Dark Lord helped do this. Correct?"
Lucius nodded. "Yes. Except for a freak win by a white pawn called Harry Potter, we would have won."
Severus sat back and looked at his friend and ally. "Yes. Now. Let us consider the board and how we will take this forward." He paused. "You breed Abraxan, correct?"
Lucius nodded.
"Now, let me ask you a question: If you have two Abraxan, a stallion and mare both from the same dam, and you wish to breed the next generation, what do you do?"
Lucius sat back. "Well. You must obtain another stallion to breed the mare and use your stallion to work with other breeders to impregnate their mares. You must avoid breeding too closely so as to prevent mutations: Wingless horses, missing parts, etc."
Severus nodded. "Now look at the pieces. Your son is a black pawn, or perhaps even a knight. You wish him to have healthy offspring, do you not?"
Lucius almost spluttered. "Of course!"
"Now, these pawns and power pieces are all related within the third degree," Severus pulled large number of pieces to the side, "these within the fourth degree," he pulled a much smaller number to another area, "and these within the fifth." He pulled a few more pieces to the side. "If these were Abraxan, which group would you breed your Stallion in?"
Lucius contemplated the pieces. He pointed to the few remaining non-related pieces and the very small number of those within the fifth degree. He looked slightly nervous.
"Unfortunately, these are all unavailable for various reasons: Already married, political enemies who loathe your family, some deformity already, or unacceptable because they are muggleborn. What do you do?"
Lucius moved his hand toward the next group, the fourth degree.
"Yes. But eventually, there will BE none left within outside groups except the white pawns which take three generations to turn black." Severus looked at Lucius and pointed to the discarded piles of pieces already removed. "These pieces, most of them, would have fallen within the two acceptable groups. But they are all gone. Politics has destroyed them, leaving you with these pieces. How will you maintain your blood status if you have destroyed the group which would have allowed your family to maintain it?"
Lucius' face was frozen as he looked between the desk and Severus. Suddenly, there was a pop and a house elf appeared. "Master! Mistress has ordered Tolly to inform Master and Guest that Dinner be served!" The elf waited until Lucius showed he heard and then popped back out.
Severus stood. "After dinner, I will be spending a bit of time with my godson. After, I would like to meet back with you here to further discuss these issues. Acceptable?"
Lucius stood and nodded, still in a light daze.
It had been an odd dinner. Narcissa, seeing that her husband was distracted with thought, did not try to engage him in conversation. Severus sat with Draco, who loved seeing his Unca' Seb (she would soon have to teach him to say things properly).
Severus had a satisfying time playing with Draco until it was time for his godson to sleep. He then made his way back to Lucius' study.
When he entered, he saw that Lucius had an open bottle of firewhisky and was not looking his controlled self. He sat down and looked at Lucius.
Lucius finally said, "You have quite ruptured my world view. What is there to say beyond what you already so forcibly demonstrated?"
Severus poured himself a fingerwidth. "You must choose your path. I know that our comrades look forward to the hopeful return of our Lord so as to complete the destruction of the 'distasteful' elements of our society. But I – and now you as well – know that if such happens, we will likely destroy ourselves within fifty years – and quite possibly much quicker than that."
Lucius looked at Severus and said with some irritation. "You're Head of Slytherin! You know that Salazar Slytherin was opposed to the integration of mudbloods!"
Severus looked at Lucius with some disdain. "Of COURSE he was. A thousand years ago, the average muggleborn was an unwashed illiterate scrabbling within the mud. If they were confused, they went to their priests – who taught them that magic was evil and a tool of Lucifer. Every muggleborn brought to Hogwarts was a potential spy. Slytherin was, ultimately, a political animal. He wanted to increase the power of the wizard and prevent destructive elements from being invited into his home … regardless of the blind and brainless vision of his fellow Founders. I would point out, both muggle and wizard society has changed much within the last thousand years."
Lucius sighed. "What would you have us do?"
Severus replied, "Educate ourselves. Muggles have raced forward, lacking magic, to achieve things we could not dream of. Muggles have been to the moon and have created weapons so powerful that they could destroy London with the push of a button. It is time, in my opinion, for the Wizarding world to move into the current century. We try so hard to prevent Muggle influence and ideas that we reject the inventions that they have created. They have the ability to speak to another, with the push of a few buttons, on the other side of the world. There are thousands and thousands of magicals within Britain. Do you know that the Muggle government has a standing force of over two hundred thousand soldiers, sailors, and officers? During the Grindlewald war – they had five million."
Lucius looked horrified.
Severus continued on, implacably. "Yes. They can send a device into your window that has the power of a thousand reductos. And the Muggle who sent it wouldn't have to be closer than five miles. Muggles are advancing. They are beginning to place visual devices all over the Muggle world which will record everything – even if there are no human witnesses present. They have devices a hundred miles above us which record everything that happens on the ground." Severus took a sip of his whisky.
"Twenty years. Perhaps if we are lucky forty. That is how long we have until it is almost impossible to hide ourselves. What will we do?"
Lucius took a long drink of his own cup. "You paint a terrifying picture. Wizarding society isn't ready for these truths."
Severus scoffed. "Of course not! If we told most wizards exactly what Muggles could do, they would be terrified. And the actions of the Dark Lord would expand a thousand-fold. And we … would … die. The Dark Lord was playing with Greek fire when he ordered us to attack Muggle targets. We must begin to educate them, or we will be lost. And it is up to us, who know the truth far better than the Muggle-loving fools currently enjoying power and influence, to prepare our society for the future. So I ask you: What will you do?"
Severus Snape was enjoying his day. He noted, with some amusement, that Minerva McGonagall was most certainly not. Over the last two weeks, the number of incidents involving Slytherins had been reduced to almost nothing. And when one was involved, it was proved almost without exception that the Slytherin was not at fault.
The students of Slytherin were growing quite fond of their new Head of House. He was an unholy terror if you did something stupid with potions (a Gryffindor 'prank' to contaminate a Slytherin's cauldron had taught them, and every other student who heard about it, never to do the same), but otherwise he proved to be a much better advocate than Slughorn ever was. The Slytherins who were often ignored by Slughorn were especially appreciative as he allowed none of the "powerful" members of even their own House to take advantage of them.
Suddenly, he felt a warming against his chest. He pulled out his medallion and looked at it. He felt a bit of irritation that the Headmaster seemed to find much joy in using his own contribution to Hogwarts to summon and the other Heads when he needed something.
He made his way out of his office, setting his face into a neutral expression. He provided the password to the office and made his way up. Albus called him in before he could even knock.
He made his way inside and saw the Headmaster was not alone. "You asked to see me, Headmaster?"
He barely concealed his sneer when he saw who was present.
Albus was giving his usual congenial look as he replied, "Yes. Young Sirius here was enquiring about his godson, Harry. I have explained to him your role and why it is necessary. I would like you to work together on this now."
Severus nodded. "Very well." He addressed the other wizard. "We will discuss matters within my office."
Sirius looked ready to protest but only sighed. He stood up and said, "We will be back, Headmaster." He then turned to follow Severus.
Sirius barely held his negative comments back but he had resolved to follow the advice of the Traveler. As the two walked down the corridor, they were interrupted by a first-year Gryffindor. The two paused in their travel as the eleven year-old called out, "Professor?"
"Mr. Weasley. What can I do for you?" he asked with the normal tone he used to speak to students
"Um. I'm having a problem with the Potions essay. I can't find some of the information. I was wondering if I could get some help?" Bill Weasley was very nervous asking, but Severus Snape WAS the Potions professor.
Severus considered for a moment. "I am in the middle of something at the moment. However, if you can find a Ms. Moira Cunningham, fifth year from your own House, she will most likely be able to help you. You can tell her I sent you as I find her a most competent brewer."
Before Bill could answer, another passing student interrupted. "Professor?"
He turned his head. "Yes, Mr. Vaisley?"
"Sir, I have a bit of time before dinner. I might be able to point him in the right direction." The third-year Slytherin was calm as he volunteered.
Severus nodded in his direction and then turned back to Bill. "Mr. Vaisley will help you. If he cannot direct you, speak to Ms. Cunningham. If that produces no result, come to my office after dinner."
Bill stood up a bit straighter as he replied, "Thank you, Professor." He quickly turned and moved toward the third-year. As the two adults turned, they heard the older boy say, "Well come on, firsty. Let's figure out your essay."
Sirius was shocked as he followed the Slytherin Head of House, even as he kept glancing back toward where they had met the two students. "What's up with that, Snape? How in hell did you get the Slytherins to willingly help Gryffindors?"
Severus barely concealed his snarl as he replied, "I have been teaching then the value of positive interaction with other Houses. I am certain that Mr. Vaisley is cultivating a relationship with a possible future ally as well as following my counsel in changing the image of Slytherin."
As the two entered his office Sirius' voice rose in protest, "You're teaching them manipulation!"
Severus looked at his schoolyard nemesis. "Of course I am. They are Slytherins. Rather than teaching them influence peddling, as our former Head of House did, I am teaching them to consider the present circumstances and future opportunities." He sat behind his desk even as he motioned Sirius toward another chair. "It has been a wonderful time. In the last two weeks since I took over, Slytherin has lost only ten points for dueling in the halls. And that Slytherin was soon restrained by his house mates. The Slytherins are being taught to avoid stupid confrontations that give them no benefit."
He allowed a smirk to show on his face. "Of course, the Gryffindors have been absolutely being killed in the House-points race."
He quite enjoyed Sirius Black's horrified look.