Remedial History

Chapter Four: The Substitute Teacher

After history class on the following evening, Neville asked Theo to join him and Potter for another study session. Potter seemed less than enthusiastic about this, however, so Theo declined the invitation and returned to the Slytherin dorm alone.

Blaise joined him a few minutes later, yawned, and stretched out on his bed. "Just been having a chat with some of the Hufflepuffs," he said casually. "I think we might have a few more guests tomorrow evening."

It wasn't until that very moment that Theo remembered he still hadn't invited Neville to the next night's Pureblood Youth League meeting.

But, as it turned out, nobody went to any meetings on Tuesday night.

After dinner, Professor McGonagall ordered all fourth- through seventh-years to remain in the Great Hall. "Roll up your sleeves. Both of them," she commanded after the younger students had gone back to their common rooms. "Your Heads of House will be inspecting your arms."

Theo glanced at Tracey, who had been sitting next to him at dinner. She shrugged and began rolling up her sleeves, looking bewildered. Theo didn't have a clue what this was about either.

Her arms were slim and tanned, and the candlelight gave her skin a golden glow. She wore silver bracelets on her wrists and a circle of jade about her upper arm. "I like your jewelry," Theo whispered.

She smiled, and he blushed for no good reason. "Thanks. It was a birthday present from my grandmother."

Behind him, he heard Crabbe mutter something. Draco answered in an undertone that carried more easily than Crabbe's lower voice, "No, Father won't let me. He says perhaps when I come of age, if I can make a good go of running ... you know ... our thing. Did you?"

Crabbe made a negative-sounding grunt.

"Of course it wouldn't matter anyway. I can't believe they're fools enough to let Snape do the inspecting."

Blaise was leaning against a pillar with a slight smirk on his thin lips, as if the scene amused him. A handful of the Gryffindors showed their arms to Professor McGonagall eagerly, but nearly all the other students in the hall were clearly as baffled as Theo and Tracey. Professors Sprout and Flitwick gave most of their students' arms little more than a glance, although there were one or two they inspected closely. Professor Snape moved more slowly. Much more slowly. The students from the other Houses had already left the hall by the time he got to the sixth years.

"Left sleeve higher, Nott!" he ordered when it was Theo's turn. Without waiting for Theo to obey, he grabbed his left arm and shoved the sleeve of his robes up over his shoulder. Still gripping Theo's lower arm tightly enough to cut off the circulation, he examined every square inch of skin from his elbow upward.

Theo dreaded the second half of the inspection, but Professor Snape seemed to find his right arm far less interesting.

Tracey drew in her breath sharply as their Head of House seized her, wrested off the jade armlet, and threw it on the floor. When he moved on to the next student, Theo saw bruises beginning to appear just above her elbow.

Suddenly Theo was furious. He wanted to hurt Snape like he'd just hurt Tracey, but he knew that was impossible. Not knowing what else to do, he knelt down to pick up the armlet. The clasp had broken. "I'm sorry, Trace. Maybe you can get it fixed in Hogsmeade."

"It's all right," she said dully, as Snape moved along the line of sixth-year Slytherins. "What d'you expect from him? He's never liked us."

Theo wondered if Luna was right about why Snape's attitudes toward the students in his own House seemed to vary so widely. His manner with Draco and his cronies was businesslike, and his hands were positively gentle when he touched Blaise, although he inspected their left arms no less closely than Theo's.

* * *

Professor Snape became even snippier with Theo and Tracey in Potions, but Theo's other classes went on as usual. Professor Just Todd introduced the Defence Against the Dark Arts students to a stunning variety of state-of-the-art Sneakoscopes, Secrecy Sensors and other magical devices, some of which might have been quite useful if only they worked properly. Unfortunately, he always bought the newest, flashiest, and least reliable version of everything.

His Foe-Glass, for instance, looked much shinier and more impressive than Professor Moody's cracked one, but displayed only some indistinct whitish stuff no matter how hard Just Todd polished it. He made the class send a fleet of Whee-Mail rockets to the manufacturer detailing the problem. The company didn't precisely apologize, but they sent a mysterious item called an Imprint Eraser for free. As soon as their professor took it out of the package, it started zipping around the room and singing a rather peculiar song about clothes dusters. Just Todd thought it was very cool, but nobody could figure out how it worked. Theo and his classmates wasted a whole period making imprints on pieces of parchment, but the device stubbornly refused to erase any of them, and it didn't seem inclined to dust anybody's clothes either.

And Remedial History of Magic got duller and duller, until the fateful evening when Crabbe and Goyle decided to amuse themselves by enchanting spitballs and sending them flying into the Hufflepuff girls' hair. A particularly large one fell directly through Professor Binns' feet. He looked down.

"Oh, dear me," he said, straightening up. "I seem to have made a most alarming discovery. Am I ... am I dead?"

Nobody spoke.

Professor Binns turned to Neville. "Mr. Frogbottom, am I dead?" he demanded.

"Er, well," said Neville uncomfortably, "that's a pretty blunt way of putting it, but yeah ... you do seem to have ... passed away a while ago, sir. I'm sorry."

"Passed away a while ago? How long a while?" Neville looked blank, so Professor Binns addressed the next student. "Mr. Potholder, do you happen to know when I died?"

"Um, not exactly," said Potter, "but Remus - my guardian - says you were already dead when he was at school, so I think it would have to be at least twenty years. Probably longer."

"Twenty ... years?!?" exclaimed Professor Binns. "And nobody thought of informing me?" He swooped down the aisle, looking more animated than Theo had ever seen him, and stopped in front of Theo's desk. "Mr. Sot, why have you never mentioned to me that I am dead?"

"Well, to be perfectly honest, sir," said Theo, trying desperately to keep a straight face, "I thought you would have noticed by now."

"This is distressing," announced Professor Binns. "Extremely distressing. I shall have to speak to the Headmaster at once."

"I think he knows, sir," said Theo.

"He knows and he didn't tell me? Most unlike him. Yes, I must certainly have a word with Professor Dippet about this."

"Er, actually -"

"What?"

"Never mind, sir. You go and speak to the Headmaster. That's a good idea."

Professor Binns glided noiselessly out of the room. Theo's eyes met Neville's across the room, and they both collapsed in helpless laughter.

* * *

One week after Professor Binns' abrupt departure, Professor Dumbledore announced at breakfast that History of Magic classes would resume that day. "I have found a substitute, and I believe he will be acceptable." His eyes were twinkling behind his spectacles.

Promptly at half past eight that evening, the new professor drifted into the classroom, bowed deeply, and flipped his head back onto his shoulders. "Lordlings and ladies, it is my great pleasure to introduce myself as your substitute professor. Sir Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington, at your service!" he announced.

Theo had always felt uneasy around the Gryffindor ghost. He preferred people to be either beheaded or not beheaded, not somewhere in between. Potter and Neville, however, greeted the substitute enthusiastically. "Nearly Headless Nick! Congratulations!"

"I would prefer that you call me Professor de Mimsy-Porpington," said Nick with a sigh, but Theo suspected he was fighting a losing battle. "Now, I understand that Ho-Hum Harold - excuse me, Professor Binns, that is - left off in the middle of the Third Goblin War, is that correct?"

Several students mumbled unenthusiastically that it was.

"And I also understand that he has covered the Goblin Wars every single year since you have arrived, and since it doesn't appear to have sunk in yet, it probably isn't going to. If you will permit me to take the liberty, I think we shall leave the goblins behind for the time being and turn to some of the larger questions. What is history? Where does it come from? Why do we study history?"

Theo felt entirely at sea. History was a class; it came from books; and he, along with the rest of the students in the remedial section, studied it because they had received the abysmally low mark of T on their O.W.L. exams and had not been allowed to drop it. He had a feeling these were not the answers Nick - Professor de Mimsy-Porpington - was looking for.

"Yes, Polly?"

"History is ... the study of things that happened a long time ago."

"A very interesting definition," said Nick thoughtfully, "but speaking as a person who remembers many the events in your history books, I wonder when they passed into history and where one draws the line between a long time ago and now. And what is the difference between history and myths or legends, if they both happened a long time ago?"

Anna Horton raised her hand. "History is true, and myths and legends are fictional."

"Ah," Nick replied, "but is history always true? Or is it only as truthful as the historian?" The classroom was silent for a long moment, and then Potter raised his hand. "Yes, Harry?"

"Well, my friend Hermione says there's always a grain of truth in myths and legends. I suppose it can work the other way, so there might also be a grain of - falseness in history?"

"Yes. Or more than a grain, if the history in question is the version found in most of your textbooks. Don't look shocked, Polly, educators are notorious for playing fast and loose with the truth in order to mold the next generation in the image they think proper."

Something stirred in the back of Theo's head, something Professor Lupin had said years ago. My generation seems determined to remake yours in its image. Not that this helped. He hadn't understood it then and it didn't seem to shed any light on what Nick was saying now.

"So we are left with the question of why we study history at all," Nearly Headless Nick went on, "if much of it, frankly, is a lie, and the rest of it deals with events too long ago and far away for most of you to care about them."

The students stared at him. This was obviously a trick question, but they weren't sure what the catch was.

"Yet another interesting issue," Nick remarked, seemingly out of nowhere, "is raised by the fact that we call this course History of Magic, when wizards have - I would argue - had more impact on Muggle history than they like to admit. And vice versa. This was certainly true in my own time, before the International Statute on Magical Secrecy, and I am not sure it is any less true now."

Crabbe and Goyle eyed one another uneasily, while the two Hufflepuff girls looked up with some interest.

"Can anybody think of an example from recent times? Theodore?"

Luckily, Theo knew the answer to that one. "The Dark Wizard Grindlewald," he said promptly. "He had all those ideas about uniting the Muggle and magical worlds, so he allied himself with that crazy Muggle dictator who killed all those people, didn't he?"

"Yeah," said Crabbe, "but we slapped that Muggle-loving punk down. He's gone. History."

"Grindlewald is indeed history," said Nearly Headless Nick, "and current events as well, as it happens. It can be argued that the current wave of anti-Muggle prejudice is a direct reaction to the events of the 1940s, whether or not the perpetrators are consciously aware of this. What are some other ways in which the events of the last few months have been shaped by what has gone before?"

Theo looked at the floor, wishing he read the Daily Prophet more often and hoping Nick wouldn't call on him again. The rest of the students seemed to be doing the same.

The substitute professor didn't seem to be put out by the fact that nobody in the class seemed eager to answer his questions. "We shall, I think, return to these questions over the course of the next few weeks. In the meantime, I ask you to be your own historians. Everything has a history, so we may as well start with yours. What events have shaped you? Three feet of parchment, to be handed in one week from today."

* * *

As usual, the piece of parchment in front of him looked distressingly blank. Theo had no idea how to fill it. Nearly Headless Nick's words came back to him: Everything has a history. Well, it was easy for him to say that. Obviously he must have had a pretty exciting history if he'd been important enough to be beheaded. Nothing very interesting had happened to Theo.

Well, he'd been born. He supposed that was a good place to start, although he didn't remember anything about it.

My name is Theodore Wilkes Nott. I was born on the fifteenth of March, 1980. My parents' names are Jephthah and Rachel Nott. We are pureblood wizards who can trace our lineage fifteen generations back. My sister Medea was seventeen when I was born, and my other sister, Lavinia, was seven, so I'm by far the youngest in the family. My mother was killed when our house was raided by Aurors during the war. I was only a baby then. My dad owns a dead-rat shop ... (Theo looked this over, frowned, and crossed out the last few words) ... My father owns a hippogriff feed shop in London and he works long hours, so Medea pretty much brought us up.

There, that was three whole inches of history if he made his handwriting large enough. Only two feet and nine inches to go.

He could try describing his family, but that was kid stuff. Nick - Professor de Mimsy-Porpington - wouldn't care that Jephthah Nott was dark and thin like Theo, and that he walked with a slight stoop and jumped at sudden noises. Or that Medea had a mole above one eyebrow and went into strange rages when Muggles spoke to her, which meant she couldn't hold a job and his father had to do most of the shopping. Real histories didn't include details like that.

Lavinia had a history, but Theo didn't feel like writing it down.

He could always write about school. School was important and official; it belonged in a history.

I was accepted into The Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry when I was eleven, and I took the Hogwarts Express to school on the first of September. I met my best friend, Blaise Zabini, on the train, and at the beginning-of-term feast we were both Sorted into Slytherin House.

Another inch. He laid his quill on the edge of the ink tray, trying to think what else to say. He remembered...

* * *

Actually, when he thought of his first year of school, he remembered a night a few weeks before term began, the night Lucius Malfoy and his family came to dinner. Theo was never sure why Medea kept inviting the Malfoys over, or why they accepted. He had begun to be dimly aware that Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy spoke with a posher accent than his own family, and wore nicer clothes; they looked out of place in the Notts' ramshackle house. The two families were not friends, exactly, but Theo had an idea that they had some sort of hold over each other.

The conversation drifted toward Hogwarts, a topic Theo tried to avoid thinking about. School was the Great Unknown, and if the other students were anything like Draco Malfoy, Theo didn't expect to get along with them. The Nott household was safe and familiar and contained love of a sort, though it was a strange one-sided love that went through several channels before it reached Theo. Jephthah Nott seemed to have used up most of his store of affection on his dead wife and his eldest daughter, but now and again he favored Lavinia and Theo with a thin smile that showed he was proud of them, most recently when Lavinia had become the first in the family to finish her seventh year at Hogwarts. The rest of the Notts had drifted away from school somewhere between their O.W.L.s and N.E.W.T.s.

Medea accepted her father's devotion as her due and regarded her sister Lavinia with a fierce, possessive adoration, although she appeared to consider Theo an afterthought. Lavinia, in turn, stormed and raged at Medea during their frequent quarrels, but for her younger brother she had a tenderness that seemed to contain something of the love both Jephthah and Medea had bestowed elsewhere. She brought sweets from Honeydukes when she came home from school, and she didn't consider herself too grown-up to play Gobstones or Exploding Snap, and she listened to what Theo had to say instead of criticizing him. It seemed unfair that Lavinia had to finish her last year at school just before Theo began his first. He would have liked to stay home with her.

As they were finishing off the cake and coffee, the conversation drifted toward Hogwarts. "Draco will be a Slytherin, of course," said Narcissa Malfoy.

"So will Theo," said Medea. "All the Notts have been Slytherins."

"I don't want to be in the same house as Theo," said Draco, kicking one of the table legs.

Theo didn't want to be in the same house as Draco, either, but he was too polite to say so.

"Manners," muttered Lucius Malfoy out of the corner of his mouth. "Are you certain, Medea? I must say that Theodore has never struck me as a particularly ambitious boy. Perhaps he would be better placed in Hufflepuff."

Everybody knew Hufflepuffs were useless. Theo wondered why Mr. Malfoy had bothered to rebuke his son if he was just going to turn around and be rude himself.

"He will not be a Hufflepuff." Medea was going into one of her angry fits; a small red spot had appeared on each cheek. Although Theo was never the target of her rage, he still found this side of his sister unnerving. "No brother of mine will stay in a house of mudbloods, coming into contact with their families..."

"Of course he won't, sweetheart," said Theo's father in a soothing voice. He slid an arm around his daughter's shoulders, which she shrugged off. "Theo, why don't you go and play with Draco?"

"Playing with Draco," in Theo's experience, usually meant listening to Draco criticize every toy or game Theo owned. Gobstones were out because Draco would complain about the smell, and he sneered at Lavinia's battered old broom, which she allowed Theo to borrow when Medea wasn't looking. ("That's a girl's broom. I'm lucky my father can afford to buy me a real one.") Chess was probably the most tolerable option; Theo always lost, which kept Draco in a decent mood.

Theo set up the pieces slowly, dusting them off and placing them in the exact center of their squares with meticulous care. They liked it when you did that and sometimes offered good advice later in the game, except for one of the white bishops, who was always cranky. The white pawns had a noisy eight-way argument about who was going to have to start in front of the bishop this time. Theo finally selected the smallest pawn, the one who reminded him of himself. He felt sorry for it, but he knew it would protest less than the others.

He looked up and saw that Draco had become absorbed in one of the books on Dark magic that Theo's father never read but seemed afraid to throw away. Theo had always found them dull, but he was grateful for Draco's interest. Perhaps they wouldn't have to play chess after all.

He slipped out of the room and reached the top of the stairs just in time to see Lavinia storm out of the dining room. "Go on then, talk amongst yourselves. God forbid that I should have a say in matters that don't concern me at all," she was saying in a voice heavy with sarcasm. She slammed the door and stomped off in the direction of the kitchen.

Theo thought of following her, but the prospect of listening at the keyhole was too tempting.

"Little spitfire, isn't she?" Lucius was saying. "Reminds me of your sister Bella, my dear. She might have done very well for Rabastan. Pity he's - holidaying on the island."

Theo had heard that phrase before. It seemed to be some sort of code. The grownups never specified which island, but Theo's father always flinched at the mention of it.

"She isn't the type to care for an older man," said Medea firmly. "That's why I'm anxious to introduce her to some young, attractive men of the right sort - before she makes a mistake. I was hoping you might be able to help me with that, Narcissa."

"What counts at the right sort?" asked Narcissa. "If you don't mind my saying so, Medea, I would suggest that you keep your expectations within the bounds of reason. She is pretty, but there are certain - disadvantages ..."

"What disadvantages?" demanded Medea. "My sister has brains and character as well, and I will not have her possibilities limited by her birth."

"For my part, I'd be satisfied if he's a pureblood," said Jephthah Nott placatingly. "If only things were different - I like the look of that Weasley boy who comes into the shop sometimes, the one who's keen on dragons."

"She can't marry a Weasley," said Medea.

Theo's stomach lurched. Lavinia married? He had never thought of the possibility - his sister had only just turned eighteen - and he didn't like the idea.

"Why not?" asked Narcissa. "Surely you're limiting her possibilities if you raise her to turn up her nose at her own class."

"Politics, my dear, politics," said Lucius smoothly. "I agree that it is quite impossible."

Jephthah sighed. "It's been ten years and let's face it, we picked the losing side. Can't we put the past behind us?"

"Are you ashamed of it, Mr. Crankenthorpe?" Lucius' voice was chilly. "I can't think of too many other reasons for running a shop under a false name."

"That's easy for you to say, but some of us have to earn a living instead of lounging around a manor all day," replied Theo's father with a bit more spirit than usual, but a moment later he sounded as bitter and exhausted as ever. "Business is bad enough as it is, and half the customers would boycott if they knew who ... and what ... we were."

The other adults started talking in raised voices, and Theo knew he'd better get out of the way before any of them opened the dining room door. He joined Lavinia in the kitchen, where she was firing cleaning spells at the dishes in an exceptionally aggressive manner. "Scourgify!" she shouted from across the room, holding her wand like a dagger.

"What's the matter, Vin?" Theo asked.

Lavinia turned around, but didn't answer the question. "Are you worried about the Sorting?" she asked in a softer voice.

"A little," he admitted. "I mean, Medea's not going to be very happy if I end up as a Hufflepuff."

"Would you be happy as a Hufflepuff?" Lavinia asked. She was looking at him with a strange, serious expression.

Theo didn't know how to answer that. What did he know about life in different houses? "I don't think so," he said.

"Then you have nothing to worry about," she said. "The Sorting Hat never tries to send people where they don't want to go - unlike some so-called human beings I could mention."

Theo wondered if this was really true. He had always had an odd feeling that Lavinia didn't altogether like being in Slytherin, although she had never said so. But there was a far more important question on his mind. "You're not going to go and get married, are you?"

"No, Theo. I'm never getting married."

She made it sound like things were all right, but for the rest of the summer they seemed to have gone all wrong. Lavinia barely spoke to their father and sister, although Medea kept leaving small gifts on her younger sister's pillow and fussing with her hair. Nobody except Lavinia paid any attention to Theo. She was the one who took him shopping for wands and school robes in Diagon Alley, and she paid for Buffy out of her own pocket money.

"Thanks," said Theo, admiring his new pet's jewel-bright eyes.

"Thank you for getting me out of that old mausoleum for a day. I think I'll go mad if nothing changes."

As much as he loved his sister, her new streak of bitterness made Theo uncomfortable. "I wish I were going back with you," she whispered as she helped him carry his trunk aboard the Hogwarts Express. She sounded rebellious, and a little desperate.

"I wish you were going instead of me," Theo confided.

"You'll love it, Theo. Honest, you will." She took five Sickles out from under her robes and handed them to him. "Pocket money in case you want a bite to eat on the train," she said. "Take care, and don't be too scared of people, all right? You'll have friends in no time."