The Rules of the House

In Which Pansy is a Slytherin

Finally, about an hour later (it seemed like fifteen to Pansy) it was her turn for the shower. She stepped into the bathroom and, with a grimace, wiped off the shower with a used towel. Blech. Sharing this single bathroom was much worse than sharing at Hogwarts - at least there, she knew that there were several showers to pick from, they were always freshly cleaned by a house elf, and she was only sharing with other girls or other prefects.

This bathroom was also not fit to accommodate her needs. She liked to swim for a while in the bath, not stand for a few minutes under a hot spray of water. She sighed, undressed, and turned on the water.

After a few minutes of washing the grime of her horrible stay at Grimmauld Place away, Pansy turned around to get her kit from the bathroom floor. When she turned around, armed with a pouf and apple-scented potion, she screamed. The water was no longer, well, water colored. Instead, dark red water - the color of blood - was pouring out of the spigots. What was worse was that it... it smelled like blood. Pansy closed her eyes in horror as the spray soaked her from head to toe. It couldn't be real blood. It just couldn't be. Watching as it trickled slowly down the drain, she shrieked again, jumped out of the shower, wrapped a white towel around herself, and flung open the door, revealing a surprised George and Ron Weasley.

"George, there's something wrong with the water." Normally she would never call upon a Gryffindor for help with anything, but she felt that a bloody shower was some cause for concern.

"What's the matter?" He looked at her, confused.

"It's blood. There's blood coming out of the faucet instead of water! It was horrible! It was all over me, making me sticky and red..." She held up the hand that wasn't clutching her towel to her. It was perfectly clean.

"Wha..." She looked all over herself. The white towel was completely immaculate. Her pale skin was covered with drops of water - clear, regular water. "I- I don't understand."

The Weasels were looking at her now with something like amusement. Gryffindors DO NOT laugh at Slytherins.

"Well... I must have fallen asleep. Goodbye." She slammed the door in their surprised faces. She leaned on it, covering her face with a hand that was shaking like a leaf. Behind the door, she could hear masculine laughter.

Damn them. Damn them all. They'd obviously planned this joke on her. The vase, the books, and now this. Did they really think it was funny?

Of course they did. They were idiotic Gryffindors. They probably thought it was funny that she (and everyone else in the house) thought that she was losing her mind. Stupid, poor, disgusting, blood traitor Weasleys.

~*~

After finishing up her shower (with no further mishaps), Pansy started down the stairs. She could smell bacon frying in the kitchen, and her empty stomach rumbled loudly. In her fits of agony the night before, she'd ended up skipping dinner. As she reached the third flight of stairs, she saw Potter and Granger making their way toward the kitchen. She sneered. Then, her heart stopped.

As she stepped from one step to the next, the moldy red carpet yanked out from beneath her. Horrified, she tried to catch herself, but it was too late. She rolled down all three flights of stairs, afraid that if she attempted to catch herself on one of the railing bars she would snap her arm.

Screaming, she finally landed at the feet of Potter, who was trying to cover his snickers with a look of concern.

"Pansy! Are you alright?" Granger knelt next to her.

"I'm fine, no thanks to you two!" Pansy snarled. She staggered to her feet, grabbing the railing post. It was a hideous gargoyle creature. She shuddered and quickly removed her hand. "Were you trying to kill me?"

"Pansy... we didn't do anything..." Potter began.

"Yes you did! You purposely tried to kill me! You think these ridiculous pranks are so funny - well, just you wait!"

Pansy stormed toward the kitchen, full of righteous indignation.

~*~

"Now, children, today we'll be cleaning out some of the upstairs rooms." Mrs. Weasley threw about fifteen more pieces of bacon on Potter's plate. "You really should eat up, Harry, dear," she said. "You're far too skinny."

"Thanks, Mrs. Weasley," said Potter politely.

Pansy sneered. "Will I be expected to partake in the festivities?" she drawled.

"Do you live in this house?"

"If you can call this living."

"Then you'll help clean it. It's an unpleasant chore, but everyone must do their share to make this house easier to live in."

And that, apparently, was that.

Suddenly, as she was taking a sip of her pumpkin juice, Pansy was hit with a very Slytherin Idea.

"Mrs. Weasley," she began, in a cold, yet polite, voice, "you say that every person in this house deserves to be respected, right?"

"Yes, dear."

"And that every person should have a fair chance at living peacefully, without the emotional strain of watching their every move like a hawk, waiting for a conniving Gryffindor loser to -"

"Yes, dear, yes."

"Well, I would like to be justified. I have already had several pranks of a very unfair nature played on me, and I would like restitution. I have been nearly killed twice and was blood-rained on. Surely these things count as a blow against my livelihood?"

"Darling, don't you think that you may be blowing these little incidents out of proportion?" asked her mother, who was delicately buttering a croissant.

"No, Mother, I don't. I just rolled down three flights of stairs! I'm lucky my neck wasn't broken!"

"Yes, well, I suppose this is the one time you can feel fortunate about your baby fat, dear."

The Gryffindor scum snickered. Thanks, Mother.

"I don't know why you're laughing," Pansy whispered scathingly to Ginny, whose features became stony.

Mrs. Weasley looked a bit concerned. "Fred! George!"

The Weasley twins had picked an unfortunate time to apparate in for some breakfast.

"Yes, Mum?" they asked in unison.

"What do you know about some pranks that have been played on Pansy?"

"We don't know anything, Mum."

"Pansy has been flipping out a bit..."

"...claiming she's seeing things..."

"...that aren't there..."

"We're worried about her," they finished.

Mrs. Weasley eyed them. "You don't know who is playing these pranks?"

"Cross our hearts..."

"...and hope to fly."

"Well, then. Ron, Harry, Ginny? Do any of you know what's been going on with these pranks?"

"It's not us, Mum, I swear!"

"It's not, Mrs. Weasley, I promise."

"Oh, yes, because the promise of a Gryffindor is good for much," Pansy snorted.

"Better the promise of a Gryffindor than the promise of a Slytherin," Granger retorted.

Pansy opened her mouth; then shut it again. Really, one can't argue with facts.

"Pansy, I suggest you keep a low profile for a while. Take a seat in the library-" Lupin was abruptly cut off.

"Not the library!"

"Erm, then in the upstairs parlor, perhaps. Just settle down with a book or some homework, and we promise that the other children will leave you alone. Mrs. Weasley will fetch you when the time comes to start cleaning."

Mrs. Weasley nodded in approval.

"Alright, then." Pansy huffed up out of her seat, and dramatically flung the door to the kitchen open. Slytherins always take every opportunity to make an exit.

~*~

In the solitude of the parlor, Pansy began to feel calm again. She did some of the deep-breathing techniques her mother's relaxation instructor had taught her. That old bag claimed that Pansy was 'too uptight with her emotions, which led to a disturbing display of temperament.' Please. How can you be uptight with your emotions but display temperament? What a load of -

Pansy's calming thoughts were interrupted by the sound of a B flat. She opened her eyes and gazed across the room. There was a large, intimidating black piano covered in a layer of dust so thick that you could have scooped it up with a spoon. Clearly no one in this house was musically inclined.

The B flat played again. Then was followed by an C sharp, and a cacophony of dreadful sounding notes. The keys were banging down, making odd, twanging noises. The pages of the music book flipped as though in a high breeze. The notes became a song - sinister and evil, and a bit out of tune, which was no surprise, considering how old it was.

Pansy sat still in her chair. Maybe it was just one of those pianos that played itself. Yes, that was it.

Two cabinet doors swung open with a creak, and Pansy stifled a scream as a set of lady's and men's dress robes flew out and began to dance together, filling out as though they contained bodies.

She felt a tap on her shoulder. Pansy jumped off the couch and turned to see that the drapes were making a pass at her. She rushed toward the door and pulled the cloudy, crystal knobs. The door wouldn't budge. She banged on it, shrieking for help. No one came.

Sobbing, Pansy crawled to a table and hid between the legs. Across the room, the drawers of a desk were opening and closing in beat to the music, and the bottles of ink were pouring into one another, making a large mess on the desktop. The lights began to flicker. The curtains swayed with the eerie music.

The table she was huddling under suddenly levitated. Pansy shrieked and jumped to an armchair. Unfortunately, the chair took off in flight, spinning in harmony with the couch.

Pansy screamed very, very loudly.

The chair began to spin faster.

"Pansy?"

The music stopped. The chair dumped Pansy six feet down to the floor, and plummeted straight towards her. She rolled away quickly, and two of the chair's legs went through the wooden floor. The other furniture crashed to the floor, and the room was silent.

"Pansy? Unlock the door. Is something the matter?"

Pansy hurled herself at the door, trying to unlock it with numb fingers. Finally, it slid open.

"George!" Pansy was beside herself. Tears were streaming down her face.

"What happened now?" George asked her, a bit tiredly.

"The piano was... was... and the robes and the furniture, and..."

George looked around the room. Apart from Pansy's footprints in the dust, and the white cover that had been taken off the chair she was sitting in, the room looked as though nothing had been touched in fifteen years.

"Pansy, there's nothing here."

"But there was! I swear! I'm not some stupid Hufflepuff, you know! I know what I saw!"

"Okay, calm down." George steered her toward the couch and pulled off its dust cover. He pushed her down and sat beside her. "We need to talk, anyway."

"About what?" Pansy's breathing was going a little slower now that she was no longer alone, but at the same time, sitting in such close proximity to George was having a strange effect on her heart rate.

"About these blind prejudices of yours, that's what." He frowned at her.

"What business is it of yours?" she asked him rather harshly.

"I suppose it's really not."

"There you go."

"But... don't you think that maybe, if you stopped antagonizing everyone around here, these things would stop happening to you?"

"What, do you mean that I have to play nice with Potter and the Mudblood so they'll stop trying to kill me?"

"There you go, right there. Hermione is not a Mudblood. I don't know what Draco Malfoy has brainwashed you with all these years, but Muggleborns are just like everyone else. They're your equals. Hermione Granger has more power in her little toe than Crabbe, Goyle, and Nott have added together."

This was true. But still...

"What would you know about it? What would you know about being a pureblood? You're a traitor. Your family gave up the nobility and pride that comes of being pure, of having no superiors. You're weak."

"Yes, well, I reckon that we just don't fancy being inbred pillocks with their heads shoved so far up their arses that they can't see reason."

"I beg your pardon? My head is not shoved anywhere. And, may I remind you, that you are just as inbred as I am."

"Maybe I am. But my children won't be."

"How do you know? Have you suddenly grown an Inner Eye? Have you Seen the future?"

"No, but I know the only Pureblooded girl I'd be interested in can't get over her unreasonable prejudices and is determined to go through life thinking she's superior to everyone who crosses her path."

George stood up and looked at her coldly.

"Maybe, just maybe, if you decided to open your eyes, you'd actually see what's dancing naked right in front of you. Think about it, Pansy. Your mother and father are divorced. You live with her now, and she lives here. She's part of the Order of the Phoenix, a group of people determined to stop prejudices against Muggles and to stop the darkest lord - who's a half-blood, by the way - in a century from turning everyone, purebloods included, into slaves. These noble, upstanding people have also taken you in. They don't care that you're Slytherin. They don't care that you're a pureblood and have fancy ideas about yourself. They care that there's a small chance that, though it's buried somewhere deep inside of you, that icy heart of yours will thaw."

He stormed out of the room.

Well. That was... odd. She'd never seen one of the Weasley twins look so... serious before.

Pansy leaned back on the couch. He was wrong. Mudbloods were most certainly not the equals of purebloods. That was insane propaganda, created by Mudbloods who wanted a bigger place in pureblooded society. And who was he to lecture her? She was right, damn it! Purebloods, especially Slytherin purebloods, were the superior race.

But... what if she was wrong? Could it be possible that all these years they were lying to her? Her family, her friends, all secretly passing around one simple idea of superiority that sparked a revolution?

And what if You-Know-Who did win the war? George said they'd all be turned into slaves, purebloods included. That couldn't be true. It just couldn't. And He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named was a half-blood. Absolutely ridiculous.

But still... what if he was right?

~*~

"Right now, everyone listen up." Mrs. Weasley was wearing an apron and had the sleeves of her robes rolled up. "We'll just be sorting through these boxes today. Now that-" She broke off, looked at Potter, and spoke more gently. "Now that Sirius is no longer with us, I'm not entirely sure what to keep and what to throw away."

Pansy looked at Potter, whose eyes were closed and fists were clenched. Sirius? Not-

"Not Sirius Black? This is the home of a murderer?"

"He was not a murderer!"

Pansy stepped back; nearly everyone in the room was glaring at her, and Potter's green eyes were crackling with energy.

"Okay, okay. Whatever you say." Potter gave her one last glare, and turned back around to Mrs. Weasley. Thank God for her Slytherin life preservation instincts. Sheesh.

"Anyway, I'm not really sure what to keep, so...I suppose we should start a pile for anything that looks worth saving, and everything else throw into a rubbish bag."

That was certainly easier said than done. There were probably two hundred boxes crammed haphazardly into the room, which was about the size of the downstairs parlor. With a heavy sigh, Pansy picked a corner far from everyone else and began to pull open the lid of her first box. This was going to be tedious.

~*~

The boxes were filled with, Pansy supposed, what you would normally find in a storage room: spare cutlery, paintings of ancestors, a few statues, some needlework. The only problem was that these things didn't act like normal storage room objects. When Pansy opened her very first box, the cutlery stored inside made a beeline straight out of the box, nearly taking off her turned-up nose. It was currently stuck in the boards of the ceiling, wiggling their handles like tails, trying to free themselves.

The paintings of ancestors, who had previously been sleeping, argued very loudly against being put out with the trash. The insults and screaming gradually became so bad that Professor Lupin had to step in with a bottle of paint-removing potion. Pansy asked him why he hadn't used it on Mrs. Black, and he told her that she'd had the painting spelled against it, and the consequences were 'very unfortunate.'

The statues started running about as soon as they were pulled from their boxes, and it was not so pleasant to have the bust of Morinda Black jump on your toes when you went after her.

The needlework was deadly. Ginny Weasley pulled a delicately embroidered fire screen out of a pile, and the thread immediately pulled out and wrapped itself around her wrists,

ankles, and finally her neck. She was saved by Potter (what a surprise), who jumped (needlessly) on top of her and cut the strings from her neck with a knife he'd pulled out of his baggy pants. Who knew Potter had it in him? If Pansy didn't know any better, she could have said that move was almost... Slytherin of him. She snorted. Harry Potter, a Slytherin.

As she chuckled, she pulled open another box. Inside sat some bed sheets. Innocent enough. As Pansy pulled them out of the box, they quickly wrapped around her, tighter than a mummy's bandages, and began to squeeze. Fortunately, Granger moved almost as quickly as her friend, and rescued her from the sheets before she suffocated.

"Th-thanks, Granger," Pansy panted, trying to pull air back into her lungs.

The kids all stopped and looked at her.

"Did you just thank me, Parkinson?" Granger looked rather shocked.

"Yes, I did. You helped me out and I thanked you." Honestly, the one time in her life she'd actually been nice, people questioned it?

"Well... you're welcome."

"I'll make it up to you, of course."

"Make it up to me?"

"Well, obviously. I owe you a favor now."

Granger frowned. "You don't owe me anything. I did it because it was the right thing to do, not because I wanted something in return."

"Really?"

Granger nodded.

"Wow, you Gryffindors are strange. You really don't want me to do something for you?"

"No. Well, unless you see something from these boxes of horror try to attack me. Then I'm all for it." She grinned crookedly, and Pansy was shocked to feel herself smiling back.

"It's a deal."

Wait a second! Slytherins don't smile at Gryffindors, and purebloods certainly did not smile at Mudbloods. There must be something in the dust in here. Yes, that was it. She turned back to her box and was startled to see George Weasley looking at her with a small smile on his face. When she raised one of her eyebrows at him (Trademark Slytherin Look Number Four ^©), he nodded his head at her.

She coughed and got back to work.

~*~

In Which Pansy Listens to Some Stories

That night, after Pansy had showered the dust off and climbed into her favorite silky green pyjamas and matching bathrobe, her mother asked to speak with her. Pansy accompanied her down to the kitchen, where Mrs. Weasley presented her with a mug of hot chocolate and a plate of warm, chocolate chip biscuits. Pansy accepted them with a lukewarm smile.

Dear Lord, what kind of effect were these people having on her?

"Pansy, darling, I've brought you down here because I think it's time for you to know."

"Know what, Mother?"

"About how Kingsley and I fell in love."

Pansy choked on her sip of chocolate. "No, Mother, really. It's fine. I don't need to know."

"Oh, but, dear, I want you to know! I want you to know how happy I am!"

Pansy faked a yawn. "Oh, well, it is getting rather late, you know, and I've had a trying day..."

"It's only eight-thirty, dear."

Pansy slumped in her chair. It was obvious that there was no way she could get out of this.

"Start at the beginning, I suppose."

"Well, as you know, around Christmastime I discovered that your father was having an affair with a half-blood."

"But, Mother," Pansy interrupted, "Daddy's always had his ladies. You know that."

"Yes, dear, but at the time, the fact that he was... socializing with a half-blood was quite offensive to me. Can you imagine choosing a half-blood over me? And what if he'd gotten her pregnant?"

"Mother, honestly. Daddy's very careful about that sort of thing."

"Well, anyway, I knew that it was the final straw. I got into a huge fight with your father and moved to the East Wing."

"You've always lived in the East Wing."

"Yes, but this time I moved all of my shoes from the West Wing closets to the East Wing."

"That must have taken Tibby ages."

"About a month," her mother confirmed. "After that, I began socializing with other people, just for a breath of fresh air. Many of my old friends can be rather stifling at times."

"Yes, I imagine so." Sometimes there was only so much gossip to keep the rumor mill going; Slytherin had many a dry spell throughout the year.

"Then, at this lovely party the ministry was throwing for... I don't know, some charity or other, I met this lovely, lovely man. Kingsley Shacklebolt." Her mother placed a hand over her heart and closed her eyes in a way that uncomfortably reminded Pansy of someone.

"We started to go out, a few dates here and there. He was such a gentleman. And then, after a few months, and after your father and I were officially divorced, he took me to this beautiful restaurant, and we went strolling through a rose garden in the moonlight. Suddenly, he stopped and took my hand. In his deep voice he said-"

"'Malvina Dolohov, you are one of the most wonderful and beautiful women I've ever met. Would you like to share your life with mine and join our magic together in the bonds of matrimony?'"

Pansy turned, startled, at the deep voice behind her. She looked up, and up, and up at the dark figure that was Kingsley Shacklebolt.

He grinned at her, white teeth flashing in the gloom of the basement kitchen. "And what did you say?" He turned to Pansy's mother.

"I said 'Yes!'" Malvina leapt from her chair and into Shacklebolt's brawny arms.

Yuck.

Pansy was feeling very, very uncomfortable. "Umm..."

"Anyway, darling." Her mother turned away from her, ugh, lover, and faced Pansy. "Kingsley taught me a lot about the world. About the prejudices of pureblood society and about the goals of the Order. I know what you've been raised to believe. I just want you to make the right decisions."

"Well, thanks. I'll just be off to bed then..." And before anyone could protest, Pansy was out of her chair and up the stairs. Unfortunately, she was clearly not destined to finish her night in solitude.

"Pansy? May we speak to you about something?" It was Granger, wearing pink fluffy pajamas and carrying a large, leather-bound book.

"Fine."

Pansy's less-than-enthusiastic acquiescence didn't seem to bother Granger, who nodded and walked into the downstairs parlor, glancing behind her to see if Pansy was following.

Assembled in the downstairs parlor (obviously recently cleaned and pretty lived-in) were Potter, four of the Weasleys, and Granger.

"What's all this, then?" Pansy stood guardedly with her back to the door.

"We wanted to talk to you about all the... accidents... you've been having lately."

Pansy snorted. "I don't think 'accidents' is the right word for what's been happening to me. Are you all going to apologize?"

"No..." That was Potter.

"...but we think we may know what's happening," finished the Weaselette.

"Oh really? It took all," she counted, "six of you to figure out that you've been playing pranks on me? Impressive. I always gave Gryffindors the credit of being smarter than Hufflepuffs, at least, but it seems I was mistaken."

"No, we're not playing pranks on you. We think it's the house." George took over smoothly.

"What do you mean, 'it's the house'?"

"We think the house is doing these things..."

"...to take revenge on you..."

"... for fighting with Mrs. Black."

"Ridiculous. How on earth could a house possibly be doing all of these things?"

"Well, you see," Granger began, "this house used to belong to a very dark family-"

Pansy held up her hand. "Save it, Granger. I don't want to hear your fairytale reasons. I thought you'd be up front about it - Gryffindors are supposed to be brave, after all, but I guess you lot aren't their finest. I'll be around when you decide to apologize."

She whirled around, her bathrobe billowing proudly in a way reminiscent of Professor Snape at his finest, and stalked out of the room.

~*~