A Choice Between Paths

Chapter 2: The First Day of a Long Year

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The first day of term dawned gray and dismal. A constant drizzle rained down upon the grounds. Marivetta was always up before her classmates. She was standing in front of her mirror, fastening her hair into its usual bun.

Toria was the next to rise.

"Morning, Mar," she said, stretching out her arms.

"Mmm." Marivetta mumbled around the hairpin she was holding in her teeth.

Toria and Marivetta prepared for morning classes in two very different ways. Marivetta was meticulous, as she was in all aspects of her life. After finishing her hair she put on light makeup. Then she thoroughly charmed the wrinkles out of her clothing.

Toria, on the other hand, ran her fingers through her hair and considered herself done.

Of course, Toria is also the girl who ripped off the fastener to her robes and replaced it with several over-sized safety pins. She was pinning each of these when she turned to Marivetta.

"Since you're the teacher's pet now does that mean you won't actually be taking potions with the rest of us?" she asked.

"Assistant, not pet," Marivetta said, straightening her tie. "And I will probably still be in your class. I will most likely be assisting in lower level classes." She flung her bag over her shoulder and they made the journey down the stone corridor to the common room in silence.

A crowd of students, incidentally mostly first years, was huddled around the bulletin board staring up at a large sign.

"What the hell?" Toria asked.

Marivetta shouldered her way through the crowd of students and ripped down the sign. "Oh honestly, listen to this," she said, reading the sign. "Pocket money failing to keep pace with your outings? Like to earn a little extra gold? Contact Fred and George Weasley."

"You can't be serious," Toria said, reading the remainder of the sign. "Virtually painless jobs? How did they manage to get this in here?"

"No idea."

Randolf and Draco were slowly making their way through the common room, Crabbe and Goyle following silently behind. Draco was walking like a proud soldier; his chin held high and his chest puffed out. His prefect badge gleamed on his chest; he must have polished it when he woke up.

Marivetta ignored Toria's sudden rush to fix her hair as they approached.

"Brandon McKinnon says a House Elf posted it last night, Draco said, slicking back his hair gracefully.

"Well, at least it wasn't a student?" Toria interjected, flashing a smile at him.

Draco indulged her and gave her a grin. "I already gave Theodore the schedules to hand out at breakfast and the first years know where they are going with out guidance," Draco said.

"Most excellent," Marivetta said, smiling. "Then I shall just head on up to breakfast, coming?"

They walked out of the thick stone door and past the stone snake that guarded it. They had just reached the top of the stairs leading into the Entrance Hall when they spotted Harry, Hermione, and Ron coming down the marble staircase.

"Well, I think it's a pity we're not trying for a bit of inter-house unity," Hermione said.

A group of Ravenclaws fled when they spotted Harry, causing Draco to laugh.

"Yeah, we really ought to be trying to make friends with people like that," Harry said sarcastically, shooting an angry look after the Ravenclaws.

"I want to go make friends with them," Draco said. "Anyone who hates Potter can be my friend."

Toria giggled and Marivetta found herself rolling her eyes again. She stepped out into the Entrance Hall, removing the folded sign out of her bag.

"Miss Granger! Mister Weasley! A word please," she called.

The golden trio stopped, Ron shot Hermione a puzzled look, but she seemed to recognize Marivetta.

"This was hanging in my Common Room this morning," she hissed, shoving the flyer into Hermione's hand. "Now I don't care what they do to first years in their own house, the less of you there are the better. But I don't want to find this in my house again or I'll see to it those two are at the least suspended."

Hermione looked furious. "How did they manage this?" She stomped her foot angrily. "I assure you it will be handled."

"Good." Marivetta nodded and walked into the Great Hall, her friends following closely behind.

"That was beautiful," Toria said. "Simply beautiful. You as good as told her you wanted Gryffs to be an endangered species and all she cared about was that bloody sign."

Draco and his minions were still laughing.

It wasn't until they were seated at their table that Ron turned to Hermione and asked: "Who was that, anyway?"

She let out an exasperated sigh.

"Marivetta Hunter, 7th year prefect, and she might as well be Head Girl. Trudie is going to be utterly useless, she's more concerned about her popularity than anything else."

"That girl reminded me of McGonagall," Harry said.

Ron shook his head. "No, Snape. Actually, I think that would be what their kid would be like if Snape and McGonagall got together."

Harry snorted in his eggs.

"Just don't cross her, it would be a bad idea," Hermione said, smearing butter on her toast.

Schedules were being passed along the Slytherin table. Randolf peered over Marivetta's shoulder.

"You will be spending way more time with Snape then I would ever want to," he said.

"But imagine all the Potions I will be learning."

"You are so weird," Toria said, chipping black nail polish off of her pointer finger with her thumb nail as she gazed down at her own schedule.

"You spend all of Friday tailing Snape," Draco said. "But, on the bright side, your first Teacher's Assistant slot is with my class."

Marivetta was almost relieved by that. Her biggest worry was un-cooperative students. She brushed her escaped tuft of hair behind her ear and shoved her schedule in her bag.

"I'm in for a busy year," she said, scooping some scrambled eggs onto her plate. "Between classes, assisting the Professor, and prefect duties."

"Do you plan on sleeping?" Draco asked.

"Not this week, because we have hallway patrol every night this week," Randolf said.

"Yeah, thanks to our beloved Head Girl," Marivetta said, shooting an evil look at Trudie across the isle at the Ravenclaw table.

Marivetta had her normal Potions class first that day, so she, Randolf, and Toria walked to the Dungeons together. She had hardly sat down when the 7th year Ravenclaws walked in, including Trudie Drumhiller.

Trudie made a beeline for the table where Randolf was sitting. He shot Marivetta and Toria, who were sitting one table over, a panicked look.

"What is she playing at?" Toria asked, her curtain of black and green hair falling in her face as she leaned forward to whisper to Marivetta.

"She probably want to mooch off of his intelligence," Marivetta said, looking disgusted.

The door to the classroom opened and everyone fell silent as Professor Snape began their class.

"Now this seating won't do at all," he said. He waved his wand and a desk appeared up front next to his own. "Miss Hunter, if you please."

Marivetta, exchanging surprised looks with Toria, shifted her stuff up to the new desk. She set her ingredients up while Professor Snape shifted more seats around. When she looked up again she noticed that Randolf had been moved to sit next to Toria, and Trudie was sitting alone looking annoyed.

"You are all entering the last leg of your magical education here at Hogwarts," he began, his eyes roaming across the students in the room. "Some of you are already prepared enough for your NEWTs. The rest of you have got quite a bit to learn if you want to score high. I don't suppose I have to stress the importance of doing well on these tests, since I assume you all realize that your NEWTs will determine what careers you are qualified for."

"This year we will be getting into some of the most complex potions that I am allowed to teach you. But how far we go is going to be based on your progress as a class. If you progress at a reasonable speed we will get to brew intriguing things such as the Polyjuice Potion and Veritaserum."

A ripple of whispers shot through the classroom and the excitement was almost palpable.

"I expect nothing short of perfection before we can reach such levels. If you all work hard there is no reason why we should not be able to get there. First, a review: pick any potion that I taught you last year and brew it with out your notes. You have an hour."

He waved his wand and an hourglass appeared on his desk. The classroom whirred into motion.

The hardest thing for Marivetta was to pick from one of the many potions she had learned the previous school year. In the end she chose Dreamless Sleep, as she was one of a select few who had managed to successfully brew that potion.

She couldn't resist and opportunity to outshine Trudie, the snotty Head Girl.

Professor Snape was making slow rounds through the classroom. Toria and Randolf were working on one of the Healing Draughts. So far they had the ingredients lined up and measured. Nothing had been added to the cauldron though.

Trudie was staring at her ingredients as if waiting for a sudden moment of insight. He had to work hard not to laugh out loud at her. She seemed to be waiting for the ingredients to jump up and start measuring up on their own.

Then there was Marivetta, her face blank as she meticulously diced Elderflower root. She didn't seem to be the tiniest bit worried about failing. She didn't question or second-guess herself; she just forged ahead.

He was reminded a lot of himself at that age. Determined, desperate for recognition. He recognized the looks she threw at Trudie as well, it was the look of a frustrated soul. Marivetta knew she deserved to be Head Girl, but she'd been passed over just as he had been so many years before.

But the reasoning for it was clear to him now. It was because she was a Slytherin, however not because the Headmaster was biased. Instead, it was because the rest of the school was biased.

Dumbledore was worried that the Prefects from other houses wouldn't listen to a Slytherin Head Girl. It was unfair, and everyone knew it.

Snape feared for his young protégé, because his thirst for recognition had played him right into Voldemort's hand. He didn't want the same thing to happen to her.

"You should be done with your preparations," he announced.

He could have graded their efforts based upon their expressions. Some looked only mildly nervous, others looked terrified. Marivetta looked confident and stress free.

"Bottle your potions and label them clearly with your name and what potion it is meant to be," he said.

Marivetta had only just reached for a phial when Snape turned to her desk.

"Wait. You can bottle yours after class, right now I'd prefer you to help me collect your classmates meager attempts."

"Yes, sir."

She couldn't help making mental notes on the potions as she checked them all for the students name before filing them in the rack set on Snape's desk. There were a lot of Healing Draughts, which wasn't so surprising. They had the least amount of ingredients to remember, but the measurements had to be very precise for the potion to be any good.

She was taking the phial of Toria and Randolf's potion when Professor Snape's voice rang through the classroom.

"Tell me, Miss Drumhiller, are you deaf?"

"No, Professor," she answered, looking nervous.

"Then you must not pan any mind to instructions," he said, brandishing her potion at her. "This is a potion we learned in your fifth year, not your sixth year."

The Head Girl flushed. She opened and shut her mouth a couple of times much to the amusement of the Slytherins in the room. Snape waved his wand and the potion vanished. He handed the empty container back to the stammering girl.

"Perhaps next time you will listen harder in class," he said, and then turned to the next student as if she wasn't there.

Toria and Randolf were still giggling as they left, waving goodbye to Marivetta.

Snape was gazing down at the rack of phials. He picked one up to read the label and made a sour face.

"Looking at this, can you now see why I believe you won't learn much in this class?" he asked, holding up a second phial.

"It is rather ridiculous," she agreed.

"I'm going to take these to my office," he said. "While I am gone you should bottle your potions. All of it. I would hate for such a perfect Dreamless Sleep potion to go to waste."

"Thank you, professor."

She concentrated fully on emptying the contents of her cauldron into bottles. She didn't look up from her task until the fifth year Slytherins and Gryffindors were filing in.

She nodded to Draco as he passed.

"What's she doing here?" Rom asked Hermione under his breath.

"She's probably his new assistant," she answered, unloading her potions notes from the previous year onto the table.

"Since when does Snape get an assistant?" Harry asked.

"He has one every year," she answered. "But we've never actually had one assist during our period."

"So how did you know about them?" Ron asked.

"Everyone knew about them, at least everyone that paid attention."

Ron opened his mouth to argue but before he could Professor Snape was back and the classroom went silent.

Marivetta hardly paid attention to Snape's opening lecture this time, it didn't vary all that much from the one she had heard in her own class that morning.

The class was brewing the Draught of Peace, and he had just sent them to the cupboard for their ingredients when he turned to her.

"Now, I have given them an hour and a half, but there's no reason a skilled brewer can't make this in an hour. Impress me."

He was testing her, she knew he was. And he was testing her nerve more than anything. To brew such a precise potion quickly required you to have confidence in your measurements. There wasn't any time to second-guess things.

She wondered if he was watching her. Time was irrelevant at that point, flowing by with each ingredient measured and added. She dumped in the final ingredient and a silver vapor began to rise from her cauldron. Before she could even consider packing up her ingredients and calling Snape over he was there at her side.

"Fifty-five minutes and twenty-nine seconds," he said. "I am impressed. Feel free to make rounds around the classroom. Take note of anything you find interesting.

The students around the room were still adding ingredients. She walked past Harry Potter, whose potion wasn't as thick as it should have been at that point. Neville seemed to be in able to properly measure anything.

"Double check your moonstone measurement before you add that," she whispered under her breath as she passed by Draco.

As she passed by Crabbe she nearly coughed to death in the fumes that his cauldron was emitting. She didn't bother staying nearby long enough to figure out what he did wrong.

"Tell me, Potter, can you read?" Snape's voice echoed through the dungeon.

Marivetta turned. Potter's potion was issuing copious amounts of dark gray steam.

Snape berated him. She had never seen her professor act so viciously towards a student. She moved to the front of the room and by the time she turned back again Harry's potion had vanished.

"Those of you who have managed to read the instructions, fill one flagon with a sample of your potion, label it clearly with your name, and bring it up to me or Miss Hunter for testing," said Snape. "Homework: twelve inches of parchment on the properties of moonstone and it's use in potion-making to be handed in on Thursday."

As the students began to shuffle to the front of the classroom, Harry packed up his things in silence, throwing dark looks up at Snape.

Marivetta packed up her things and waited to be dismissed. Once the last of the students had vanished, Snape turned to her.

"Now, as time passes you will become more active in the process. Today was more a test than anything else," he said, almost grinning. "You seem well equipped and I'm sure it will be a productive year. There is one more thing: on nights when you do not have patrol duties I will need you to spend at least an hour helping me grade papers and prepare the next days lessons. Understood?"

"Yes, sir."

"Good. You may go now."

Marivetta felt as if the first half of the day had lasted forever. She was relieved to take her seat at the Slytherin table between Randolf and Toria.

"How'd it go?" Toria asked.

"He's still testing me," she answered, pouring her self a tall glass of pumpkin juice.

"Testing your? But you brewed Dreamless Sleep from memory!" Randolf said.

"And then I brewed the Draught of Peace in under an hour," she said. "I feel like my brain just got finished running a marathon."

Draco Malfoy was retelling how Snape had reamed Harry Potter in Potions, much to the glee of a pack of 3rd year Slytherin girls.

"Well you might want to snap your brain back into gear. We've got Defense Against the Dark Arts next," Randolf said.

Marivetta groaned. Defense Against the Dark Arts was her weakest subject. She always received high marks but she always hat to work for them. Not quite so difficult was Charms. Charms was the use of practiced spells, whereas Defense Against the Dark Arts was deciding what spells to use when. And all of the spells tended to be more complex.

"I suppose it could be worse," she said. "I could be still taking Divination."

Toria laughed. "Oh, come on, when Trelawny told you that you didn't have a psychic bone in your body, I almost lost it."

"You had to remind me of that," Marivetta said, glaring at her.

Randolf and Toria broke into laughter.

All conversations dropped down to a whisper as the 7th year Slytherins and Gryffindors filed into the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom. Umbridge was sitting behind her desk, watching them. She was not an attractive woman, Marivetta had decided. She had a round, squashed face that always looked angry.

"Good afternoon, class," Umbridge said, with a smile that was even less attractive than her frown.

Marivetta winced slightly. The woman's high-pitched voice was almost as irritating as fingernails scraping down a chalkboard.

There was a general mumble from the students around the room.

"Tut, tut. That won't do," she said. "I said 'Good afternoon, class.'"

"Good afternoon, Professor Umbridge."

"Much better. Now let's get started. Wands away, quills out," she said, prodding the board with her wand until words appeared.

"IT seems, looking at the few notes I've received from your previous professors that prior to now your Defense Against the Dark Arts education has been fragmented and disrupted, she said. She had said the word 'professors' as if she hardly believed that they had deserved the title. "Fortunately we hope to remedy that this year with a carefully structured, theory-centered, Ministry-approved course of Defense Magic."

There was a sudden murmur that ran through the class after the words "theory-centered". Marivetta watched as Fred Weasley leaned over to George and whispered something.

"Hem, hem!" The classroom fell silent again. "Our course aims are as follows." She tapped her wand on the board and more words appeared.

Course Aims:

1- Understanding the principles underlying defensive magic.

2- Learning to recognize situations in which defensive magic can legally be used.

3- Placing the use of defensive magic in a context for practical use.

"You aren't honestly going to teach a 7th year level Defense Against the Dark Arts class without practicing any of the spells, are you?" George blurted out.

"Please raise your hand if you want to speak, Mr.?"

"Weasley."

"Mr. Weasley do you expect a situation in which defensive magic is necessary to arise in this classroom?" she asked.

Fred began to mouth noiselessly as if trying to think of something to add to his brother's argument.

Arnold McIntosh stood up. "With all due respect-"

"Hand, Mr. McIntosh," she snapped. "I would expect better from our Head Boy."

She scowled and raised his hand over his head before speaking again. "What I was trying to say is that if we are going to be tested on these spells at the end of the year, we should know how to do them."

"Should you thoroughly read the text and study the theory there is no reason you shouldn't be able to perform the spells for your NEWTs."

Marivetta rolled her eyes. She felt a pit of concern building in her stomach. Without some sort of practical practice she would fail her Defense Against the Dark Arts NEWT. But despite this she stayed silent.

In fact, none of the Slytherins spoke; they merely watched the fall out.

"Don't be daft, you can't expect us to perform spells for the first time at our exams!" Angelina Johnson shouted.

"Hands, please!"

"This is bullshit," George Weasley said, his hand held high.

"Twenty points from Gryffindor," Umbridge snapped.

Silence fell over the classroom and many of the Gryffindors looked murderous.

"You should all have a copy of Defensive Magical Theory by Wilbert Slinkhard," Umbridge said, as if the argument had never occurred. "Turn to Chapter One; Basics for Beginners and read the chapter. There is no need to talk."

"So that class is going to be a total waste of our time," Randolf said, once they'd left the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom.

"Basics for Beginners? Do we look like beginners?" Marivetta asked.

"Utterly ridiculous," Randolf agreed.

Marivetta pushed her Defense Against the Dark Arts worries from her mind to concentrate on Transfigurations. She was half tempted to say something to another professor about her concerns, but she shelved the idea. She would try to handle her dilemma on her own.

McGonagall gave them a pile of homework on Fabrication Spells before dismissing them.

"All I want is a nice dinner and to finish my homework before we start patrolling at Midnight," Randolf said.

"I don't envy the two of you," Toria said. "I value my sleep."

The Great Hall was alive with activity when they walked in. People were murmuring in every direction.

"He says he saw Cedric Diggory murdered…"

"He reckons he dueled with You Know Who…"

"Come off it…"

"Who does he think he's kidding?"

Marivetta sat down next to Draco.

"What is going on?" she asked.

"Potter had a falling out with Umbridge. He told her all about what supposedly happened after the Tri-Wizard Tournament last year," he explained. "She told him he was a liar and now it's all over the school."

"Seriously?" Toria asked.

"I haven't had her yet, but I can already tell I'm going to love Umbridge," Draco said.

Marivetta watched as Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, and Ron Weasley fled the hall.

"I wouldn't be so sure, Draco," she said.

She spooned some mashed potatoes onto her plate. After a long pause she spoke again.

"I just have a feeling it is going to be a long year."