Of Courageous Slytherin

"Lestrange, Rodolphus!"

Prat. Mother would be furious to know I was practically sinking in my seat because of all those annoying prats.

He walked confidently and that old rag shouted "Slytherin!" after barely touching his head. Certainly no time to even debate his place in the two seconds it stood there. Would it be too much to say I was watching resentfully? That I was jealous while the fool walked towards the table, my table, and halted a few seats away? But it was that I couldn't help it, because he looked so infuriating, all perfect stance and small, cunning smirk; his skin so smooth and his eyes so petite and bluish grey as they took in the whole room and integrants from his place. He looked every bit the slytherin I wanted to be. Prat.

And then came bloody Lucius Malfoy. The idiot who was not Lestrange, smirking superiorly as though he possessed all the answers on the palm of his hand, but Malfoy, subtler and cold-mannered. He was gracious in his step, and smart enough to know some answers were not sitting in his bloody palm, thank you very much. Lestrange was as foolish as he was childish, whereas Malfoy was sly and ingenious. But wasn't he an annoying prat! He made the whole cunning thing tricky with his long and perfectly thought plans, and it knotted my stomach every time I saw him. Lucius Malfoy was as clever as Lestrange a romantic fool - and both of them were pricks. All of them were.

With elegant strides, Malfoy took the open seat next to me. "Stop glaring, Bellatrix." Idiot. Handsome, elegant, and no matter how clever he might be, an idiot to the core. Idiot.

"Something the matter?" Mocking eyes were looking back at me; these boys certainly didn't know how to be comforting.

"She's fidgety, Lestrange, I wouldn't advice you to get any near." Malfoy's eyes had a spark of scorn as well. His lips were curling into a smirk. Maybe he was a foolish child too, after all. "Relax, Bella, Hogwarts is not but a bunch of untutored fools, my father tells me, learn what you will and discard the rest."

"Right, he says that so as to take your mind away from the fact you failed a position in Durmstrang?"

"As if getting into Durmstrang had anything to do with him. You should be attacking the family's bank accounts, Flint." Lestrange's lips ghosted a smile even though my comment went ignored by. Fool.

Malfoy's perfect stance had not been marred though; he even clapped the new slytherin soaring our way. I did not catch a name. "A matter of changing plans, Flint, Durmstrang did not meet Mother's qualifications. Father was inclined to agree."

Flint was a third-year Neanderthal; at least I couldn't help but think so, when his bulky frame and protuberant eyes framed me instead. "Of course, the Malfoy kin has not got to worry about fortune. Haven't your learned, Black? You ought to have. Lucius here could be your wealth provider very soon, a suitable suitor I daresay, don't you?"

Albeit a third-year Neanderthal with a good vocabulary. I glared.

"Ah, nervous, I presume then. The sorting hat did take its time. Something you want to tell us, Black?"

'Black, is it? Such a long time since I last had a Black... clever, Blacks are, so clever they turn tricky; such a clever young mind I see here, intelligence which does not need to be sly. In Ravenclaw, with the proper training, and the appropriate friends... but no, maybe Gryffindor could make you big, I see no real fear to face the unknown and even the unforgiving, an almost irresponsible courage it could be said. You are trustworthy as well, devoted maybe even to those who do not deserve your loyalty. Hufflepuff could do you good; you would find friends ready to show you the difference between loyalty and blind following. However, then... these ideas repulse you, you shudder at the thought of being in any of these houses...'

My cheeks flushed at the remembrance of the sole two minutes the sorting hat had been hanging over my eyes, debating, debating!, even I could not believe it, where to put me! Imagine that, a Black anywhere other than slytherin! And it wasn't like those prats to pass on a reason to be annoying. As usual, the Neanderthal was smirking and Malfoy looked faintly amused. Lestrange, on the other hand, watched me thoughtfully; the ghost of smile had not disappeared... Fool. This, of course, was the perfect cue for my face to redden even more when I discovered there was no snappy retort at the opening of my mouth as it was my usual.

"Do return to your seat, Flint, Professor, ah, Professor McGonagall keeps glancing at us from her place, and we wouldn't want trouble so early, now would be?" Malfoy was shooing the Neanderthal away, despite Flint being older and bigger. I didn't care. I kept thinking back to the sorting hat, to the Fool and the Idiot.

Had it something to do with shame? Shame that I am not the daughter my parents expect of me, or the sister Andromeda and Narcissa look up to? Jealousy, and as much as it hurt to say, was a given. Those idiots could get into slytherin without even so much as thinking it and I could not? Not Fair. But why? I did not understand why I was not enough to be placed in slytherin instantly, like Malfoy and Lestrange. If I had not asked it of that old rag would I be sitting someplace else? What a frightening thought, in Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff or, I shuddered, Gryffindor. Surrounded by people who did not know me and I would not want to know. Alone, amongst all those losers who could not lie to save their lives!

'Those not!' I urged. 'Slytherin!' I pleaded, suddenly afraid.

'Ah, those not, huh? Slytherin? Where all your ancestors have been sorted and triumphed? Another Black in the noble house of Slytherin, I should have thought of it, the house where real friends are found and treasured, and your cleverness may be developed to the limit... Slytherin you say, then? Well, if you want it that way...

'SLYTHERIN!'

My heart was still pounding furiously when the table clapped and I took a seat amongst them; I had been scared, desperate to be seated where I was. And then came Crabbe and he did not have to beg it of the hat, and neither all those who followed him. And so by the time Lestrange was up and sitting on the stool, I could not help but glare. Pricks, all of them are.

"My advice would be eating, Bellatrix." Malfoy was not looking my way, he seemed uncomfortable while glancing over his goblet at Goyle sitting in front of us and devouring his food like a starving animal.

"Why are you so concerned about me? I am not hungry, thank you for caring, Lucius." I sneered back at him. He did not reply and merely pursued his lips and continued eating. I picked on my plate. Idiot.

Headmaster Dippet spoke about something or other and I think I sighed in relief when it was announced we could access our dormitories. Hogwarts was as confusing as it was big, but confusion I was used to. And the dungeons, though tasteless in themselves, would surely prove to be useful for all the things Lucius and I had in mind to break "subtle havoc" in this immense school. Of course, none of this would prove to be true until I learned my way around, which right then did not happen.

"Enough, Bellatrix Black, your sulking annoys me." Lestrange was suddenly walking by my side. He was looking at me uninterestedly, not at all annoyed, as if neither his comment nor my possible answer mattered to him.

"Is there a particular reason why you felt the need to add my surname to that statement, Rodolphus?" He did not keep walking, and when I tried to past by, he took hold of my wrist. I tugged out of pure instinct, but he didn't let go, and I didn't feel like fighting for it. Glaring took over instead.

"Are you going to tell me?"

"Why should I?"

"Because you are getting on my nerves with all the idiotic sulking and blushing, this way you don't prove very useful to either Lucius or me."

I pushed him away. "Maybe it will be gone by tomorrow, I would think you to possess at least a once of patience, Lestrange... And I'm not some kind of toy that cares to be useful to Lucius or you! If I want to sulk, or blush, I do so, so move. I'm not up for your chauvinistic comments." He was playing that perfect-stance thing again, his back straight and his arms firmly crossed about his chest. He was smirking, as if mocking me and my words, his small eyes again looking at me thoughtfully, or maybe amusedly, I didn't know.

"Bellatrix," he drawled superiorly.

"Oh, don't go playing Malfoy with me!" I groaned. "Fine, I'll tell you."

His perfect stance was not marred, despite the fact that I knew he wanted to look triumphal. He stood there, waiting for me to begin while I tried to think of a good enough lie to get him off my back.

"Is has something to do with the hat, doesn't it?"

I hesitated. Fool. "Yes."

"Well?" Apparently the silence annoyed him. I leered at his edginess, Lestrange wanted to appear calm and patient much like Malfoy was, but he just wasn't. So I talked, just so that he wouldn't go bitching to Malfoy later. And maybe because I was too bloody tired to think up a lie. The halls were empty for Merlin's sake and Lestrange was getting on my nerves anyway, I wondered what he would say if I told him what the hat had said.

"Gryffindor." I muttered. "The stupid hat wanted to put me in gryffindor. He also wanted to put me in Ravenclaw, and even considered Hufflepuff. Hufflepuff."

"Is that all?"

"Yes, that's all!" Idiotic him.

He looked annoyed again. "We are not one-dimensional beings, Bellatrix; we are much more than just courage, loyalty, intelligence or cunning. So stop being so bloody dramatic and get a grip on yourself already. If the sorting hat wanted to put you in anything other than slytherin and couldn't make up its mind, it's because you have more qualities than just being sly. But you made a choice, and the sorting hat had but to follow it. You choose where you are going to be placed, Bellatrix, not it."

I gapped. I might have blushed as well, though for the love of me I wouldn't know why. Maybe because I felt incredibly stupid listening to Lestrange's sudden sprout of wisdom, maybe because it was Lestrange attempting to comfort me and it was somehow wrong listening to it, using words I would expect Malfoy a million times more capable of using. And maybe because what Lestrange said kind of made sense and I flushed at the knowledge that I shouldn't worry, that I was in slytherin and that how I came to be just doesn't matter. That what-ifs were for losers, something that I wasn't.

But Lestrange was foolish, was he not?

"You wouldn't know..." I started, attempting to sort the bundle of ideas tumbling in my mind.

He shrugged. "I don't. Lucius said you were jumpy and to see if I could say something to snap you out of it. He's tired of talking to me apparently and Crabbe and Goyle don't present such good company. Flint is simply a nuisance."

Bloody idiot, I should have known. "You are an idiot, Lestrange." I sneered cruelly. "You don't know what you are talking about."

"I must admit, it may just be a theory. It was something that got me thinking since father hinted at it a few months ago."

"What?"

"He said to think about slytherin while they put on the hat."

"And what were you thinking when the rag was placed on your head?"

He grimaced, standing silently for a few seconds, obviously debating whether to tell the truth or not. "I was thinking..." He looked away. "I was thinking this was a stupid way of deciding and that, maybe, I was a little scared about the house I would end up into. And that I wanted to be where my... where my friends were."

Whatever. Not something I wanted to think about right then, not ever actually. I was just tired; I wanted my bed and my sleep before class tomorrow morning with all the "untutored fools".

"Rodolphus?"

"Hmm?"

"How are we going find the dormitories now?"

"Huh... "

"Idiot. "