Why We Fight

Part 8:
Sorting Out the Sorting
(Saturday, September 3, 1977 - Continued...)

To say that Hermione Granger was simply shocked about the day's events was like saying that Earth reversing its orbit around the Sun was just a "little change." Hermione "Know-it-All, Prefect Mudblood" Granger had just been Sorted into Slytherin House. And was making friends with her loathed Potions professor and future Head of Slytherin House, Severus Snape. Hermione was amazed at how wrong she'd been about the sallow-faced, hook-nosed prat of a man. He was actually quite -- perish the thought -- nice. Ron and Harry were going to be having kittens when they read about it in her journal.

"Hermione?" Snape asked as he noticed the secretive grin on her face.

"I was just thinking of my friends," Hermione stated. "They'd never think I'd be...here."

"Here?" Snape asked, arching a black brow curiously.

"In Slytherin," she clarified. "I must have read Hogwarts, A History a hundred times...I'm just not used to the thought of being a Slytherin." She would never add the fact that she was Muggle-born, God knows what the Slytherins would do to her if they found out.

"What's wrong with being a Slytherin?" Snape asked with a smirk.

"Well...I just never thought myself to be that ambitious...other than schoolwork, of course. I'm dead clever; I could've seen myself as a Ravenclaw. I'm a loyal friend; I could've been a Hufflepuff. I guess...I'm brave, I could have been a Gryffindor," she murmured, blushing.

"The Sorting Hat sees inside you. It wouldn't have put you in Slytherin if it didn't think you'd make a good Slytherin," Snape explained.

She nodded. This is totally and completely unbelievable, Hermione thought. I'm having a heart-to-heart with Snape. She shivered off the weird sensation she was getting from this. "I've heard a lot of bad things about Slytherins," the brunette finally admitted.

Snape nodded. "It's understandable," he stated.

Hermione looked at him curiously. "That's all you can say? 'It's understandable'?" she asked.

---

Across the room, Draco, the Marauders and Lily watched the Slytherins. A few other Gryffindors noticed the way the blonde was watching the new Slytherin and Severus Snape. "Bloody hell, Snivellus is actually talking to a girl," a Gryffindor stated.

---

Snape hadn't answered Hermione's question, his gaze had settled on the blonde woman that had been making out with Lucius Malfoy the night before. There was a niggling feeling of recognition in the back of her mind. "Who is that?" she asked.

"That's Narcissa Black," Snape said, his voice had a saccharine edge to it. Snape...fancies Draco's mum? Hermione thought, forcing back laughter. Narcissa was a pretty blonde woman, her riotous golden curls framing an angelic face and her bright blue eyes danced as she laughed. Lucius -- no, no, Malfoy Senior -- must have given Draco -- bloody hell, Malfoy -- his eyes, Hermione noted. She frowned as she realized that she'd been paying enough attention to Draco to know his eye color. Hermione shook off that thought and noticed that Narcissa didn't have the look that Hermione had seen on her before: the look of someone that had smelled something rotten. Maybe it had been Lucius's influence?

The blonde looked young and carefree and Hermione felt a wince of sympathy for her. In three years, Narcissa Black would be married to Lucius Malfoy and have that horrible prat of a son named Draco. The brunette scowled across the room at Draco and he smirked in return. She turned to face Severus. "You fancy Narcissa?" Hermione asked.

Severus Snape's face flushed crimson and he stammered. "Er...well...I...um," he stuttered.

Hermione giggled. "Oh, so you do fancy her," she stated and Severus gave her a less-practiced version of the scowl that he sent so many Gryffindors -- especially her -- in the future. She was chastised. The brunette instantly stopped her laughter and began to examine the bacon and eggs on her plate like it was the most interesting thing she'd ever seen.

"Sorry. It's...just..." he sighed. Hermione was still caught on the part where Severus Snape had said he was sorry. "My family used to be one of the greatest pureblood wizarding families. Then my father--" his dark eyes hardened to the look that Hermione was most familiar with "--he gambled away our fortunes...and the family name was tarnished. There's no way Narcissa would ever..."

Hermione had the strongest urge to comfort her potions professor. She patted his back and he flinched but he didn't pull away. "She's not good enough for you, Severus," she reassured him, rubbing her hand in comforting circles.

Realization dawned on her about his flinch...she had read in a psychology book that sometimes people that were abused were more likely to pull away from human interaction. Mingling it with the visions that Harry had gotten from Snape during their Occlumency lessons made a picture that Hermione didn't want. Snape's father had abused him. Her jaw clenched and she wanted nothing more than to hit her professor's father good and hard with some kind of nasty hex.

---

Sirius saw the scowl that Hermione sent Draco's way and the wheels in his head began to turn. The two obviously weren't a couple as Draco had proclaimed the night before. A smirk lifted the corner of his mouth and fell away as he noticed the flush creep over Severus's sallow skin. She laughed at his expression, golden-brown eyes filled with mirth and silvery tears. He sent her a glare and she was instantly serious again.

Sirius fought his urge to beat Severus to a bloody pulp while Draco watched, amused. The blonde frowned as he noticed something. Had Snape been looking at his mother? He blanched as a sudden unwanted vision of Narcissa Malfoy and Severus Snape involved in a clandestine affair made his stomach roil and his hands clench.

Sirius frowned as he noticed the sudden angry/sickened expression that passed over Draco's face and believed it was caused by Hermione's closeness to Snape. He sighed. Apparently, they were involved after all.