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rarepair_shorts
Title: II. Slytherin (adjective) does not describe Slytherin (noun).
Pairing: Minerva McGonnagall/Tom Riddle
Prompt: Misnomer
Rating: G (again!)
Word Count: 1498 (Sorry!) I have an excuse - it's the important-later-on encyclopaedia intro.
Summary: Tom might have missed the Blitz, but Fall Seelöwe - the invasion of England - looms. He's been evacuated to the country and by Merlin, he's not happy.
Author's Notes: In spite of my best efforts, I think I've dislocated the historical timeline by a few months. 'Operation Sealion', Göring and Raeder belong to Hitler - the Reichsmarschall wouldn't fit through my door anyway - and the term Gezaubererpolizei (literally 'magic police') belongs to Valdhery's HP fic Of Snakes and Foxes. I did mean to submit this before I left for Germany in January,but I forgot. Oops.
Link to Prompt Table: Progress is in the Prompt Table
The index cited a total of ninety-two biographies, six hundred and four contributions to major elements of modern magic, one family tree and two portraits. Another one of Lucius Tiddlypuss' Never-Blow-Out Finest Hippogriff-Wax Candles sputtered into its death throes at a blast of wind. Perhaps Black had realised someone was...redistributing...his possessions after all. A half-hissed curse fled his lips. although there was no-one nearby to hear.
"Riddle!"
A shadow appeared at his door, defined only by the corona of light from the corridor. A new...inmate...by his voice and his forced bravado. Father shot at Dunkirk? Mother drinking herself to death? He couldn't raise a shred of sympathy. If the Muggles would fight these senseless wars, they might at least consider the consequences.
"Matron wants you. Not in the office, in the sitting room."
The imperious summons was ruined by the boy's stifled yawn. At this hour? Mad, she was. Mad, superstitious, certainly stupid and occasionally none too sober, "Missus Cole," (Matron's chosen sobriquet) embodied everything despicable about the Muggle world. He concealed the magical items he'd saved from confiscation as best he could in a room that managed to be bare and cramped simultaneously.
He couldn't even keep his wand when faced by a Muggle with a rusty poker. Marvolo. Slytherin. Even the book mocked him.
"I realise rumour-mongering is bad for morale, but is there an invasion? We had Ger-ring with his air raids, so perhaps the navy will be just as hopeless?" gushed Matron.
Göring was probably the spelling, Tom thought. Any hours in the orphanage found him devouring whatever knowledge came to hand - or from theft - in great, hungry gulps. Languages were always useful, so he'd started on those. A false, unfamiliar, laugh, a clink of teacup on saucer.
"My apologies, Matron, Mrs - ?" he paused in the doorway, raised eyebrow and charm in place.
"Mrs. Umbridge-" began Matron.
"Call me Dolores!"
"Dolores is here to arrange evacuation for you poor young things to the countryside. I thought she would like to see how responsible and well-mannered the children are, especially our star pupil!"
If there were any truth in that sentence he'd transfigure Dumbledore into a tap-dancing canary during the Sorting. A deformed, pustulant one. Minerva would never speak to him again!
Punishment notwithstanding, the idea was very tempting.
"My pleasure. Does this mean it's Raeder's turn with the Navy, or is it Grindelwald's and the Gezaupo?"
"Oh, isn't he well-informed!" beamed the elder Umbridge.
So the Gezaubererpolizei really did exist, instead of being Prophet propaganda. Reginald Skeeter might have been right about the wizarding offshoot of the Gestapo. A rare occurrence for the tabloid king.
"I don't think my husband will mind if we take him in. It'll be one less billet to find at any rate."
The look on Matron's face! Enchanting! How would she talk her way out of this one?
"Certainly. We'll put him on the same evacuation train as the others."
Two months stuck with the Umbridges. Cow. Not even magic could make up for that!
For the second time in as many weeks Tom plunged into the seething mass of humanity at King's Cross station. A bandaged soldier swayed unsteadily past him. Tom caught only 'Spook Division', 'Rommel' and 'St. Valery' before his mates prevented him from blundering off the platform. Pity. He sucked in an unwilling breath, trying to control his temper. All this fuss over a bit of Poland!
"Have you all got your gas masks and bags? Follow me!"
While the rest of the orphans fumbled with string-knotted cases and unfamiliar equipment, Tom slid his way to the group nearest the barrier. If he could just slip through he'd be at Hogsmeade in three days: he had no fear of walking along the tracks. The coin acquired from those house-mates too stupid or lazy to do their own homework would last for -- how long? Never having had any money before, Tom realised, he had no idea what things cost.
The barrier was more resilient than usual; the colours dancing across his vision too bright, too complex in their embroidery across the fabric of reality; the tingling of magic in his veins sharp and thorny. Go back, go back, go back! Concealment be damned! His mind shrieked at finding the loopholes and he slammed into something, stripped of thought, hearing and vision.
"Merlin and Circe! Sincerest apologies!"
Tom sucked in air while his eyes presented a blurry sketch of silvery hair and tanned face above a broad, muscular frame encased in navy robes.
"Julius? Tell me how you slithered from Hades, you snake!"
"Not Julius, but I feel as if I've been dragged from the underworld," Tom replied dryly.
"Er...ah. Perhaps you'd better sit down until I find your parents. You look a bit peaky, lad. I'll get my daughter to look after you - if she ever turns up in this mess," his assailant snapped, voice transforming from awkward to annoyed.
Tom caught a flash of gold on the robes: crossed wands above the dragon of St. George. Gods, he'd walked straight into the head of the Auror department, Sir William-
"Pa!" shrieked a voice, before Sir William embraced a blur of dark hair and long legs.
Had the ground split open before him, Tom would have happily leaped into the molten rock beneath. He fixed his eyes on a crack in the barrier and his ears on the mindless hum of surrounding chatter, ignoring the emerald robes which encased her figure so well and would inevitably, he thought grimly, lend a green tinge to those lovely grey eyes; pointedly avoiding the fond paternal conversation which he had always been denied.
Coward, chided his mind. He shrugged involuntarily. That didn't bother him: the distinguishing trait of his House was astute duplicitousness - and perhaps moral flexibility. He wasn't a Gryffindor with their strange prerequisites of bravery and self-sacrifice.
Yet a Master of the Dark Arts must have nerves of adamant.
But he would also recognise discretion as being the better part of valour, surely.
"Tom!" Minerva exclaimed, looking at him with undisguised curiosity.
"You're classmates then? Why don't you and Minerva catch up while I find Jul--Tom's parents and I'll see you back here?"
"I, I don't have any, Sir William," Tom put in swiftly.
He flushed slightly under Minerva's gaze, certain that the brown tag on him made him look like some kind of human post - and he felt a damn fool already!
" 'T. M. Riddle, c/o Mrs. Dolores Umbridge'," quoted her father discreetly, eyeing the tag.
"Oh, that. I'm being put up wither her for the duration of the summer."
"You mean you have to put up with her," joked Minerva. "She set my hair on fire in Charms," she clarified.
The faintest of smiles broke through Tom's sour expression.
"And other things besides, if the rumours are true," Tom added.
"Your House rumours at any rate. I don't know how you stand sharing the same common room - with her brother too!"
"You would be a Slytherin, wouldn't you?" her father murmured, almost unaware of saying it.
"You wouldn't mind if--" Minerva began, eyes alight.
"No, Minnie."
"Father! Must you call me that?"
The young lady flushed several shades of scarlet in as many seconds, avoiding Tom's eyes. Fine with him - she wouldn't see that state of his clothes. They drooped from his thin frame anyway after weeks of rationing. His threadbare shoelaces. His uncombed hair. That bloody postage tag.
"Special Executive hasn't vetted him," the Auror-General clarified.
"Surely they'd allow Tom - he's hardly dangerous! And...and how would he have passed through the barrier unvetted?"
Point for her then. How had he done it?
Meanwhile, Sir William looked spectacularly unconvinced. Tom couldn't even manipulate a total stranger! A fine Slytherin he made.
"Wait here," the Auror-General ordered. He whirled to face Tom again. "What does the M stand for?"
Riddle met his gaze guilelessly. "Marvolo."
"Of course," Sir William snorted.
He stalked off. Well, wasn't this nice?
"He isn't always like that," Minerva muttered.
"It doesn't matter," he managed to reply. "Thank you for, well, for offering to take me in."
At least he was talking to her scalp. Were Minerva staring at his face rather than her shoes, he might become distracted. He did tend to spout, if not nonsense, at least the obvious under her scrutiny.
"I thought you might be lonely in the -- I mean, without your Housemates. And it isn't as if the Umbridges are pleasant," she rushed out, as if saying the words faster made them more palatable.
"Yes. I often wish I had company. Not, not that I want visitors exactly, just someone with whom to talk."
He certainly did not want visitors. That he had found his magic alone and friendless, instead of in the castle which should have been his heritage; that he had blundered along the road to his Art instead of being guided by someone else who knew what it was to have that power; those had been the bitterest disappointments in his life. God forbid anyone should turn up at that hellhole and see what he was truly like!
"I'll show you to the civilian train Minnie," remarked her father.
"Must you leave already?"
He eyed Tom for a minute, ignoring his daughter's plea.
"You too. SOE cleared you for residence -- but don't either of you dare enter the operations wing, you hear me?"
"Yes, Father."
"Of course, Sir William," he remarked innocently.
Pairing: Minerva McGonnagall/Tom Riddle
Prompt: Misnomer
Rating: G (again!)
Word Count: 1498 (Sorry!) I have an excuse - it's the important-later-on encyclopaedia intro.
Summary: Tom might have missed the Blitz, but Fall Seelöwe - the invasion of England - looms. He's been evacuated to the country and by Merlin, he's not happy.
Author's Notes: In spite of my best efforts, I think I've dislocated the historical timeline by a few months. 'Operation Sealion', Göring and Raeder belong to Hitler - the Reichsmarschall wouldn't fit through my door anyway - and the term Gezaubererpolizei (literally 'magic police') belongs to Valdhery's HP fic Of Snakes and Foxes. I did mean to submit this before I left for Germany in January,but I forgot. Oops.
Link to Prompt Table: Progress is in the Prompt Table
Marvolo
Family II 313-457 illus. 320
Game, role in I 14-17
Magic,
advancement of III 1, 3, 26-45, 102-314,
theory IV 2, 7, 29-36, 77-79, 93, 95,
also see by name (M-theory etc.)
also see by discipline (Alchemy, Dark Arts, etc.)
Slytherin,
association with House I 14
Individuals
The index cited a total of ninety-two biographies, six hundred and four contributions to major elements of modern magic, one family tree and two portraits. Another one of Lucius Tiddlypuss' Never-Blow-Out Finest Hippogriff-Wax Candles sputtered into its death throes at a blast of wind. Perhaps Black had realised someone was...redistributing...his possessions after all. A half-hissed curse fled his lips. although there was no-one nearby to hear.
"Riddle!"
A shadow appeared at his door, defined only by the corona of light from the corridor. A new...inmate...by his voice and his forced bravado. Father shot at Dunkirk? Mother drinking herself to death? He couldn't raise a shred of sympathy. If the Muggles would fight these senseless wars, they might at least consider the consequences.
"Matron wants you. Not in the office, in the sitting room."
The imperious summons was ruined by the boy's stifled yawn. At this hour? Mad, she was. Mad, superstitious, certainly stupid and occasionally none too sober, "Missus Cole," (Matron's chosen sobriquet) embodied everything despicable about the Muggle world. He concealed the magical items he'd saved from confiscation as best he could in a room that managed to be bare and cramped simultaneously.
He couldn't even keep his wand when faced by a Muggle with a rusty poker. Marvolo. Slytherin. Even the book mocked him.
"I realise rumour-mongering is bad for morale, but is there an invasion? We had Ger-ring with his air raids, so perhaps the navy will be just as hopeless?" gushed Matron.
Göring was probably the spelling, Tom thought. Any hours in the orphanage found him devouring whatever knowledge came to hand - or from theft - in great, hungry gulps. Languages were always useful, so he'd started on those. A false, unfamiliar, laugh, a clink of teacup on saucer.
"My apologies, Matron, Mrs - ?" he paused in the doorway, raised eyebrow and charm in place.
"Mrs. Umbridge-" began Matron.
"Call me Dolores!"
"Dolores is here to arrange evacuation for you poor young things to the countryside. I thought she would like to see how responsible and well-mannered the children are, especially our star pupil!"
If there were any truth in that sentence he'd transfigure Dumbledore into a tap-dancing canary during the Sorting. A deformed, pustulant one. Minerva would never speak to him again!
Punishment notwithstanding, the idea was very tempting.
"My pleasure. Does this mean it's Raeder's turn with the Navy, or is it Grindelwald's and the Gezaupo?"
"Oh, isn't he well-informed!" beamed the elder Umbridge.
So the Gezaubererpolizei really did exist, instead of being Prophet propaganda. Reginald Skeeter might have been right about the wizarding offshoot of the Gestapo. A rare occurrence for the tabloid king.
"I don't think my husband will mind if we take him in. It'll be one less billet to find at any rate."
The look on Matron's face! Enchanting! How would she talk her way out of this one?
"Certainly. We'll put him on the same evacuation train as the others."
Two months stuck with the Umbridges. Cow. Not even magic could make up for that!
For the second time in as many weeks Tom plunged into the seething mass of humanity at King's Cross station. A bandaged soldier swayed unsteadily past him. Tom caught only 'Spook Division', 'Rommel' and 'St. Valery' before his mates prevented him from blundering off the platform. Pity. He sucked in an unwilling breath, trying to control his temper. All this fuss over a bit of Poland!
"Have you all got your gas masks and bags? Follow me!"
While the rest of the orphans fumbled with string-knotted cases and unfamiliar equipment, Tom slid his way to the group nearest the barrier. If he could just slip through he'd be at Hogsmeade in three days: he had no fear of walking along the tracks. The coin acquired from those house-mates too stupid or lazy to do their own homework would last for -- how long? Never having had any money before, Tom realised, he had no idea what things cost.
The barrier was more resilient than usual; the colours dancing across his vision too bright, too complex in their embroidery across the fabric of reality; the tingling of magic in his veins sharp and thorny. Go back, go back, go back! Concealment be damned! His mind shrieked at finding the loopholes and he slammed into something, stripped of thought, hearing and vision.
"Merlin and Circe! Sincerest apologies!"
Tom sucked in air while his eyes presented a blurry sketch of silvery hair and tanned face above a broad, muscular frame encased in navy robes.
"Julius? Tell me how you slithered from Hades, you snake!"
"Not Julius, but I feel as if I've been dragged from the underworld," Tom replied dryly.
"Er...ah. Perhaps you'd better sit down until I find your parents. You look a bit peaky, lad. I'll get my daughter to look after you - if she ever turns up in this mess," his assailant snapped, voice transforming from awkward to annoyed.
Tom caught a flash of gold on the robes: crossed wands above the dragon of St. George. Gods, he'd walked straight into the head of the Auror department, Sir William-
"Pa!" shrieked a voice, before Sir William embraced a blur of dark hair and long legs.
Had the ground split open before him, Tom would have happily leaped into the molten rock beneath. He fixed his eyes on a crack in the barrier and his ears on the mindless hum of surrounding chatter, ignoring the emerald robes which encased her figure so well and would inevitably, he thought grimly, lend a green tinge to those lovely grey eyes; pointedly avoiding the fond paternal conversation which he had always been denied.
Coward, chided his mind. He shrugged involuntarily. That didn't bother him: the distinguishing trait of his House was astute duplicitousness - and perhaps moral flexibility. He wasn't a Gryffindor with their strange prerequisites of bravery and self-sacrifice.
Yet a Master of the Dark Arts must have nerves of adamant.
But he would also recognise discretion as being the better part of valour, surely.
"Tom!" Minerva exclaimed, looking at him with undisguised curiosity.
"You're classmates then? Why don't you and Minerva catch up while I find Jul--Tom's parents and I'll see you back here?"
"I, I don't have any, Sir William," Tom put in swiftly.
He flushed slightly under Minerva's gaze, certain that the brown tag on him made him look like some kind of human post - and he felt a damn fool already!
" 'T. M. Riddle, c/o Mrs. Dolores Umbridge'," quoted her father discreetly, eyeing the tag.
"Oh, that. I'm being put up wither her for the duration of the summer."
"You mean you have to put up with her," joked Minerva. "She set my hair on fire in Charms," she clarified.
The faintest of smiles broke through Tom's sour expression.
"And other things besides, if the rumours are true," Tom added.
"Your House rumours at any rate. I don't know how you stand sharing the same common room - with her brother too!"
"You would be a Slytherin, wouldn't you?" her father murmured, almost unaware of saying it.
"You wouldn't mind if--" Minerva began, eyes alight.
"No, Minnie."
"Father! Must you call me that?"
The young lady flushed several shades of scarlet in as many seconds, avoiding Tom's eyes. Fine with him - she wouldn't see that state of his clothes. They drooped from his thin frame anyway after weeks of rationing. His threadbare shoelaces. His uncombed hair. That bloody postage tag.
"Special Executive hasn't vetted him," the Auror-General clarified.
"Surely they'd allow Tom - he's hardly dangerous! And...and how would he have passed through the barrier unvetted?"
Point for her then. How had he done it?
Meanwhile, Sir William looked spectacularly unconvinced. Tom couldn't even manipulate a total stranger! A fine Slytherin he made.
"Wait here," the Auror-General ordered. He whirled to face Tom again. "What does the M stand for?"
Riddle met his gaze guilelessly. "Marvolo."
"Of course," Sir William snorted.
He stalked off. Well, wasn't this nice?
"He isn't always like that," Minerva muttered.
"It doesn't matter," he managed to reply. "Thank you for, well, for offering to take me in."
At least he was talking to her scalp. Were Minerva staring at his face rather than her shoes, he might become distracted. He did tend to spout, if not nonsense, at least the obvious under her scrutiny.
"I thought you might be lonely in the -- I mean, without your Housemates. And it isn't as if the Umbridges are pleasant," she rushed out, as if saying the words faster made them more palatable.
"Yes. I often wish I had company. Not, not that I want visitors exactly, just someone with whom to talk."
He certainly did not want visitors. That he had found his magic alone and friendless, instead of in the castle which should have been his heritage; that he had blundered along the road to his Art instead of being guided by someone else who knew what it was to have that power; those had been the bitterest disappointments in his life. God forbid anyone should turn up at that hellhole and see what he was truly like!
"I'll show you to the civilian train Minnie," remarked her father.
"Must you leave already?"
He eyed Tom for a minute, ignoring his daughter's plea.
"You too. SOE cleared you for residence -- but don't either of you dare enter the operations wing, you hear me?"
"Yes, Father."
"Of course, Sir William," he remarked innocently.
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