Begotten

“Professor, I—“

“Save it, Miss Priel,” Snape said, holding a hand up. “It may be the winter holidays, but students are still not permitted to wander the corridors.”

“I know, I just—“

“So you knowingly broke the rules?” He lifted an eyebrow, sitting perfectly still in all black with one long leg crossed over the other.

“Yes, but—“

“I don’t like docking points from my own house. However…” There was no getting a word in edgewise. The bat-like man stood up, towering over Moriah and peering down at her as he wrapped his robes around himself. “I think a detention scrubbing cauldrons will be enough to deter you from anymore rule-breaking.”

Moriah, usually a very well-behaved young girl, scowled up at the professor, not even trying to hide her anger and burst out without thinking, “What are you even doing up? It’s, like, two in the morning!”

The professor puffed up, eyes shining dangerously. “Not that it’s any of your business, but I was having a very important conversation with Professor Quirrel and decided to make sure everything in the common room was well.” She didn’t buy it. “Especially since you’ve taken to spending time with Potter. He’s a meddlesome boy with whom I don’t want my students associating with.”

Moriah made a show of rolling her eyes, almost begging him to slap her. She had been tired of Snape after her first Potions class.

“What are you, a Malfoy?” She spouted off, and his lips thinned. “You sound like Draco, and he’s eleven years old! Harry is a perfectly decent person and he doesn’t going around terrorizing other students!”

The blonde had no idea where all of this was coming from. Perhaps all of her frustration and confusion was coming to a head. She was sick of all of the questions about her own family and the cryptic hints she continued to get. Snape was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Taking a step toward her, he lowered his head just slightly. “You might want to mind your attitude, Miss Priel. You don’t want to get on my bad side.”

She laughed. “Do you have a good side?”

The sallow-faced man just stared at her, upper lip twitching, before he turned away and walked toward the door to the common room.

“Detention next Saturday at nine o’clock.”

“Fine.”

He let out a sort of scoff, then walked out. As soon as the door shut behind him, Moriah mumbled, “Bloody git,” before retiring to the dormitory and lying down in her bed.

There was no way she was going to be able to get to sleep, too angry at Snape and too caught up on the mirror.



“You really said that to him and didn’t get hexed?”

“Not a scratch on me,” Moriah beamed.

Currently, she was walking with Ron and Harry to class, both of them in awe of her Snape story and the way she had spouted off.

“Granted, I probably wouldn’t have done that if I wasn’t so shaken up thanks to someone—Harry grinned—“but it felt really good. Why does he have to be my head of house?”

“Look at it this way,” Ron started with his mouth full of a muffin from breakfast. “You’re doing the rest of us a favor. Slytherin has him so no one else has to.”

Moriah rolled her eyes. She wanted to ask why she was even in Slytherin, but she knew well. It was her blood.

“Anyway, I’ve got detention this Saturday, so do your best to get into some trouble and join me.”

“I’m sure we will,” Harry laughed. They had a certain talent for attracted attention when they least needed it.

Winter break was over, and all of the students of Hogwarts had returned to the school. Lessons were starting back up that day, and unfortunately, Moriah was to end her day with double potions. Until then, she would get to impress Professor McGonagall and Professor Flitwick with her skills in Transfiguration and Charms. She hoped it would balance out the horror of Potions.

“You know, Snape tends to favor his own students above all else, but I reckon he doesn’t like you very much, Moriah.”

“I agree with you. I’m rotten at Potions, and talking back to him like I did was probably the last nail in my coffin. I’m failing his class for sure, now.”

All three of them walked into the Transfiguration classroom together, looks of disgust on the Slytherin’s faces. Moriah ignored them, though, and took her seat next to Draco. She remembered the earrings from him and turned to thank him only to see that his face was already burning scarlet.

“Draco?” He didn’t look at her. “I just wanted to thank you for—“

“Don’t,” he hissed, and Moriah frowned. “Pansy might hear.”

Cracking a smile, Moriah nodded. “Alright, later then.”

The boy breathed a sigh of relief then turned his attention to Professor McGonagall who began going over how to transfigure animals.

After a rather disastrous lesson resulting in Neville Longbottom’s toad getting turned into a bubbling pile of goo, the students were released. Moriah’s intentions were to catch up with Harry, Ron, and Hermione, but Draco stopped her, grabbing her by the wrist before recoiling when her snake bracelet hissed at him.

“What the bloody hell is that?”

“Oh,” she stroked the tiny serpent. “It was a Christmas gift from Dumbledore.”

Malfoy scoffed and Moriah did her best to ignore it. “Anyway, thanks for the earrings. They were a big surprise. You really didn’t have to.”

A blush began creeping its way up the boy’s neck and Moriah had to fight not to giggle at it.

“Yeah, it was nothing. Mum just asked about friends from school and money obviously isn’t a problem in my family.”

She knew he was doing his best to be nice, but arrogance just came naturally to Draco.

“Right, well, how was your break?”

The two walked together to the charms classroom and Draco told Moriah about his Christmas presents and his paternal grandparents visiting. Apparently, it was all small talk to the blond boy because once they reached the room, he turned his piercing gray eyes on her and asked, “Why’ve you been hanging out with Potter and Weasley so much?”

Moriah shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know. I just have some things in common with them, I suppose.”

“They’re in Gryffindor! And the Weasleys are just about the biggest family of blood traitors around.”

“I don’t care about any of that. Blood purity means nothing to me,” she spat and the girl could feel that fire rising in her again.

“Well, it should. You’ve been placed in the most prestigious house. You shouldn’t taint yourself with wizards like them.”

Moriah just shook her head, gritting her teeth, and walked into the Charms classroom, leaving Draco and his backwards thinking alone at the door.

Taking a seat next to Harry, she noticed that she had interrupted yet another private conversation, and with the residual irritation from Draco, she said in annoyance, “You three have got to stop doing that. If you don’t want me hearing whatever you’re talking about, just tell me not to sit next to you. It’s that simple.”

“It’s not that,” Harry spoke up first. “It’s just—“

Ron elbowed him and Moriah raised her eyebrows at him before sighing and standing back up.

Harry took hold of her robes and pulled her back down, then leaned over and whispered to her. “It’s just important and very secret. Come to Hagrid’s with us this evening and we’ll fill you in.” Hermione and Ron were both staring at him as if he had grown a second head. “What? I think she could help us!”

The thought of being included was a relief, but it hurt a bit to know that, despite how much time she’d spent with the trio, Ron and Hermione were still so distrustful of her. She knew why; it was because of the green and silver that she wore. They wouldn’t fully accept her because of her house and Moriah doubted if they ever would.