A Tale of Two Brothers

Chapter 17

"I think we should go and talk to Albus. Harry hasn't even answered the howler. He has to have listened to it." Lily paced around the study, toying with the thirtieth letter they'd written so far.

Harry had not sent them even a single word ever since going to Hogwarts.

At first, they'd tried to ignore it by thinking that it was probably all the excitement and wonder that made him forget about writing a letter. But then, three days went by, and no letter came through. They'd written and sent a letter themselves, asking Harry about how he was and how he found Hogwarts, but they got no reply. Three more letters followed it, but they still weren't answered.

It was then they'd contacted Bill and got to know about Harry's sorting.

Harry was sorted into Slytherin.

It was a huge shock, to be truthful. They hadn't, even in their wildest dreams, had thought that their son would be sorted into the house of snakes.

Lily was very ashamed of it, but it had taken them an entire day to get over that fact.

Five more letters followed, assuring their little boy that they did not mind Harry being a Slytherin, that in fact, they were very happy for and proud of him. That they had always thought that there was a possibility of him being sorted into Slytherin. But still, they received no letter.

And thinking more about it, they thought about Harry's behaviour and everything, it was perfect. Harry was and always had been a Slytherin, they realized. All of them had just stupidly assumed that he'd be a Gryffindor just because they were. Now that they thought about it, they should've never forced their assumptions and biases about the houses in Hogwarts on their children.

Their poor baby was probably in a very difficult place right now.

And it was all their fault.

"I've tried." James said. He was sitting on the chair in front of the desk, tapping his quill on the blank parchment. "And he can't help us. Apparently, parents can't come to meet their children when they're at school unless it's an emergency, of course. And by emergency, they mean life-or-death situations. So that means unless our child isn't on the brink of death, I can't fucking meet him."

"James."

"It's stupid, Lily. Who made those rules again, huh? Probably some fucking old men with five wives who didn't care about their own children even when one of them died at their fucking cigar table or something. No, they cared more about what? Moving staircases which are so inconvenient makes you want to blast them into pieces. Or those disappearing–"

The fireplace roared up, and Regulus stepped out of it.

"Is he ranting about the staircases again, Lily?" He hugged her and gave a bag full of books about Salazar Slytherin and his house to James. "Though I can say, his points are very valid. I remember one of the older students had actually blasted one of them off during my second year or something. Poor bloke was late to transfiguration, and Minerva wouldn't listen to anyone, so he used a bombarda maxima of all things. Luckily, not many were out, but three students got fractures. One Ravenclaw and two Puffs. They were happy there wasn't any Gryffindor, or the incident might've escalated badly. Cassius was suspended for three weeks after that, though."

James took out one huge tome and opened it.

"Severus said no, by the way." Regulus said. His face gave away that the potions professor said more than just a simple no.

An awkward silence followed his words. Severus Snape was an entirely different topic for them.

"How do you think Harry will be, right now?" James said, turning the pages of the tomb.