Solace of Slytherin; a grandson of Voldemort Story

I Don't Find Trouble (It's Just Half My Charm)

An: at the time of writing the drafts for this, this fic has just recently hit the 20k mark. I never thought that this fic would get this much attention, especially with some of my interpretations and imaginings of the characters. Still, I'm thankful that I get to write about this universe with aspects of characters that I wanted to explore in the books. That being said, enjoy protective Hazel, Nico, and Cat.

At the corner of his eye, Nico sees Hazel fiddle with her wand, trying to familiarize the grooves and smooth surfaces by gliding her fingers over it again and again. He twirls his wand around his own fingers, mimicking the tricks that he's seen Percy do with Riptide. He lets his feet nervously tap as his only indicator of his nerves, to the annoyance of the students next to them. Hazel eyes flit across the room and Nico's own follows. The reflective surface of the multiple picture frames giving him full view of the red head's attention on the both of them.

Nico does a trick with his wand that sends it over the air and caught in between his fingers, Hazel thrums her own in an imitation of an applause.

They both freeze at the slow opening of the door. Tucking his wand back to the table and smoothing over his uniform once more, Bianca made sure to teach him to make a good impression. He closes his eyes and takes a calming breath, steadying his mind and body. Opening his eyes to a sickly sweet grin meeting him.

"Good morning students!"
"Good morning-"

Nico's voice froze at the lack of response from the other students, having stood up to attention to greet Ms. Umbridge like the last school he had gone to almost 5 years ago. Hazel herself was on her way to stand up, but slowly slinked her way down back to her seat seeing no one else stand up. Nico slowly doing the same in shame.

Jesu Christi- Percy said that being too posh with introductions makes you look like prime bullying material when you go to high school.

"So you gotta- y'know- play it off. Hopefully you'll fall back into obscurity and people will stop snickering at you after a week." An internal Percy rattles of his 'totally fool proof forget-it-didn't-work-in-the-last-dozen-or-so-schools' plan to survive high school.

Slumping to his seat in a poster image of nonchalance while trying to ignore the burning sensation from his ears.

Hazel's face was buried  in her hands.

Nico let himself cringe at the approving look Umbridge gave both of them, he wasn't one to be rude but something about her-demeanor set him off.  Like following Bianca to have a private chat with Mr. Thorne- like lambs being corralled to their slaughter.

Only this time Bianca was gone, and this time Nico had to be the one to protect the one sister he had. Scary teachers had to be treated as neutrally as possible. Be as insignificant as possible and they'll take longer to corner you alone to reveal their monstrous sides to eat you, just like the camp orientation film said.

(They also said if all else fails to shout obscenities loud enough that hopefully an adult would be close by and rush what's left of your mutilated body back to the hospital, but Hazel said one needed to manifest positivity to receive positivity. So they got her attention and stood out, but at least she's giving them appraising looks that were less predatory than the manticores. It could get worse-which it won't-)

Nico sighs as the thoughts in his head run wild. Closing his eyes and breathing into the palms now covering his face to cool off. Feeling the comforting shoulder pats from Hazel at least made him feel better.

Yeah, really embarrassing introduction and now the teacher was making the other kids do it. This is definitely already the worst first day of school. No way it can get worser, not by the rules of grammar and self-gaslighting.
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