The Mark of a Death Eater

Langlock

"Well it's not my fault!" I yelled angrily.

"You can hardly say that. Miss Granger is currently in the hospital wing. If it wasn't for Mr Potter, Mr Weasley and I, she wouldn't have been able to breathe."
I choked on my laughter.
"Serves her right." I sneered.
Professor Snape banged his fist on his table, making me jump. "You're not taking this seriously!" he yelled.
I tried to put on an innocent expression. "Of course I am. It's just, well, she provoked me." I shifted uncomfortably in the hard chair that was facing Snape.

Okay, well, she hadn't provoked me, as such; here's what happened.

After realising I was behind them, the trio spun around angrily. Granger appeared lost for words having been caught in her act but Potter looked angry.
"Speak of the devil," he said. "We were just talking about you."
"Really?" I asked sarcastically. "I couldn't tell. I thought that by freakish, Granger, you were referring to yourself."
Her cheeks turned red and she stuck her chin in the air. "Well, I wasn't." She took a step forward. "See, my hair's not freakishly green."
"Yes, it's a pity," I said. "It could've improved your looks. But I suppose when you're a mudblood there's only so much you can do."

Something snapped in Hermione Granger. She whipped out her wand and pointed it to my chest. I didn't need to, mine never leaves my hand. "I - AM - SICK - OF - EVERYONE - CALLING - ME - A - MUDBLOOD!"
She was yelling, taking a step forward with each word, with which I took a step back.

"That's right, run away, coward." Only Gryffindors were entitled to calling people cowards.
I smiled.
"I'm not running away. I could do you three pathetic no-one's by myself any day. So go ahead." I took a threatening step forward. "Let's see what the Weasel, Mudblood and Chosen One have up their sleeves."
I tilted my head to one side. "Or, is it the Prince now?"

They looked at each other in surprise. "The Prince?" Weasley asked. "Blimey Harry, how'd she know?"
I threw him a disgusted look. "I pride myself in having a few more brain cells than you do Weasley," I said, rolling my eyes.

"Let her go, Hermione..." Potter said tugging on the girl's arm. "She's not worth it."
I laughed. "Do you think I can't hex all three of you right now? Or are you just too cowardly? I thought you Gryffindors were supposed to be brave."
Granger's eyes flashed. "Just go! Leave!" She began to storm away.
"Fine," I said coolly, tossing my head. "Run away from a fight, mudblood. Go get that clumsy oaf Hagrid or Loony Lovegood. I heard she helped you the last time you had a fight."

"That's it!" Weasley spun around, grabbed his wand and yelled something I didn't hear. Instantly, I spun a shield charm around myself. The spell ricochetted off me, and almost rebounded against Weasley, who ducked. It hit Granger instead. For a moment, I expected her to scream. She was clutching at her throat with both hands, but made no sound. Then she fell to the floor and began thrashing wildly. As Potter tried wildly tried to do the counter curse, Professor Snape materialized around the corner. He took one look at the situation, sized it up and made quick work of it. He did the counter curse and told a girl -a third year, I think- to take Granger up to the hospital wing.

After Weasley and Potter explained the story of what happened (ten points from Gryffindor and detention for Weasley for firing the curse), I was called to his office, where I now sat.

Because after Granger sat up, gasping for breath, I simply did the spell on her again. And after Professor Snape did the counter curse and dragged me away from the Golden Trio, I pointed my wand over my shoulder and did the curse on last time. I couldn't even move because I was shaking of laughter. She couldn't breathe -neither could I. I have to admit, had she suffocated it would have been disastrous for me but it was too good an opportunity to resist.

The curse was 'Langlock' and all it was supposed to do is make your tongue glue itself to the roof of your mouth but it had a unique effect on Granger since she had a blocked nose from a cold. My dad taught the curse to me. Apparently one of his friends invented it (that was a rather good bit of magic) and they used it on unsuspecting idiots.

I knew the counter curse, obviously, (it's anapneo) I wouldn't have let her die... I suppose... But now I was sitting in Professor Snape's office.

And he looked very, very angry.

"I don't care what she told you!" he shouted. "You could have seriously injured, or even killed her."
I threw my hands up. "But she's not dead now is she? She's fine. I wouldn't have done it if I hadn't known the counter curse. I mean, I'm cruel, but I'm not that cruel."
Professor Snape shook his head. "Very well... You may leave. Your reputation at the school among the teachers is fairly clean, so consider this a warning. One more time, Miss Evergreen..."
I nodded and tried to appear grateful.

Snape held the door open for me to leave. On my way out, however, I noticed something. Again. Two vials of some silvery blue substance was nestled among several newspaper cuttings. This must've been memories. Shimmering swirly, cloudy stuff for a pensive. I was tempted to sit and stare at them, having never seen real ones, but Snape had ushered me out of the door before I could ask him about it.

I decided to ignore his 'warning'. He could threaten me, but I wasn't afraid of anything they could do to me. I found it hard to be afraid of anything here at Hogwarts.

Of course, death was always an issue.

I remembered doing boggarts with Professor Lupin in the third year. It was interesting doing it, and seeing the fears of others. One of the Ravenclaw girls was afraid of clowns. In any case, my fear was death. Picture the Grim in Reaper standing menacingly over your dead body. Not a pretty picture.

The newspapers I'd seen reminded me of what Malfoy was currently going through. It seemed a little like a dream now. A bad dream. After lunch and all my classes I retreated to the library to do some reasearch. I had offered to help, hadn't I?

After an exhausting two hours of digging through histories, I found nothing useful except that my mother's father's family was know for sticking up for goblin rights some odd years ago. All death eaters that sought protection and disclosed information to the Ministry were safe for a while. But that was when You-Know-Who was defeated in Godrics Hollow. Now that he was back, well, alot of those people were killed. I groaned. This would not lift Malfoy's spirits. I pictured him in dark robes, acting like a Death-Eater. Casting dark marks over buildings, killing people ...

Even if it was muggles who deserved to be killed? a particularly nasty voice that I often tried to push down whispered in my mind. No, I thought firmly. People are people. No-one deserves to be killed like that. Or at all for that matter. I had tried so many times to recondition the thoughts and beliefs that came along with years of pure blooded pride and entitlement. It was difficult, and I hated that I was struggling to be a decent person.

What makes you different from death eaters, then?

My morals, I hissed back at that stupid voice.

I grabbed the books I hadn't yet read through (including a book on Arithmancy for homework) and handed them to Madam Prince. She looked at me questioning my as she regarded the titles.
"Background reading," I said, taking a leaf out of Malfoy's book. I pulled them away from her as she began to flip through them. "They weren't in the restricted section," I said truthfully.

I had an ancient runes test for the next day as well as an essay to do on the history of Arithmancy. I sighed as I made my way to my dorm. Things were certainly not looking up for me today.

And as luck would have it, they wasn't going to get much better.