Pariah: The Other Malfoy

Chapter 9: Feuds

The reaction was instantaneous. The Slytherin Quidditch team moved in front of Draco, yelling at me and protecting him from further harm, while my teammates moved in front of me, all wanting a piece of my brother for themselves. Draco had said that word in front of the wrong crowd, no doubt about it.

"I'm telling father about this," Draco hissed at me and I laughed slightly.

"Go ahead. See if I care," I said, "But don't ever speak to my friends like that."

"What is going on here?" It was Snape, great, "I believe I gave permission for the Slytherin team to practice."

"She punched Draco in the face," one of the Slytherin members said instantly, resulting in a roar of argument from my team, trying to explain Draco's actions.

"Five points from Gryffindor," Snape fixed me with a hard stare, "Miss Malfoy, with me. Gryffindors, leave the Slytherins to practice before I find reason to take even more points off."

I clenched my fists but followed Snape silently, my team talking amongst themselves, clearly annoyed. I hoped Hermione wouldn't feel too bad about what my brother said, he was an idiot. This time last year, I probably wouldn't have even noticed what Draco had said, it was too often in my own vocabulary. But after a year being friends with Hermione and the boys, my knee jerk reaction to the word mudblood was fury.

"Explain yourself," Snape said once we were at his office.

"Draco called Hermione a mudblood," I said quietly, "It was a natural reaction..."

"And how do you think your father will react when he finds out?" Snape continued.

"No worse than he usually does when he sees me, I'd assume," I shot back, annoyance clear in my voice.

"Lyra, though I agree that your brother's actions were despicable, I would also say to you to be careful. You have to watch out for yourself, not always others," Snape said.

"If it wasn't for my friends, I wouldn't even know mudblood was such a despicable term, I wouldn't know blood purity is nonsense, I wouldn't know that I wasn't superior to everyone else," I said, "The least I can do is punch my brother in the face when he's being an idiot."

"I can only help you so far," Snape sighed, "But if you insist on angering your father, there's not much I can do."

"I can handle myself," I said.

"Very well. Dismissed," he said with a sigh and I left to find my friends.

"Thank you, Lyra," Hermione said the moment I joined them, "But you really shouldn't have."

"He's my brother," I said, "I won't stand by and watch him use vile terms like that against my friends. He deserved it."

"What did Snape want?" Ron asked.

"He was warning me that my father would be furious and he wasn't going to be able to help me," I sighed.

"He's right, your father won't be happy," Harry said quietly, "What will he do to you?"

"There's nothing he can do while I'm at Hogwarts," I said, "I'll have done something else to annoy him by the time the Christmas holidays come, so it won't matter."

"Did... did your father really buy brooms for the entire Slytherin team... and..." Tobias trailed off, staring at me sadly.

"Yeah, after my sorting I haven't had a great relationship with my parents," I pretended to shrug nonchalantly, "Its fine. I don't want anything from them anyway."