Harry Potter fic--gen.
May. 10th, 2005 08:57 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cygna_himeDo I get points for fandom originality? Genfic's a rare beast.
Three Things They Don't Tell You
A brief commentary by Regulus Black on what the world would have you believe about himself, his school, and his House.
Something they don’t tell you about Hogwarts: House traits aren’t all or nothing.
Nine people in ten could fit in more than one House. The Sorting Hat picks out the strongest traits, and makes the Houses come out more or less equal. As far as personalities go, each House has as many as any school does. They aren’t always the ones you’d think of, either. There are more traits to the Houses than the ones they’re best known for.
For example: My best friend, Greg, one of the sneakiest Ravenclaws you’d ever see, and his brother Ted, one of the thickest Slytherins. For example: Myra, Greg’s girl, who’s not much for studying, though there’s no one quicker with a witty comeback—or a comforting word, if it comes to that. For example: Corin Carver, a Hufflepuff sixth year who works as hard as anything for himself, and not at all for anyone else. For example: Certain Gryffindor seventh-years who hardly have a name for honour. For example: me.
I know I’m what they call (though they shouldn’t) sure Slytherin material: old blood, old money, old magic. They say it as though half the school isn’t third-generation magical or more. The Blacks are older than most, which is worth being proud of, but we’ve money and property enough that we would never dream of trading on the name. I was always told that what the name didn’t matter, but what I did with it did. That’s the way the Black family works.
I’m not particularly fond of the Dark Arts, either. Mother wishes I were, so she could teach me all about her favorite hobby, but—how could I want to do something with my mother? It’s her pastime, not mine, no matter how much she drags me into Knockturn Alley or teaches me spells that take more than they give. I have to study the Dark Arts when she asks, or there will be trouble, but it’s not something I want to do. I don’t know yet what I want to do with my life, but it’s not going to be studying spells written in the Dark Ages. It’ll be something completely new, and all mine.
Something they don’t tell you about Slytherin: I fit in here just fine.
Not everyone ends up in the same group; there are hundreds of us in Slytherin alone, we’ve got more than enough people to split off. There’s a Dark Arts group, some who actually like it and some whose parents make them (one good thing about my embarrassment of a brother is that whatever I do looks good by comparison), and two at least of people who are planning on going into politics, and want to make the ‘right’ friends, and the Quidditch-obsessed, and so on. My group—though it isn’t mine, but Henry’s, if it’s anyone’s—isn’t any of those. We’re all purebloods, of course, second-generation at the very least (Lillith Arken’s mother was only a halfblood, though we don’t hold it against her), but as I said before, most are. We’re mixed Houses, mostly Slytherin and Ravenclaw, with a few Hufflepuffs and the very occasional Gryffindor who isn’t scared of what the Boresome Foursome say about ‘fraternizing with Slytherins’. We go to all the Quidditch games, though we don’t play (bar my second cousin Mordred, who’s a reserve Chaser for Slytherin); we more or less are the Gobstones and chess clubs; we sit in the more comfortable of the empty rooms to study together, since some people (the politicians-to-be and the Boresome Foursome, yet again) get upset about other Houses in their common rooms; we mind our own business, more or less, and let the rest of the school mind theirs. We’re nothing special, really.
It can be a problem. Whenever I go home over Christmas, Mother gives me a lecture about how I should be making ‘the right friends’ who can ‘help me later in life’. I know Mordred and Delphy get more of the same. I’m lucky, though: Mother never gets properly into her stride before she gets distracted by whatever new atrocity my idiot of a brother has invented this term and goes after him instead. I never listen, any more than Sirius ever has. My friends are my friends, and I’m not changing them for her. She lets me get away with it, though she’s ordered Sirius a dozen times to stop being friends with the rest of the Boresome Foursome. My friends are purebloods, mostly old families on one side at least, and that’s good enough for her, what with one thing (Sirius) and another (my cousin Andromeda’s marriage to a Mudblood, of all things).
I’m not obsessed with family the way Slytherins are supposed to be, either. Mother is someone to be put up with at vacations, Sirius is someone to be avoided at school and to thank for his bad example at home, my cousins are…grown up, and never very interesting anyway. They’re not worth more time than parties and reunions require. My friends are. They’re well worth the ten-minute lecture, to have someone to write letters to in the summer and pass notes to in class. They never pick me out to torment because I don’t follow them around like a house elf. They don’t drag me down Knockturn Alley to buy supplies for potions I’ll never make.
Something they don’t tell you about blood: It isn’t thicker than water, at all.
----
I've thought for a while, and developed some theories about Marauder-era Hogwarts, which appear in here.
1. The years were much larger then than they are in Harry's time. He was born during the War, when everyone was living in fear. Far fewer children would have been born in the War years, from a combination of people dying and not wanting to raise a child in such a world. The Marauders era would have had more students; I've estimated at 700 or so, all told (25/House/year). It's a *castle*, it wasn't meant for the handful of students in Harry's year.
2. There was a much larger proportion of pure-bloods than in Harry's time. This is fairly obvious: The witches and wizards were the ones dying in the War and not producing children, while the rate of Muggleborns stayed roughly equal. I, for one, presume that the numbers of students who had two magical parents was vastly higher before the War decimated the wizarding population.
3. Inter-House hatred was much less pronounced before the War. This is partly a supposition; after a war, people are much less likely to trust the group they blame for the war. Although I imagine (many) Gryffindors and (many) Slytherins did not get along, I'm betting that both had friends in Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff. The three-against-Slytherin would not come about until after the War, when so many of the Death Eater elite were proved to have been Slytherins.
I'm developing the urge to write a series about the whole 'Regulus group', most of whom are OCs, going through Hogwarts in various stages of group, and how most of them died in the early years of the War. Such is the fate of moderates.
I enjoyed this; it's nice to build up a Hogwarts that isn't Harry-vision, or Gryffindor-vision at all. And I figure there must have been moderates, purebloods who weren't really on a side. I thought Regulus belonged there. Sirius never would forgive him for not being wholly 'good' or wholly 'evil'.
Three Things They Don't Tell You
A brief commentary by Regulus Black on what the world would have you believe about himself, his school, and his House.
Something they don’t tell you about Hogwarts: House traits aren’t all or nothing.
Nine people in ten could fit in more than one House. The Sorting Hat picks out the strongest traits, and makes the Houses come out more or less equal. As far as personalities go, each House has as many as any school does. They aren’t always the ones you’d think of, either. There are more traits to the Houses than the ones they’re best known for.
For example: My best friend, Greg, one of the sneakiest Ravenclaws you’d ever see, and his brother Ted, one of the thickest Slytherins. For example: Myra, Greg’s girl, who’s not much for studying, though there’s no one quicker with a witty comeback—or a comforting word, if it comes to that. For example: Corin Carver, a Hufflepuff sixth year who works as hard as anything for himself, and not at all for anyone else. For example: Certain Gryffindor seventh-years who hardly have a name for honour. For example: me.
I know I’m what they call (though they shouldn’t) sure Slytherin material: old blood, old money, old magic. They say it as though half the school isn’t third-generation magical or more. The Blacks are older than most, which is worth being proud of, but we’ve money and property enough that we would never dream of trading on the name. I was always told that what the name didn’t matter, but what I did with it did. That’s the way the Black family works.
I’m not particularly fond of the Dark Arts, either. Mother wishes I were, so she could teach me all about her favorite hobby, but—how could I want to do something with my mother? It’s her pastime, not mine, no matter how much she drags me into Knockturn Alley or teaches me spells that take more than they give. I have to study the Dark Arts when she asks, or there will be trouble, but it’s not something I want to do. I don’t know yet what I want to do with my life, but it’s not going to be studying spells written in the Dark Ages. It’ll be something completely new, and all mine.
Something they don’t tell you about Slytherin: I fit in here just fine.
Not everyone ends up in the same group; there are hundreds of us in Slytherin alone, we’ve got more than enough people to split off. There’s a Dark Arts group, some who actually like it and some whose parents make them (one good thing about my embarrassment of a brother is that whatever I do looks good by comparison), and two at least of people who are planning on going into politics, and want to make the ‘right’ friends, and the Quidditch-obsessed, and so on. My group—though it isn’t mine, but Henry’s, if it’s anyone’s—isn’t any of those. We’re all purebloods, of course, second-generation at the very least (Lillith Arken’s mother was only a halfblood, though we don’t hold it against her), but as I said before, most are. We’re mixed Houses, mostly Slytherin and Ravenclaw, with a few Hufflepuffs and the very occasional Gryffindor who isn’t scared of what the Boresome Foursome say about ‘fraternizing with Slytherins’. We go to all the Quidditch games, though we don’t play (bar my second cousin Mordred, who’s a reserve Chaser for Slytherin); we more or less are the Gobstones and chess clubs; we sit in the more comfortable of the empty rooms to study together, since some people (the politicians-to-be and the Boresome Foursome, yet again) get upset about other Houses in their common rooms; we mind our own business, more or less, and let the rest of the school mind theirs. We’re nothing special, really.
It can be a problem. Whenever I go home over Christmas, Mother gives me a lecture about how I should be making ‘the right friends’ who can ‘help me later in life’. I know Mordred and Delphy get more of the same. I’m lucky, though: Mother never gets properly into her stride before she gets distracted by whatever new atrocity my idiot of a brother has invented this term and goes after him instead. I never listen, any more than Sirius ever has. My friends are my friends, and I’m not changing them for her. She lets me get away with it, though she’s ordered Sirius a dozen times to stop being friends with the rest of the Boresome Foursome. My friends are purebloods, mostly old families on one side at least, and that’s good enough for her, what with one thing (Sirius) and another (my cousin Andromeda’s marriage to a Mudblood, of all things).
I’m not obsessed with family the way Slytherins are supposed to be, either. Mother is someone to be put up with at vacations, Sirius is someone to be avoided at school and to thank for his bad example at home, my cousins are…grown up, and never very interesting anyway. They’re not worth more time than parties and reunions require. My friends are. They’re well worth the ten-minute lecture, to have someone to write letters to in the summer and pass notes to in class. They never pick me out to torment because I don’t follow them around like a house elf. They don’t drag me down Knockturn Alley to buy supplies for potions I’ll never make.
Something they don’t tell you about blood: It isn’t thicker than water, at all.
----
I've thought for a while, and developed some theories about Marauder-era Hogwarts, which appear in here.
1. The years were much larger then than they are in Harry's time. He was born during the War, when everyone was living in fear. Far fewer children would have been born in the War years, from a combination of people dying and not wanting to raise a child in such a world. The Marauders era would have had more students; I've estimated at 700 or so, all told (25/House/year). It's a *castle*, it wasn't meant for the handful of students in Harry's year.
2. There was a much larger proportion of pure-bloods than in Harry's time. This is fairly obvious: The witches and wizards were the ones dying in the War and not producing children, while the rate of Muggleborns stayed roughly equal. I, for one, presume that the numbers of students who had two magical parents was vastly higher before the War decimated the wizarding population.
3. Inter-House hatred was much less pronounced before the War. This is partly a supposition; after a war, people are much less likely to trust the group they blame for the war. Although I imagine (many) Gryffindors and (many) Slytherins did not get along, I'm betting that both had friends in Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff. The three-against-Slytherin would not come about until after the War, when so many of the Death Eater elite were proved to have been Slytherins.
I'm developing the urge to write a series about the whole 'Regulus group', most of whom are OCs, going through Hogwarts in various stages of group, and how most of them died in the early years of the War. Such is the fate of moderates.
I enjoyed this; it's nice to build up a Hogwarts that isn't Harry-vision, or Gryffindor-vision at all. And I figure there must have been moderates, purebloods who weren't really on a side. I thought Regulus belonged there. Sirius never would forgive him for not being wholly 'good' or wholly 'evil'.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-10 06:55 pm (UTC)(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From:(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-10 09:20 pm (UTC)(And YES, there should be an award merely for writing good gen!)
(no subject)
Date: 2005-05-11 11:39 am (UTC)Those assumptions are interesting. I've never thought about the pureblood rate, and it makes sense. Hmmm.
You've made me write HP fic again... I have a bunch of Ravenclaw OCs giving me Significant Looks now. (Why do they always show up during exams term? T_T)
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