The Good Slytherin

Chapter Thirteen: Mark

"What do you mean she didn't know?" was all Mark could say when Marion quietly finished telling her story.

Gathered around the library table, both he and Tristan stared at Marion in disbelief. Only minutes before Mark had just begun a new paragraph for his art history essay when Marion had entered looking quite pale. It was then that Mark had realized that Daphne had been gone a while and the arrival of her cousin in her place had seemed ominous.

"She didn't know, Mark." Marion's voice was still low and calm. It was unusual to see her so somber.

Tristan laid down his quill and put his hands on his cheeks, eyes wide with shock.

"Marion, did you know about this?" Mark jumped in. "Did you know that Daphne had no idea that she had an aunt?"

"No!" she hissed, devoid of her usual tone of arrogance. "I swear to you! I just assumed we all did!"

Mark was utterly gobsmacked as they sat huddled over the library table. Suddenly reminded of his own family, wasn't it only two years prior that he himself found out about a secret family member? Was it also shame that prevented Daphne's family from telling her the truth?

"How do you know about Delphinia Thorpe, Mark?" she asked, words tinged with accusation. He immediately went on the defensive.

"From my Dark Lord supporting parents," he snapped. "You think I was going to bring it up with Daphne, especially when she never mentioned it? Hey, Daphne. Let's talk about how three of your family members were murdered in one night. Smashing idea, Marion."

"You know that's not what I meant."

Tristan looked very grim. "My dad told me about Delphinia Thorpe when he found out I was friends with Daphne. And Mark's right--it would have been rude to mention it to her."

Mark felt a tiny surge of triumph and asked the one question they all wanted to know. "Marion, why on earth would Daphne not know she had an aunt?"

"Probably because reputation is everything to my family."

"And because this Delphinia was a Death Eater?"

"Not something you want to admit in certain company."

"So it was an embarrassment and so they pretended like this woman never existed."

"But it's daft," Tristan added, tapping his quill anxiously against the cover of one of his textbooks. "Short of casting a mass Memory Charm, you cannot make people forget. Daphne was bound to find out."

It was silly, but Mark remembered his own family's protracted attempts to cover up the existence of a Squib--the shame had been far too great. "What I don't get is why? It's one thing for the family to disassociate themselves from Delphinia Thorpe, it's another for Daphne to never know she existed."

Marion crossed her arms impatiently. "Well, you'll have to ask her parents because I don't know."

"And now Malfoy knows that she didn't know about Delphinia Thorpe," Tristan whispered. "It will be all over Slytherin by now."

She looked at them without blinking. "I have no doubt in my mind."

Mark glanced at his watch and noticed that it was almost eight, which meant that the library would be closing and they would have to either find somewhere else to go before curfew or head back to Slytherin for the evening. Suddenly his stomach started to churn with anxiety. Yes, all of Slytherin would know by now.

Tristan must have anticipated the time because he began to slowly pack away his things. Mark sighed and did the same, making sure he got Daphne's books and parchment too. They solemnly filed out of the library and headed down the stairs to the dungeons. No one said a word.

When they finally reached the blank stone wall that hid the entrance to the common room, they looked at each other in silent anticipation--no one wanted to go in. After a few moments, it was Tristan who suddenly said the password when it seemed no one had the courage. The makings of a stone door formed immediately, sliding open to reveal the common room before them.

Instantly met with the low murmurs of students, Mark could easily hear Pansy Parkinson's savage laugh above the din. Sure enough, he spied her pug face at the opposite end by Draco Malfoy, joined by a host of other students gathered by the fireplace. It looked as though Malfoy had just finished acting out the scene where he told Daphne that she had an aunt she never knew about.

As they entered the common room, the animated voices of his classmates fell silent and all eyes turned to them expectantly.

"Do we just ignore them and go to the dormitories?" Mark whispered to Tristan, his wand feeling heavy in his robes and wanting very much to hex someone.

A couple of sniggers broke the silence and Tristan replied, "Come on," and headed through the crowd and towards the boys dormitory. As Mark followed, he noticed that Marion was keeping close to him. Normally he would have expected her to disassociate herself in light of recent events.

"Careful, Marion," Malfoy's haughty voice rose over the low murmurs. "If you keep hanging around the likes of these blood traitors, people might start to get the wrong idea."

Mark could hear Marion sigh angrily from next to him. "You know Draco, you're a real arsehole," she snapped loudly, voice echoing on the stone walls.

Silence, save for a gasp from Parkinson and titters from her mates and Mark could see a faint swath of crimson form across Malfoy's pale cheeks. "We should go, Marion," Mark whispered as he tried to steer her away, sensing that the scene could quickly get ugly.

"You'd do well to mind your loyalties," Malfoy replied coldly.

"My loyalties?" Marion scoffed. "If a blood traitor means not having to associate with the likes of you, then so be it!"

Mark knew that Marion was very devoted to her cousin, even when it seemed incongruous to the reputation she fostered in Slytherin, but he would never have expected her to go that far. From the looks of it, neither did a lot of people--everyone was mute with shock.

"Oooo. Did you hear that, Draco?" came Pansy Parkinson's sycophantic squeal.

"Oh fuck off, Pansy," Marion hissed before Malfoy could respond.

Finally, all of Slytherin erupted into a roar.

"I think we've done enough damage here, Marion," Mark said as he finally got her to head towards the dormitory. Tristan looked stunned.

"Oh bloody hell, what have I done?" she whispered when they were finally out of the common room.

"You stood up for your cousin."

Marion looked like the full weight of her actions was starting to sink in--he had never seen her so shaken. "I just told off Malfoy and Parkinson, didn't I?"

"Uh, yeah," Tristan reminded.

"Bugger!" she said before heading to the girl's dorm.

Mark couldn't help but feel sympathy for her. She had risked her cushy position in Slytherin to defend her cousin, though he had to admit that calling Malfoy an arsehole in front of the whole house might have been a bit overkill.

In his disbelief over the unfolding of a great secret and the scandal of Marion telling off Malfoy, Mark had forgotten to notice that Daphne had at least stood up to Malfoy when he demanded her loyalty to the Dark Lord. Mark gave her the biggest hug ever when he saw her the next day. From the looks of it, Daphne was still in a state of shock.

Doing their best to avoid their fellow Slytherin students at all costs, it was hard to tell the extent of the fallout. Thankfully their classes were light that day, leaving them to anticipate the upcoming holiday. No one saw much of Marion, who was supposedly hiding out in her room according to Daphne.

"I've got to face them tomorrow, don't I?" she asked dazedly.

"Sod it. We'll run off to France and have our own Christmas," he said as he folded his school robes into his trunk that afternoon. Daphne looked on dejectedly--her stuff was already packed in anticipation of the journey back to London the following morning. Normally she couldn't wait to get back home, but Mark had a distinct feeling that this year she would rather be someplace far, far away and frankly, so would he.

"Mark, you don't understand," she suddenly blurted out. "I always thought I was better that the other Slytherins--that I was good, that I wasn't connected to the Dark Lord like the Malfoys. How can I be the good Slytherin with an aunt who was a Death Eater?"

"That's rubbish," he said calmly as he set down the jumper he was trying to fold. "My uncle was a Death Eater and a bloody fine one. You know I'd never want to be like him."

Daphne lapsed into silence and he truly felt sorry for her. She had been quieter than normal all day and barely made an effort to finish her Wizarding Art essay. Watching her sulk about, he realized just how cruel it was to find out from Malfoy that she had an aunt she never knew about.