Order Only - Teddy Nott

[alt_hydra]

Mrs Longbottom has made it clear that we should share with the entire Order when we believe someone is in danger, so that's what I'm doing.

Harry, Hermione - Teddy hasn't decided to stop interfering with the both you. If anything I think he's got worse. You might have noticed he's been trying to follow me around ever since Justin and I yesterday. He sat next to me at supper last night and offered to "take my mind off" things. And then he sat next to me again, tonight, because I was late and couldn't get in next to Remy or Pansy. I tried to be very busy with my woolten pie, but he just doesn't care about interrupting a person. And it's not that he doesn't know he's interrupting, he just doesn't think to care.

Well, he started talking about "Harry's mudblood" and said that he's thinking of changing his strategy. It was then that I started actually listening to him. Because it was about you, Hermione, and this is Teddy we're talking about after all. You see, he thought that Hermione was awfully unconcerned when he threatened to expose her secret, so now he's sure that Hermione's secret must have been a lie. He also thought she was way too certain that Harry wouldn't allow her to do anything she didn't want to do.

I had to start talking to him then, to find out more. And it meant I had to say terrible things. But I just pretended I was Mummy, and it wasn't really so hard, even though I couldn't finish my food because of it.

So I asked if he thought Hermione's secret was very awful, and he said it was awful enough, but then he said "I think that mudblood bitch had the stones to lie to me. To a pureblood! One of her betters! And I want to know why."

I said: "They probably all lie." (because everyone does, honestly)

He said Harry was far too trusting and that it was important we find out why Hermione thinks she can get away with lying, and make sure she knows she can't. Only then I asked him if that wasn't Harry's job, not ours, and he said that Harry's been tricked, and it's our job to look out for him and drop the scales off his eyes.

And I knew then that what Teddy wanted me to do was legilimise Hermione, find out what her real secrets are, and share them with him.

He kept calling me Hides and touching my hair. I thought I'd be sick.

I suppose I paused a little too long, because then he said that I must have "gone soft." (What does that mean? When have I ever not been soft? That's what Mummy's called me my whole life... only I think Teddy believes I'm like her, or he thinks I'm like him, which is a frightening thought. He kept going on about how "we" were both too clever to be fooled by a mudblood, even Harry's mudblood.)

I told him I found his obvious goading a bore, and he didn't like that. Said he'd just find out by himself if I wouldn't help him. So I told him, very low and clear, "I'm not helping YOU. I'm going to find out myself, for myself. How are you going to get it out of her? You don't have the means. I do. If you want me to share with you what I find out then we do it my way."

A really horrible smile crossed his face and he said "Oh, I have means, but yours are less likely to get my arse kicked again."

I tried to get what he was thinking just then, because it sounded so awful. But Teddy isn't easy to listen to. It doesn't seem as if he's afraid of anything, and his mind fires in all sorts of directions at once. All I saw was that he thought his black eye made him look dashing. I told him that it didn't. He must've been flattered that I legilimised him because he only said "you know you think it's sexy."

He's really so repulsive and foul. But he's not stupid at all. I only wish that he were.

So I finally told him that I would legilimise Hermione and find out what she was hiding, but that I would only tell him what I discovered if I was in the mood. He was smug and ever so confident that I would tell him everything, but at least it finally made him leave.

We'll have to think of what to do. Some false secret I can pretend to have legilimised out of Hermione. Or, I don't know, maybe we ought to have Vince and Greg kill him.

I'm sorry. That's a horrible suggestion, I realise. But his head is dark and awful and I know, I know that he's capable of anything.

Comments

[alt_harry]

Right.

Okay.

Thanks for passing this along, Hydra.

You're right. We can't deal with him like we do other people. He's dangerous. And Dolohov and Raz don't want him on the council either.

[alt_harry]

So what should we do? To help you, and keep him from nosing around Hermione? Because he's not going to stop on his own, and it looks like beating him up again probably won't work.

The more we make a big deal out of it, the more he might think she's hiding something.

I mean, I keep saying it's about his disrespecting me by messing with my property, but I don't think he's taking it that way at all.

[alt_hydra]

He doesn't understand why you care about your "property" so much. She's just a mudblood to him. You can always get another. To care that much is unnatural. So now he's decided that Hermione must've done some kind of sneaky trickery to make you care.

I don't know what to do. Maybe everyone else has ideas, but all I've thought is that Hermione might need to tell me a real secret. Not that she does magic, of course. But something real and believable. I hate that it has to be that way, but I don't know what else will work.

[alt_terry]

What if you told him something that happened between her and Carrow. Because he's DEAD, and he can't contradict anything. Or Miss Professor Carrow.

I'm not quite sure what. But if it involves either Carrow, it could be something sick and twisted, and that might please him.

(Sorry, Hermione.)

[alt_hydra]

It might please him, but it also might not satisfy him at all, because the Carrows are dead he might dismiss the secret as irrelevant since it can't be proven. There's no telling with Teddy.

[alt_harry]

What if it were about Voldemort?

Something she could've picked up in Buckingham, or overheard me saying?

Something that'd get him in trouble if he knew it and blabbed. Like his real name. Or his parents' names. Which prove that he's halfblooded.

[alt_sally_anne]

If Hermione's most shameful secret were that she knew that the Lord Protector were a half-blood

well, on one hand it's a hilarious idea but unfortunately Teddy might decide to kill Hermione to protect Our Lord's secret. I wouldn't put it past him.

[alt_harry]

We can keep an eye out, see what he does with it. He's mad. There's no telling for sure what he'd do.

And yeah, trying to kill Hermione might be one of the things he settles on. But he could also decide to go against Voldemort, too. Or throw them both a tea party. I don't know.

Sorry.

I guess what I'm saying is he could do that no matter what.

[alt_hermione]

Oh, Harry, that's a wonderful idea!

Only it's not my shameful secret, then, is it--it's Voldemort's.

Hm.

[alt_harry]

Well, maybe the key is how you found out?

Or that what you thought at first was that he wanted your BIGGEST secret, like you misheard him, and when you sorted out that it was something shameful, you were so relieved you just said the first dirty thing you could think of?

[alt_terry]

Mmm. Perhaps he might react favourably if you make it clear that it's a secret she's been trying very hard to keep from her master--Harry Marvolo. Something that Carrow did to her.

I dunno. Hermione might have a better idea than me. The two of you know Teddy Nott better than I do. I avoided him any chance I had.

[alt_hermione]

No, it's all right. It's probably my fault first for not coming up with anything worse than making him think I fancied Professor Lestrange and then for not being worried enough when he was talking to me. Only I was so much more worried about--other things. I thought I'd fooled him at the time but he must have decided differently later.

Right. Professor Carrow.... I'm not sure what to suggest, either. It can't be sexual because I had that spell on me for so long. I'd rather not say something like he made me eat cat food or live rats or something like that because what if Nott decides to try it?

Maybe we could say that he once made me and Terry strip naked and serve him and Miss Professor Carrow dinner. With any luck, Nott will find that image so gross and horrifying he won't be interested in a reenactment.

And Hydra--I'm so sorry he's being such a loathsome little cockroach. Maybe we should make sure that Crabbe and Goyle put him in St Mungo's. (Sorry, Madam P.)

Or.... Do you suppose we could beat him at his own game? He's trying to blackmail me, but Hydra, you said he sounded oddly fascinated, too. What if we wrote his father informing Mr Nott that Teddy's been sniffing after me, and not in a wholesome, mudblood-hating, patriotic sort of way? We could send an owl tonight. We'd still have to deal with this situation but maybe over Easter holidays his father will find the right way to frighten him into settling down.

[alt_sally_anne]

I'd be really worried Mr Nott would take things out on you.

[alt_harry]

Oh. Right.

[alt_hermione]

Yes. Fair point.

Damn.

So it's back to putting him in St M's.

[alt_alice]

If this escalates significantly, then yes, that might be an option we'd have to consider.

[alt_harry]

That'd work, yeah.

[alt_terry]

For the secret, that might work, yeah. Especially because Teddy was there when Carrow made all my clothes fall off in the Great Hall, so he already knows that Carrow didn't mind seeing mudbloods from the skin out. And embarrassing them that way. It could be believably something that Hermione kept secret from Harry, to prevent her master from going head-to-head with his professor over his property.

Urgh.

[alt_draco]

It's not your fault.

[alt_sally_anne]

Could you tell him that you know her secret, but you're not going to tell him?

I suppose that would just have him after you, endlessly, though.

Ugh.

[alt_hydra]

I think it would have him after me, yes. He might even like it, and think that I was withholding the secret because I wanted all his attention.

But I can endure it if it's our only or best option. I'm afraid of him, but that doesn't matter.

[alt_pansy]

He probably shouldn't just up and disappear. It wouldn't be like Sarah Fawcett, or even the Pink Toad. His father would make too much noise, and unless we were really careful

And I don't suppose we'd be able to convince the LP that Harry needs to kill someone of his choosing, either.