Letter

Dear Tanya Degurechaff,

I thank you for your letter informing me of the errors my child has made, though it has left me with a few questions as well.

First and foremost among these questions being who you are. As Chairman of the Hogwarts Board of Governors I am kept informed of changes in staffing and general operations of the school and have not heard of you becoming a member of the faculty at Hogwarts. There is however one Tanya Degurechaff listed among the student roster in the same year as my son. Indeed my son has even made some complaints against this person in my letters, but it would appear my advice to him on the matter has been ignored in a rather unfortunate manner.

I would request from you what your relation to the student Tanya Degurechaff is. In the mean time, rest assured I will be writing to my son about how his actions are perceived and how to more carefully pick his words and will be having a firm conversation with him when he comes home over the winter break.

I await your response,
Lucius Malfoy

—-

Dear Lucius Malfoy,

I apologize for the confusion caused. It was not my intent to portray myself falsely as a member of the faculty, but to simply prevent my involvement in the situation from unduly coloring your opinion and methods of raising your son.

I am the student Tanya Degurechaff and it was myself along with Harry Potter that had our parents insulted by Draco.

My personal feelings about my parents are nonexistent due to having been left at an orphanage at an incredibly young age with no information on who they were or why I was not left in the care of a family member. The unknown status of my parents aside, Mr. Potter's parents are not people that should be casually insulted in such a manner. I understand there is some belief Mr. Potter defeated the leader of the terrorist organization known as the Death Eaters that caused instability within magical society in the 70s, but it is clear to me that saying a baby killed a prolific murderer and terrorist is a ridiculous claim and that it was clearly his parents that sacrificed themselves to take out the one known as Vol de Mort.

Mr. Potter's parents died ending a reign of fear and terror, fighting so that their child could grow up in a safer, more stable time. To besmirch their name is to spit upon the prosperity and safety of our time.

I apologize if I may have come across poorly in your son's letters. At our first interaction he gave insult to the house I was sorted into. As a response, I chose to 1) pretend that he was interested in pursuing a romantic relation with the cute blonde girl in Gryffindor ie myself and 2) rebuff these fanciful attempts at wooing myself by pointing out that I had no interest in dating him. I do not want you to feel that my lack of interest in your son is a slight against your person or your son's, I do not have interest in pursuing a romantic relationship with anyone at this time.

I am willing to allow Young Draco's youthful transgressions to slide by this time.

Sincerely,
Tanya Degurechaff

—-

Lily Moon

Theater Club was so much fun. They practiced fake emotions and how to pretend to be people other than themselves and how to whisper theatrically which meant talking loudly in a way that pretended to be quiet. And Snape seemed like less of grumpy grumperston during the club meetings and more like a mild confused instructor barely staying a lesson ahead of the class. Lily liked mildly confused instructor barely staying ahead of the class Snape over grump grumperston Snape because mildly confused instructor barely staying a lesson ahead Snape wasn't as mean with his comments and actually a little funny.

Besides the fake emotions and pretending to be other people and whispering theatrically, they were making set pieces for the play they had chosen. Professor Snape said that the roles would be split up after the winter break when practice could be done with regulatory and costumes could be fitted.

Lily Moon liked being able to spend time with students from all the houses, but the Slytherins were acting weirdly around Tanya. Lily overheard earlier in the day Lavender talking to Parvati about how she heard from Lisa Turpin who was talking with Daphne Greengrass that Daphne heard from Blaise Zabini that Draco received a Howler that morning in the first year boy's dorm room. From what Blaise told Daphne who told Turpin who told Lavender who was telling Parvati when Lily overheard, Malfoy's father and Tanya have been in conversations about Malfoy and Malfoy's father was upset about how Malfoy was behaving towards Tanya.

It was like one of the princess stories where an arrangement for the hand of the beautiful maiden is arranged with a dashing prince by the parents, except Tanya is her own parent and the dashing prince. So that would make it more like the stories where the prince comes in to help kingdom in exchange for the hand of the beautiful princess. That seems right! Tanya defeated the troll for the hand of a different fair maiden already, so why couldn't she defeat some other evil beast on the behalf of the most Ancient and Noble Lineage of the Great House of Malfoy?

"Something get your attention, Ms Moon?" Professor Snape asked standing behind Lily as she fell over the boat set piece she was suppose to be painting. Lily gave the professor a big grin as several of the students laughed at her falling over. Snape just sighed before bending over to help Lily back to her feet. "You silly girl. What got you so distracted?"

"The romance between Tanya and Draco," Lily staged whispered.

Snape got a pained look on his face as he closed his eyes. "I apologize for asking. Just do not allow these thoughts to distract you in a more dangerous situation. Like class. Or going down the stairs." Snape went to check on the backdrop the Weasley Twins were working on in a swirl of his robes.

Lily picked up the boat piece she knocked over and began casting the coloring charm again. If Tanya was attempting to arrange a marriage with Draco by talking to his father, Tanya would need to perform some daring feat to show that despite her humble orphaned origins she was worthy of being in the company of High Lords of the Land. A bold daring feat defending Draco's purity and-

"You do know you are talking out loud again, right?" Lavender asked Lily.

"Oh, was I?" Lily laughed. "My bad."

"I don't think Tanya and Malfoy would make a good couple. I mean, sure they would look cute next to each other, but Tanya, well, she's Tanya."

"I don't think they would either, but it is so much fun making stories up. My daddy gets paid to make up stories and he is always saying that he loves what he does."

"That's neat," Lavender said with a funny smile. It looked like the smile Auntie Gene got when Lily hugged her. "Just leave me out of your stories."

"Too late," Lily said, reaching behind her back and pulling out a pair of hand puppets of Lavender and Parvati in pirate outfits. "I already made a story of Captain Brown, Pirate Queen of the High Seas, and her first mate Parvati plundering the seven seas in search of treasure and to enslave cabin boys for your crew and pleasure. I even made puppets."

"So I see. Why?"

"Because you are my friends and creating stories about you as awesome pirate queens is the least I can do for my friends."

Lavender had Auntie Gene's smile again. "Thanks."

"Friend hug!" Lily gave Lavender a hug. Lavender returned the hug. Puppet Parvati pulled Puppet Lavender into hugging Lavender as well.

Lavender pushed Lily away. "I draw the line at being hugged by a hand puppet."

"Ok."

—-

Tanya Degurechaff

Midterms are arriving shortly as the final scholastic event before a portion of the student body goes home to spend Christmas with their families. Professor McGonagall had taken down the names of the students that would be staying over the break and in addition to myself not wishing to return to the orphanage and deal with their religious sermons about the birth of their savior yet again, Harry and the Weasleys would be staying while it appeared the rest of the house would be heading home.

To prepare for the midterms, Hermione suggested a special study session that was achieved through much grumbling and griping.

"Do we really have to do this?" Ron complained rather loudly.

"No, but a quick overview of what we learned this semester would not hurt," I told the assembled students as we commandeered a corner of the Common Room. "Further more, I do not want to see any of you receive a low grade on your midterms."

Low grades would have detrimental effects on the house's standing in the House Cup. Currently the scores were rather close without any one House having a significant lead or falling particularly behind. With the tightness of the race, it would not be proper to be the cause of our house slipping down the rankings.

"To start, how about we check how good everyone's levitation charm is?" Starting off with a relatively fun activity would hopefully keep everyone's attention better during the less exciting parts of the study session. It was not like I could use the threat of danger to keep everyone's attention sharp, we were school children. Not soldiers.

Going through the various spells we had been taught, interspersed with some light theory discussion, allowed us to breeze through a good portion swiftly. Having set a good pace for the study session, we continued touching on the different subjects and checking that everyone at least had a surface level idea of what we were discussing.

On the whole, I felt most of my fellow first years would do fine. Hermione was needlessly concerned about how she would do when it seemed clear to me she would be a top scorer with Harry not too far behind. Parvati, Lavender, Seamus, and Dean would all be fine. My main concerns were Ron, Lily, and Neville.

I gave even odds that Ron would get marked off for putting as few words as he possibly could manage onto the paper in a fit of laziness and apathy towards his schoolwork. Neville would do fine in most of the classes, but he was extremely nervous about potions and he seemed the type to choke under pressure.

Lily… Lily was a tricky one. Her exuberance was clear, but she seemed to space out regularly. When I had asked her about the levitation charm, she went on a tangent about tiny pixies coming out of the wand to lift the paper we were testing the spell on. While imaginative, if I was grading a paper with such an answer, I would mark the answer as wrong and irrelevant.

She was either going to surprise me by managing to achieve high marks, or I would be disappointed in her poor performance and need to take corrective actions. Either way, I will not find out which until everyone is back and class resumes so I would not allow Lily's possible performance bother me when I would have most of a month without classes, clubs, or quidditch practice to get in the way of spending time with a good book.