It was in this context that Hermione found herself in the tail end of an interesting discussion about the culture surrounding accidental magic with the members of the newly named, 'Founders Club', just before the start of their next meeting, and for which she had a special surprise for the members.
Sophie idly swung her legs back and forth while sitting on a desk. "But why is it so important? If they can test for magic just by having the child open a chocolate frog package…"
Hermione shrugged. "It's not so much a, 'does our child have magic,' thing as it is a, 'how powerful might our child be,' thing. The old families especially are always watching out for powerful bouts of magic or unique talents emerging, like metamorphism, or seership."
"I guess that makes sense."
Kevin Entwhistle and Justin Finch-Fletchley nodded.
The door opened and Dean Thomas walked in. "Am I late?"
"No." Hermione stood up and pulled her shrunk trunk out of her pocket. "You are right on time." She put the trunk on the floor and un-shrunk it. "But before we start today, there's something I need to bring up."
Dean Thomas crossed the room and sat down.
Hermione took a deep breath. "You know we've been starting to study occlumency?"
The four members of the Founder's Club nodded.
"Well, my lord would like to have a word with you about that." The four all looked startled.
"You mean, Lord Slytherin?" Justin asked. "Yes."
"He's coming here?" Dean asked incredulously.
Sophie gulped.
"He is here."
The assembled muggleborns exchanged nervous glances. Justin was already staring at the trunk.
Hermione knocked five times on the trunk lid, the trunk opened and Harry slowly climbed out. He towered over the nervous first years, none of whom took their eyes off him as he turned, conjured a plush armchair in the middle of the room, and sat down. "Good afternoon, children."
Driven by several months of wizarding culture training, the four hastily got to their feet, scraping chairs and desks as they went, and executed bows and curtsies with varying degrees of success. Even Kevin didn't do too badly.
Hermione couldn't help but smile.
"Good afternoon, Lord Slytherin." They said in almost unison.
Harry's mask nodded once and turned to her. "Very well behaved group you have here, Hermione."
Hermione's smile widened. Sophie blushed.
Harry turned back. "Please, sit."
They did.
"So," Harry began, talking into the silence of five first years dutifully watching an adult. "I've been hearing quite a bit about what's been going on here. To say our world isn't the best when it comes to transitioning new peoples to our society would be a massive understatement. That is something that I intend to help change — and it's projects like this," he made a sweeping hand gesture, "that will help to make that change. I understand you've recently begun to work on equalising one of the many advantages that old families have on new ones."
They looked at him blankly. "Occlumency," Harry clarified.
They all made 'oh' noises and nodded quickly.
"Normally, learning occlumency takes years, and that's primarily why children start learning at an early age, often as young as six, however, I have a Slytherin family method to rapidly speed up that teaching time."
Four pairs of eyes widened. Kevin and Justin glanced at each other with raised eyebrows.
"Normally, this method is restricted to those of Slytherin House, however, I'm experimenting with a slightly altered method, which, while not quite as effective as the original, should still be a lot faster than the traditional method, and, if you're up for it, I'd like to try out that method with you four. Thoughts?" Sophie raised a nervous hand.
"Yes, Miss Roper?" "We're currently doing meditation exercises, how is this new method different?" "Questioned like a true Ravenclaw."
Sophie made a nervous smile.
Harry reached into the pocket of his robe and produced a small stack of parchments. "Do you know what these are?" All four nodded.
"Those are Gringotts contract parchments." Justin said.
"Yes," Harry said, "and on them are confidentiality contracts. If you wish to go ahead and join this program, you'll have to sign one of these first."
All four looked at the parchments warily.
Hermione grinned.
"Good." Harry said. "You are cautious. That's a trait that should keep you out of a lot of trouble in the future. The contracts are quite simple. Please feel free to read them over." He handed the stack to Sophie who took one for herself before passing it on. "They say, in short, that you will not speak of or in any way communicate the new occlumency method to anyone, without my written permission, for the next ten years, after which you will be free to do so as you wish."
"And if we do?" asked Dean.
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