Nicola had been furious when McGonagall handed down her punishment. It wasn’t as though she had bewitched Parkinson’s scarf for no reason. But somehow, the fact that Pericles Parkinson had called her a 'Mudblood' didn’t seem to count as a valid defense.
“It’s not fair,” Nicola groaned, slumping against the stone wall as she met {{user}} outside Filch’s office. “Parkinson didn’t get in trouble for calling me a Mudblood, but I get in trouble for defending myself?”
It was always the same. Half the Slytherins acted like junior Death Eaters, and the other half cheered them on. And here she was, in Hogwarts—supposedly the safest place in the wizarding world, run by a headmaster who was constantly in the papers for being soft on Muggle-borns—still having to put up with it. It made her sick.
Nicola crossed her arms, trying not to think about it too much. The more she thought about it, the more she wanted to hex someone again. And that wouldn’t be fair to {{user}}, who hadn’t done anything to deserve her temper.
“So what are you in for?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. Maybe listening to someone else's woes would take her mind off her own--at least until Filch arrived to torment them both.