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Blaise Zabini was brought into the world by accident, no matter what his mother told him.
"The fates knew I would be lonely, my sweet boy, so they stitched you together for me." She had told him once, braiding his hair down. He supposed both things could be true. That one could be an accident and still need to exist.
And his mother was lonely, due to the curse. It had been a clever punishment for her. Any man she sold her heart to would die before her.
Of course, Blair Zabini took nothing lying down, so she conveniently sold her heart to men with larger bank accounts.
"I won't have you growing up as I did in Haiti, Blaise. We had nothing there. Hogwarts was my only way out. You should want for nothing." She would hum.
But Blaise did want one thing, though he dared not speak it aloud. He wanted his papa back. The shadow of a man he chased. The secret he could never tell a soul.
His papa, the muggle man.
Blaise's half-bloodedness was hidden by his mother's many husbands. Who could say if he was Avery, Mulciber, Black, or Parkinson? Who could tell which Malfoy or Nott sired him?
His mother could say as much if she wanted but instead said nothing. "Blaise is a Zabini," She told Gardenia Parkinson when the woman had asked. "He is a carbon copy of me anyways, and I'd hate to be a leech on my late husband's family."
Blair wouldn't hate to be a leech, but she would hate to be called one in the social papers.
And then his sorting. As if enough weight didn't rest on his tiny shoulders, he had been the last sorted and a hat-stall.
Interesting , the hat had whispered in his ear. Your heart shines gold, but your mind is platinum. Same as the Granger girl.
"Please, Slytherin," Blaise argued. "I want my mum to be proud of me."
It will be a hard road. There will be no room for your kindness or your bravery. You will have to shed your lion fur for snake skin.
"It is the road I must take." Blaise thought. He could bring ruin to his mother in Gryffindor. Could jeopardize his whole life.
That selflessness would have done you well in Gryffindor, but if you're certain. The hat hummed.
And so Blaise was a snake.
He spent his nights in his first year at Hogwarts lying awake, wondering if he made the right choice.
It took him two minutes into the feast to make a mental note of every black kid in his year, and five for the full school.
For his year, there was Bem Adagonye in Ravenclaw. Then, Hermione Granger, Lavender Brown, and Dean Thomas in Gryffindor.
Two years above were Angelina Johnson and Lee Jordan in Gryffindor. Had he ostracized himself? Would he have a community if he had taken the hat's advice?
It didn't take Blaise long to dissuade those fears though.
Hermione Granger sat with him in the library, even though they didn't speak.
Bem Adagonye and he read poetry together and made bewildered eye contact when a particularly unseasoned meal was served at dinner.
Angelina Johnson took him to the quidditch pitch and taught him how to fly so he wouldn't embarrass himself.
He traded Lavender his DADA notes for her potions ones, and they both managed to keep from failing.
He spent his evenings with Lee and Dean sometimes too, craving plantains and missing their moms.
One night, on top of the Astronomy tower, when Lee had gone off to bed, he and Dean had talked for hours.
"Can I tell you a secret?" Dean asked suddenly.
"Who would I tell?" Blaise answered.
"I'm not a muggle-born," Dean admitted, shoulders tense. My dad was a wizard, but he died during the first war."
Blaise raised an eyebrow. "Can I tell you a secret?"
Dean nodded, head cocked to the side.
"My dad was a muggle. I'm not pureblood."
Dean choked out a laugh. "What the fuck?"
"What a pair of half-bloods we are, huh?"
"Might as well be brothers, honestly."
Being Black at Hogwarts isn't too bad for Blaise if he's honest. What is pretty bad is being black in Slytherin.
Pansy sneers at Angelina's hair one year, and Blaise has to remind himself that Angelina isn't his biological sister, and no one would forgive him if he cast an unforgivable at Pansy.
Except maybe his mother, who would be glad for the excuse not to talk to Pansy's mum.
The only members of his house that Blaise can manage to stand are Draco and Theo.
While his best mate would never argue with a member of his house in public, Draco hexes Goyle when the idiot makes fun of Lee's dreads as soon as they get back to the dorm.
Theo, on the other hand, decked a member of their house for saying that Blaise should go to Uagadou instead of Hogwarts in the middle of the Great Hall.
Theo got detention, a howler, and lost Slytherin 20 points (plus losing the actual fight) but Blaise still watched him smile through the blood.
He doesn't want to follow his mates into the ranks of the Death Eaters though, and his mom seems similarly upset at the idea.
However, by his fourth year, he spends every other summer with the Malfoys, and Lucius says he would be a prodigy if it weren't for his background.
Blaise wishes that Lucius was a student at Hogwarts so that Draco could hex him, or Theo could hit him.
Lion fur for snakeskin, Blaise reminds himself to keep from crying.
It had become his mantra. His cloak of protection when all else in his life seemed lost and unfair.
In their fourth year, something new happened. During one of their library sessions, Hermione asked him for advice on boys . Blaise often prided himself on being imperturbable, but the idea of Hermione looking in the direction of a boy at all shocked him.
Hermione wouldn't tell him much, but she did get a well of information from Blaise. His mother was a Black Widow, after all. The woman raised her to know all there was to know about men.
Blaise installed Hermione's weave and split the price for her dress in exchange for a promise.
"This'll all feel rather different, so just promise me you won't let the way you look start defining you." Blaise had said, gripping her shoulders.
Hermione nodded, her afro-puffs shaking from the effort. Dean had caught them both then, and the three picked out their dress robes for the Yule Ball.
Hermione had looked lovely, sneaking glances at Fred Weasley while Viktor Krum twirled her around. Likewise, Dean had spilled punch on his robes trying to ask Seamus to dance with him, and Blaise laughed at both of them.
Fools in love.
Blaise adores his honorary siblings, but he could never feel that way.
Or so he thought.
That summer, something about Draco Malfoy seemed to change. Or rather, Blaise changed, so his feelings about Draco changed in accordance.
Draco started wearing the Malfoy family ring that year. His hair had grown out only a small amount. And worst of all, he was fucking hot.
Blaise was absolutely out for his best mate.
Also, apparently he was bisexual.
He'd written to his mum, waiting for her to tell him how to proceed, but she just reminded him that she loved him, and told him to do what he felt was right.
Being black in Slytherin was bad enough. Being a black, closeted Slytherin felt like a death sentence.
So in the summer of their sixth year, after Draco fails to murder the headmaster and Theo succeeds in murdering his father, Blaise has made a decision.
He was defecting to the Order of the Phoenix.
He expected it to be rather solitary, but it's not. His mother gives him a pocket watch with a suspicious look in her eyes and tells him to be careful with it, and he packs it delicately.
Before he could leave his home for the last time, however, Draco and Theo appeared in his floo.
"You didn't think we were going to let you leave by yourself, did you?" Theo asked, green eyes wide, mouth in a permanent smirk.
"I'm defecting from the Death Eaters. Before I get marked." Or worse, Blaise thought. Watch you two get marked.
"And if you're defecting, so are we. I wasn't sure what to pack so I just got my potions kit and my broom." Theo explained, broom strapped across his back.
"You didn't pack clothes?" Draco and Blaise chorused, looking at Theo with bewilderment.
"I want to buy muggle ones!" Theo had justified, pouting.
"Fine. Off we go." Blaise sighed.
He was never really alone, he supposed.