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Harry's mental grumbling halted as soon as he walked into the Great hall. There his eyes, not to mention his ears, met with the strangest sight he had ever seen.

Draco Malfoy and Hermione Granger were faced off in the center aisle, toe to toe in a shouting match and the professors were sitting back seemingly enjoying the show! Strange, shouldn't someone be putting a stop to this?

". . . furthermore, just because the pure-bloods have always had a monopoly on all high ranking, prestigious positions doesn't mean. . ." screeched Granger, her face red.

"It's tradition, Granger!" Malfoy snarled, interrupting. " But then, what would YOU know about OUR traditions and culture? You are, after all, an outsider, it is OUR world!"

"Your world? I think Her Majesty might disagree! And as for tradition! Shall we talk about tradition?" Hermione arched an eyebrow smugly. "You value traditions so highly, yet almost all pure-blood families take any squib born to them and cast it out. They deny their own children a family and a name, all in the name of tradition and purity of blood."

"Leave it to you to focus on something so ridiculous. Squib children have no place in our world. . ." Malfoy was stopped abruptly when Hermione broken in once more.

"I was told that pure-bloods value family above all and yet when a newborn fails to prove magical, it is cast out and forgotten. A practice, I might mention, which is still in effect among only the most primitive muggle tribes when the child is female, or not perfect. . . it is not, however, a custom practiced by civilized societies!"

Draco Malfoy shrugged. "This is tradition, it's worked for more than a thousand years. Who are you, an outsider, to question it?"

"I am the daughter of a squib. As such, I feel it is my right to question!" She huffed, then continued. "Has it never occurred to you that the blood a squib carries is the same as that in the veins of its parents and their other, magical children? Why blame a child for lack of magic when it was obviously the parents own imperfect blood that created it? That they are at fault for producing a child with no magic, not the child. Perhaps it is they who should be condemned and barred from reproducing again, to keep their obviously flawed bloodline from spreading!" Hermione's words fell into silence as the students and teachers sat stunned by her logic.

Malfoy stood before her, mouth open in shock.

"It looks to me that the pure-blood 'tradition' of getting rid of squib children is simply a way for them to hide their flawed and weakening blood lines!" She waited a moment for any rebuttal, then continued. "And, just so you know, a squib in a magical family is no different than a magical child popping up in a muggle family...two sides of the same coin!

"And what if Oliver Twist is right? We need the infusions of new blood from muggle-borns and half-bloods to keep magic strong and alive."

With a stubborn tilt of his jaw Malfoy finally spoke. "Well, he can't be right. We would've seen the effect before now."

Hermione snarled. "Perhaps we already have! Of the three most powerful wizards in the world, two of them are half-bloods and only one a pure-blood!" Had anyone looked at the head table, they would have seen Filius Flitwick and Severus Snape struggling to contain their mirth. Unaware of her professors' reactions, Hermione blithely ranted on.

"So then, your answer to all of this is to just bury your head in the sand, maintain the status quo and ignore the problem, hoping it'll go away? Is that what you are telling me? Because, if it is, then you might as well dig that hole longer and deeper and save us the trouble of burying you when the time comes!"

Harry moved to sit with Neville and his friends. Now he understood why the teachers hadn't interfered. They were using this argument to prove a point. He wondered if the professors really understood that point. He glanced over at the Ravenclaw table. Many were listening and taking notes. No, they weren't about to join in, they might miss some important fact.

Harry noted that the twins were quietly conducting business as usual, taking bets and urging their Housemates to join the pool. They weren't having much luck though since the odds-on-favorite was Hermione.

"And don't forget our career discussion with our head of house. Professor McGonagall lied to all muggle-borns when she extolled the virtues of working and living in the Wizarding World," Hermione stated. "I can't believe that a witch of her caliber would so mislead her students unless she was under direct orders to do so. That is NOT the Gryffindor way."

A stunned gasp rippled through the hall as Hermione turned and strode proudly back to the Gryffindor table and her friends waiting there.

With a wide grin, Harry stood and applauded his friend's logic. The rest of the hall, save Slytherin, soon followed.

Minvera McGonagall was too shocked at the turn of the debate to sputter a denial.

Poison Pen, Chapter 31