Since the Christmas Break, or the Yule Break as it was now called, life at Hogwarts had settled down. Only the muggleborn and raised children still called that break a Christmas Break and that was only because for them, that was it's traditional name. But with two high ranking and strongly traditional ladies now running the school, the traditions of this society were making a decided comeback. They were slowly teaching the students through word of mouth the traditional names for each school break and what those traditions actually meant to the magical people. Because it wasn't enough to simply tell a child the name of his or her holiday was now being changed and to refer to it as something else from now on. Children had to be given a reason for things like that or they'd not only not remember your change but they'd resent you for trying it. Children like the holidays they've grown up with and only a stupid adult tries to remove or alter them.
The Christians had found that out when they'd been waging war on civilizations as a means of spreading the word of their faith and converting people to their ideology. They'd discovered the best way of converting a population was to adopt their most important holidays and assign those days new more appropriate meanings. In time they'd eased out the traditional names by giving each holiday a new more Christian friendly name and completely ignoring the fact the holiday was completely pagan in origin.
But for some of the student body, this new change was seen as reason to strut all over the place declaring themselves superior to everyone who still used muggle terminology. Or were known to be from families living in the muggle world. This was leading to more conflicts in the halls as purebloods challenged muggleborn and raised children trying to force their point of view on them. For that reason Lady Malfoy was often seen walking the hallways between and after classes looking for the hot spots so she could diffuse them before they boiled over into harmful spell casting.
There was one incident of Draco strutting and trying to lord himself over other students, which he was doing a lot of these days. Simply because his Mother was the Deputy Headmistress now. Most children now heard him routinely saying 'When my Mother hears about this…" instead of his often quoted statement of "When my Father hears about this…" In this particular incident, he'd overheard Denis Creevey talking to the ghost form of his brother and referring to the just past school break as the Christmas of Change. Immediately, he'd pushed himself into the conversation just so he could throw his weight around.
"It's not Christmas, you stupid mudblood," he declared loudly as he shoved himself in Denis' face. "It's Yuletide. Only worthless mudbloods and those who love them, call it Christmas. Now that my Mother is running this school, you better get with the program and learn your place lest you meet the same end as your brother here." He'd puffed out his chest and sneered for the benefit of his friends to Denis.
"And I was having a private conversation with my brother, Malfoy, about the holiday my family celebrates. You call it Yule, if you like. I'm sure it's Yuletide your family celebrates. That name means nothing to me, however. Or to Colin. I'll call it Christmas because for us and our family, it's always been Christmas. And most likely it always will be Christmas. So go away and leave us alone. This is a family conversation and you're not our family. Or are you trying to tell me that because you're a pureblood you have the right to tell my family how to celebrate our chosen holidays just because Colin and I turned out to be magical?"
Draco let his wand slide into his hand as he sneered even deeper at Denis. "You forget your place, mudblood. We purebloods run this world and you mudbloods need to learn your place here. My mother is in charge around here now and that…"
"Makes you nothing more than any other student, Mr. Malfoy," interrupted a cold, refined voice from behind the posse at Draco's back.
Draco turned his head slightly to see who had spoken though he already knew as he'd recognize his Mother's voice anywhere. Especially when she spoke in that particular tone of voice. "Mother. I heard this… muggleborn referring to the Yule Break as a Christmas Break and just stopped to explain to him the new name for the school breaks. He refuses to honor our traditions."
"Yes, so I heard, Mr. Malfoy. And in the process you insulted him and his family which you had no call to do as he had not in any manner insulted you. You intruded on a private family conversation without any regard for the subject matter or the persons involved and leveled what could be construed as a threat of death against him. A particularly nasty death at that given his brother is a ghost and just how he came to be one which everyone here is well aware of."
"But I heard him refer to our traditional holiday by that meaningless muggle name the old Headmaster preferred," Draco whined understanding he was the one in trouble here. Not the muggleborn he'd been challenging. "That's no longer to be tolerated here at Hogwarts. We celebrate the traditional holidays now."