Think and Hogwarts and anyway and not much and school is not enough to tell him what that question meant. 

"I..." 

That's fine, Christopher can ramble for a little bit until he gets the idea. "I mean, it's really cool that we get to learn magic now, but I kinda miss English class, you know? And Music. Music was the best." 

Qualifier it's really something magic something something English something something music music was the best. 

He looks at Parsons, totally blank. 

That...that's not an 'I don't know what to say' blank face, that's an 'I have no idea what you just said' blank face. 

"...did you understand any of that?" 

He catches understand and that. He wishes that didn't probably mean what it probably means. 

"...no," he says, reluctant. 

"Okay." Gently, like Sasha might break if he says the wrong thing, he asks, "Why not?"

Well.  

"I arrived in Britain seven months ago and none of you know how to teach your language. I've been placed in an entirely new world twice in the last year and I am trying to learn but it is so much harder than any of you think it is, and if I could trust that I was safe then maybe I could focus on learning the language and then it would be fine, but I can't, not here and not anywhere, and it's hard enough to try and keep up as it is," he says, in perfect, fluid, unhalting Russian. 

Christopher flops backwards to lie on the bed and facepalms.

"You're from another country," he says, slightly muffled through his hands. "And no-one bothered to make sure you spoke English before sending you to a Scottish boarding school." 

...this explains a lot. Like, a LOT. In fact, it possibly explains almost everything weird about Mikhailov. At the moment he's struggling to see that as a victory. 

"I speak some English." 

"Not enough to have a conversation," Christopher points out. "...not enough for classes?" 

"I......can take notes. When I try." His homework is borderline incoherent because he's literally just copying sentences from the book that have words he recognizes, but he doesn't know how he'd phrase that in English. 

"Is writing easier than talking?" Maybe they should switch to writing back and forth, especially since it's quieter and less likely to wake up the other boys. 

"No. I can.... copy, in writing." He's pretty sure that's what that word means but he's not nearly as sure as he'd like to be. 

Nod. 

Argh. This is a hard problem and Christopher is really not qualified to solve it on his own. 

Oh, that's a thought. "Do any of the teachers know?" 

He shakes his head. 

(At least, if they know, they've never given any sign of it. He's not sure whether it's more likely that they haven't noticed or that they don't care.) 

Alright. That's a place to start.

"I think we should talk to Professor Snape," he says, trying to sound more confident than he feels. "He's our head of House; he's supposed to help with things like this." 

(He catches Snape, help. He's seen Snape's face in classes, has seen the way his lip curls at anyone but the best-performing Slytherins, has heard the sneer in his voice when he answers questions.)  

"If you think so." 

"If we ask a different teacher, they'll tell us to go to Snape," he tries to explain, speaking a little slower than normal and choosing words as carefully as he can when he doesn't actually know the limits he's working with. "Maybe he won't help, but we should try him first." 

He nods. 

"Shall we both go talk to him after breakfast?" They could go earlier, Snape isn't hard to find in the mornings, but he'll be grouchy and snappish and even less likely to be helpful. This isn't an emergency, it can wait a few hours. 

After breakfast is clear enough. He nods again. 

And so after breakfast they go to Snape's office. Technically this isn't Christopher's problem but he thinks he's less scared of Snape and will probably be better at explaining the thing.

Also, he's not sure Mikhailov would actually go on his own, given that he hasn't done this at any point in the last month. 

"Parsons. Mikhailov. To what do I owe the pleasure?" His tone suggests that pleasure is the farthest thing from his mind. 

He tries to keep his eyes from darting around — it's not like he doesn't already know where the exit is — and winds up looking down at his hands. 

Yeah, looks like Christopher is going to be the one doing the talking. He's not surprised.

"Professor, Mikhailov isn't a native English speaker. He needs a language tutor, and—"