Sorry to talk about Harry Potter again but when it comes to the slave race that Rowling put in her books, she said she based the house elves off of brownies. You know, those creatures in British folklore that clean your house for you because they like doing it and are offended if you try to pay them?
Why not just put brownies in your story then? Almost identical effect without all the slavery.
If you wanna make the Malfoys look worse just idk maybe they put a spell on Dobby to bind him to their house and he can’t leave unless the malfoys break the rules and they’re bad to him but don’t technically try to break the rules until Harry tricks them into paying dobby with some clothes.
There. Problem solved. You can have hundreds of brownies living at hogwarts even. And when Hermione misinterprets their situation and tries to thank them and start paying them the brownies start getting offended and leaving and this causes an actual problem for the school. Much easier to make a subplot about not listening to the people that you’re trying to help.
Just another way you realize as an adult that these books weren’t really thought through very well.
