Summary: Five people from the different walks of life. One, born of the noble, was pampered; one, born of the dark, was disgraced; one, born of the ordinary, was extraordinary; one was cursed; and one… well, liked cheese.
Five children, five lives. Add five yellowish envelopes with green writing, and their fates are intertwined forever.
Categories: Marauder Era Characters: None
Warnings: None
Challenges: Series: None
Chapters: 5
Completed: No
Word count: 19971
Read: 13255
Published: 08/10/07
Updated: 01/29/08
1. Prologue by x_lily_evans_x
2. Chapter One by x_lily_evans_x
3. Chapter Two by x_lily_evans_x
4. Chapter Three by x_lily_evans_x
5. Chapter Four by x_lily_evans_x
Prologue by x_lily_evans_x
Author's Notes:
Disclaimer: Not mine.
James
A boy with a rather small frame for his age stared at himself in the mirror, looking rather sulky as his mother attacked his messy jet-black hair with a wet comb.
“Honestly, James, your hair just won’t lie flat!” the mother said, shaking her head.
“Well, don’t comb it,” said James, crossing his arms. “We aren’t attending anything important, anyway.”
“Nonsense,” his mother said, “we’re going to your father’s colleague’s house for dinner. You want to look your best, don’t you?”
“No, I don’t,” said James. “I don’t even want to attend this stupid dinner anyway. It’s not going to be fun.”
“That’s also rubbish. Some of your father’s colleagues are bringing along their families, too. There’s even a boy your age.”
“So who’re the families?” asked James, looking superbly unconvinced.
“Well, there are the Prewetts, the Fawcetts, the Spinnets, and the Malfoys, to name a few.”
“The Spinnets?” James perked up a little. “Is Gemma coming?”
“Yes, she is. Oh, before I forget”beware the Malfoys, the hosts. They’ve not a very good reputation.”
“What’d they do?” asked James curiously.
“They are mostly pure-blood extremists,” said his mother. “And they’re not very nice people, really. Watch yourself around their son, you don’t want to make ””
But James had suddenly run to the window. “Look, there’s an owl, Mum!”
Sure enough, a tawny owl flew into the room, and landed on James’s outstretched finger.
“It’s from Hogwarts!” James shrieked, undoing the letter from the owl. “Look, Mr. James Potter, Third-Floor Bedroom, Number Eighteen, Listhwaite Place, Darby Road, Third-Floor Bedroom, Pillswork.” The owl hooted and flew off. He ripped open the letter with trembling fingers and read the contents rapidly:
HOGWARTS SCHOOL
of WITCHCRAFT and WIZARDRY
Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore
(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorcerer, Chief Warlock,
Supreme Mugwump, International Confederation of Wizards)
Dear Mr. Potter,
We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all the necessary books and equipment.
Term begins on September 1st. We await your owl by no later than July 31.
Yours sincerely,
Minerva McGonagall,
Deputy Headmistress
“Yeeeeesssss!” James punched the air. “I’m iiiiinnnn Hooooggggwwaaarrrts, I’m iiiiinnnn Hooooggggwwaaarrrts!”
Mrs. Potter chuckled as she watched her son fly about the room, clutching the letter in one small hand.
“Calm down, James!” she called after her son.
“When are we going to Diagon Alley to get my stuff?” asked James eagerly, his cheeks pink with excitement as he obediently returned to his mother.
“Soon, James,” smiled Mrs. Potter. “Soon. Now sit down again, I have to comb your hair.”
James groaned, but the letter enclosed in his hand kept the smile on his face and the twinkle in his hazel eyes.
Sirius
A boy stood in front of a woman. His head was slightly bowed, yet in his grey eyes there was no sign of remorse as the woman lashed out at him repeatedly with vicious words. In fact he was no older than eleven, but because of his aristocrat nose and slightly long dark hair that fell into his eyes rather elegantly, he achieved the look of a handsome thirteen-year-old.
“We’ve told you a thousand times never to talk to Muggles on the streets. Yet you choose to disobey us repeatedly. When will you learn, boy?” She raised her hand as if to strike the boy’s face. The boy winced, but otherwise kept his ground.
Just then, a small creature with huge ears and eyes knocked on the door. “Excuse me, Mistress,” it said, addressing the woman. “Kreacher has an owl here, addressed to Master Sirius. It seems like it is from Hogwarts, ma’am.”
The boy who the lady had been reprimanding earlier straightened up and took a few strides towards the creature. “Give it here, Kreacher.”
“Master Sirius’ mother hasn’t told Kreacher to do anything,” said Kreacher, with a nasty grin at Sirius Black.
“I said give it here! It’s my letter!” said Sirius, louder.
Kreacher looked imploringly at Sirius’ mother.
“Sirius, stand back. I shall take it,” said the lady, with an imperious glare at the boy. A shadow flashed across his grey eyes, but he stepped back obediently. The woman took the letter from Kreacher. “You may leave.”
“Kreacher will escort himself out, Mistress,” said the house-elf. He edged out, throwing Sirius a dirty glare. Sirius retaliated by kicking the house-elf in the behind, carefully covering this by taking a swift step to the right.
Mrs. Black took her own time opening the envelope. Sirius clenched and unclenched his fists, waiting impatiently as his mother read his letter.
“Well?” he demanded after a minute or two.
“It seems that you’ve been accepted into Hogwarts,” his mother said in a bored tone, holding out the letter towards him. Sirius snatched it and rapidly read it. A ghost of a grin flitted across his face for a while, and then it was gone.
“Now, Sirius, I want you to have a bath, seeing that you were in such close contact to filth,” said Mrs. Black, and she wrinkled her nose, as though a garbage bin had just been placed under her nose. “Then I want you to dress in your best robes. We are going to the Malfoys’ manor for dinner.”
Sirius grabbed his letter, and fled upstairs to his room, but not before his younger brother Regulus caught him by the robes and pulled him into his room. “Sirius, did she hit you?”
“No,” said Sirius impatiently.
“What’s that in your hand? A letter? From Hogwarts?”
Sirius nodded.
“You’ve a place?”
Sirius nodded again. Not enough air in his throat for speech. A bubble of joy was welling up inside him, squeezing the air out of his lungs.
“You look happy, Sirius. Really happy.”
“Of course I’m happy, Regulus. I’m free from this house at last.”
Lily
“Severus, I got my letter!” Lily Evans whispered to her friend in delight. “Professor McGonagall came to my house and explained everything. Oh my God, I can’t wait!”
Severus Snape smiled widely, too. “I can’t wait, either. I want to Apparate to Hogwarts now!”
“Come again? ‘Apparate’?” Lily asked, puzzled.
“It means to instantaneously travel,” Severus explained. “You know, you think about a certain place, and then you focus and do a little twirl, and you end up there in a matter of seconds. At least, that’s what my Mum told me.”
“Interesting,” Lily said, smiling slightly at this new piece of information. “So when are you getting your stuff? Can I get it with you?”
“Of course,” Severus said, beaming. “Of course.”
Lily Evans flashed a grateful grin at him and then turned her head away to examine the letter in her hands once more.
She did not catch the affectionate look her friend gave her.
Remus
“Ouch!” a boy with light brown hair gasped in pain as his mother dabbed lightly on a gash on the side of his arm. He was only eleven, but his face was scarred and his arms had muscles that suggested he went regularly to the gym to work out. In truth, he was a lycanthrope: a werewolf.
“Sorry, poppet,” his mother said. She wrapped bandages around his wound. “How does it feel now, Remus?”
“Much better,” said the boy, smiling at his mother. “Though it still hurts if I do this”” he raised his arms in the air.
“Well, don’t do it, then,” his mother said, dropping a kiss on his head as she bustled about the room, putting away the ointment. “Try not to move around much for a few days.”
“I’ll try,” promised Remus. “When’s Dad coming home?”
“He’s Apparating back here as soon as his meeting with Dumbledore ends,” said Mrs. Lupin, sighing. “I do hope you can go Hogwarts.”
“So do I,” said Remus quietly. Mrs. Lupin sat down beside him and pulled him carefully into her arms, and they sat in this position, mother and son, for a long while till they heard a pop that signified Remus’s father’s Apparating home. They rushed out of the room, Remus not really caring about his injuries at the moment.
“How was it?” asked Remus eagerly.
Mr. Lupin replied, his back turned, “I did my best.”
Remus’s shoulders sagged. It was the worst answer his father could’ve given. And then his father turned around, with a letter held out to Remus.
“Congrats, my boy. You’re in.”
His son’s face broke into a huge smile.
Peter
A small boy who looked no bigger than eight was sitting by the table. He had mousy brown hair, and in fact, was eleven, not eight. His mother bustled in and said, “Peter, sweetie, watch out for your Hogwarts letter today. It’s around this time that letters arrive.”
The boy ate the cheese off his pizza” he was half-blood” and nodded. “I’ll keep an eye for the owl,” he promised.
Peter wondered idly which house he’d go to at Hogwarts. His mother had told him all about Hogwarts, and so far Peter felt that he wasn’t brave” at least, he didn’t feel brave, he wasn’t smart, he wasn’t really hardworking or loyal, for that matter, and he wasn’t evil.
So as far as he could see, he didn’t belong to any house. Excellent. Not.
But Peter knew indeed that he had magic, because one day back in kindergarten, the playground bully was just aiming a punch at him when some force made the bully fly halfway across the playground. Peter had had to write lines, but his mother had been delighted.
Maybe I’ll be in Hufflepuff, mused Peter. After all, Mum was in that house too.
His thoughts were interrupted by a brown owl that had just landed into his glass of juice. The envelope stained orange. Peter cursed and undid the envelope excitedly.
He confirmed the Hogwarts stamp and yelled gleefully, “Mum, I’m in!”
A/N: See that little box down there? :D
Chapter One by x_lily_evans_x
Author's Notes:
Disclaimer: This is not mine. I mean, sure the writing is, but the characters aren't. Oh, and thanks for all your reviews! I only hope this chapter is up to everyone's standards...
Sirius
It was hard, I’ve decided, very hard, to take a bath.
This is not a question of my hygiene, but the sanity of my house elf who routinely sticks his ugly snout into the toilet to see if I’m cleaning myself up as well as my mother had ordered me to.
When this happens for the third time, I lose my temper and fling the nearest towel into his face. I mean, Mother makes me use Mrs Skower’s Dirt Removal Wash, for crying out loud. The first time I bathed with it, it nearly got rid of my skin, let alone “Muggle filth”.
I’ve never quite understood my family’s hatred for Muggles. They’re the same as us, apart from the fact that they don’t have a spark of magic in their blood. Once when I was eight, I’d secretly went out of Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place to the nearest playground because I was sick of Kreacher’s tutoring. I’d played with a few Muggle children, and they didn’t seem as disgusting as Mother describes them. Their lack of magic (which isn’t their fault, I’m sure” I mean, who wouldn’t want to perform magic?) seemed to be the drive of Mum’s anti-Muggle speeches, which she gives once a day and which my wuss of a brother lap up. And no, it’s not enough that he actually takes the nagger seriously. He has to parrot her, too. I swear, sometimes having Regulus around is like having a mini Mother be your shadow.
Speak of the little wuss. There he is, banging on the door.
“What?” I holler, toweling my hair dry.
“Are you done bathing?” he asks.
After pulling on clothes, I wrench the door open. “Yeah, I’m done. What do you want?”
He looks around him nervously, as if he is about to commit a crime. Dunno why he bothers, though. Mother never scolds him. Neither does Father. Kreacher’s never nasty to him, either. In all of their eyes, he can do no wrong. After making sure that the coast is clear, he gestures for me to go closer and then says in a low voice, “Watch out, Sirius. Mum’s really angry that you threw a towel at Kreacher.”
“It’s not my fault, “I say indignantly. “The sneaky arse was peeping in on me when I was naked, Regulus, naked.”
“But Mum was the one who made him do that. Anyway, what makes you think he wants to look at your scrawny self?” Regulus protests. Have I mentioned that Regulus’ very big on the way we treat Kreacher?
Well, if I haven’t, now you know.
“Scrawny?” I ask indignantly, pointing to my arms. “There’re more muscles here that you’ll ever have on your body, you twig.”
Regulus isn’t fazed. “Whatever. The point is, if you’re angry about that, you ought to take it up with Mum.”
I make a face at the thought of what could happen if I do that. Probably will involve a couple of curses and my yelling.
“Thanks, but I think I’ll pass.”
“Sirius! Just””
“I know, I know! Leave Kreacher alone! The message got through crystal clear, Regulus!” I cry in frustration. “Now leave me alone.”
“We’re supposed to go to the Malfoys, remember?”
“Ah, of course,” I say sourly. Our family goes to the Malfoy Manor at least once a year, because our father and Abraxas Malfoy are colleagues. And each time, Regulus and I are forced to go along, whereas the children of the other colleagues are stripped of this burden. Which means that Regulus and I are left to the devices of the delightful Mr Lucius Malfoy, who prattles on and on about how he, being Keeper for the Slytherin Quidditch Team, has so many adventures and excitement in his life.
Which means that we are in for pure torture.
And this evening it is no different.
Oh, wait, I forget. Lucius Malfoy has just been appointed as Prefect, which means that we are in for purer torture.
“Mum and Dad are waiting downstairs for us,” Regulus informs me.
“What? Why didn’t you tell me?” I ask, dashing about the room to get a comb to run through my hair.
“I was going to tell you, but I thought it’d be better to warn you about Mum. Her mood’s pretty foul now.”
When I am done, I grab his arm and sprint down the stairs, where our parents are waiting. They don’t look too happy about the delay.
“Looking messy as usual, Sirius,” Mother says disapprovingly. “Did you not clean yourself up?”
Father strides forward to adjust my dress robes. “Looks fine now,” he says brusquely. “Let’s go, the Malfoys are already waiting.” He grabs my hand and Apparates. We arrive at a pavilion outside the Malfoy Manor, and wait for a few seconds for Mum and Regulus to arrive. Then we walk up the driveway towards the tall towering gates of the Manor.
“Now, remember, be polite to everyone,” Mother reminds. “Sirius, don’t use that dull-eyed stare on anyone, or else.”
She doesn’t have to continue. “Or else” simply means that I will be locked up in the basement of our house for the night, and be susceptible to the clutches of our ghoul.
“Yeah, all right,” I say.
“This time, all of your father’s colleagues are bringing their children…”
So this means we aren’t going to be stuck with just Lucius! I can dance the whole night through.
“…and I want you to be the aristocratic children who you were born as, and not like the common slob you often behave like, Sirius.”
I give a jerk of my head, whereas Regulus trills, “Of course, Mum!”
She smiles and ruffles his hair, because Regulus is her son. Her obedient, smart, charming, and eager-to-please son. The son who shares all her beliefs, the son who is a worthy Black.
The son who I never was. The son who I will never be.
_________________________________
James
I suppose that I’m considered quite lucky. I can even qualify as pampered. I have whatever an eleven-year-old wizard could dream of: a Cleansweep Two, a crystal chess set, a gold Gobstones set, a peacock-feather quill, and an owl.
So, if I can have all those stuff, why can’t I not attend the dinner at the Malfoys?
It was exactly what I have asked Mum as I unwillingly put on my dress robes.
She has replied that all of Dad’s other colleagues are also bringing along their children, and if I don’t go, it will seem as though they spoil me rotten, and I don’t want to seem spoilt, do I, and besides, Gemma’s going too, so why the complaints?
I’ve replied that I happen to know that the Fawcetts have a twelve-year-old daughter to whom Gemma is relatively close, and she’d probably leave me alone the whole evening to die of boredom.
Mum has only laughed and said that I was such a worrywart, and a people-person. The latter of which I do not understand, but she doesn’t go on to explain, only gets me downstairs, where Dad is waiting, and we Apparate to a pavilion near the Malfoy Manor.
Which is where I am at the present.
“Are we ready?” Dad asks me.
“No,” I reply sulkily. “I never will be.”
I know I am behaving like a spoilt child, but I cannot help it. The fact that I am to waste an evening at an annoying dinner tends to do that to me.
Mum sighs. “C’mon, James. Cheer up, it’ll be all right. Fun, even.”
I cross my arms, unconvinced. Dad kneels down beside me and ruffles my hair. “James, you behave yourself, and I’ll get Nellie to bake you your favourite brownies.”
I almost drool. “To eat tonight?” I ask.
Dad nods, and I grin, cheering up considerably. “Okay. I’ll behave!”
“Excellent!” Dad and Mum share a smile but I don’t care that I am being bribed. All I care for are the promised brownies.
We walk to the imposing Malfoy Manor, and almost immediately, a fair-haired boy appears from the manor. He greets Dad and Mum politely, albeit coolly, and gives me no notice.
“Lucius,” Dad says to the boy. “How tall you’ve become!”
Lucius smiles coldly. “I should hope to be tall. Whoever has heard of a Quidditch Captain who is not tall?” That said, he gives me a contemptuous glance.
I know I am short and skinny for my age, but who is to say that I wouldn’t grow to be tall?!
“You’re Quidditch Captain?” Mum asks, and I know that she has caught sight of that less-than-friendly look Lucius has given me; although she has a smile on her face I can tell it isn’t entirely friendly.
“A prefect, too, Mrs Potter,” Lucius reminds humbly.
“That’s wonderful!” Mum says, and I can almost see her struggling not to roll her eyes.
“Thank you, Mrs Potter,” Lucius says, leading us to the drawing room.
I know the Malfoys are rich, but I’ve not expected the front doors to be gold-leafed. We are shown to the drawing room, where the other families and their children are sitting. I catch sight of Gemma and wave at her. She grins back.
“Ah, Phillippe!” says a tall man who looks remarkably like Lucius. He stands up and shakes Dad’s hand “You are just on time!”
“I should hope so, Abraxas,” Dad says, smiling, but there is something strained in it. “This is my wife, Eleanor, and our son, James.”
The rest of Dad’s colleagues and their families stand up, shaking our hands. We are then led to the dining room, and I find myself sitting between Gemma and a dark-haired boy whose name I have not caught earlier on.
As Gemma is busy talking to Amelia Fawcett, I decide to make some conversation with the boy beside me, because Merlin forbid I should die of boredom.
“So, er, what’s your name?” I ask.
The boy starts, and looks at me, as though surprised that I am actually talking to him. “You didn’t catch it earlier on?”
I raise my eyebrows. “No, I didn’t. I hope that’s okay with you.”
He looks relieved, even happy. “No, it’s perfectly fine. I’m Sirius. And I know you’re James.”
“Yeah, that’s me,” I say. “So what’s Hogwarts like?”
He looks nonplussed. “What are you talking about? I’ve never even been there.”
“But you look thirteen!”
“Well, I assure you that I’m eleven,” he says. “I’ll be going there on September first.”
“See you on the train, then,” I say, grinning.
“You’re going to be a first year, too?” he asks.
“Mm-hmm,” I say. “And so is Gemma here.” I indicate my traitor of a best friend, who doesn’t seem to care whether I had any company or not.
Then the food starts appearing on our dishes. I am extremely impressed, as Nellie, our house elf at home, has been serving us our meals, sometimes along with Mum. We’ve never had things like this happening at home. We start digging in and soon the small talk between Sirius and I go on to Quidditch and our favourite teams. Mine are the Ballycastle Bats, whereas his are the Tutshill Tornadoes. We then start arguing about which team is the better one.
And as the dinner goes on, I realise that this evening has not been entirely wasted after all.
Still, that’s not saying I don’t want the brownies.
_________________________________
Remus
Since I was five, each time I mention Hogwarts, Dad will be very silent, and Mum will look very sad. And when I was eight they took me aside and told me that werewolves are less than welcome at Hogwarts.
It has been one of the worst days of my life.
But yesterday has been one of the best days of my life. Yesterday, Professor Dumbledore had given me a chance that few wizards will have given, and let me enter Hogwarts. He has given me the chance to walk through the crowded alleys of Diagon Alley, purchasing wands and spellbooks I will otherwise not be able to purchase, and study witchcraft and wizardry with other wizards and witches my age.
Professor Dumbledore has assured Dad that arrangements have been made for my transformations every full moon, and that neither the students nor I will be in danger of any sort. Dad told me that the Headmaster of Hogwarts has said that apart from my affliction, I will be just like any other student at his school.
Professor Dumbledore had given me a new lease of life.
And I cannot thank him enough.
_________________________________
Lily
I cannot understand why Petunia is so wary of magic. She knows what she has agreed to when she had said she is coming with us to Diagon Alley. Mrs Snape has had already told her that there will be magic occurring everywhere. Petunia has nodded bravely, and like the best friend she is, she said that she’ll stick with me.
I’ve beamed at her, happy that she is joining us, but now she is whimpering and flinching at any bit of magic going on around her. “I want to go home!” she tells Dad and Mum repeatedly.
“But we can’t,” Mum keeps saying. “We haven’t gotten all of Lily’s things yet!”
At which Petunia throws me a dark look, as if it is my fault that she can’t go home. All right, I admit, it is somewhat my fault indirectly, but isn’t she the one who’s agreed to come with us?
“She’s getting on my nerves,” Severus, my other best friend, says to me in a low tone.
“Mine too,” I mutter back, hugging the basket containing my newly bought cat. I’ve always liked cats, so I’d gotten Nightfall, a cat with ice blue eyes and dark grey fur, from The Magical Menagerie. (Severus doesn’t like cats much” he’s gotten a black rat instead” but the feelings between him and Nightfall are pretty much mutual.) “I don’t get why she’s so strung up. She’s usually a lot better than this.”
Severus gives a cough that sounds like a snort. He is always disagreeing with me on the terms of Petunia being nice. He thinks that she’s mean and spoilt and keeps making me do things, but honestly, she isn’t. She’s a great sister. I am perfectly willing to do whatever she does.
However, ever since Professor McGonagall came to my house, she has become rather detached from me. Today is the first time in two weeks since she has spoken more than ten sentences to me at a time.
“Can we hurry up and get her things, then?” Petunia goes.
“We’ve not long to go, have we?” Dad asks Mrs Snape.
She shakes her head. “Just their wands left,” she says, and brings us to a small, rather shabby shop which has gold letters on the door that read: Ollivanders: Makers of Fine Wands since 382 BC. Mrs Snape pushes the door open and somewhere in the shop a bell tinkles. We follow her in. There is a sort of air about the place that suggests mysteries that can never be solved. The noise and bustle of Diagon Alley was entirely muted as the door swung shut. The shop was small and we have little room to stand. There were shelves and shelves of long thin boxes, containing wands, or so I presume. Once we settle down slightly, an aged man seems to appear at the back of the shop out of nowhere. He approaches us slowly, andwhen he reaches us he looks at us, his gaze finally resting on me. His eyes are pale and wide, and look like moons. It is a little creepy, because he says nothing for a long while, and when he does speak, it is in a soft voice.
“You’re here to buy a wand.”
It isn’t a question.
I look at the rest of my family, Mrs Snape and Severus. Petunia is currently between Dad and Mum, as if they are shields, whereas Mrs Snape and Severus just looked at me as though expecting me to answer him. “Er, yes,” I say.
He takes out a tape measure from his pocket and starts to measure the length of my shoulder to my finger, then wrist to elbow, followed by shoulder to floor, knee to armpit, and lastly, around my head. While he measures, he tells us a little about wands, and what the different cores are. And when he is done measuring he leaves the tape measure on the floor and darts around his store, and returns with a stack of boxes in his arms.
Brandishing a wand at me, he says, “Try this one. Maplewood, dragon heartstring. Twelve inches, rather bendy.”
I take it, and wonder what I am supposed to do with it. Mr Ollivander looks at me as though I am a little slow. “Give it a wave.”
I wave it, feeling slightly stupid, and nothing happens. Mr Ollivander takes the wand back and hands me another. “Birchwood, phoenix feather, nine and a half inches long.”
I wave, and still nothing happens. Now truly feeling stupid, I hand the wand back, but Mr Ollivander looks far from annoyed. In fact, he looks rather happy. He looks like what I feel like when I’ve been given a particularly difficult school assignment” ready for a challenge.
After many wands, he hands me yet another, saying, “Made of willow, unicorn hair, ten and a quarter inches long, swishy. Give it a wave.”
I take it from him, and there is sudden inexplicable warmth in my fingers. Upon my waving it, red sparks shoot out from it. I look at the wand in delight, and my parents cheer, as do Severus. It has also wangled a soft “wow” of awe from Petunia. Mr Ollivander himself is nodding appreciatively, and as he packages my new wand away, he tells me that it is excellent for charm work.
Then it is Severus’ turn to get his own wand. Mr Ollivander measures him like he did me, but for Severus it does not take long for his wand to choose him. On his very second try, his wand (“Made of fir, dragon heartstring, twelve inches”) has silver sparks shoot out from the tip. Severus looks pleased, and after we pay for the wands, we thank Mr Ollivander and head outside.
Dad takes my wand and examines it interestedly. “This is all so great,” he says. “I suppose it doesn’t work for me?” He waves it, but nothing happens.
“Only our Lily can make it work,” Mum says, looking at me fondly and ruffling my hair. I take my wand back from Dad and run my fingers over the smooth willow. Severus has also taken his out and is looking at it, too. Petunia sidles over and joins me at my side.
“Can I look at it, Lily?” she asks.
Severus starts to say something cutting but I shoot him a glare and he falls silent. This is the first time all day that Petunia has said something that is remotely pleasant to me.
“Sure,” I say cheerfully, and pass my wand over to her.
She examines it in admiration and hands it back to me with something strange in her face.
It’s only after we return home and I’m sitting at a corner stroking Nightfall that I have put a name to her look.
Longing.
_________________________________
Peter
Boys should never go shopping with their mothers. Especially if their mothers are like mine. Mum is slightly bossy, and she’s always wanted a girl. That, as you can see, is an extremely dangerous combination.
As a result, Mum has been trying to get me things that seem more suited for girls. At Madam Malkin’s Robes for All Occasions, she has actually fingered the Hogwarts uniform for girls longingly, with a far off look in her eye. I have to clear my throat loudly and point to the boys’ uniform significantly.
Shopping with Mum is a very dangerous affair.
Thank Merlin it is all over.
We’re sitting at the Leaky Cauldron, drinking butterbeer. Mum looks at me across the table. “My little boy, all grown up,” she says proudly. “I can’t wait to see you in your uniform, you’ll look absolutely dashing, sweetie.”
I beg to differ. I’m not exceptional in looks. I am rather small in size, with mousy hair and small blue eyes. If you want someone “dashing,” I’m not your man. Or boy.
A few rowdy boys at the next table look over at Mum’s words, and sneer at me. Mum doesn’t notice them, but I do. I’ve been jibed countless of times, but that doesn’t mean that each time it gets easier being the brunt of people’s jokes.
“Mum,” I say quietly, after draining the last of my butterbeer, “can we go home now?”
Mum nods, and gathers our shopping bags. “Of course we can.”
As we leave, I can’t help but throw the rowdy boys a last look. They stare back challengingly, and I sigh. If this is the kind of company I’ll find at Hogwarts, then I’m not so sure I want to go anymore.
_________________________________
Lily
Severus and I lie on the porch, staring at a moth which has chosen to rest upside down on the ceiling.
“What shall we do now?” I ask, fanning myself. It is so very hot, I feel like plunging into a sea of ice cubes.
“I dunno,” Severus replies in a tone that sounds as lazy as I feel.
I drag myself off the heated tiles of the porch.
“Where’re you going?” Severus asks.
“Up to my room,” I tell him, “where maybe watching a little television can take my mind off the heat.”
“Good idea.” He scrambles up too and we head into the house.
This being the first time he’s in my house, Severus thinks that Petunia’s bedroom’s mine, and walks in before I can stop him. When I am about to yell to him that it’s in fact Petunia’s room, Severus has already given a gasp and says a strangled, “I don’t believe it!”
I dash into Petunia’s room, saying, “What is it?”
I ask. He doesn’t answer, but beckons me to go over. After looking over my shoulder to check that Petunia’s not there (she’d be furious if she knew Severus’s in her room), I walk over to where he is, at the dresser, holding a yellowish parchment in his hand. It is similar to the one that I had received from Professor McGonagall. “What is it?” I ask again curiously.
“It’s a letter from Dumbledore,” he says in reverence. “I don’t believe this! She’s written to him and he’s written back! Frankly, I’m astonished the letter had even gotten through to Dumbledore, they must have wizards working undercover in the postal service or something…”
“Let me see!” I demand, and he hands it over to me.
Dear Ms Evans,
Thank you very much for writing to me. However, I must most regrettably tell you that we are unable to give you a place at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
However, do not fret too much about this. Being a non-magical person does not mean in any way that your sister is better than you. Being non-magic certainly did not stop Sir Isaac Newton from discovering gravity, nor did it stop Thomas Edison from inventing all his most miraculous gadgets. Being non-magic is merely like being born without a certain tool that your sister has been born with, but there is really not much difference” if you persevere, you can be every bit as successful. And that is what I call magic.
Yours sincerely,
Albus Dumbledore
Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry
I feel a pang. The reply, though kind, must have hurt Petunia very much.
Just then, the automatic gates of our house open with a crack like a shot. Severus and I jump, and Severus snatches the letter and stuffs it back into the envelope before leaving it on the dresser. We look at each other in panic, and then, forgetting totally about our plan of watching television in my room, dash downstairs and lie down, grabbing a couple of magazines to pretend that we’ve been reading.
The car parks, and Petunia comes in. She sees both of us. “Oh,” she says to Severus flatly. “You’re here.”
Severus does not deign to reply.
“So, Petunia,” I ask hurriedly, having no idea why I am asking her this at all. Paranoia, I guess. “How did your ballet lesson go?”
“It was fine,” she says shortly. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going upstairs for a bath.”
She heads for her room. I look after her, and there’s that twinge in my stomach again. Although she’s only going upstairs to bathe, it’s as if she’s taken a path, a different path from the one that I’m taking. It’s never going to be like it has been all these years. It’s going to be very different. I used to do everything with Petunia. Now I’m leaving her, Mum and Dad for an entire school year to live and study with other children, most of whom I do not know.
And for the very first time, I am scared.
A/N: Okay, firstly, please don’t kill me for having Remus’ part so short. I just didn’t have anything much planned for him in this chapter, but I’ll have more stuff for him to narrate, pinky-swear. And yes, just in case you were wondering, I love Remus just as much as most of you do. Which is a lot, just not as much as I adore James and Sirius. Well, feel free to leave a review, yes? :D
Chapter Two by x_lily_evans_x
Author's Notes:
Anything/anyone that/who seems suspiciously familiar isn't mine. Also, much thanks to Joanna (lucilla_pauie) for editing this, you're a gem. :D
James
It sucks when you have to part with your broom for an entire year, just because the school thinks that first-years can’t fly as well as the students from other years.
Especially when you’re an absolutely brilliant flier (and I am not being cocky or anything, because that’s what a few people have been telling me) and are likely to help Gryffindor win the Quidditch Cup.
This is exactly what I tell Mum as I sit on my bed, clutching my Cleansweep Two close to me.
She looks at me, shakes her head, and says, “Talk about arrogant.”
I agree vehemently. “My point exactly! Those people are so conceited, they think the youngest students can’t fly at all””
“I was,” Mum interrupts, reaching over and tweaking my nose, “talking about you.”
“Me?” I ask, leaping up from my bed. “Mum, I am a brilliant flier. You said so yourself!”
Mum gives a long-suffering sigh, but there is an unwilling grin on her face. “James, I think you really need a lesson on being less… boastful. It’s perfectly all right when other people praise you for your abilities, but it is definitely not okay to go around praising yourself.”
I ponder on what she says for a while, then say, “But it’s all part of my charm, isn’t it?” and add a smile for good measure.
“Charm? Ha, I wish!” she says, ruffling my hair. “Don’t go around boasting like that. It’s unseemly for a young gentleman such as yourself.”
“All right,” I relent. “But I still don’t get why first-years can’t bring along their brooms.”
Mum adds one last scarf to my trunk, and then snaps it shut. “It’s because there might be a Muggleborn in your dorm, who doesn’t know a single thing about flying, and then he might steal your broom because he wants a taste, and ends up hurting himself.”
“Well, it serves him right for stealing my broom!” I say. “Besides, flying is so easy, I don’t believe anyone can’t fly properly””
“What,” Mum says, looking sternly at me, “did I say about being stuck-up?”
I cross my arms. “Fine.”
“It’s your last day here, why don’t you go out and fly?” she suggests. “Come in at about five, though, we’ve invited the Spinnets over for dinner.”
I trudge slowly out of my room, broom in hand, and nose high up in the air, as if I cannot care less about her suggestion. But after I check that she is out of sight, I race down the hallways and out into the open garden and kick off from the ground.
The sky rushes down to meet me, and as the wind tousles my hair, I feel free.
_________________________________
Sirius
It is the last night at home before I officially leave for Hogwarts, and I cannot be happier. My trunk has been packed weeks ago, and I’ve been spending a lot of my time shut up in my room practising simple spells with my wand.
In recent days, Regulus keeps coming into my room and going through my trunk, flipping open my textbooks and swishing my wand. He has broken my window and set fire to my carpet so far. The broken glass I have mended, but I had to use my wizard’s hat to put out the fire.
Today he is staying put in my room most of the time, because he says that in a few hours I’ll be gone forever. Honestly! The way he talks, it’s as if I’m going to meet my death. Sheesh.
Kreacher comes into the room without knocking, as usual.
“What do you want?” I ask him shortly, not wanting to lose my temper on our last night in the same house. He is Kreacher, after all.
Who am I kidding? No, the reason why I don’t want to lose my temper is because Mother might find out and I might get spanked the day before I go to Hogwarts for the first time of my entire life. Glamorous to attend school on the first day with finger markings on your buttock, I think not. Even though they won’t be seen, they’ll probably feel sore when I sit. Thanks, but I’ll go without.
Kreacher ignores me, and looks at Regulus, who is, once again, twiddling my wand. “Your Uncle Cygnus, Aunt Druella, and your cousins have arrived,” he tells Regulus. Regulus drops the wand, hops off the bed and races out of the room faster than a Gringotts cart.
Family love. How very touching.
I turn to glare at Kreacher. “Anything else?” I ask. He ignores me again, and leaves the room.
Somewhere from downstairs, I hear the muffled, lively chatter of my parents, uncle, aunt, Regulus, and my cousins, Andromeda, Bellatrix, and Narcissa. Andromeda’s voice floats up from the hall. “Where is Sirius?”
I walk towards the hall as slowly as I can. When I enter, I flash a bright smile at everyone and greet them.
“There’s the new Hogwarts student!” Uncle Cygnus says. He walks up to me and shakes my hand. “And how do you feel about going to Hogwarts tomorrow?”
His breath smells of tobacco, as usual. It is not a pleasant smell, and I have to stop myself from wrinkling my nose.
“Excited,” I say, trying to appear indifferent.
“Ah, cool and collected, our Sirius,” Andromeda says, smiling. She’s eighteen this year, and she’s my favourite cousin. I grin at her.
Mother smiles at me. It’s meant to look benign, but unfortunately, when she is smiling at me, she can’t pull off the kindly look. “Narcissa will be in her Fifth Year, too, so she can take good care of you,” she tells me, her arm around Narcissa.
“She’s been made a prefect,” Aunt Druella tells everyone proudly. Narcissa attempts to look demure and humble, but her smug smile says it all.
“Congratulations,” Father says, smiling like he never usually does. “I expect the same from you, Sirius. You’re always so sloppy and lazy…”
Bellatrix speaks up for the first time. “Oh, I’m sure Sirius will surprise us all.” It doesn’t sound like a compliment. I give her a look, and she shoots a smirk at me.
“Let’s hope he does,” Father says, and starts talking about his work. The adults join in enthusiastically.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I demand, turning to my cousin.
“Well, isn’t it true?” Bellatrix asks, her gaze hard and cold. “You’re the black sheep of the family, Sirius” you’ll never do us proud.” And as Mother asks her a question, she turns and smiles at her, all beautiful and demure again.
Andromeda overhears. She comes over and wraps an arm around my shoulder. “Do you want to go for a walk outside?” she asks. I jerk my head in a non-committal answer. She steers me outside of Grimmauld Place, where the cool air of the night washes over us. Once we are out of hearing range, she says, “Don’t listen to Bella, Sirius. She’s just being her usual catty self.”
“No, it’s true,” I say. “It’s true that I’ll never do my family proud. But I don’t mind, actually.”
And suddenly, I realise that it’s true. I don’t mind at all.
In fact, disgracing them, I find, is my dearest wish.
_________________________________
Lily
We are standing on Platform Nine and Three-Quarters, and Petunia is still angry with me. We have arrived here by car. Petunia, Severus, Mrs Snape, and I were sitting in the backseat, and Petunia has barely even talked to me on the way here.
I have absolutely no idea why my sister is so sullen today though. But this is my last chance to make things all right with her, as I’m not going to be seeing her until Christmas break. So I step up to her and begin tentatively, “Petunia?”
She ignores me. I try again, louder this time, “Tuney!”
She shakes her head as if trying to ward off an irritable fly. “What?”
“Don’t be mad at me,” I say. She doesn’t reply. “Look, Tuney, whatever I did”” The letter that I’m not supposed to read, forbidden to read seems to be back in my hands, and once again I feel as though I’m shriveling up with guilt.
Petunia turns away from me, as if she knows exactly what I have done when Severus and I were snooping around in her room the other day.
I swallow.
“Tuney, I” *I’m sorry, Tuney, I’m sorry! Listen”” I catch Petunia’s hand and hold on tightly to it, and Petunia tries to pull away. “Maybe once I’m there” no, listen, Tuney! Maybe once I’m there, I’ll be able to go to Professor Dumbledore and persuade him to change his mind!”
Petunia stops tugging her hand away from me for a moment, and stares at me. Usually I’m able to read the expression in her eyes, but today she’s kept them emotionally blank. Then she resumes her tugging. “I don’t- want- to- go!” she says, and successfully relinquishes my grip. “You think I want to go to some stupid castle and learn to be a- a-”
She pauses, looking around the platform, where our parents, Severus and Mrs Snape are standing a few feet away. She is apparently not able to find a description. I bite my lip. Taking her hand again, I am about to plead my case again when Petunia continues.
“-you think I want to be a- a freak?”
Shocked, I slacken my grasp and hot tears prick the backs of my eyes. Petunia takes this opportunity to snatch her hand away. She looks triumphant, glad that she has found the correct adjective.
“I’m not a freak,” I say, all too aware that my voice is shaking. “That’s a horrible thing to say.”
“That’s where you’re going. A special school for freaks,” says Petunia with vindictive pleasure. “You and that Snape boy… weirdos, that’s what you two are. It’s good you’re being separated from normal people. It’s for our safety.”
Petunia is my sister. My protector. My best friend since my birth. She has laughed with me, cried with me, comforted me, and supported me. We’ve fought loads of times, but within five minutes we’d make up and laugh and play as though nothing’s happened. Petunia’s always been there for me.
Today, as we stand on Platform Nine and Three-Quarters, she has turned against me.
With every word she has spoken, it’s as if a dagger is poking holes in my heart. It’s painful. And then suddenly hurt has become rage, and I want to hurt Petunia as much as she’s hurt me.
“You didn’t think it was such a freak’s school when you wrote to the Headmaster and begged him to take you.”
And I watch with a kind of spiteful pleasure as Petunia flushes.
“Beg?” she says, and her voice is higher than usual. “I didn’t beg!”
I feel cruel, but I deliver my next sentence anyway. “I saw his reply. It was very kind.”
Petunia now looks horrified. “You shouldn’t have read”” she whispers. “That was my private” how could you-?”
Suddenly guilt fills me, and I involuntarily throw a glance at Severus. Petunia follows my gaze and gasps.
“That boy found it! You and that boy have been sneaking in my room!”
Stung, I leap to my own defense. “No” not sneaking” Severus saw the envelope, and he couldn’t believe a Muggle could have contacted Hogwarts, that’s all! He says there must be wizards working undercover in the postal service who take care of””
The blood drains out of Petunia’s face very quickly. This is a sure sign of her fury. “Apparently wizards poke their noses in everywhere!” she snarls, and then spits, “Freak!” before flouncing off to our parents, leaving me quite alone and in the middle of a crowd of strangers.
I wipe my eyes on the back of my hand and look up to see Severus, staring rather concernedly at me from Mrs Snape’s side. Anger rushes through me as I remember that he’s the one who made Petunia so angry at me. I pointedly ignore him and walk to my parents.
“I want to go home now,” Petunia is snapping at them.
“But we have to see Lily off, don’t we?” Dad tells her.
Petunia doesn’t say anything, clearly not wanting to explain about the letter Dumbledore wrote to her. She presses her lips together and throws me a scathing look. Mum looks at me and her eyes seem to question, “What’s going on?”
I shake my head briefly, and muster a small smile. Mum quickly changes the subject. “So, Lily, you’re going to be away from us until Christmas. I bet you can’t wait, hmm?”
I feel worse when I am reminded of the fact. No Dad, no Mum, and no Petunia. “No,” I say, and my voice wavers. “I can wait.”
Mum bends down and hugs me. “Oh, honey,” she says, her voice thick. “We’ll miss you, too. Write to us often, Eileen told us that there’re school owls for students to use.”
I almost start sobbing there and then. “I’ll write. Every week. Perhaps everyday.”
“We’ll think of you every minute,” Dad says, hugging me now. “Now, we better go load up your trunk, and we can talk a little more before you have to go.”
A guard in red livery helps us with it, while I carry Nightfall in a basket. Severus is right behind me with his own trunk, but I refuse to even look at him. He’s somewhat the cause of my argument with Petunia. When I return to the platform, I hug and kiss Dad and Mum, and then turn to Petunia. On occasions when I go off for a period of time, like a school trip, she would hug and kiss me goodbye. Today, however, she is pointedly looking at the ceiling.
“ ’Bye, Petunia,” I say, wanting to hug her and tell her how sorry I am, but my pride does not allow it.
She nods coldly. “See you Christmas,” she says in a detached kind of voice.
Mum opens her mouth to scold Petunia, but I make her stop. “It’s kind of my fault,” I mutter. It makes me feel worse when Mum doesn’t scold me. I suppose it due to the fact that I’ll be gone until the end of the year.
“Well, write a moving apology to her soon,” Mum suggests. “She’ll forgive you.”
The guards whistle, signaling that the train is about to leave. She hugs me once more and I dash to the train before the door closes. Staring out of the window pane and waving to my parents, I sincerely hope that Mum is right, and Petunia will forgive me, because I cannot imagine a life in which Petunia and I aren’t best friends.
I can’t, and I won’t.
_________________________________
Remus
I have just said goodbye to my parents. I won’t be seeing them till Christmas. That is assuming if my secret doesn’t get found out before then.
I’m excited, but scared, too. Scared that someone will take a look at me and know from my tenseness that something’s different about me, and investigate and find out about my being a werewolf. Scared that I’ll be sorted into Slytherin, and be a disappointment to my parents. Scared that I won’t be able to make any friends, because I haven’t lived in an area with many children my age around, and the only friend I’d ever made there had been forbidden by his mother to play with me when she’d found that there’s something strange about me.
My fears aren’t unfounded, though, at least, not the last one. It’s been at least a minute since we’ve pulled away from King’s Cross Station, and I’ve still not found a compartment to sit it, and am dragging my trunk with me all around the train, looking for an empty compartment.
I pause outside a half-empty compartment. Three boys are already in it, along with one red-haired girl, who doesn’t seem to be acquainted with them. She’s sitting right at the corner, by the window, whereas the three boys are chatting to one another by the door. I raise a hand to knock on the door, but then hesitate. What if they tell me to go away? I think I will just die of humiliation. However, the bespectacled boy catches my eye, and motions me to join them. Taken aback, but pleasantly surprised, I slide the door open, and the two boys greet me boisterously.
“Finding a seat?” the bespectacled boy says. He is rather small, with messy black hair that sticks up at the back. His hairdo might look unkempt on anyone else, but he has an imperious air about him that suggests he is an emperor in his own home.
I nod, grinning.
“Sit down here, then,” another boy says, indicating the seat opposite himself and next to the bespectacled boy. He looks about thirteen, and, with his dark hair and grey eyes, is extremely handsome in a haughty sort of way. I think I’m a little afraid of him. I place my trunk in the baggage compartment above us, and sit down meekly.
The last boy, who has sandy hair and is sitting beside the haughty-looking boy, grins and me and says, “I’m Kelvin, this’s James, and he’s Sirius. We’re all first years.”
“Remus Lupin,” I offer. “I’m a first year, too.”
“We were just talking about Quidditch,” Sirius says. “What’s your favourite team?” he asks suddenly.
“Me?” I say, slightly alarmed. “Oh, I don’t know, the Tornadoes, I guess.”
“Ha!” Sirius says delightedly to James and Kelvin. “I told you the Tutshill Tornadoes rule.”
“They might rule,” James says, “but the Ballycastle Bats are the best!”
“No, they’re not!” Sirius says. Turning to me, he says, “Remus, you and I will prove James and Kelvin wrong!”
Just then, the compartment door slides open, and another boy, with lank, greasy hair and who is already in his Hogwarts robes, strides in.
He walks over to the girl by the window, and starts talking to her, but before I catch a word, Sirius calls me back to attention, and help him counter argue James and Kelvin’s argument.
We discuss some of the best players the teams have had in centuries, and then we lapse into a short silence, during which we hear the newcomer say, “You’d better be in Slytherin.” I look around in their direction in surprise; usually Slytherin’s the last house anyone would want to be in.
**“Slytherin?”
It is James who speaks. His voice is contemptuous for the first time since I’ve been in the compartment.
“Who wants to be in Slytherin? I think I’d leave, wouldn’t you?” he turns to Sirius, arching an eyebrow.
Sirius doesn’t smile. “My whole family have been in Slytherin.”
I feel surprised; Sirius doesn’t seem like the type with a Slytherin background, he seems nice enough. James is obviously as staggered as I am.
“Blimey,” he says, “and I thought you seemed all right!”
Sirius breaks into a rebellious grin. “Maybe I’ll break the tradition,” he says, and I hear the hopeful tone in his voice. “Where are you heading, if you’ve got the choice?” he asks James.
The answer seems to be instinctive; James lifts his hand, as if brandishing an invisible sword. “ ‘Gryffindor, where dwell the brave at heart!’ Like my dad.”
The boy with the red-haired girl makes a noise in his throat. James rounds on him.
“Got a problem with that?” he asks in a deceivingly angelic voice, but the look he throws at the boy is one of great dislike.
“No,” the boy says, sneering. “If you’d rather be brawny than brainy””
“Where’re you hoping to go, seeing as you’re neither?” Sirius cuts in. James laugh. I look at Kelvin and we both shift uncomfortably. It has only been less than half an hour, and already I am in the middle of an imminent fight.
The red-haired girl doesn’t seem to find it funny as well. She sits up, rather red in the face, and looks at both James and Sirius with a less-than-friendly look on her face. “Come on, Severus, let’s find another compartment.” She gets up, clutching a basket, and stalks out of the compartment.
“Oooooooo…” Sirius says, and together on cue he and James repeat after the girl, copying her lofty voice. When the boy” Severus” walks past us, James sticks his foot out to trip him, but is unsuccessful. I am secretly thankful for that.
“See ya, Snivellus!” James calls after the boy, and together he and Sirius hoot with laughter. Kelvin and I laugh nervously. I feel like I’ve just run a long marathon; I can’t imagine what would’ve happened to me if we’d ended up dueling and hauled off to the Headmaster’s office once we’d reached Hogwarts.
“So, how about that spectacular catch of the Snitch made by Roderick Plumpton in 1921?” Sirius says; it’s as if Severus has never come in and the girl has never been in the compartment at all. Within milliseconds we have resumed our argument about which Quidditch team is the best, and I forget about what has happened just moments ago.
_________________________________
Peter
“Firs’-years! Firs’-years over here!”
A loud booming voice sounds, and I look around for the source. There is a very, very large man near the edge of the platform.
“Let’s go, then,” Stewart Kavanagh, my new friend, says, and we follow the crowd towards the huge man. When we reach the man, I realise that I barely come up to his mid-thighs.
“Who is he?” I ask Stewart in awe.
“That’s Hagrid, the gamekeeper,” Stewart explains. “My dad told me he’s very nice.”
I eye the pockets of Hagrid’s cloak. They seem to be moving. With what, I do not know. Deciding to keep a safe distance from his cloak, I take a step back, and manage to tread on someone’s toe. I turn around, uttering an apology hurriedly.
“Ouch!” the boy yells, and accompanies that exclamation of pain with something much stronger. “Watch where you’re stepping, you idiot!”
“Severus!” the girl standing beside him says reproachfully. “He’s already apologised.”
Severus turns to me and warns, “Don’t do it again.”
I nod hurriedly. “I won’t, of course I won’t,” I assure him, before retreating a few steps and bumping into Hagrid, from whom I had been trying to distance myself. I turn around, apologising, and realise that I’m facing one of the pockets. A squeak emits from it, and I freeze.
“It’s a dormouse,” Hagrid’s booming voice tells me kindly. I look up, and see that he’s smiling at me. I smile back hesitantly.
“All righ’ there, everyone?” he calls to the crowd of first years now surrounding him. “Righ’, I’m Rubeus Hagrid, Keeper of Keys and Grounds at Hogwarts. Follow me, everyone, we’ll be makin’ the trip to Hogwarts on boats, across the lake.”
Two dark-haired boys near me chorus, “Brilliant!” Hagrid grins at them through his wild beard.
“Mind yeh don’t fall in, though,” he says. The two boys grin back, and we start walking towards the lake.
“If we fall in, what’ll happen?” the girl behind me asks her fierce companion, the boy Severus, in an undertone.
“If you’re lucky, some underwater creature will rescue you,” Severus tells her.
“Won’t Hagrid help us?” the girl persists, sounding nervous.
Severus snorts. “That half-giant? No, my mother says he’s an oaf. Doesn’t know anything worth knowing.”
“That’s not very nice!” a chorus of voices say loudly and fiercely. I jump, and look around. Stewart, the two dark-haired boys and one of their companions, a boy with light-brown hair, are glaring at Severus.
“Would you mind being kinder to others?” the boy with the light-brown hair says. His tone is mild, but his eyes flash in the dim lighting. “Just because he’s not entirely human it doesn’t mean that he doesn’t have brains, you know?”
“Yeah, Snivellus,” says the dark-haired boy with spectacles. “And in one special case, the brainless one is a human.” His tone leaves no doubt that he means Severus himself.
Severus looks at the girl for help, but she shakes her head almost imperceptibly, her eyes telling him that she too thinks that he might have gone too far.
By this time we’ve created a jam, and Hagrid stops. “Everything okay back there?” he calls.
“Yeah, fine,” the other dark-haired boy calls back, and he looks at Severus, as if daring him to object.
“Do that one more time, and my fist’ll be in your mouth before you know it,” Stewart snarls. Then he nudges me, says, “C’mon,” and we turn around to continue our journey to the lake, jogging down the path to catch up to Hagrid.
The road is steep and narrow, and extremely dark. If not for the fact that I am sandwiched between Stewart and another girl I do not know, I would have had a panic attack already. Severus and his friend are arguing in fierce whispers, but no one else is talking apart from the occasional nervous outbreak of giggling. Finally, after an eternity, Hagrid says, “Yeh’ll be getting yer first glimpse of the castle soon.”
We crane our necks, trying to be the first one to sight the legendary Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Suddenly the path opens to the edge of the lake, a beautiful black surface of the water. Reflections of the little sparkling stars dot the water. And on the other side, right at the peak of a high mountain, is an immense castle with its windows glowing a welcoming yellow in the midst of darkness.
“It’s brilliant,” I whisper in awe to Stewart, who seems too amazed to speak.
“All righ’, everyone, get into the boats here,” Hagrid says, gesturing to a fleet of small boats floating in the lake by the shore. “No more than four to one boat!”
Stewart and I get into a boat, accompanied, to my displeasure, and to his, apparently, by Severus and his companion. Severus is scowling deeply at me, and the girl is smiling apologetically at me. I smile back nervously and turn away.
“Everyone in?” Hagrid yells. He is sitting in a boat by himself. “All right” FORWARD!”
At once the boats set off, gliding silently across the lake. I stare up at the castle, trailing my hand in the inky lake. It is only when I feel something moving close to my fingers that I pull my hand out in a hurry. As we near the cliff, the castle looms nearer and nearer, until it completely dwarves us. As the first boats reach the cliff, Hagrid calls for us to duck. We pass through an opening in the cliff hidden by the hanging ivy, and were carried along a dark tunnel. I’ve never liked dark places, much less enclosed dark places. I begin to feel a little dizzy from fear, but luckily we soon reach a sort of underground harbour, and I thankfully climb out of the boat onto rocks and pebbles. We follow Hagrid up a passageway in the rock, and at last reach open air, right next to the castle. We walk up a staircase and gather around a huge oak door. As Hagrid looks around to ensure that none of us are lagging, I am attacked by a bad case of nerves. To my left, Stewart is anxiously smoothing down the front of his robes in a bid to neaten himself. I copy him, not wanting to look like an utter mess.
Hagrid knocks on the door, and butterflies take flight in my stomach. My knees buckle under me, and Stewart helps to steady me. “It’ll be all right,” he says, although it seems more like he’s telling that to himself. “There’s nothing you can do about it, so don’t be nervous.”
And he’s right. Whether Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, or Slytherin, I don’t have a choice. So I muster up the last reserves of my courage, trying to stand steadfast as the oak door swings open and reveals a tall witch in emerald robes.
A/N
* Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, JK Rowling, The Prince’s Tale, page 536, UK edition
** Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, JK Rowling, The Prince’s Tale, page 538, UK edition
Here's the second chapter! I hope I've given Remus enough chance to air his opinions, and I hope I've managed to keep everyone in character. I'd really love for you guys to give me comments and reviews, even if you utterly detest this story, because we as authors need to know what readers think of our story. :D
Chapter Three by x_lily_evans_x
Author's Notes:
Anything you recognise isn't mine. Thanks for beta-ing this, Joanna! (:
Sirius
We form a rather straggling line in the Great Hall. As the Sorting Hat sings its song, I look around me at the various house tables, and see my cousin Narcissa at the Slytherin table. She is looking adoringly at Lucius Malfoy, her fellow Prefect. I grimace. Bad taste, Narcissa.
The witch in emerald robes, who has introduced herself as Professor McGonagall, is now unfurling a long scroll. She looks up and says, "Now when I call your name, you shall come up front and put on the Sorting Hat."
I feel nervous as I stare at the Hat, who is now silent. My parents have told me loads of times that all the Blacks have been in Slytherin, and that I mustn't break this tradition. But I want to. I want to end up in any house other than Slytherin. Preferably Gryffindor, because of its famed rivalry with Slytherin. I don�t want to end up sitting at the Slytherin table with Narcissa. The idea is just too appalling.
"Anderson, Patrick!" Professor McGonagall calls. A boy at the back staggers past us, white and shaking. He puts on the hat and sits on the stool, and after a while, the Sorting Hat proclaims him a Ravenclaw. Beaming, he takes off the Hat and runs to the wildly cheering Ravenclaw table.
"Arching, Eliza!"
"Hufflepuff!"
"Black, Sirius!"
I can't move. James, who's behind me, gives me a gentle push, saying, "Good luck, mate," and I stumble forward, past the other first years, past Professor McGonagall, grab the Hat, and sit down on the stool, before placing the Hat on my head. The brim drops down to my nose, and all I see is blackness.
"A Black, now, aren't you?" the Hat says. Its voice seems to be in my head. "Quite the rebel, I see. You've got a brilliant mind, no doubt!"
I smile inwardly. Being sorted into Ravenclaw isn't as good as being sorted into Gryffindor, but it will ruffle my parents' feathers for sure.
"Plenty of courage, too. You're fiercely loyal to those who matter to you... Rather die than betray them, yes? Well, then, better be GRYFFINDOR!"
I feel as though Christmas had come early. Wrenching the Hat off my head, I get up from the stool and walk to the Gryffindor table. There is no cheering; everyone is scrutinising me and there is a great deal of whispering, most of which are along the lines of, "A Black! In Gryffindor!" Narcissa looks at me in disgust. James, Remus and Dumbledore are one of the few who are clapping and (in James' case) whooping. I grin widely at James and Remus, and they give me thumbs-up.
As I sit down at the Gryffindor table, my new housemates give me a wide berth. I raise my eyebrows at them, and say, "You know, I may be named after the Dog Star, but I don't bite." It is one of the most cringe-inducing things I have come up with in my entire life, but in my euphoric state, it is the best I can do. However, it seems to break the tension; the people around me laugh, and start congratulating me.
I keep fidgeting in happiness, and it is a while before I can properly concentrate on the Sorting. When I have at last settled down somewhat, the person being sorted is the red-haired girl ("Evans, Lily") who was in the same compartment as us earlier on. She is almost instantaneously sorted into Gryffindor. She looks regretfully at her greasy-haired companion, who James has so wittily dubbed 'Snivellus,' before joining me at the Gryffindor table. I make space for her, but she recognises me, and refuses to look in my direction.
When it is Remus' turn to be sorted, the Hat takes a very long time to decide which house he should be in. But at last, he too is sorted into Gryffindor, to my delight. I clap exceptionally hard for him as he, blushing furiously and grinning delightedly, walks towards us, and I ruffle his hair as he sits between Evans and me. I've initially thought him to be a nancy boy, but after he'd defended Hagrid, I've changed my mind. Kelvin Macby, the boy who was with us on the train, is sorted into Ravenclaw.
So now the only person I know personally who has yet to be sorted is James. He hardly looks worried at all; in fact, he's jabbering away to the girl whom he'd introduced to me as Gemma, his best friend, at the Malfoys', and occasionally grinning at Remus and me.
"How does he manage to keep his cool?" Remus whispers to me, as 'Pettigrew, Peter!' is sorted into Gryffindor.
"Dunno," I say, shrugging. "He knows that he's definitely going to be sorted into Gryffindor, I guess. Look, it's his turn now!"
James is almost strolling to the stool. He serenely puts the Hat on his messy black hair. Of all the first-years I've seen, he is definitely the calmest.
"GRYFFINDOR!" the Hat yells, and I hear some grumbling from Lily Evans.
Remus and I are, on the other hand, wild with ecstasy as we both clap James on the back and mess up his hair even more than it already is. For all his composure earlier on, James is now whooping as loudly as some of the other Gryffindors.
When Snivellus is called up, James nudges me. He is sorted into Slytherin, as he very much wanted to. "That's where he belongs, anyway," James says, grinning. He seems to be in a hyperactive mood. "What a slimy git."
And when "Spinnet, Gemma!" is sorted into Gryffindor, James cheers excitedly. I remember that Gemma is his best friend. He whacks her arm as she joins our table, sitting between him and Evans. I hear Evans say in a put-out voice, "He's your friend?" James smirks at Evans, probably just to infuriate her. I crack a grin.
When the Sorting ends at last, Dumbledore stands up. "Welcome to another year at Hogwarts," he says, beaming at all of us. "Now, I know your stomachs are probably painfully empty, so... bon appetit!"
The plates fill with food, and we tuck in eagerly. The food is delicious, better than anything Kreacher has ever cooked. We wolf down our food, chatting merrily about anything that comes to mind; lessons, teachers. It seems like a relatively short time when the plates clear by themselves and Dumbledore stands up to speak again.
"I presume that your stomachs are well fed, so I shall make a few short announcements before I send you all up to bed. First of all, our caretaker Mr Apollyon Pringle would like to remind you that the Forbidden Forest is out of bounds. Secondly, a few of you might have noticed that there has been a Whomping Willow, newly planted, on the school grounds. Now, the Willow is quite violent; it has a - ah, tendency, shall we say, to grievously injure anyone who approaches it. So, if you value your intact body, kindly stay away from it."
"Sounds exciting," James hisses over to Remus and me. "We should try going near it some day."
Remus squirms uncomfortably. "It's dangerous, Dumbledore said," he whispers.
"Don't be a ninny, it'll be fun," I say. "What's life without a little excitement?"
James grins and reaches over to slap my palm. We turn back to look at Dumbledore.
"And let us give a warm welcome our new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor Alyssa Tillanders," Dumbledore says, and with a sweeping motion gestures to a relatively young lady sitting directly to his left.
We clap politely.
"And that is all. Prefects, please lead the first years to their respective common rooms. Good night!"
Everyone stands, and silence becomes noisy chatter again.
"Who's leading us back to our common room?" Remus wonders. At that moment, a boy calls very loudly for the Gryffindor first years. We trudge over to him and another girl.
"Form a line, please," says the boy. "I'm Frank Longbottom, this is Wendy Rhineley, and we're your fifth-year prefects. Now, I know you're all very tired, so if you keep up and don't get lost, we'll be at the common room in quite a short time."
Wendy heads to the back of the line, and we make our way to the Gryffindor common room, following Frank. We climb up flights of stairs and walk down endless corridors, Frank and Wendy each taking turns to tell us things we ought to take note of, like trick stairs, and walls that pretend to be doors. After a short time, my legs are like lead, and I wonder how short a time it'll really take to reach the common room. Then suddenly, people at the front of the line scream loudly.
"What happened, what is it?" James asks me, trying to look over my shoulder to see the commotion. He doesn't have to ask; the next moment, something swoops over us and drops something sizzling at us. We all dodge, and the next moment, the sizzling object blows up in a multihued explosion, quite like fireworks. The people around us scream, and the people in the portraits yell in fright, scurrying into the next frame.
"Whoa, cool," James and I simultaneously exclaim, and Remus is open-mouthed with awe, but most of the others aren't very happy.
"There're portraits in here, Peeves," Wendy shouts at the thing swooping around, which on closer inspection is a small, old man with a wicked expression on his face. "Imagine if those fireworks had damaged them!"
Peeves ignores her. "Why, here are the little first years!" he says gleefully.
Frank is stern as he reprimands Peeves, but his lips are twitching slightly. "When will you stop scaring the first years, Peeves? D'you want us to call the Bloody Baron?"
Peeves makes a face, and swoops past us (we all duck) and through the wall.
"That's our resident poltergeist, Peeves," Frank says. "The Slytherin ghost is the only one who scares him."
"Do we have a Gryffindor ghost?" a small boy with mousy hair, whose name I think is Peter Pettigrew, asks up front. He sounds positively terrified of the idea.
"Yes, we do," Frank says, but upon hearing Peter Pettigrew's squeaks, adds quickly, "he's a very nice ghost. Extremely helpful."
We walk along a few more corridors and stop before a portrait of a very fat lady wearing a pink dress. "This," says Wendy, gesturing to the portrait, "is the Fat Lady. Her portrait conceals the entrance to the Gryffindor common room. To enter the common room, tell her the password, and she'll swing open. The passwords are changed regularly, and each time they're changed the new password will be made known to you."
"The password for now is Romulus," Frank tells us, and the portrait of the Fat Lady swings forward, revealing a round hole in the wall - the entrance to the Gryffindor common room. Frank leads the way in, and we find ourselves in a circular, snug room full of comfy armchairs. I want to jump into one armchair and curl up to sleep, but Frank calls for the boys to follow him through a door, and Wendy tells the girls to follow her through another door. After an exhausting climb up a spiral staircase, we enter what is to be our dormitory. Five four-poster beds with dark red velvet curtains, lie in wait for the five new Gryffindor boys. Gryffindor boys. I am one of them. You would think that by now it's already sunk in, but I discover that the thought of being a Gryffindor first-year brings a kind of wild joy that causes me to lose my lethargy and makes me want to jump from four-poster to four-poster. I am on the verge to do just that, but I remember at the last moment that Frank the prefect stands by the doorway, and try to restrain myself.
"All right then, everyone?" Frank asks us.
"All right," a few of my new roommates murmur their assent. Frank chuckles, tells us that we can find him in the dormitory a few floors down if we need anything else, then leaves.
"Really amazing, isn't it?" James says delightedly, walking over to the windows and peering outside.
I look at the surroundings with a great big smile on my face, and then leap onto the bed which has my trunk beside it. Here I am, in the home of the lions, in the lair of the enemies of Slytherins.
"Amazing doesn't even begin to describe it."
_________________________________
Lily
It's strange being in a whole new environment without Severus at my side. Prior to my arrival at Hogwarts, I've always imagined the both of us being in the same house, and being almost inseparable at all times. But right now I'm in Gryffindor, a house totally at odds with Severus' house, Slytherin. Judging by the comments made by the noisy boys Severus and I have met on the Hogwarts Express, and a few of the remarks made by older Gryffindors during the feast, Slytherins are a shady lot. It looks as if my friendship with Severus is going to be a lot trickier now. My heart sinks at the thought that we may possibly not be best friends for much longer. However, I do not have that much time to wallow in self-pity, as we've reached the top of the spiral staircase, where our dormitory expects us. We enter, and I am somewhat stunned.
"So, here we are, the girls� dormitories," Gemma Spinnet, whom I've made friends with on the train ride to Hogwarts, remarks dramatically. Her theatrical comment is ruined by her bounding onto her four-poster bed, which is right beside the window and next to mine.
"At Hogwarts," adds a blond-haired girl who I know to be Mary Macdonald. She looks just as awe-struck as I feel, looking around at the room that is to be our home at Hogwarts for seven years.
"It's brilliant!" I exclaim. Walking over to my bedside, I realise that the cat basket containing Nightfall stood on my trunk, and I take her out. She's relieved to get out of that small confined space, and leaps onto my bed with a grateful mrrow. I hop onto my bed as well, and roll over so I was facedown. My next sentence comes out slightly muffled. "This bed's divine."
"Agreed," Gemma says. I sit up and hug my pillow. "I think we should introduce ourselves properly, in order of our beds. I'm Gemma Spinnet."
"Lily Evans," I say, seeing that I'm next.
"Alicia Steinwright," says the girl whose bed is on the other side of mine.
"I'm Mary Macdonald.'
"Deborah Hallowell,' says the last girl. She is in the midst of tacking up a poster that says 'Tutshill Tornadoes.' "Anyone plays Quidditch?"
"I do!" Gemma and Alicia both yell, whereas Mary and I shake our heads.
I grin at Mary. "Muggleborn?"
She nods. "Mmm-hmm. You?"
"Same, but I do have a wizard best friend, and he tells me about Quidditch, but I've never actually played it before."
"You've never actually played it before?" Gemma asks the both of us in scandalised tones.
"Horrifying!" Deborah says, aghast. It's as if she is commenting on a murder.
"We'll have flying lessons this year, anyway," Alicia says.
"But we can't wait till then!" Deborah cries indignantly. "Mary, Lily, we're going to teach you the rules of Quidditch, whether you like it or not. It's the best game ever!" She looks at us, as if daring us to disagree. When we don't, she continues, "Merlin knows how you were able to survive for so long without knowing Quidditch - honestly!"
"Hey, I like your cat," Gemma says, coming over to my bedside and picking up Nightfall, who doesn't seem to mind her, to my surprise. Nightfall doesn't allow anyone to touch her; as of yet only Mum and I have managed to do so and remain unscathed. Gemma chucks her under her chin and she purrs loudly. "What's her name?"
"Nightfall," I say proudly.
"She's so tiny! Did you just get her?" Gemma asks, now cooing over my cat.
"Yeah, a few weeks back at Diagon Alley," I say, and bend down to fumble with the lock of my trunk. After a while, I give up and rack my brains for a spell that I've read before. I recall it, take out my wand, and say, "Alohomora!"
Gemma put Nightfall down. "That's a good one," she says, impressed. "Are you sure you're a Muggleborn?"
I beam. "Yeah. I found it in one of our spellbooks," I say, pulling out from my trunk my blanket. Almost everyone I know tells me it's tattered (though I prefer the term 'rugged homeliness'), but I've been sleeping with it since I was four, and old habits die hard. Nightfall didn't take too well with it a few weeks ago, but I've trained her, and now she's fine with it. Sniffing the blanket, I find with delight that it smells of home, and that smell gives me a sense of security so strong that I feel truly comforted since the moment Severus has been sorted into Slytherin.
"Security blanket?" Gemma asks. Her tone isn't mocking, but understanding. Still, I can't help but feel a little defensive.
"Yes," I say defiantly.
She smiles, and removes a worn little stuffed dragon from her trunk. "Security dragon," she says, giggling. I giggle, too, feeling a rush of affection for my newfound friend.
"I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm tired," Alicia says. She's already undressed and put on her pyjamas, and now snuggles into her bed. "Someone put out the candles. G'night, everyone.
The rest of us put on our pyjamas, too, then murmur our goodnight's and retire for the night, dragging the deep red velvet curtains around our bed. Nightfall curls up beside my head on the pillow, and I sniff my blanket again, inhaling the soothing scent. This time, a pang of homesickness accompanies the scent, and I think of Petunia.
I'll write to her tomorrow, I tell myself. And then I'll deliver it to her. Then she'll forgive me. She has to.
And with that last thought in mind, I fall asleep.
_________________________________
James
The next morning, our dormitory is full of chaos as we stumble over one another or our trunks in our haste to wash up and change into our uniforms so we can go down for breakfast. The cause of chaos?
Oversleeping.
Back home, I can oversleep and I won't have to rush because every event will simply have to wait for me. But here in Hogwarts, no event will wait for me. I can't say I don't mind the sudden change. I race to the bathroom to wash up, and almost roar in frustration when I find that it is already occupied by someone else.
Back home, I have a bathroom in my room. This bathroom is for me to use, and at anytime of the day, it is left unoccupied. But here in Hogwarts, bathrooms won't be left unoccupied just for me.
"Oy!" I yell, hammering on the door. "Open the door! I need to wash up!"
"Why don't you change on your bed?" Sirius calls over to me, pulling on one of the Gryffindor ties that have been left on every bedside table.
"Good idea," I say, and throwing one last glare at the closed bathroom door, I march back to my trunk and yank my uniform out of it, messing up the orderliness. Just as I am putting on my tie, the door opens and a boy who I know is named Peter Pettigrew comes out.
"About time," I say, and duck into the bathroom to brush my teeth.
"I'm sorry," Peter says apologetically. "I was taking a quick shower."
"You still needn't have closed the door, I wouldn't want to peek at you," I mean to say, but through the toothbrush in my mouth what actually comes out is a lot of mumbling and some toothpaste.
Remus ducks into the bathroom to wash his face.
"You ready to go, James?" he asks, as he wipes his face with a towel. "Sirius is waiting for us in the common room."
Spitting out the last of the toothpaste and gargling water in my mouth one last time, I wipe my face on another towel and survey myself in the mirror. I look fairly presentable, with the slight exception of my forever-messy hair. "Yeah, I'm done," I say, and we race downstairs to the common room, where we join Sirius and go to the Great Hall together.
Most of the students are finishing their breakfast, and the three of us are a few of the last students to enter the hall. We take a seat near the end, and I call "good morning" to Gemma, who calls back to me. Professor McGonagall, who is giving out timetables to the various years, looks at us disapprovingly as we gobble down our food like starved trolls. I half expect her to give us a talking-to, but all she says is a sardonic "Be careful you don't choke" before she turns to help the seventh years fix their timetables.
One of our roommates, Stewart Kavanagh, passes us three first-year timetables. He and Peter have almost finished their breakfast. "We've got Charms first with the Hufflepuffs, followed by Potions, then lunch," he tells us.
"Where's the Charms classroom?" Remus asks, somehow managing to speak politely through his mouthful of scrambled eggs.
"Dunno," Stewart shrugs. "Peter and I'll wait for you so we can go together if you want to?"
"Yeah, that'll be good, thanks," I say as I sink my teeth into the heavenly toast after finishing my eggs.
"Hey, James, want me to wait for you?" a voice comes from behind me. I look around and see Gemma. Next to her stands Lily Evans, who is determinedly looking everywhere but at us.
"No, it's okay, you go ahead first."
"Right, see you in Charms, then," she says, waving, and then she's gone.
"Done," Sirius says, shoving the last of his toast into his mouth and pushing the plate away. Remus and I gape at him; we are only halfway through our toast. "Hurry up, we're going to be late."
"You can go ahead first," I say, like I've said to Gemma a few seconds earlier.
"No, I'll wait," Sirius says, so defiantly that Remus and I stare. "I mean," he hurriedly amends, "since we've been late together from the start."
By the time Remus and I are done eating breakfast, most of the students have left for their respective classes. I look around for Gemma in hopes that she can possibly lead us to the Charms classroom, but she has already left.
"C'mon," Peter urges, antsy to move off. "We've still got to get our stuff for Charms and Potions."
"What do we need to bring?" Sirius gasps between breaths as we race to our dormitory.
"I dunno, quills and parchment to write notes on, I suppose," Remus replies. "We haven't got any books specifically for Charms, do we?"
"I dunno," I say, as we sprint into our dormitory, "I thought The Standard Book of Spells, Grade One was sort of a Charms book. Oh, and One Thousand and One Magical Herbs and Fungi is for Potions, I think." Gathering parchment, stationery, and the thick spell books in our arms, we go back downstairs to the common room, where a basic directory for the various classrooms is tacked up to the notice board and rapidly scan through it for a sign of the Charms classroom.
"There it is!" Sirius crows triumphantly, prodding a little box on the directory excitedly. "It's on the third floor. Right, let's go!" We dash out, tearing down four staircases. Peter gets his leg caught on a trick stair, and we have to pull him out and gather his fallen things, which wastes us some more time. By the time we reach the classroom, gasping for breath, lesson has already started. We look at each other in panic, wondering what we ought to do.
"I think we should just go in," Remus says, chewing on his bottom lip nervously and looking at the rest of us.
"No, I vote we just skive off the whole lesson," Sirius says, looking all ready for a nice romp in the grounds, and I can't say I'm against that idea, either.
"Better late than never," Stewart insists. I imagine what Mum will say if she hears that I'm skiving off my first ever lesson at Hogwarts.
"All right, we'll just go in," I decide, but no one wants to knock the door. In the end, it's Peter Pettigrew who actually knocks on the door.
A squeaky voice floats out of the classroom. "Come in."
We stare at each other. "That's supposed to be the teacher's voice?" Sirius says incredulously. I shrug, but already Remus is opening the door and leading the way in.
"We're really, really sorry for our tardiness, Professor," he says, hanging his head.
"Yeah, we're really sorry," we mumble after him, but not before Sirius and I catch sight of our teacher - an extremely short man sitting on a pile of books on his chair. He nudges me and I nudge back, and we both have to stifle our laughter.
"Ah, our four missing students," the teacher squeaks, peering down at us kindly from atop the mound of books. "No matter, no matter, it's the first day of school, it's expected that you'll be late. Got lost, did you?"
That's not the truth, but we nod hastily and say, "Yes, Professor."
"Well, take a seat, boys," he says.
The unoccupied seats are scattered far and wide, which means I'm not able to sit with any of my roommates. Also, none of the unoccupied seats are right beside Gemma. My friends file past me, and the only remaining seat is the desk beside Lily Evans, the red-haired girl we'd met on the train. She throws me a look of great dislike. I give her what I hope is an innocent smile; it'll probably infuriate her more than a glare.
"Hey, Evans," I whisper, in hopes of irritating her further.
She tries to ignore me at first, but I whisper her surname some more.
"What?" she finally snaps, and is shhh-ed by our classmates.
I grin to myself. "What's the teacher's name?"
"Professor Flitwick," she says brusquely, before facing front again.
Professor Flitwick squeaks about the various charms that we will learn in the coming days and years at Hogwarts, and about how charms can actually be discovered sometimes. He also says that we're not going to be doing any practical spellwork for today, and this somewhat slackens the focus of the class. By the end of the lesson, Sirius and I are carrying on a mouthed conversation, and a few students are passing notes to one another. Lily Evans, however, listens in rapt attention, taking down notes. When the bell finally rings, I am one of the first out of the classroom, and I wait for Sirius and Remus to come out, too.
"We've got Potions next, I remember. Where and with whom?" Sirius asks, as we follow a clump of our housemates along the corridors.
Remus checks his timetable. "Potions is in the dungeons," he informs us. "With the Slytherins."
"The Slytherins?" I ask, recalling a particular Slytherin from yesterday. "We're to meet ol' Snivellus again, then?"
Sirius starts to grin, but before he can say anything a furious voice comes from my other side.
"You think you're so great, Potter - calling people names, I suppose you think that's awfully smart of you."
I turn in surprise, and realise that it's Evans. "In case you hadn't noticed, Evans, it was your dear friend who insulted Hagrid. 'Oaf,' I believed he said," I shoot back.
"It's his mother who told him that, he's just parroting what she said," Evans says, flushing pink. "Oh, forget it, why do I even bother?"
"Yes, why do you?" I taunt, and she barrels past me in fury.
"James, you didn't have to do that," Gemma says, sighing, and I start, not realising that she's been behind us all this while.
"What, it's my fault that her friend's a jerk?" I demand.
"No, I'll admit that it's Snape's fault, but - oh, never mind, see you in Potions, James!" And with that, my best friend runs off after Evans.
I have to admit that I am rather peeved about this. Gemma's supposed to be my best friend, and now she's siding with Evans!
"I thought she's your best friend," Sirius says, rather gleefully.
I look at him in surprise; he seems to have read my thoughts. Remus also gives him a glance. If there's one thing I observed about Remus from almost a day of knowing him, it's his gaze. They're very piercing, and make you feel as if he knows exactly what you're thinking. I can't blame Sirius for feeling guarded and wary.
"What?" Sirius says defensively. "I was just making a remark."
"Nothing, nothing. Hurry, we're going to be late," Remus says, herding us to the dungeons, and that is that.
A/N: What do you think of this? Your thoughts are much appreciated, so if you don't mind... (Points down there. And also, hopes that you get the hint). Thanks!
Chapter Four by x_lily_evans_x
Author's Notes:
Nothing but the original characters belong to me.
Chapter Four
Remus
Perhaps it’s what comes out of being a werewolf from such a young age, but the feelings of others have always shown through clearly to me. Perhaps it’s because of how I interpret the way others are speaking to me to see if they’ve found out what I am. I’m quite perceptive; sometimes I read into other’s emotions a lot more than I should. More than I want to. Certainly I’ve read quite a lot in Sirius’ passing remark about James’ best friend, Gemma Spinnet.
Sirius is quite a complex character. He’s from a family full of Dark wizards, and yet he seems like an ideal Gryffindor. But was it from my imagination that Sirius had added that remark with the (possibly subconscious) idea of driving a wedge between James and his best friend? Maybe he’s never known friendship, and is jealous that James, who seems to be his best friend, has another best friend. I look at Sirius, who’s now laughing merrily with James about some joke, and shake my head.
Stop reading so much into things, Remus, you’ve got enough on your plate for the moment. Who are you to scrutinise others, anyway? You’ve never had any friends since the age of five.
The thought is sobering, and I remain absolutely silent the rest of the time. It is all very well now, Sirius and James are friends with me. But what if they find out about my monthly transformations? Will they still be willing to be friends with me?
We reach the dim dungeons without much incident, and join the students already waiting outside. Sirius gives us both nudges with his bony elbows. “Look, it’s Snivellus,” he hisses.
I squint through the gloom and sure enough, I see Severus Snape. He’s not wearing his surly expression though, he seems to be almost smiling as he chats to Lily Evans.
“Look how greasy his hair is, Evans will probably be dripping oil,” James says, enjoying himself immensely. When I shoot him a dubious look, he adds, “Give it a few more seconds,” which causes Sirius to hoot with laughter. The door opens and our teacher appears.
“Now, now, what’s all this ruckus about?” the teacher asks, and it is hard not to stare at him. He has a walrus mustache, and is immensely large; the buttons on his front seem to be straining from the pressure of holding the two sides of his robes together. His eyes scan through us critically, and singles out Sirius, who is still laughing. “Ah, Sirius Black! Welcome to Hogwarts. I’d personally hoped you’d be in Slytherin you know, but you were sorted into Gryffindor…” He shakes his head and sigh, while Sirius looks at James and me quizzically. We shrug. “No matter, no matter, come on in, everyone!”
We file into the dungeons where the teacher tells us to sit in pairs, with whomever we like. I end up sitting with Mary Macdonald, who is in Gryffindor too. James and Sirius sit together in front of us. By the time we settle down, the teacher has already written three words on the chalkboard: Horace Slughorn (which I presume is his name), and Potions.
“Good morning, everyone,” the teacher booms. “I am your Potions master, Professor Horace Slughorn.” He looks around genially at everyone. “Now, I presume everyone has browsed through your copy of One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi?”
Everyone nods their heads rapidly, as if afraid of being the only one who hasn’t looked through it.
“Excellent!” Professor Slughorn smiles widely. It is fascinating to watch the ends of his walrus mustache inch upwards as he does so. I try not to stare so much. “So I’ll begin with some questions.
“What are some of the most common ingredients in potion-making? Lily Evans?” he asks, looking up from the class register he is holding.
Lily Evans says alertly, “Belladonna, scarab beetles, and ginger, to name a few. Of course, they can be found in our potions-making kit.” She grins at Slughorn, who chuckles. As he does so, his double chin wobbles comically. I can tell from the way James and Sirius are elbowing each other that they have noticed it, too.
“Very good, Lily,” Slughorn says, nodding at Lily and smiling. The ends of his moustache bob up again. Not that I’m staring at it. Well, not too much, at any rate. “You’re a cheeky one. Take ten points!
“Lucia Flint! Could you tell me what an ingredient is used in a potion to cure boils?”
I know this answer. The potion is first one in the book, and is the most basic of them all.
Lucia Flint turns out to be a Slytherin girl, who has a blank, foolish sort of face (probably due to the fact that her eyes are widely spaced). She proves to be as vacuous as she looks. “Erm, I don’t know, sir.”
“It’s all right,” Slughorn says kindly before looking at the class register again. “Then” Abeley Higgs, could you answer the question?”
Abeley Higgs is quick to reply. “One ingredient would be porcupine quills, sir.”
Slughorn beams. “Well done, Abeley! Ten points to Slytherin!” He looks around at all of us. “Now! I hope that you are all looking forward to brewing Potions! Potions isn’t all about just popping ingredients into your cauldron and stirring, you will need utmost concentration, and of course, no potion is complete without the maker’s magic.”
I jot down notes in point-form at the blank sides of One Thousand and One Magical Herbs and Fungi, and jump a little as Slughorn, who has walked down the aisle till he is right beside Mary and me, claps his hand loudly.
“All right! We will start with this potion!” He waves his wand at the chalkboard, and at once, instructions to making a potion start to scrawl themselves out. It turns out to be the very same potion for curing boils. “Any ingredients that aren’t included in your potions-making kit are available in the student’s store cupboard” “ he flicks his wand in the direction of a door and it opens, leading into a larder-like room” “so feel free to help yourselves. Work in your pairs, and you have the next forty-five minutes to prepare your potions. Begin now!”
Mary and I agree that I go get the ingredients while she sets the cauldron boiling. I hurry to the stores cupboard, almost bumping into Severus Snape, who hisses, “Watch where you’re going, Bigfoot!”
“Crazy Snivellus,” comes Sirius voice behind me. “You all right, Remus?”
It’s a very nice surprise to hear someone other than my parents ask if I’m all right. I grin at Sirius and say, “I’m fine, thanks.”
“So what do you make of this Slughorn character, eh?” he asks, smirking. “Did you see how his double chin trembled?”
“Alongside with his bobbing walrus moustache,” I quip. He bursts out laughing, to my surprise and delight. I’ve never had friends laughing at what I say. However, Slughorn turns to look at us and I feel a stab of guilt. “But he’s a very nice teacher,” I add quickly, as we make our way into the store cupboard.
“Yeah, a regular old softie,” Sirius agrees, getting some porcupine quills and passing them to me.
After getting all of the ingredients we need, we go back to our respective seats and carefully follow the instructions on the board. Mary and I take turns chopping up the ingredients and adding them to the potion accordingly, and at the right time. After about forty-five minutes, the potion is a brown colour, as opposed to the shimmery black it is supposed to be.
“What did we do wrong?” Mary says, feverishly tracing her fingers in the space between lines as she reads the instructions. “I thought we followed all the instructions.”
“We did,” I say, reading the instructions as carefully as I can, but Slughorn’s cry of “five minutes left!” makes me jumpy and I cannot concentrate.
As Slughorn passes by, Mary hails him and asks, “Professor, our potion’s gone brown, and we don’t know what we’ve done wrong. We’ve looked through the instructions countless of times.”
“You’ve probably missed a stir or two before adding the sprig of baby’s breath,” he explains. “There’s nothing you can do now, but it’s close enough for amateur potion-makers like you! Very good, the both of you!” He beams at us before continue his walk around the dungeon.
In no time, time is up, and everyone stops stirring their potions. Slughorn walks around examining each cauldron, and nods and explains where each pair has gone wrong. When he sees James and Sirius’, he commends on how their potion is black, which is a colour no pair has reached as of yet. What is needed to it to have the shimmer, Slughorn explains, are more porcupine quills. When he reaches Lily and Severus’ cauldron, he stops and stares. And then smiles the biggest smile he has smiled all lesson. His mustache goes crazy.
“We have our experts here!” he cries delightedly. “Everyone gather around Lily and””
He breaks off, looking questioningly at Severus Snape. “Severus Snape,” Snape mutters.
“Lily and Severus’ cauldron!” There is a noisy scraping of chairs as we all get up from our seats and go over to Lily and Snape’s table. The potion in their cauldron is the exact colour as described in the book.
“See how it is shimmery at the surface?” Slughorn points out. “Well done! Twenty points to Slytherin and Gryffindor each! Now, everyone clear their desks and afterwards you are all dismissed. Good job, all of you!”
Mary is a little dissatisfied that our potion isn’t mentioned, and I share her disappointment, too. I had wanted to be the best student in every lesson, to show Dumbledore that he hasn’t made a mistake in letting me attend Hogwarts. But it didn’t seem possible now.
My disappointment persists through the clean-up and afterwards. When Sirius and James join me they seem to sense it, too.
“What’s wrong, Remus?” James asks.
“Nothing,” I say, and force myself to smile. They won’t want to hear about it, anyway.
“C’mon, it’s not nothing, and you know it, so save us the trouble of pestering you and tell us, will you?” Sirius says.
Caving in because I also feel the need to pour out my troubles to friends, I tell them about how I want to be the best. Instead of just saying a few words of comfort and then going on to a more interesting topic, they take my problem seriously.
“That’s crazy,” James says. “Why would you want to be the best in everything?” He glances sideways at me. “You’re not a teacher’s pet, are you? I didn’t think you to be the type.”
I laugh. “No, I’m not.”
James and Sirius stare a little unconvincingly at me.
“Okay, maybe I am, a little,” I admit. “I just want to show Dumbledore that he hasn’t”” I stop myself just in time.
“Show Dumbledore what?” Sirius asks.
“Show him that I’m worthy of Hogwarts,” I say. There, I’ve managed to hide my problem, but instead I sound like a sad little swot.
“Remus, that’s just insane,” Sirius says seriously. “I mean, it wouldn’t be living. Living means you’ve got to let go a little; be wild sometimes.”
I inexplicably think about my transformations. I certainly become wild in those times. Literally. “Oh, I do get wild sometimes,” I say truthfully.
Sirius and James grin. “Now that’s living,” James says.
Just then, Gemma’s voice comes from behind. “Hey, James, d’you want to have lunch with us?”
We all turn around to see her, along with Mary.
“James is having lunch with us,” Sirius says. It may be just me, but there is a note of coolness in his tone that wasn’t there a moment ago.
“Oh, right,” Gemma says, looking a little surprised. “I mean, all of you could join Mary and me for lunch, of course.”
“All right,” James says, smiling. “We’ll all join you and Mary for lunch. All right, Sirius, Remus?”
“It’s fine with me,” I say, nodding.
“It’s okay,” Sirius says. The cool note is still there.
There is an awkward pause” and then suddenly Gemma and James start talking about how they find the lessons this morning. We all chip into the conversation, apart from Sirius, who doesn’t say much at all.
An unbidden thought makes its way into my mind. Is Sirius jealous of Gemma, somehow?
Then Mary asks me a question about Charms that I have no answer to, and I tell her that I am not sure. But what I am sure about is this: I have a lot to learn about my new friends.
And I am looking forward to it.
_________________________________
Peter
Stewart, a few other first years from Gryffindor, and I are eating our lunch when an owl soars into the Great Hall and deposits its mail in front of Sirius, who is sitting along the table a little way from us with James, Remus, and a two other Gryffindor girls whose name I do not know. As most of the owls have arrived and delivered their owners their respective presents or letters in the morning, all eyes follow the lone owl.
When Sirius sees the letter attached to the owl’s feet, he groans loudly. “It’s a Howler,” he announces to the people sitting around him.
“A Howler?” I say, turning to look at Stewart for an explanation. Although I’m Half-Blood, I don’t know quite a lot of things that happen in the magical world because my mother doesn’t exactly sit me down and tell me everything that goes on.
Stewart explains, “A Howler is a sort of letter that””
But he is cut off as Sirius opens the letter, and a screechy female voice that is a hundred times louder than Stewart’s fill the Great Hall.
“WE’VE NEVER FELT SO ASHAMED OUR WHOLE LIVES WHEN WE READ THE LETTER YOUR COUSIN NARCISSA WROTE TO US. WE’VE KNOWN ALL ALONG THAT YOU WEREN’T AS SUITABLE AN HEIR AS YOUR BROTHER REGULUS WOULD BE, BUT TO HEAR THAT YOU WERE SORTED INTO GRYFFINDOR IS SOMETHING THAT WE HAVE NEVER EXPECTED FROM EVEN YOU. YOUR FATHER IS ON HIS WAY TO HOGWARTS TO REQUEST THAT YOU SWITCH TO SLYTHERIN. DO AS YOU’RE TOLD TO SALVAGE WHAT IS LEFT OF YOUR REPUTATION.”
The Hall is silenced as the Howler curls up and bursts into flames.
“” does just what that Howler did,” finishes Stewart lamely.
Everyone stares at Sirius, probably wondering what he is going to do. Sirius doesn’t seem to know that he is being observed by hundreds of pairs of eyes.
“Reputation, schmeputation,” he dismisses loudly to his friends. “I am definitely not going to switch to Slytherin and be roommates with slimy Snivellus.” His friends hoot with laughter and James slaps him on the back. They continue eating.
My eyes jump to the Slytherin table. I know who exactly “slimy Snivellus” is, seeing as James” the bespectacled boy” had called Severus Snape that just the night before. He is not there. Neither is his friend, the nice girl called Lily Evans.
Slowly, the buzz of chatter returns, and before long, everyone is talking, the Howler and Sirius Black forgotten.
_________________________________
Sirius
James, Remus, Gemma, Mary, and I are hurrying to Transfigurations when a burly Hufflepuff stops me in the corridor.
“You Sirius Black?” he grunts. “Dumbledore told me to look for some tall, dark-haired Gryffindor first-year.”
“That’s me,” I say, shooting glances at James and Remus. They’re both frowning, and I know that they suspect what I suspect: my father is already in the Headmaster’s office, and that my presence is required.
“Dumbledore wants you to go to his office. He didn’t say why.” The Hufflepuff looks keenly at me, as if waiting for me to explain. I don’t.
“Where is his office?”
“I’ll take you.”
I wave goodbye to James and Remus, and a nod to Gemma and Mary, before setting off after the Hufflepuff. He brings me to a pair of stone gargoyles and says, “Peppermint Pixies!” It seems to be the password, as the stone gargoyles spring aside, revealing a door. The Hufflepuff ushers me through the door and up on the first stair of the staircase. As soon as we’re on it, the staircase spirals upwards and we find ourselves before another oak door. The boy knocks and calls out, “Sirius Black here to meet you, sir.”
“Ah, excellent, Wesley,” comes Dumbledore’s voice. “Please send him in.”
Wesley opens the door and pushes me into a very fine-looking circular room full of books and various strange objects. Dumbledore sits behind a table, and before him sits a wizard who I know to be my father.
Dumbledore turns to face us, smiling. “Thank you, Wesley. You may leave now.”
Wesley turns to leave reluctantly, obviously wishing he could stay and find out what this is all about. I, on the other hand, have no other wish than to leave.
“Good afternoon, Mr Black,” Dumbledore says, beams at me. “As you can see, your father came to me with a request.”
My father stands. “Sirius,” he acknowledges.
“Hello, Father,” I say.
“Headmaster, I want my son to be transferred to Slytherin,” Father says, turning back to Dumbledore.
I don’t want to be transferred to Slytherin. I would rather be force-fed poison and have all my fingernails pulled out.
“Ah, so you have told me,” Dumbledore says to Father patiently. “But what I was wondering is… does Sirius here want to be transferred to Slytherin too?”
“I” what?” my father asks in disbelief. He turns to look at me. “Headmaster, Sirius does want to be transferred to Slytherin. Do you not, Sirius?” His grey eyes, so like mine, flashes at me, daring me to disagree.
Oh, yes, as much as I want to be Snivellus, I think.
“No, I don’t,” I say loudly and defiantly. “Slytherin’s the last house I’d want to be in.”
My father’s mouth drops open in disbelief. Then disbelief becomes anger. “You silly boy! Slytherin’s the best place for you, Sirius. No one in Gryffindor would want to be your friend””
I shake my head. “I do have friends, Father,” I say. “They don’t discriminate against me. Unlike Mother and you.”
Father turns red in the face. “You unreasonable boy!” he says, then turns to Dumbledore. “The Sorting Hat must have made a mistake, Headmaster.”
“The Sorting Hat has always been right, but if you want to, Sirius can put it on and be Sorted again,” Dumbledore says courteously.
“Yes, that’s what I want,” Father says savagely, before attempting to calm himself down and adding, “Headmaster.”
Professor Dumbledore takes the Hat from off its shelf, and brings it to me. Before he puts it on my head, he looks at me with his piercing blue eyes, as if telling me to stop him, encouraging me to defy my father…
And I take heed.
“Father, what do you not understand?” I ask testily. “I want to be in Gryffindor. I wouldn’t have it any other way. I have never wanted to be in Slytherin.”
My father stares at me. “Never?” he asks.
“Never,” I confirm.
He stares at me, and I stare back.
“I still want you to try on the Hat,” he says.
I look at him in disbelief, then at Dumbledore.
Dumbledore puts the Hat on my head and before I can begin to protest, he says quietly, “It won’t matter, Sirius,” and winks.
That alone sends me back into silence.
“You again?” comes the Hat’s disgruntled voice, seemingly in my head. “I was just ready for a nice long rest until the next year.”
Yes, me again, I think. My father wants to know if I’m really in Gryffindor.
“You’re brave and daring, to the point of stupidity,” says the Hat lazily. “Tell him that.” Then it shouts, “GRYFFINDOR!”
And then Dumbledore removes the Hat from my head.
“Er”” I clear my throat. Both men look at me. “The Sorting Hat wants you to know that I’m brave and daring to the point of stupidity, Father.”
I feel like bursting into laughter at the sight of Father’s furious face. “All right,” he says. “All right. Gryffindor it is. Thank you, Headmaster. See you at Christmas, Sirius.” And then he exits the office.
“Welcome again to Gryffindor,” Dumbledore says quietly, his eyes twinkling.
“Thanks, Professor,” I say, grinning.
“Now, why don’t you join your housemates in Transfigurations with Professor McGonagall? I think you’re a little late,” he says, and hands me a note tied with a silver ribbon. “Hand this to her, and I daresay you will not be interrogated.” He smiles, and I mumble another thank you before leaving.
My father has often said that Dumbledore is a deluded, Muggle-loving fool.
I find that I really like this deluded, Muggle-loving fool.
_________________________________
James
Professor McGonagall, our Head of House and Transfigurations teacher, is halfway through explaining the theories of said subject when there is a knock on the door, and less than a second later, the door bursts open, and Sirius dashes into the class.
“I see you have kindly decided to join us, Mr Black,” Professor McGonagall said. “I was almost led to think that you have decided to skip classes.”
“Oh no,” Sirius assures her, “I would never dream of skipping classes.”
I am dying to drag him to the seat Remus and I’ve saved for him, and demand what has happened in Dumbledore’s office. Sirius hands Professor McGonagall a letter. She opens it, reads it, and nods at him, almost smiling. Then, at my wave, he heads to the empty seat between Remus and me.
“What happened? Are you still in Gryffindor?” I demand in a strangled voice.
He looks at me, his grey eyes sparkling with mischief. “Where else would I be?”
“Excellent!” Remus and I hiss, and I add dramatically, “I am about to faint with happiness.”
“I’d like to see you do that,” Sirius says, his eyes glinting with amusement.
I promptly sprawl over my desk in a realistic swoon (if I do say so myself).
“Potter, do rouse yourself from your sudden fainting fit, we have a class to carry on,” says Professor McGonagall’s crisp voice, and a few students nervously giggle.
I immediately sit up and find Sirius and Remus trying to contain their laughter.
“Of course, Professor,” I say, grinning at my two friends. “I would never dream of interrupting your class.”
A/N: Well, here's the fourth chapter! What do you think of it?
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