1
The Train Ride
Fleur threw her arms around her children, unable to hold back a sob before she cried, “Oh! My darlingz! Look after zem, Victoire! Now I will be all alone at 'ome!”
Victoire muttered a distracted reassurance in reply, looking for her friends in the crowd. Dominique glanced around self-consciously.
"Mum, you’re embarrassing us,” she whispered into her mother’s silvery blond hair, which was much like her own. Fleur released them and stepped back. Bill knelt before them and looked into each of their eyes for a moment. His mouth tightened and his eyes misted over a little. Louis looked on calmly while Dominique grimaced.
Their father suddenly grinned and said, “I expect at least one of you to be in Gryffindor. You two are my last hope,” he joked. Fleur elbowed him gently in reprimand and Victoire glared, annoyed at being labelled a disappointment. She'd thrown the Weasley tradition a little of its course when she was Sorted into Ravenclaw two years ago.
“I have to go find a compartment,” she said and kissed both of her mother’s cheeks before struggling through the mob of students towards the train.
“We should go,” said Dominique. Her father smiled and stood.
“We will be proud of you, what ever 'ouse you are in,” said her mother seriously before shooting another glare at her husband.
“Of course,” said Bill apologetically. Louis’s mouth twitched, his eyes meeting his father’s in quiet understanding.
Fleur swooped again to kiss her children’s faces, and stood back to allow Bill to hug them, saying “Promise you will write every day, both of you! If you can’t find the Owlery, use Victoire’s owl.”
Dominique knew better than to ask Victoire to borrow anything; her sister was possessive about her things.
Once Dominique had wandered into her sister’s room while she had left for her first year at Hogwarts. She was playing with an orb charmed to give a steady glow at night that Victoire had forgot to pack. She then accidentally dropped it on the floor, and, horrified, shoved the sharp pieces under the bed, cutting her hand. She grabbed the cut in pain and when she uncovered it, it had miraculously healed.
This was her first magic, but she didn’t dare tell her parents. Eventually, Victoire wrote home for the orb because she was afraid of the dark, and she had had little sleep without it.
It was a secret, irrational childhood fear that Victoire had difficulty overcoming due to a traumatising experience during a game of 'hide and seek' at Grimmauld Place when Harry and Ginny had not yet moved to Godric's Hollow. Victiore had hidden in one of the upstairs wardrobes. The door had locked behind her and she was trapped while a set of robes attempted to choke her to death: the remnants of an old anti-theft hex. The robes had been left in Sirius'' parents bedroom during the early days of The War, and no-one had thought to remove them.
Fleur searched the room for the orb and inevitably discovered the fragments. Guessing what had happened, she tried a Reparo charm on it, but some of the fragments were missing and the charm failed.
Dominique walked into the kitchen and saw the shards on the table. Her mother looked down at her, disappointment shadowing her lovely features. “Why didn’t you tell me?” she'd asked gently.
Her mother instinctively knew it was her to blame. Louis would never venture into Victoire’s room, not since he'd once been caught sitting on her bed reading her diary. When he looked up to see Victoire standing in the doorway, hands akimbo and eyes shooting sparks in uncanny resemblance to Grandma Weasley, the book flew out of his hands and proceeded to beat him over the head. Louis fled, followed by Victoire and the diary.
When Victoire got home for Christmas break, she had gotten her revenge on Dominique. Dominique always slept with a glass of water by her bed at night. She got thirsty and hated getting up for a drink.
One night, Victoire had crept into her siblings' room and poured a Weasley's Wizard Wheezers concoction into her water. Dominique sipped her water during the night and awoke to discover she was hovering close to the ceiling. She let out a piercing shriek of alarm, waking Louis, who also yelled in fright. Their parents rushed into the room to see what had happened.
Fleur said “Oh, my goodness!” while Bill leaned against the door-frame, laughing uncontrollably.
There was no way she would ever even ask to borrow anything from Victoire.
The train whistle sounded, and Dominique hurried after her twin towards the train, pulling her trunk behind her. Her mother had charmed it to be feather-light, and she had no trouble dragging it up the steps and into the train.
“Dom!” a voice called behind her. Dominique turned, to see Molly and Lucy, Uncle Percy and Aunt Audrey's twin daughters, behind her. Molly had the typical Weasley hair, but one of her eyes was blue while the other was brown. Heterochromia was what she called it, having learned the word from her mother Audrey, a healer of Muggle parentage.
No one was brave enough to tease her about it. Except for Uncle George. He always said “And how is my multicoloured niece?” which was very gentle teasing, especially by Uncle George’s standards, but Molly took any jibe very seriously and sulked.
“We had better find a compartment before there aren't any left,” she said. Dominique nodded and started forward again, looking around for Louis. She spotted his short blond hair a couple of metres away and towed her trunk after him. “This one’s empty,” he said, and slid the door open.
Dominique, Molly and Lucy trailed in after him. Once they had settled their trunks onto the shelf above them, they sat. Lucy peered around Molly, looking for their parents, Uncle Percy and Aunt Audrey.
She had blue eyes, and her mother’s tight brown curls, along with a light dusting of freckles across her nose. She inherited the need for glasses from her father, but favoured a light, metal-framed pair rather than her father’s horn-rimmed frames.
Dominique glanced out of the window and caught sight of what appeared to be her entire family waving at them from the platform. A sea of red heads dotted with black, blonde and brown. She smiled crookedly and waved back.
The train lurched into motion, and she had to press up to the window with her brother and cousins to keep sight of them. The train gathered speed and the track curved away, hiding her family form view. Dominique settled back in her seat and rested her head back on the headrest. Listening to Molly and Lucy argue about Houses.
Molly was quite certain of which house she was going to be in; “Gryffindor, of course. It is the Weasley tradition.”
-
Lucy glanced at Dominique and Louis and said, “Victoire’s in Ravenclaw. She doesn’t seem to find it so bad.”
-
A flush crept along Molly’s neck. “Well, yes,” she stammered, embarrassed to realise she had hinted that Victoire was not a true Weasley.
Dominique sighed. She had been kept awake the previous night, wondering the very same thing. Suppose she wasn’t in Gryffindor, and disappointed her father? Suppose she was in a different house to Louis? Louis sensed her worry and smiled at her.
“We’ll be fine,” he told her quietly. “They’ll be proud of us no matter what house we get put in. Dad will get over it if we’re not in Gryffindor.” Dominique smiled in thanks.
She reasoned that her father would have to get over it eventually, if she wasn’t in Gryffindor. Maybe Ravenclaw wouldn’t be so bad…but what if she and Louis were separated? She didn’t think she could bear to be parted from him. They had never been separated for more than a few hours at a time since birth.
Louis was definitely a Ravenclaw, she decided. Quietly intelligent, he was always curled around a book. He got along well with Aunt Hermione, and had read most of her library.
Molly was a Gryffindor. Brave when she wanted to be, and sometimes rash, not thinking before she spoke, like her Uncle Ron. She also had an annoyingly pompous attitude, which Dominique attributed to her cousins' father,
Lucy was harder to place. She could be a Gryffindor, because she had bravery of a different kind. She was timid, afraid of many things, but worked to control her fear. She was also smart, and had a knack for remembering things in great detail. She had read all the first year textbooks and could easily quote from them by memory, a trait she had in common with Aunt Hermione. Perhaps she would be a Ravenclaw.
Dominique didn’t know where she belonged. She thought she could be brave if she had to, and she was fairly smart, but less bookish than her brother. She was ultimately loyal to her family above everything else, so she could be a Hufflepuff.
But she was cunning. When Louis stayed up late at night reading, she covered the crack between the door and the floor with a blanket so their parents wouldn’t see the light.
-
When she was at a playground, a Muggle boy taunted Louis for reading a book. Dominique stood behind him, eyes narrowed and fists clenched, her anger and indignation rising. Louis was ten times as smart as this Muggle bully, but intelligence meant little in a playground.
She looked down at the kid’s old, dirty trainers. When the boy turned to walk away, he tripped into a puddle, and Dominique smirked in satisfaction to see his shoelaces were tied.
She was also ambitious: she didn't want to be just another Weasley. She wanted to live up to the standards of The Golden Trio and have great adventures.
What if she was put into Slytherin?
A wave of cold fear washed over her. Her family would surely disown her. A Weasley had never been in Slytherin in living memory. Her family had taught her that Slytherins were underhand backstabbing cowards, Uncle Ron even going as far to suggest they were barely even worthy of attending Hogwarts at all.
There was no way she could be in Slytherin. Her musings were interrupted when the compartment door slid open.
“Anyone hungry?” asked the lunch lady. The trolley was laden with liquorice wands, pumpkin pasties, cauldron cakes and a large assortment of wizard confectioneries.
Dominique pulled out the purse her mother had given her that morning and said “I’ll have a pumpkin pasty and,” she paused-- “a box of Bertie-Botts Every Flavour Beans, please”. She paid for her food and went back to her seat.
Dominique munched on her pasty happily while Molly tore open a chocolate frog. “Severus Snape” she read. “A previous Head Master of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Professor Severus Snape was awarded the Order of Merlin, Second Class after being discovered a loyal agent of The Order of The Phoenix, and a central player in the downfall of Lord Voldemort.”
“They print Voldemort’s name on chocolate frog cards?” Dominique asked.
“He’s dead,” Molly scoffed. “Uncle Harry defeated him. He’s not coming back.”
Dominique shook her head. Perhaps Voldemort was gone for good, but her cousin’s attitude worried her. Molly was careless, and didn’t understand the incredible amount of suffering that he had inflicted. Dominique couldn't fully understand the level of the destruction created by the wizard, but she knew very well to be wary just by the way that Aunt Hermione, Uncle Ron, and Uncle Harry looked grim whenever Voldemort was mentioned.
She carefully picked out a white jelly-bean. She nibbled the end and was relieved to find it was her favourite” coconut.
“What I want to know is how Snape got onto a chocolate frog card!” said Molly. “From what Uncle Ron says about him, the man was pure evil!”
“But Uncle Harry says Severus Snape was a brave man,” rebutted Lucy. “Auntie Ginny would hardly let Uncle Harry name Albus after someone evil”.
Molly snorted and turned away. “The name’s bad enough anyway, without Snape being evil. ‘Albus Severus!’ He’s going to get hell for that when he gets to Hogwarts.”
“I’m sure he’s used to it by now,” said Dominique dryly. “James gives him hell enough.”
Molly snickered and looked out the window before saying authoritatively, “It’s getting dark. We should put our robes on”.
After struggling with their trunks, they all managed to get their robes over the Muggle attire that they'd worn to the station.
The train eased to a stop, and Molly took charge, opening the door of the compartment and poking her head out. A familiar voice rang out, “Firs’ years! Firs’ years follow me!”**
Dominique, Lucy and Louis followed Molly out of the compartment and into the already crowded corridor. Lucy stood on her tiptoes and smiled and waved at Hagrid. He saw her and smiled back, nodding to them. He turned around and they followed his bushy salt and pepper head through the crowd.
When they finally emerged, they stood panting and jostled on wet, springy grass before a wide, glassy lake. Hagrid led them to the edge where a line of boats rested in the water as close to the ground as they could get.
“No more’n four to a boat,” Hagrid instructed**. Dominique stepped forward excitedly and stepped into the boat closest to her. It did not bob in the water, but sat solidly as if it was on hard ground.
Molly followed less certainly. Once, her father had to take a month-long business trip to Venice and Audrey had elected to take the family along. As Venice had more canals than streets, Molly and the rest of the family quickly discovered her ability to empty her stomach at the mere sight of a boat.
Lucy followed after, even more nervous than Molly” but grimly determined. Louis boarded last, seating himself as gracefully as if he were sitting on a throne.
“Forward!” commanded Hagrid and the boat immediately moved at his command.** Louis peered curiously over the edge.
-
“I wonder what charm it is that makes the boats move,” mused Molly.
-
“I don’t think it’s a charm,” remarked Louis. “I can just make out a tentacle. Uncle Charlie told me a Giant Squid lives in there. I bet it pushes the boats. It would explain why Hagrid commands them.”
-
Molly paled visibly, even in the moonlight.
“You’ll get your firs’ glimpse of Hogwarts, in a minute,” **Hagrid called to the first years.
Dominique looked forward eagerly.
They rounded a bend and were greeted with the spectacular view of the large, Scottish castle. Tall spires and towers reached into the sky, and slits of windows revealed warm yellow light from the interior.**
The boats fetched up against the opposite bank, and the first years scrambled out, tilting their heads back in awe to better admire the castle.
They mobbed after Hagrid, shuffling towards the enormous doors. Hagrid knocked on the doors with a ham-sized fist, creating three resounding blows against the heavy oak boards.**
** Excerpts taken from Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone by J. K. Rowling, published by Bloomsbury
Slytherin's Weasley by Tariel
Story Notes:
I have obtained permission from Inverarity to borrow certain events and characters from Hogwarts Houses Divided. I will reference these as they appear.