This chapter kind of got away from me. I was hoping to get to the Sorting and the first actual letter to Ginny, but I needed to make some small changes to canon events that spiralled into some pretty lengthy passages. I was almost tempted to split this chapter up further, but I didn't want to give myself any more excuses for delaying proper new content.
I've also made a few small tweaks to the previous chapter, nothing major with regards to plot, just giving Ron a few small reactions to Harry talking to Ginny so he doesn't seem completely irrelevant. I'm not sure what it is, but Ron is a character I find quite tough to write for, so any nitpicks there would be especially appreciated. All other nitpicking is also welcome, of course ;)
Anyhow, this is a long'un, so get comfortable.
Also, if anyone can think of a better chapter title, it'd be much appreciated.
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Dear Ginny | ||||||
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Category: Alternate Universe Characters:All Genres: General Warnings: Spouse/Adult/Child Abuse, Violence/Physical Abuse Rating: R Reviews: 13 Summary: What if Harry and Ginny had decided to write to each other when they first met on Platform Nine and Three Quarters? Hitcount: Story Total: 8264; Chapter Total: 1526 Author's Notes: |
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Harry knelt on the hard paving of the platform where he’d landed for a moment, shaking his head in an attempt to stop the world spinning around him from his first magical journey, as his ears adjusted to the sounds of the waiting crowd. If this was what all transportation was like in the wizarding world, Harry thought he might prefer just to walk wherever he needed to get to. It might have been slower, but muggle travel was certainly nowhere near as nauseating, even when Uncle Vernon seemed to be trying his hardest to make Harry sick. A shrill whistle pulled Harry from his musings, and he looked up at its source to see thick, white smoke pouring from the crimson engine. A quick glance at the clock confirmed his suspicions, and Harry pulled himself to his feet, shaking the last dregs of dizziness from his head. He lifted the trunk from his trolley, suddenly very grateful the Dursleys had only ever allowed him two sets of Dudley’s old clothes. It may not have left much opportunity for style or self-expression, but it certainly made for easier hauling. Another whistle sounded over the noise of the crowd, and Harry heaved his belongings up onto the car and shut the door behind him as the train began to pull away from the station. Harry dragged his trunk through the corridor, before coming to a stop at an empty compartment. He supposed most of the rest of the students were giving their last goodbyes from the doors of the carriage, and would come looking for a compartment once they’d left the station proper. An ache rose up in Harry’s chest as he gazed longingly out of the window at the waving families, but he quickly quashed it back down. It wasn’t as if he had anyone left he’d want to be waving to, anyway. Tearing his eyes from the window, Harry began to search the top layer of his trunk for a schoolbook to read. He’d just spotted his copy of The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 1) by Miranda Goshawk, intending to learn some more incantations, when a flash of red in the window caught the edge of his vision for the second time that morning. He looked up to see Ginny running along the yellow tiles, her eyes scanning up and down the train. Harry smiled despite himself. He wished, for the first time in his life, that he’d had a younger sibling like her, willing to try to keep up with the rapidly accelerating locomotive in search of one last goodbye. Her eyes stopped roaming the carriages, and she smiled and waved up at the train. Up at him. Harry froze for a moment. He tentatively waved back to his new quill-pal, whose smile widened as she sped up to keep pace with his carriage. They grinned and waved to each other even after Ginny was forced to stop so as not to fall off the edge of the platform, neither of the two looking away until long after they’d faded to pinpricks from each other’s sight. Harry finally let his arm fall to his side, but the smile stayed firmly in place. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had somebody to wave to. The rattling of the compartment door opening behind him shook Harry from his reverie. His stomach gave a small lurch as he caught a glimpse of orange hair reflected in the window, although he knew there was no way his new, and only, friend could have been there. He had, after all, just watched her fade into the distance. Ginny’s hair wasn’t even close to that colour, anyway. It was a much deeper red, with fiery orange highlights that seemed almost to dance in the sunlight. Harry wondered for a moment how he’d noticed that after the short time they’d known each other, when he couldn’t have said any more about his Aunt Petunia’s hair than that it was blonde, even though he’d lived with her for the last ten years. He supposed ducking heavy pans must have made it difficult to notice details, and it probably helped that he’d only last seen Ginny a few moments earlier. “All the other compartments were full, d’you mind if I sit in here?” the redhead’s apologetic tone pulled Harry out of his thoughts once again. The accent felt familiar, but somehow he didn’t think he’d ever actually heard it before. Harry turned to face the source of the voice, his smile shrinking very slightly as his eyes crossed the freckled face of the youngest of Ginny’s brothers before him, although the other boy didn’t seem to notice anything wrong. He shook his head noncommittally and the boy sat down opposite, glancing at Harry before looking quickly out of the window as if he hadn’t been looking at all, his cheeks reddening slightly. The pair sat in silence for a few minutes as they watched the houses flashing past the window, until the door opened again. They both turned to see the twins, Fred and George, leaning through from the corridor. “Hey, Ron,” one twin said, “we’re going to go down to the middle of the train. Lee’s got a giant tarantula down there.” “Ok,” Ron mumbled in reply. The twins looked at each other for a moment, as if in silent conversation, before the other twin spoke up. “Hey,” he said, “we saw you earlier outside the platform, but I don’t think we were introduced. We’re Fred and George Weasley, and this is our brother, Ron. I think you’ve already met our sister,” he paused and grinned at the dark-haired boy, while his twin brother wiggled his eyebrows at him. “of course, she’s been going on about how she was going to marry you for years, but we didn’t think you’d be quite as keen as you’ve been, Mr Potter.” How did they know his name? Harry looked up in confusion, but the twins were already turned to leave before he could begin to open his mouth to ask them. “Well, we’ll be seeing you later, then.” The twins quickly walked off down the train, the door sliding shut behind them. There was a moment’s silence in the compartment, as the redheaded boy seemed lost in thought. “Are you really Harry Potter?” he blurted out suddenly. Harry nodded slowly, still thoroughly unused to his newfound fame. “Oh, I thought Fred and George might have been joking again. They’ve been going on about how you’d be coming to Hogwarts this year whenever they could, but I thought they were just trying to get a reaction out of Ginny.” Harry felt the boy’s eyes drifting towards his forehead, and he felt a rush of empathy for the Boa Constrictor he’d met at the zoo. “Have you really got the, you know…” Harry pulled back his hair, revealing the lightning-shaped scar. Ron stared at it, eyes wide. “Is that from You-Know-Who?” he breathed. Harry sighed, but the boy seemed undeterred. “Yes, but all I can remember of it is a lot of green light.” “Wow.” Harry dropped his hand back to his side, obscuring his scar once again, but the other boy kept staring. He felt a surge of irritation, and was just about to say something when Ron stiffened and looked quickly out of the window. Harry picked up his copy of The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 1 and started reading. “Are you really going to write to my sister?” Ron asked, after a few minutes of silence. Harry looked up from the story of the Wizard Baruffio and his bison, and stared at the boy for a moment. “Of course I am, why wouldn’t I?” he slowly responded. “Oh, I didn’t mean it like that. I just thought you should know that Ginny can go a bit over the top sometimes. I think she gets it from Looney.” Harry decided not to reply to Ron’s comment about his friend, but he couldn’t ignore the odd name the redhead had used. Was it some sort of Wizarding comic book? He knew from his occasional glimpses of Dudley’s ones that they had strange names like Dandy or Beezer, and he knew of at least one Wizarding newspaper, so perhaps wizards had their own magazines too. “Looney?” “Sorry, I meant Luna. Lovegood.” He added in afterthought. “She’s completely loopy, and best friends with Ginny, but that’s only because she’s the only other magical person their age around.” “So you call your sister’s best friend Looney? That’s not very nice.” The tips of Ron’s ears turned red. “Not to her face, obviously!” “Oh, just behind her back then?” Harry felt a surge of anger as he remembered how his classmates used to talk to each other about his sellotaped glasses and hand-me-downs when he was at school. It hadn’t quite hurt as much as the beatings, but it wasn’t exactly a fond memory, and he wasn’t about to let it happen to somebody else if he could help it. “Not brave enough to say it to her face?” he spat, his indignation temporarily crushing any fears of retribution. Ron stiffened, his ears crimson as he balled his fists, and Harry shifted in his seat, glancing towards the door. Before Harry could make a move, Ron slumped back into his chair, his face falling as the redness left his ears, apparently to fill the rest of his face. He looked down at the floor. For a few moments, though it felt like an eternity, neither boy spoke, until the redhead finally broke the silence with a sigh. “No, I’m not brave enough,” he whispered sullenly, a tear making its way down his long, freckled nose. Harry gaped at him. This was not the beating he’d been expecting, and he had no idea what he was meant to do in this situation, whatever the situation was. At least he knew how to deal with physical violence, generally run like hell and hope you’re not surrounded. Harry suspected that wasn’t the right answer here, however badly he wanted it to be. In lieu of any better answers, Harry sat silently, waiting for the redheaded boy to calm down and hoping he might be able to help somehow, as he felt his own anger drain away, regret seeping into its place. He’d never wanted to hurt the other boy, just stop him from saying such hurtful things, and instead he’d just caused more pain. Perhaps his Uncle Vernon had been right after all. Harry was a nasty freak. For what felt like tenth time that day, Harry was pulled from his thoughts by a Weasley as the sniffles coming from the bench opposite finally stopped. He looked up to meet Ron’s eyes, both boys unknowingly mirroring each other’s reproachful gaze. He took a deep breath. “Sorry,” they apologised in unison, eyes widening in confusion. Harry was once again left speechless. He couldn’t remember anybody ever saying sorry to him before, if he didn’t count the times he’d been told to say sorry by his Aunt Petunia after he’d done something wrong. Dudley and Uncle Vernon had generally preferred to just whack him around a bit instead. They lapsed back into an uncomfortable silence for a few moments, before finally looking up to meet each other’s eyes. A silent agreement passed between them. They were both forgiven, but neither boy had any desire to bring the offending discussion up again any time soon. Silence filled the compartment once again as the pair gazed out of the window at the passing scenery, although it was not nearly as oppressive as it had been before. “So,” Harry said, hoping to break the spell, “are all of your family wizards?” Ron looked confused for a moment. “Um, I think so. I know my brothers and Ginny are magical, and so are all of the relatives I’ve met. I think Mum mentioned a second cousin who’s an accountant once, but I don’t remember ever meeting him.” A doubt that had niggled at the back of Harry’s mind since his trip to Diagon Alley made its way to the front of his mind. “You must know loads of magic already then, with all your family being magical and all,” he muttered, just loud enough for Ron to hear. Loud enough, that is, if Ron hadn’t already been distracted by the arrival of a small, smiling lady pushing a trolley of sweets down the corridor. The door slid open, and a kindly voice came through it. “Would any of you dears like anything off the cart?” Out of habit, Harry looked down at the floor. The Dursleys never let him have sweets unless somebody explicitly called them out about it, and he’d decided they weren’t really worth the punishment anyway. He was about to shake his head and return to his book when the weight of the bag of gold and silver coins in his pocket brought a grin to his face. What the Dursleys didn’t know couldn’t hurt him, after all. Harry stood up and walked towards the door, vaguely registering Ron’s comment about having brought sandwiches but pushing it to the back of his mind as he instead tried to decide what he’d buy. He remembered the time Dudley had dropped one of his pile of Mars Bars down the back of the sofa without noticing, and the memory of the taste of the chunk of chocolate and caramel when he’d snuck out of his cupboard that night to fish it out filled his head. It had been more than worth the risk of a beating for being caught out of his cupboard, even after he’d had to pick off the bundle of hairs and dust that had settled on it. Harry had just resolved to buy as many of the confection as he could carry, when he reached the bustling cart to find not a single Mars Bar in sight. Not just Mars Bars, but Marathons, Twixes, Lion bars and even Blackjacks, the disgusting sweets Mrs Figg seemed to have an endless supply of, were absent from the trolley. Instead, he found an assortment of strangely named sweets with flashing packages, advertising such delights as Pumpkin Pasties, Liquorice wands, Chocolate Frogs, and several stacks of red and white-striped boxes filled with something called Bertie Bott’s Every Flavour Beans, which apparently promised ‘A risk with every mouthful!’. Uncertain as to what any of the sweets on offer actually were, and not wanting to miss anything, Harry carried a small selection of everything back to the compartment, his coin pouch lighter by 11 silver Sickles and a few bronze Knuts. Ron stared at him, half-wrapped sandwich in hand, as Harry dumped the sweets in a pile on his chair. “Hungry, are you?” A guilty feeling rose up in Harry’s stomach as he remembered the redhead’s earlier comment about his sandwiches, but it was quickly replaced by a much more urgent sense of emptiness. He took a bite out of a pumpkin pasty. “Starving” he grinned back. “Want one?” Harry had never had anything to share before, or indeed anyone to share it with. He worried that in his excitement he might have come on a little fast, and judging from the colouring of the redhead’s face, he thought, grin fading, he was probably right. “Nah, I’m alright,” Ron muttered, taking a bite from one of his sandwiches and unsuccessfully attempting to hide his grimace, “Mum made us all sandwiches, anyway.” His voice dropped slightly, though not quite enough that Harry couldn’t hear. “Never remembers I don’t like corned beef, though.” That settled it. “Swap you for one of these?” Harry tantalizingly waved a pumpkin pasty in the space between them, smiling to himself as Ron’s eyes followed the treat through the air. A few seconds of teasing later, however, the redhead tore his eyes away from the pastry and placed them firmly back on his sandwich. “You won’t want this, it’s really dry. She doesn’t have much time, making food for all five of us.” Harry was not going to be so easily put down. “Go on, you know you want to.” Ron seemed poised to argue, but a rumbling in his stomach betrayed him and the pair soon found themselves making their way through Harry’s assortment of sweets, chatting as if they hadn’t just met that day. As Harry tried the corned beef sandwiches, which, while significantly better than Ron had made out, did not go well with Sugar Mice, the conversation turned back to their families. “They really left you to grow up with Muggles?” Ron blurted out through a mouthful of Cauldron Cake, oblivious to the small chunks of food he spat with every syllable. “What are they like?” “Absolutely bloody awful,” Harry replied. “Well, my Cousin, Aunt and Uncle are, anyway. The rest of them are alright though,” he quickly added. He wasn’t sure what had possessed him to curse, even if it was nothing close to the kind of words his Uncle Vernon used on a regular basis, generally to describe Harry himself, but he allowed himself a rueful grin as he glanced at his feet. It was nice not to worry about flying pans for once. He looked back up at Ron. “I wish I’d had a witch and three wizard brothers.” “Five brothers,” Ron corrected him, a gloomy look on his face. “I’m the sixth. Bill’s the oldest, he was the Head Boy. Charlie’s 2 years younger, but he was a prefect and Quidditch Captain. He just left Hogwarts this year. Percy’s a prefect now, and Fred and George mess around loads but they still get really good marks, and everyone thinks they’re hilarious. Everyone expects me to do as well as them, but even if I do it’s no big deal because they’ve already done it. I never get anything new, either. I’ve got Bill’s old robes and Charlie’s old wand, and Scabbers here used to be Percy’s before dad gave him an owl for being made prefect.” He pulled a fat, grey rat from his jacket and placed it on the windowsill, where it lay still. “He’s useless, hardly ever wakes up. I was hoping for an owl, but they couldn’t — I got Scabbers instead.” Ron’s ears had turned pink again, and he turned to stare intently out of the window, thoughts of food forgotten. Harry wasn’t quite sure what Ron was so upset about, but he didn’t want to risk upsetting him again, so said nothing as he watched the trees and fields passing by the window. He’d never seen so much green before. A little while later, Harry was back to reading his schoolbook, murmuring the incantation to the wand-lighting charm under his breath, and Ron was sorting through his collection of Famous Wizard Cards from the chocolate frogs they’d finished, when the compartment door slid open to reveal a round-faced boy, his eyes reddened and slightly moist. “Sorry, have either of you seen a toad at all?” When both Ron and Harry shook their heads, the boy in the doorway burst into tears, and judging by the state of his face, not for the first time that day. “I’ve lost him! He keeps escaping from me!” Harry racked his brains for a solution. When Dudley lost something, Uncle Vernon would normally just send his wife out to buy him something else he wanted, normally after finding some excuse to blame Harry. He had a vague memory of a teacher comforting one of his classmates at school over a lost doll, and decided that might be a better example to follow. He took a breath and looked up at the tearful boy. “He’ll turn up eventually,” Harry assured him, as he tried not to think about all of the ways the poor boy’s pet could be lost on the busy train. “I’m sure of it.” He fixed the other boy with a steely look that he hoped was in some way reassuring, and made an effort not to notice the array of wide open windows in the corridor behind him. Somehow, his words seemed to have helped, and the round-faced boy sniffed, then turned to continue his search. “We’ll come find you if we see him!” Harry promised as the door slid shut. “Honestly, I don’t see what he’s so upset about,” Ron blurted out as soon as the door had shut. “If I’d brought a toad, I’d have lost it first thing I could.” A pensive expression crossed his face for a moment, then quickly retreated as it realised just how out of place it was among the freckles. “S’pose I can’t really talk, though. I did bring Scabbers.” Harry averted his eyes to hide his growing annoyance at Ron’s insistence on badmouthing people behind their backs, but it was a futile gesture as the redhead was already focusing on the sleeping rat, a scowl worthy of Dudley on his 7th birthday pursing his lips. “He could be dead and you’d never be able to tell the difference. I tried a spell my brother, George, gave me yesterday to turn him yellow, just so he’d be a bit more interesting, but it didn’t do anything. Here, I’ll show you.” He pulled a badly chipped wand from his trunk and picked at a white spot on its end, muttering something Harry couldn’t quite make out about Unicorns. He’d just pointed his wand at the unconscious rat when the door was opened again and a bushy-haired girl, already dressed in a black Hogwarts robe walked in, followed a few steps behind by the round-faced boy from earlier. “Has anyone seen Neville’s toad? He says he’s lost it.” “We already told him we haven’t seen it,” Ron replied stiffly, but the girl ignored him, staring at the wand still clutched tightly in his hand. “Are you doing magic, then? Let’s see it.” She pushed some of the pile of sweets over and sat down next to Harry, looking back for a moment to direct Neville to the seat next to Ron, then staring so intently at the freckled boy’s wand that she didn’t seem to notice that Neville hadn’t followed her symbolic instruction. Ron seemed a little scared of the audience, but nonetheless tightened his grip on the battered wand in his hand, before he cleared his throat and began to recite an incantation under his breath. Harry could only pick out a few words in the supposed spell, but they seemed nothing like the spells mentioned in his schoolbook, which tended to be made up of only a single word which looked suspiciously similar to the Latin he’d learned at school. Harry supposed there must have been real spells like that, though. Ron had grown up with a family of wizards, after all, so he should have been able to tell that it wasn’t a real spell if they were all made up of faux-latin like Reparifage or Incendio were. Of course, the bossy girl had barely known Ron for all of 5 minutes, so knew none of what Harry, who had spent the better part of the day with the redhead, had been able to deduce. “Are you sure that’s actually a real spell? It’s not very good, is it? Unless you’re casting it wrong, I guess, I’ve only had a chance to try a few spells, but they’ve all worked so far for me. I’m the only one in my family with magic, it was a complete surprise when the letter came, but I’m ever so pleased, of course, I mean, I’ve heard Hogwarts is the best school of witchcraft there is, even the French seem to agree and they have their own school, at least according to the books, I’ve learned all of our textbooks by heart, naturally, I haven’t had much of a chance to brew many potions yet, though, I just hope what I’ve been able to do will be enough preparation not to fall too far behind,” she finally paused her rapid tirade for a few moments, maybe to finally take a breath, and seemed to notice the others staring back at her, stunned looks on their faces. Neville, at least, seemed to have experienced all of this once before, though he didn’t look like he’d had any more success understanding her. The brown-haired girl flushed lightly, and turned her intent gaze on the redheaded boy trapped in the corner. “I’m Hermione Granger, by the way, how about you?” Harry glanced at Ron’s glazed expression and, guessing that he wasn’t quite in a state to answer, decided to take the lead. “This is Ron, and I’m Harry Potter.” Ron seemed to snap out of his confusion on hearing his name and nodded his assent. “Really? I’ve read all about you, of course, I got a few extra books for background reading, and you’re mentioned in pretty much all of the newer Magical history books. You’ve even got a whole chapter in the new edition of Great Wizarding Events of the Twentieth Century, and it’s longer than the one on Grindelwald’s rise.” By this point, Harry’s face had formed a perfect imitation of Dudley confronted with a maths problem, and Hermione seemed to notice his expression as she paused, one bushy, brown eyebrow raised. “Didn’t you know? Goodness, I’d have found out anything I could if it were me. Do either of you have any idea which House you’ll be Sorted into? I hear Dumbledore himself was in Gryffindor, and most of the ones I’ve met so far seem fantastic, but Ravenclaw wouldn’t be too bad, I suppose. All of the Slytherins were horrible to us when we were looking for Trevor, that’s Neville’s toad, by the way, we’d better go and get back to looking for him, actually.” Hermione strode quickly past Neville into the corridor, turning to address the two boys once more. “You two should probably change into your robes, you know, I expect we should be arriving soon.” She didn’t wait for their reply before stalking off down the carriage. Neville grinned apologetically as he slid the door shut and made to follow her. “Whatever House I end up in, I hope she’s not in it too. Absolutely insane, she is,” Ron grumbled, missing Harry’s glare as he tossed the battered wand back into his trunk, where it let off a few yellow sparks. “Stupid spell, I bet George knew it was a dud when he gave it to me.” Harry crushed down his anger again. He didn’t particularly want to annoy the brother of his only friend so soon, even if he wasn’t entirely certain he wanted to spend much more time in Ron’s company. With any luck they’d end up in different houses and he wouldn’t need an excuse to avoid the boy. Grasping for a change of subject from complaining about other people, Harry asked the first question that came to mind. “What Houses are your brothers in?” “They’re all Gryffindors,” Ron replied, his face falling. “Mum and Dad were, too. I don’t know what they’d say if I’m not. Ravenclaw wouldn’t be too bad, but Fred and George would never let me live it down if I was a Hufflepuff. And imagine if they put me in Slytherin. They’d disown me.” “That’s the House Voldemort was in, right?” “Don’t say that!” Ron hissed, making Harry jump. “What?” The change of subject had certainly been effective in diminishing Harry’s anger, although the confusion that took its place may well have been worse. “Don’t say You-Know-Who’s name!” “Why not?” “We-We just don’t say it. I thought you of all people would understand.” “What, because he murdered my parents?” Harry was wrong, the anger was definitely worse than the confusion. He stood and stormed out of the compartment. “No, I didn’t mean that, just, y’know…” The redhead trailed off as he finally saw the glare Harry had spent much of the day practicing. “Sorry.” “I need some air,” the raven-haired boy muttered, and slammed the sliding door shut. No sooner had he turned around to leave than he collided with two thickset boys. A crunch came from between his eyes as he struggled to remain upright, and he cursed to himself. He’d forgotten to bring any Sellotape to repair his glasses with. A moment passed before he noticed the two pairs of eyes staring down at him in thinly veiled rage. “Oh, er, sorry,” he apologised hurriedly, his anger subsiding in place of fear. He glanced around for an escape route, but the boys seemed to have the whole corridor filled. “I wasn’t looking where I was going.” Both of the large boys balled their fists, mean looks on their faces, but immediately relaxed as a voice spoke from behind them. “Don’t worry about it, we heard you shouting and came to make sure everything was alright,” the voice drawled, as the two boys Harry had walked into stepped aside to reveal a pale-looking boy Harry recognized from his trip to Diagon Alley. “So, is it true? They’ve been saying Harry Potter’s in this carriage. It’s you, isn’t it?” Harry’s guard was back up in an instant, on an instinct he’d perfected over years of his cousin’s ‘gentle teasing’. He found it hard to believe that the boy he’d met in Madame Malkin’s would have any interest in helping him out. On the other hand, his only other option was returning to his compartment and trying not to hit Ron. He sighed, resigned to his fate, and levelled his gaze on the blond boy. “Yeah, I’m Harry Potter.” “I’m Malfoy, Draco Malfoy. These two,” he gestured to the boys surrounding him like bodyguards, “are Crabbe and Goyle. We’re here to offer you some assistance. I know how hard it must be for you to be taking your first steps in our world, especially after living with those filthy muggles. You’ll soon find out that some families are much better than others, and you won’t want to go making friends with the wrong sort,” Malfoy glanced into the compartment Harry had just left. “I can help you with that, Potter.” He held out his hand for Harry to shake, but Harry’s stayed firmly at his side. As much as he might be annoyed with Ron’s thoughtlessness, the boy was acting even worse. Besides, he was pretty sure Ginny would have fallen into Malfoy’s idea of ‘the wrong sort’ too, and Harry definitely wasn’t willing to betray his only friend like that. “I think I can figure these things out for myself, thanks,” he replied coolly. It didn’t seem like a good idea to start a three-on-one fight against people who were both bigger than him and almost certainly knew much more magic than him. “I wouldn’t want to trouble somebody of your stature.” “Well, the offer stands if you change your mind,” if the pale boy was disappointed, he didn’t show it. In fact, he almost looked relieved as he stalked away, closely followed by his two protectors. Harry watched them leave for a few moments, before turning and walking the other way. He hoped to avoid any more conversations for a while, but it seemed fate had other ideas as he saw a mass of bushy brown hair poke out from a compartment ahead of him, followed by the rest of Hermione Granger, who immediately began to talk at him. “Why are you still dressed in your muggle clothes? I spoke to the driver just now, we’ll be there soon, you need to get your robes on quickly or you’ll be in trouble before the school year even starts,” she waved him off towards his compartment, “We found Neville’s toad, by the way. He’d found his way into the sweets trolley.” Harry made his way back to the compartment with his luggage, grunting a greeting to Ron as he opened the door before pulling on his robes. As he fastened his cloak around his shoulders, the train began to slow, and his stomach gave a nervous lurch. He followed the crowds of his fellow students to stand by the doors in anticipation and, when the train finally stopped at Hogsmeade station, he stepped out into the crowds. They had arrived at Hogwarts. |
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