Long Road Back to Eden
Lily Evans was looking forward to her final year at Hogwarts. She thought about the secret pathways, the ever changing staircases and the night sky shining down in the magically enchanted great hall. After a summer away she was never so sure that she would always call that castle home.
Sighing she checked her watch. The Hogwarts express was still five hours away from the castle so she forced herself to snap back to reality and pay some attention to the others in the compartment. Marlene McKinnon and Mary MacDonald sat across from her discussing Quidditch of all things. As far as Lily knew they were only interested in Quidditch players, so them discussing plays of a Quidditch match seemed a little out of character.
Interrupting their stream of animated conversation Lily asked what a Wronski Feint was, trying to make sense of the conversation.
"Oh, Lily, don't you know anything" Marlene replied energetically with her black curls bouncing in excitement "it's only the specialty move of the best chaser in the world –Lennox Campbell. He was a few years above us in Gryffindor remember and just got signed to England, not soon enough either because they still lost the cup even with Lennox catching the snitch."
Lily was mistaken, it was about Quiddich players and not actual Quiddich. Internally she let out a silent nostalgic giggle. Some things never changed and no matter how old her two friends got they were still the silly little eleven year olds who started Hogwarts with her six years ago.
Marlene with her innate friendliness was quick to befriend the whole Gryffindor dormitory in first year. To Lily, a shy first year which still couldn't stop her eyes from widening every time she saw an unexplainable act of magic, Marlene was a comfort as she talked to Lily on her first day with such familiarity that Lily felt she had in fact known Marlene for years. Mary on the other hand spoke quietly with a soft Scottish accent that she went unnoticed by Lily for weeks among all the new things that Hogwarts offered. It wasn't until she was paired with Mary on the Devil's Snare project in Herbology that they became friends.
Mary's sandy blond fringe was almost long enough to cover up her wide blue eyes so every few minutes her hand would swipe across her forehead absentmindedly while she was telling Mary about the Quiddich game she had seen in Edinburgh over the summer holidays with her dad. With Marlene holding her weight as the active listener of the conversation, nodding enthusiastically in all the right places Lily decided now would be a good time to check the rest of the train as part of her new head girl duties.
On boarding the train earlier that day Lily had been excited about starting her new duty and eagerly made her way to the first compartment to greet all the new prefects and lead the first meeting of the year. Her eagerness quickly faded however upon finding out just who the head boy was. James 'rules are made to be broken' Potter sat looking arrogantly proud of himself in the prefect's carriage with his chest almost comically forward displaying a shiny gold head boy badge. Or at least that's how it looked to Lily in her disbelief of James Potters' latest success.
"Is this a prank?" Lily demanded scowling in James' direction.
"Lily!" James sound excited to see her despite her tone. He bounded forward and moved his arms up before thinking better of it and dropping them back down. "How was your summer? Did you see the world cup? That Campbell guy's a real talented seeker, eh?" James proceeded animatedly, seemingly ignoring her previous comment.
That was something that Lily thought of as James Potter's biggest talent, ignoring things he didn't want to hear and Lily's indignation towards him was something he most certainly did not want to hear. Lily took a deep breath resigning herself to this new and unwanted situation before deflecting James' questions with vague answers and reminding herself it could be worse, it could of been Black after all.
With a quiet "OK, let's get on with" it from Lily the two had navigated their way through the first meeting with James oddly muted and Lily methodically going through each point the prefects needed to know. After the meeting she had quickly made her way towards Mary and Marlene's carriage and steadily ignored the fact that she would have to work closely with Potter throughout the year.
Closing the compartment door on her way out to check the train Lily decided that she could still mostly ignore Potter, after all the fact that they had to co-ordinate the prefects didn't mean they had to be friends. Smiling at her decision Lily started to walk down the train's corridor while peeking through the compartment windows and checking that the students inside were behaving.
It wasn't long before Lily found a first year that had made himself sick on cockroach clusters. Green in the face the little guy explained that his mum never let him have sweets and that he had only had a few. Judging by the wrappers surrounding him however Lily suspected he had more than just a few. However, with a quick stomach easing charm the crisis was averted and Lily was able to move on.
It wasn't until nearly the end of the train that Lily found a real crisis which demanded the head girl's attention. There was an angry looking boy who looked strangely like James Potter with his wand out pointed towards Evan Rosier who was looking a bit more confused than his usual angry. Still he also had his wand out ready for a duel if the other boy started firing off curses.
"I know who you are" the other boy almost hissed in Rosier's direction while glaring at him with hatred burning in his oddly green eyes.
"What is going on here" Lily demanded using her best impression of the stern looking Professor McGonagall.
The effect was almost instantaneous as both boys swerved around to identify the owner of the voice. Both looked a little cowed as though they expected a teacher to be on the other side of it. Rosier narrowed his eyes at her while the unfamiliar boy looked shocked to see her. His eyes widened and he very quickly dropped his wand while his face morphed through a range of expressions which Lily had trouble recognizing but jumped at the opportunity to dispel the situation while both boys were shocked out of their anger.
Before they could mutter out their excuses however the very person Lily had planned on ignoring for the rest of the year had appeared. James Potter with Sirius Black looking gleefully around for trouble at his side had appeared. Unexpectedly however, James Potter didn't say anything that would rile the two boys up even more. In a stern, almost mature sounding voice he followed Lily's question by asking if there was a problem.
Rosier was quick to throw any blame away from himself, while the Potter look-a-like looked even more shocked upon seeing James. Lily quickly decided that this boy must be all bark and no bite when confronted with actual authority figures and not a fourth year student almost a head shorter than himself.
The boy stuttered, opening and closing his mouth as if attempting to make words while staring at Lily with his apparently default shocked expression. After Evan Rosier made a quick escape back into his compartment James made to interrupt what was quickly becoming a staring contest between the two.
With the sternness gone from his voice now that trouble had been avoided he casually asked the boy who he was. "You're wearing the Gryffindor crest but I haven't seen you round before. Are you in sixth year?" asked James curiously.
Lily herself was curious as well because she could swear that she had never seen this boy before in her life yet he wore the Gryffindor crest and was clearly at least sixteen.
The boy answered quietly, seemingly finding his voice, a soft whispery voice that somehow held an authoritive tone which ensured people listened. "That's because you haven't –seen me before that is. I'm an exchange student and am starting seventh year and I only just got sorted into Gryffindor. I don't even know anybody yet." The boy babbled defensively before getting a hold of himself and standing up straighter.
"I'm Harry King and previously I was homeschooled" the boy said wearing a now very serious expression. "My parents travel and decided that I would benefit from a more diverse education than Hogwarts offers but due to a change in circumstance I'm now attending" he said with a finality which led no room for questions. Lily thought that the boy sounded a little snobby like one of those pureblood kids who took their last names as their justification for superiority.
He shook both James' and her hands' firmly but pulled back his hand when he got to Sirius apparently not deeming him worthy of an introduction. Lily found the boys jaunty demeanor unpleasant and was quick to suggest James, the head boy, show him the ropes and made her excuses to leave the group of boys' she didn't particularly want to interact with.
"Yes, I'll show you all the ins and outs, do you have a compartment?" James asked apparently eager to play the part of mature head boy. Lily almost snorted; she doubted it would be long before James would be feeding the boy prank candy. She didn't want to stick around and supervise the situation however so she said her somewhat stilted farewells and made her way back towards Mary and Marlene.
So my first chapter of my first story… Tell me what you think. Should I keep going?