I hope you like reading my story as much as I've liked writing it! I want to thank foreverme98 for being such a huge help as a beta reader :) I'll be reposting the first five chapters, although for the most part everything has stayed quite similar. Obviously I don't own anything you recognize.
I'll only beg for reviews once, please review! It's great to hear your thoughts on my story.
"Have you three seen a toad?" A small, bushy-haired girl asked, peeking her head into yet another compartment. She met a boy named Neville a few minutes before and had taken pity on him in his frantic search for his lost pet, Trevor. It was beyond the little witch why anyone would choose a toad for a pet. If her parents had allowed her a familiar, she would have picked an owl or a cat. Owls were incredibly useful for carrying mail, and cats were, simply put, wonderful.
"Did you lose one? Good riddance…who'd want a toad for a pet?"
Hermione snickered at the blond boy with the gelled back hair as he voiced her thoughts. "A boy named Neville Longbottom told me he had lost one. I don't know anyone yet, so I thought I'd help him look for it," she said, giving away more than she'd intended. She composed her expression immediately, thrusting back the walls she'd learned to build at school and with her relatives.
"Hermione, you're a freak. You're unnatural; you shouldn't exist," her oldest cousin had snarled at her after she had shown her how she could make her toys come to life. "You're a freak," constantly echoes in her head.
The kids in her Muggle school had been told by their parents to befriend her, hoping to become connected with her parents and family. She had been invited to every birthday party and every playdate that was held, but everything changed on her eighth birthday. Two girls, the two she considered her best friends, were talking about how insufferable they found her. They said they wished that their parents would stop forcing them to be friends; they called her a buck-toothed freak, among other foul things.
Typically, she had excellent control over her magic, but this was a special case. In this particular instance, when she decided she'd heard enough and stormed in, demanding to know what they were talking about, she slipped up. Both girls found themselves coated with particularly large boils, and with buckteeth of their own. The girls had screamed, running to their parents in the sitting room. She would have liked to have felt satisfaction, and on some level she had, but it was a shallow victory. It meant she was even more lonely than before, without even the pretence of having friends.
She had met two other boys on her search for the toad. Their whole compartment was filled with sweets and discarded wrappers, and her lip curled in disgust as she remembered the scene. The redheaded boy seemed so skeptical when he first laid eyes on her. In that moment, her fear of always being seen as a freak was rekindled. She would have to work hard, in order to prove them wrong. She would show them she belonged in the magical world just as much as they did.
"Sit with us?" The boy who'd spoken earlier shot her a grin when he saw her momentary revulsion directed at the pet.
She returned his smile hesitantly, then stepped further into the compartment, taking the closest seat by the door. She glanced at the other two boys, both too enraptured with their sweets to notice her. Hermione felt something like a smirk start to form on her lips as she caught the blonde boy's eye. They noticed their identical expressions and broke out into grins again.
"We're out. Want anything?" one of the dark haired, burly eleven-year-olds asked as he stood up, after emptying the last of what Hermione thought might be jelly beans. He took her off guard when he looked at her as well as their friend. She smiled and shook her head, appreciating the gesture.
"Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans, a couple of chocolate frogs, and some sugar quills," the boy called out, and the other boy nodded, quickly walking out of the compartment in his haste for more candy.
Hermione gazed curiously at the blonde when she saw how he ordered the other boy around. He noticed her look.
He shrugged, trying to appear the picture of nonchalance. "We're not friends, their parents are forcing them to suck up to me. They get happy mums and dads, and I get bodyguards and free stuff." He raised his eyebrows, daring her to tell him he was being selfish. To his surprise she let out a cackle, tossing her head back in mirth.
"I wish I'd been cunning enough to do that, it didn't even cross my mind. Instead, my schoolmates broke out in boils when I found out they were being ordered to be my friends. They left my house screaming and never came back—It was nice to see their parents conflicted between how badly they wanted my parents, and how little they wanted their kids to interact with me."
She was still laughing, and after her reaction, the other boy visibly relaxed and laughed along with her. He was looking at her curiously, though, it seemed strange that anyone would hold her responsible for an outburst of magic before she had even attended Hogwarts.
A thought was starting to form in his head, and he desperately hoped he was wrong. "Your parents are Muggles, aren't they?"
Hermione stiffened a little at the question; she didn't hear any accusation or maliciousness in his tone, but she saw the tell-tale mask on his face she'd had to wear so many times before, and she knew he was hiding his emotions. She closed her eyes, hoping beyond hope her answer wouldn't result in the same maliciousness she'd been given by her family, excluding, typically, her parents, for being a witch.
"Yes, they are. Is that a problem?" She had meant it to sound confident, but she could hear her voice shrinking with every word.
"It depends…it's just my father and the some of the other Slytherins…" He couldn't quite bring himself to look at her as he tried to finish the sentence.
Already prepared for the worst, after experiencing her cousin's reaction to her being a witch, Hermione found herself rather unfazed by his reply. It was clear he didn't share the sentiments, and that did count for something.
"You already know you'll be in Slytherin?" She raised an eyebrow at him questioningly. From what she'd read, the sorting didn't happen until they reached Hogwarts.
"Yeah, pretty much. My whole family was Slytherin's." He shrugged, still not meeting her eye.
Hermione bit her lip. She'd read about the first wizarding war and imagined prejudices. Drawing on her aunt and uncle, she was able to come up with a pretty good picture of how his parents would react if he became friends with her.
"When we get to Hogwarts I know your little cronies will report back to their parents about me, but let's be friends until then. I'm Hermione," she introduced. It was the same everywhere, she thought sadly, as she reached out her hand to him. He looked back at her, finally, and accepted her offered hand.
"Draco." He still looked a little conflicted, but smiled at her, nonetheless, when he introduced himself. There was a war being waged in his head; he knew it would be the best if they stopped being friends the second they stepped off the train, but another side of him wanted to be friends with her anyway. He'd never had a real friend- he had people he spent time with and enjoyed the company of, but there was always underlying family politics dictating things.
"If we didn't make a show of it to the Slytherins…maybe we could be friends at Hogwarts, too?" He worried about her taking what he said the wrong way. He wasn't ashamed to be friends with her, but he also didn't want to be murdered in his sleep.
"It might be nice to have a friend in spite of public opinion," she acknowledged quietly, once again surprising him.
"I don't want you to think I'm ashamed of being friends with a Muggle-born…it's just my parents were very specific about how I needed to act," he replied, just as quietly.
She didn't press him to figure out what he meant by that, she wasn't sure she wanted to. In some cases, not knowing was perfectly alright.
"Can you keep a secret?" he asked her, already sure she could. "My Aunt Andy married a Muggle-born, Uncle Ted. Mum, father, and I visit them. I like my cousin, she's really funny. She's a metamorphmagus."
"Why is that a secret?" Hermione asked, perplexed.
"Aunt Andy was disowned when her family found out about the engagement. My father was supposed to marry her, but then the engagement passed to my mother. They're happy, but there's a lot more to it, I think. I don't quite understand, actually. Clearly neither of them hate Muggles, but they're scared of something that could happen if people found out."
It sounded a little archaic to Hermione, although she knew her cousins were likely to be given a small pool of preferred suitors to choose from. She was thankful once again that she'd been born to her parents, who liked their work and typically avoided making a show of the family money.
"You sounded like you might have had the Muggle equivalent of my life," he mused.
"My parents are dentists…they attend to people's teeth. The rest of the family strongly disapproves, thinking that my father would have done better in business or politics, and that my mother shouldn't work. Although, they haven't been disowned. Unfortunately, that means we still have to attend every kind of party and social gathering imaginable. Thank goodness I've been saved by coming to Hogwarts before I was old enough to be dragged to all of them, one or two a month was already more than I could stomach."
"I was right. Definitely the muggle equivalent," Draco said, cringing in sympathy at the thought of the parties his mother hosted at the Manor.
They heard the door rattle before the boys, who had gone hunting for the trolley, made their way back to their seats, their arms overflowing with candy.
"Honestly, you two are as bad as the red-haired boy I talked to before coming here. Ronald Weasel?" she questioned, unsure about the name.
"Weasley," Draco corrected. "I like the nickname, though. Weasel...It suits him." He snorted, backed by the two snickering boys, "And the whole family are poor as dirt; he couldn't possibly have bought that much from the trolley."
"Just telling you what I saw. He was with Harry Potter, so maybe he's the one who paid," Hermione said airily, pulling out and opening Hogwarts: A History from her bag to read more about the Houses they would be sorted into. "I think I want to be in Ravenclaw or Gryffindor."
"Why Gryffindor?" Draco asked with a sneer, looking up from his chocolate frog card.
"Well, I know I'm not especially brave, but it would be nice to think I could be," she said thoughtfully. "Do you really want to be in Slytherin?"
"Of course!" He smirked at her, but she noticed his eyes flick to the other two buffoons in their compartment and wondered briefly if his answer would have been different if they weren't there. She just shrugged, not knowing how to pursue the subject further.
They talked for the next few hours, careful to stay away from any dangerous subjects, but otherwise mostly ignoring the other boys in the compartment. When it was time to change into their robes, Hermione had already grown rather attached to her new friend and found herself feeling a twinge of disappointment that they were going to have to part ways soon.
Back in the compartment, as the train slowed to a stop, she put her books back into her bag. They'd spent the last hour going over some of the material they were going to learn. Draco found himself astounded by how well she already performed the spells.
"You're going to be the best witch Hogwarts has ever seen. My cousin says you can choose to be brave, so ask the hat to put you in Gryffindor." He spoke quietly, making sure the other two couldn't overhear. He wasn't sure why he said it, he hated the idea of her being in that House, because it would make their friendship even more difficult, and he wasn't even sure he believed what Dora had said- not completely. But when Hermione beamed at him, he decided it had been worth encouraging her, despite his misgivings.
They felt the train halt completely, and students started pouring out of their compartments. Hermione smiled at Draco one more time before she left, deciding she would look for the boy, Neville, and see if he'd found his pet. Stepping out of the train, she took in what would be her new home with wide, amazed eyes. The castle stood proudly across the lake, grander than anything Hermione could have pictured. It shone eerily in the moonlight, and she felt her excitement for school redouble.
A massive man stepped forward, waving his arms towards the first years and calling them towards the boats lined up along the lake shore. They followed him in a haze of nervous excitement, and Draco caught Hermione's eye after they spotted the giant man, both finding themselves rather intimidated by his size and scruffy exterior.
Still warily looking at the half giant, they made their way in the direction they were told to go. Hermione found herself sharing a boat with Neville, Ronald Weasley, and Harry Potter. The latter two looked annoyed that they had to share a boat with the know-it-all girl, causing her to huff and roll her eyes in contempt. They didn't even know her, and already they were rude.
"Trevor!" Neville called out when he saw his toad on the steps before them. It was all Hermione could do not to laugh as he scampered forward to collect the hideous animal. He looked up at Professor McGonagall sheepishly when he realized he'd interrupted her during her speech. The professor bristled at the interruption, then finished her speech with a steady look in Neville's direction.
When they were guided into the Great Hall to be sorted, she heard some of the students talking about the ceiling. Did they not read?
"It's not real, the ceiling. It's just bewitched to look like the night sky. I read about it in Hogwarts: A History," she informed them rather condescendingly. The Headmaster spoke a few words, and she closed her eyes, nervous about the sorting. She overheard Draco introducing himself to Harry, and from the introduction, it was clearly forced by his father. Harry hadn't been brought up the way they had—befriending the Malfoy boy wasn't demanded, and his response to the offered alliance was a very thorough refusal.
Draco seemed a little offended, but otherwise unfazed. He shrugged when she looked at him, obviously thinking the Potter boy would come around later, which she doubted considering his words. Hermione smiled to herself a little and shook her head at the politics forced on them as 11-year-olds. It seemed ridiculous, but she'd watched it happen for most of her life.
The sorting had finally started. Professor McGonagall called students forward to sit on a small wooden bench, placing the scruffy, black hat on their heads one at a time. Everyone looked nervous as they sat, waiting for it to call out a House name and seal their fate for the next seven years.
"Granger, Hermione," she eventually heard.
"Oh, no. Okay, relax," she spoke out loud, trying to calm herself. She walked forward, faltering when she heard Ronald whisper to Harry.
"Mental that one, I'm telling you." She looked back briefly and saw Draco glare angrily at the redhead. A little appeased, she made her way to the stool a little more bravely, and when the hat was placed on her head, she made every effort to think Gryffindor. I want to be in Gryffindor.
"Are you sure, Miss Granger? You have a great mind; you would excel in Ravenclaw," The Sorting Hat told her.
A little put off by the semi-sentient hat on her head, she formulated her thoughts to answer its question. "I want to be brave. I want to choose to be brave, I know I'm smart, but I want to prove that I can be in Gryffindor," she tried to communicate to it.
"But Ravenclaw is a perfect match for you, girl."
Trying a different approach, she pulled the memory of her conversation with Draco to the front of her thoughts, begging the Hat to listen to her. The Hat continued to pester her with how she belonged in Ravenclaw, and she continued to reject its attempts at sorting her there. Much to her annoyance, it seemed amused by her struggle.
After several more minutes, the hat finally yielded. "Ambitious, determined little thing aren't you? Despite your blood status, Slytherin might have been the best option for you. But fret not, I've heard you. Better be GRYFFINDOR!" The Hat exclaimed, roaring the last word out for the Hall to hear.