Full Summary: Everyone's read them. They are the stories with the perfect, beautiful out-of-character girl placed in a horribly cliche plotline. Meet Mariella. She has just come to Hogwarts, and everything is going perfectly for her... but things can't stay perfect forever. How long will it take before things start to go horribly wrong?... For Mariella that is...
Disclaimer: I own none of the Harry Potter characters.
Chapter 1
Ginny Weasley sighed as she watched Ron, Harry Potter, and Neville Longbottom play Exploding Snap. Hermione Granger was curled up in the seat across from her, reading. She looked outside the window – a light rain was sprinkling down upon the Hogwarts Express. The witch who pushed the trolley of sweets had already come by their compartment, and the five were currently nibbling on Chocolate Frogs, Pumpkin Pasties, and Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans.
Ginny was entering her fifth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Her brother Ron, and his friends Harry, Hermione, and Neville, were entering their sixth.
Neville looked over and was about to ask Ginny if she wanted to join their game, but was interrupted as the compartment door slid open.
"Well, well, what do we have here?" came a cold, drawling voice. "Two Weasels, Potty, Longbottom, and the Mudblood." It was Draco Malfoy, flanked on either side by the huge forms of Crabbe and Goyle.
"What do you want, Malfoy?" snapped Hermione, firmly closing the book she had been reading.
"Don't use that tone when talking to your superiors, Granger," hissed Malfoy with a smirk.
"Superiors? Now, I'm sure you weren't referring to yourself, Malfoy," Harry shot back.
"What's going on here?" came a voice as Malfoy made a threatening move towards Harry. Malfoy spun around, as if expecting to see a teacher. Instead, a girl was standing there. Her face was hidden by the long, hooded cloak that she wore.
"Is what's going on here any of your business?" Malfoy sneered.
"I doubt that whatever was going on in this compartment when you stuck your face in it was any of your business either. Speaking of your face – is it always that pale? It looks like you saw something that frightened you to the point of pissing yourself." The five Gryffindors laughed as Malfoy's cheeks turned pink.
At that moment a whistle sounded, announcing that the train had arrived at Hogwarts.
"You'd better watch yourself," Malfoy told the girl before turning and leaving. The girl snorted, before turning and leaving as well.
Harry, Ron, Hermione, Ginny, and Neville got off the train and squeezed together into one of the carriages heading up towards the castle.
"I wonder who that girl was," said Ron.
"I dunno, but anyone who tells Malfoy off like that is alright with me," said Harry.
The five walked into the Great Hall and took their seats at the Gryffindor table. They looked up as the Sorting Hat sung its song and began to sort the first years into their houses. Ron tapped his foot impatiently throughout the entire ceremony, obviously ready for the feast to begin.
"Finally!" he exclaimed as the last of the first years was made a Ravenclaw, and Dumbledore stood up to make his welcoming statement.
"I am aware that many of you are ready to dig into the delicious feat that has been prepared," Dumbledore began. "However, I must ask that you wait a couple more minutes. I am excited to announce that this year Hogwarts is honored to have a new student, who will be entering the sixth year. Her name is Mariella Clemens, and I trust that every one of you will make her feel extremely welcome." He motioned, and a girl stepped out of the shadows. She was wearing a dark cloak with the hood pulled down. It was the same girl who had insulted Malfoy on the train.
Ginny looked over at Harry and Ron and rolled her eyes. Both had their mouths hanging open as if they had never seen a girl before.
The girl had long, dark hair that fell down to her waist and her beautifully shaped face was tilted upwards in a somewhat defiant manner. Most shocking were her eyes, which were a deep purple. Harry and Ron weren't the only boys staring. Ginny glanced over at the Ravenclaw table and saw Cho Chang irritably slap her boyfriend, Roger Davies, out of his daze.
Mariella stared out at all the faces turned in her direction. She walked over to Professor McGonagall, who placed the Sorting Hat upon her head.
"Ah..." said a voice in her ear. "Very difficult... a good mind – very clever... brave, too... very, very difficult... Ah – I sense a great deal of power! Hidden powers... once brought out, they will be far greater than any seen in over a century!"
"Yes, tell me something I don't know," Mariella thought dully. The hat chuckled.
"Well, let's see... You have the wits of Ravenclaw. However, you contain traits and talent admired by Gryffindor and Slytherin... But where should I put you?.."
The hat had been on Mariella's head a long time. Ginny sighed, her stomach rumbling. She looked over at Ron and saw that he showed none of the impatience he had when the first years were being sorted. Instead, his gaze was fixed on the girl.
"GRYFFINDOR!" the hat finally called out. The Gryffindors clapped loudly, and Ron let out a cheer. Several of the boys from the other tables looked slightly disappointed. As the girl sat down across from Hermione, the feast appeared.
"I'm Mariella," the girl said. Harry, Ron, Hermione, Ginny, and Neville, as well as Dean Thomas, Seamus Finnigan, Parvati Patil, and Lavendar Brown, all introduced themselves and welcomed her to Gryffindor.
"That was you on the train, wasn't it? It was brilliant! – what you said to Malfoy," Ron told her. Mariella laughed.
"Yeah, I don't know what came over me – usually I'm not like that. I usually get really shy around people I don't know."
"Well, I would have never guessed," grinned Harry, as Ron nodded. Mariella blushed.
"Well, thank you."
"So... not to pry or anything, but how did you get into Hogwarts?" asked Hermione. "In all the times I've read Hogwarts, a History-"
"Which is a lot, by the way," interrupted Ron.
"- I've never read anything about exchange students," Hermione finished, ignoring Ron.
"I guess I'm the first... well, kind of... I mean, I didn't even know I was magical until a year ago. I had a lot to catch up on, bust it wasn't too hard once I got the hang of it."
"Too hard? Five years worth of magical studies!" exclaimed Ron. "Wow, I don't even know if Hermione could have done that!" Hermione frowned slightly, looking a bit bemused by this comment, but didn't say anything. Neither Ron nor Harry noticed.
That evening, Mariella was sitting alone in the dormitories when an owl tapped at the window. Getting up, she let it in and untied the letter from its leg. She watched if fly off for a minute before sitting down on her bed and opening her letter.
It was a reminder from Dumbledore. Mariella rolled her eyes; it wasn't like she was planning on telling anyone about her secret. There was a reason she had been sent to Hogwarts – to keep her safe. She wasn't stupid enough to go around telling everyone.
Crumbling the letter into a ball, she tossed it impatiently over her shoulder. It landed perfectly in the rubbish bin.
At that moment, Parvati Patil and Lavendar Brown walked in. They were avidly discussing the fashion magazine they held in their hands.
"I think this color is better though," Lavendar was saying to Parvati. They spotted Mariella and quickly asked for her opinion.
"I like that one," Mariella said, pointing to the red dress. It was a form-fitting strapless dress that went down to the floor and had a large slit up the side. "It reminds me of a dress I wore when I did some modeling in New York last year."
"Wow! You modeled?" gasped Lavendar in awe.
"You went to New York?" added Parvati with a squeal. "What was it like?"
The three girls spent the rest of the evening talking. Mariella explained that she had lived in America most her life, and answered Parvati and Lavendar's unending thirst for knowledge about modeling, fashion, New York, and other such things. Meanwhile, they told Mariella all she needed to know about Hogwarts, the classes, and the teachers – and insisted that Professor Trelawney, the Divination teacher, was the best.
AN:
Okay, this is a repost of the first chapter. It's pretty much the same as what I had before – I just fixed some spelling/grammatical errors, and added a sentence or two here and there to make it flow better.