Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters from Harry Potter or the places used in it. All of that belongs to J.K. Rowling. The plot and OC characters are mine, however.

Chapter 1

All those girls are so beautiful, I thought as I turned a page in the magazine. I looked plain and boring compared to them. Not to mention my extremely pale skin. Of course, I was not given much time to dwell on it.

"Cassie! Get downstairs right now! You're going to be late for school!" I sighed, tossed the magazine aside, and grabbed my heavy trunk, prepared to lug it all the way to China if that is what it took to get to school. Yeah, that's right. I go to school with a trunk. I don't go to any ordinary school. I go to this little crazy school called Hogwarts. When I turned eleven in June, I received a letter from that strange place saying I had gotten accepted there. My mom was proud of me; apparently, she had attended that school too. My dad, on the other hand, was clueless. Mom told me that he was a Muggle, which is a sort of normal person, I guess. As if I know anything about normal. I paused at the top of the stairs, thinking of my first day at the train station…

The clock was about to strike eleven a.m., and I was told to run through a barrier to get to my destination. I closed my eyes as I sprinted forward, afraid of smashing into it. Nothing happened. I made it to the other side safely. In front of me was a large scarlet engine that said HOGWARTS EXPRESS. I shakily made my way to the only compartment left. I was so scared I barely noticed when two girls sat next to me without asking.

"Hi there," the blonde one said, smiling at me. I nervously returned her friendly greeting. She seemed friendly. Maybe this school won't be so bad after all. She continued talking. "My name is Erica. What's yours?"

"My name's Cassie," I answered shyly. The girl with brown hair said nothing; she just stared out the window. I watched her curiously for a moment before returning my attention to Erica.

"Are you a first year like us?" she asked me. I nodded, and asked a question of my own. "What's her name?" I pointed at the silent girl next to her. A tear streaked down her face, and she turned away from me.

"Oh, her name is Wendy," she said, and stopped talking suddenly. Questions bubbled to my lips, but I knew now wasn't the time to ask them. Instead, I decided to get to know Erica better.

"Are both of your parents magical?" I whispered, afraid to disturb Wendy. She was quietly crying next to Erica, but didn't have a tissue with her.

"No, but my mom is," Erica responded. The train had been traveling for some time now, and I started to wonder if we will be fed any lunch. I stared out the window and watched the countryside flash by for a bit. I felt ashamed that I had nothing to talk about with this stranger, and she was so kind. She didn't seem to mind the silence, though, and took this time to look through one of the spell books we had been required to buy in a place called Diagon Alley. She happened to be reading a basic spell book that looked as if it was in the rain several times.

"My mom is a witch too," I said after two long minutes of silence. Erica nodded her eyes still on the page of proper wand movements. That reminded me of my own wand, and I dug it out of my skirt pocket to examine it. Redwood with a unicorn tail, the man had told me when I had purchased it. I must have waved a dozen wands before he said this was the right wand for me. I still wasn't sure how he knew that at the time. Wendy had calmed down by now, but she remained very quiet. After some more time had passed, a trolley came by bearing sweets I had never heard of, except those strange jellybeans that came in outrageous flavors such as grass and pepper. I tried one of them, but I spit it out because it tasted like rotten eggs. Erica found some wizard trading cards. She said they were Chocolate Frog Cards, but I only caught a glimpse of the frog before it jumped out of the window. My card happened to be a favorite of many collectors'. It was a picture of a famous wizard named Dumbledore. The date of his death was over ten years ago. I smiled at his picture and was surprised to see that he smiled back at me. I turned to show Erica, but when she looked, he was still again and staring blankly at the ceiling.

"All the pictures move, Cassie," she told me uninterestedly as she opened another card. It was starting to get dark now; I suggested that we change into our robes before we got in trouble on our first day. Most of the students had to take carriages that drove themselves to the castle, but Erica, Wendy, and I had to cross the lake by boat with a large man that called himself Hagrid. Just before we got into our boat, Wendy paused.

"Did you see those horses?" she asked me hesitantly. It was the first time she had ever spoken to me all day. Naturally, I answered her question without missing a beat.

"No, I don't. Are you seeing things?" I peered into the gloomy evening weather; there was nothing unusual about the last carriage, except that it moved by itself.

"I see them too," Erica commented. I wondered why I couldn't see them and they could. Maybe I needed glasses. We rode in the boat to the other side of the lake without anything else mysterious happening. Wendy retreated to being her silent, stony, self-staring at the water below us the whole time. Finally, we made it inside the castle. An woman came and introduced herself as Professor McGonagall. She was a sharp, fierce woman in emerald green robes that draped the floor. Her black pointy hat stood tall and proud above her head, and I half expected it to take flight and turn into a bird.

"Welcome to Hogwarts," she began after the usual formalities of introduction. "This is where you'll be staying to learn from September to June, and hopefully learn well. You all will be Sorted into four Houses: Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff, and Slytherin. Each House has a dormitory where you shall sleep in at night, and can spend your time there between classes during the day. Throughout the year, every member of your House has the opportunity to gain, or to lose, House points. Good behavior can win you points, but bad decisions can make you lose them, or worse. So remember, choose wisely on the path you want to take. Let the Sorting begin." She turned and led us to a great hall with a ceiling that I had never seen before. Everyone gasped in awe at the sight of it.

"It looks like the outside," Wendy said in surprise. "It must be bewitched. Have you read Hogwarts: A History yet? It's very fascinating, you should take a look." I contemplated her as we crowded in a little clump and stared at the older students; this was the most she has ever said since I met her. Some of the older kids gazed back at us in amusement, but most of them hardly paid any attention to us. They must be used to new arrivals. Professor McGonagall started calling out names. When she called out somebody, that person would shyly step up to the stool with the hat and put it on. The hat was black, pointy, and very large. It didn't fit anybody. The talking hat would think for a moment, then shout out the name of a House for everyone to hear. The clapping happened accordingly to which House was chosen. Erica and Wendy both ended up being Gryffindors. At last, it was my turn. My knees shook as I walked to the stool, but I kept my face blank. The hat was placed over my head. It covered my eyes completely. I stared into the darkness for a moment, waiting.

"Let's see here…" the hat said. "You are very brave, and you have a bright mind. You most certainly don't belong in Slytherin, you're such a sweet girl…" I nervously waited, saying nothing. How did the Sorting Hat know all of this?

"Why, I can see into your head of course," he answered as if it could read my mind. "I think you belong in…GRYFFINDOR!" There was a roaring cheer, and I took off the hat to follow the noise to my destination. I sat down between Erica and Wendy. That was how my Hogwarts year began, just like that.

I smiled at the memory as I came down the stairs. It was hard to believe that I was already starting my sixth year at Hogwarts, it felt more like my third. My mom was waiting at the bottom of the landing, looking very unhappy.

"Cassie, what were you doing up there? You're going to be late," she scolded me. I sighed and dragged my trunk to the car. My boyfriend would be waiting for me at the train station, and I bounced excitedly in my seat the whole way, my nose pressed to the window. At last, my mom pulled into King's Cross. I practically fell through the car door trying to get to him. My boyfriend, Fredrick, was by the barrier waiting for me. I ran into his arms, and he kissed me on the lips.

"I was starting to think you were planning to skip your first day," he teased me. He bit my ear gently. "I tried calling you all summer but you never answered. What happened?"

"We were planning not to talk too often remember?" I said, crossing the barrier with him.

"Yes, I do, but I just couldn't go a second without you," he answered. Normally I would be flattered, but the way he said it sounded almost…possessive. Or obsessive. Whichever it was, it set me on the edge slightly.

"Did I say something wrong?" His expression looked slightly wounded. Even on a train full of people, and him making faces, Fredrick still looked gorgeous.

"No, no" I said, too quickly. I played off the lie by smiling a little and shaking my dark red curls that I took such pride in. For once, he believed the lie. Something in his face seemed very off, that made me sense that something wasn't right. We finally found Erica and Wendy in a compartment near the back of the train, and sat down near them. I was very close friends with them now, but I noticed Wendy was wearing long sleeves in warm weather, an unusual thing, and I would have commented on it, but then I remembered that sometimes she got cold easily. She was thinner than I am, and I am skinny for my age. In fact, she looked a little too thin. Her face was pale and drawn, and I thought I could make out a few ribs poking out through her rib cage.

"Wendy," I said slowly, "Is something wrong?"

"No, of course not," she responded, folding her arms across her chest as she spoke, "Why would there be?"

"You look so thin and pale, though. Have you been stressing out?" I stared at her with true concern, but hers didn't meet mine head-on. Her confidence had faltered. I looked over at Erica, she seemed to be there as some kind of support for her.

"How has your summer been Erica? I heard you took a job for the past three months." Fredrick said to break the silence. He took my hand in his and rubbed it a little; it was cold in here. Erica nodded. "Yes, I did, thank you for asking. It wasn't much, just the early morning paper route. I got the money though. Five Galleons an hour is a fairly good pay for delivery." Wendy murmured an agreement, staring off into space. It concerned me that she was so pale and thin, I wondered what was going on. There was definately something she wasn't telling me. As we rode the carriage together to the castle, I had a very bad feeling that there were more secrets that I had never known existed waiting for me behind those walls.