Chapter One

Sherlock Holmes was not a normal 11 year old boy. Of, course, he knew that already. He'd known for a while, that from the second he had been born, he would be registered to attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

After all, that's where his brother, Mycroft was going to school currently, and where his parents had gone, and their parents, and theirs. All the way up and down the Holmes family tree, there appeared not a drop of muggle blood. Anywhere.

This was quite uncommon, seeing how much the wizarding race had dwindled over the past few thousand years. There were only a few pure-blood wizarding families left. The Holmes family was one, and the Weasleys, even though they were blood traitors; they still had irregularly pure blood. And, of course, the Malfoys. The Malfoy family had to be the most famous and popular pure-blooded family, with the Holmes family running in close second.

Sherlock and Mycroft's father was close friends with Draco Malfoy, who currently worked at the Ministry of Magic. Draco's son, Scorpius, was also turning 11 this year, and would be headed off to Hogwarts around the same time as Sherlock. The young Holmes was determined to be good friends with Scorpius, as their fathers already were.

As usually happened in pure blood families (those who were not blood traitors, at least), the Holmes family was quite rich. Sherlock and Mycroft had never wanted for anything. They had always had the best of everything, and were quite used to looking down their noses at people. They had molded their faces into permanent scowls of disinterest, only able to change into sneers of derision when the opportunity presented itself.

However, Sherlock appeared to have forgotten himself at the Holmes Estate, as he was practically bounding off the walls when they reached the King's Cross station. Mycroft tugged at his shoulder sharply, frowning down at his younger brother, and tugged him along to the barrier to platform 9 ¾. Sherlock harrumphed in annoyance.

"Myc?"

"Yes, Sherlock?"

"Why doesn't father come with us to the platform?"

Mycroft didn't say anything for a little while, walking purposefully on, then said, slowly,

"Well, father is a very busy man."

Sherlock stuck out his tongue.

"But he always comes with us!"

"Yes, well. Today he felt that you are finally old enough to handle yourself, Sherly. At least with me watching you." Mycroft smirked down at him.

Sherlock glared up, sullenly pushing his trolley along.

"Don't call me Sherly," he worked through gritted teeth.

Mycroft laughed, ruffling Sherlock's unruly hair, and walked a bit faster, causing Sherlock to nearly have to jog to keep up.

"Here we are, then. You first, Sherlock."

Sherlock took a deep breath, and ran towards the barrier, screwing his face up with anticipation.

And when he opened his eyes again, there he was, standing on the hidden platform.

"Well done," said Mycroft, who had just emerged beside him.

They walked down the platform, parking their trolleys, then boarding the train, in order to get first pick at compartments.

"Well, I've got to be off," Mycroft turned to leave, as Sherlock had been settled in a compartment by himself, "the other Ravenclaw prefects will be expecting me."

And with a flourish, the eldest Holmes turned, and strode back down the hallway, towards the front of the train.

Sherlock sighed, and pressed his cheek against the cold window, looking out onto the platform, at all of the people milling about.

There was a knock, and the compartment door slid open.

Sherlock jumped, and turned around.

"Scorpius!"

"Sherlock!"

The towheaded boy plopped down in the seat opposite Sherlock, and grinned widely at him.

"Hoping for Slytherin, then?" inquired Sherlock, noting the colors of Scorpius' outfit.

Scorpius scoffed.

"Hoping? My entire family has been in Slytherin for ages. I seriously doubt I'll be any different."

Sherlock laughed.

The two boys then got into a heated discussion as to which teachers were going to be pains this year, and both agreed that headmistress McGonagall would be the most difficult to sneak anything past.

The compartment door slid open again, this time without a knock, and the two boys looked over, pausing their conversation to inspect the newcomer.

Or rather newcomers.

"Sherlock! Scorpius!" the shorter, thin boy grinned wickedly at them, settling down into the seat beside Sherlock.

Sherlock grinned. "Hello, James."

James Moriarty was another member of a pure blood family, mostly Slytherins, rich and powerful, who were also friends with the Holmes family. The other boy was Jim's lackey, Sebastian Moran. Half-blood, destined for Slytherin, and would follow Jim straight into hell if it meant keeping the other boy pleased.

Jim began a new conversation, about new racing broom models, and Sebastian was quiet for most of the conversation, smiling timidly at points in the discussion when Jim brought up Moran's spectacular flying skills. He really was good, and would probably get onto the team as a first year. Keeper, Jim presumed idly.

They barely noticed as the train began to chug away from the platform, sparing their parents brief glances and smiles, before returning to their conversation.

They were interrupted again, soon after, by a loud thump outside the compartment door.

They all stopped talking, and looked over to the door, where a boy was uncoordinatedly clambering to his feet, apparently just having tripped.

The boy was short, and blonde, wearing a hand-knitted jumper of a soft cream color. He turned towards the compartment, saw the four boys inside watching him, and blushed furiously. He turned and ran back down the hallway, the way he had come.

The four boys in the compartment looked at each other, and burst into laughter.

"Wh-who w-was that?" Sherlock choked.

"D-du-dunno." Scorpius forced, past raking snorts of laughter.

"I do." Sebastian said quietly, "That was John Watson."

"Ugh," sneered Jim, who had regained his composure, "A mudblood."

Scorpius sniggered.

"Can they really do magic?" Sherlock asked timidly, "I mean really, like real wizards can?"

"I suppose so," Jim shrugged, "They certainly aren't equal to us, by any means. But they can do magic, or Hogwarts wouldn't even let them near the school. Personally, I don't think they should be allowed in. filthy muggle spawn."

The boys were quite, unsure of how to respond to Jim's denouncement of muggle-borns.

Fortunately, the awkward silence was interrupted as the sweets trolley came by, and the three rich boys emptied their pockets, which were stuffed full of wizard gold. They all gave a fair bit to Sebastian, who turned a bit pink, and thanked them quietly.

They sat, munching on sweets, and discussing classes and secrets passages of Hogwarts, wondering at the many fascinating things Scorpius had learned from his father.

This lead to taking out wands, and practicing trivial spells on each other, or on empty candy papers. Sebastian struggled, but the three pure bloods performed good magic, for first-years, Jim being the best at darker spells, while Sherlock excelled at advanced spells. Sebastian actually turned out to be quite good at the dark spells, and a few that the other boys had never seen, including one that would hoist a person up into the air by their ankle, that was the cause of a good laugh.

They changed into their robes, and as the train pulled into Hogwarts Station, the four boys vowed, no matter their houses, that they would stick together.