Alrighty, I'm a first time writer, but long time reader, of fanfiction. I thought that possibly I would try my hand at a Harry Potter/ Hobbit crossover, because I just saw the Hobbit movie and I love love love Harry Potter. I'm hoping that this will be a multi-chapter piece and that college life will not mess me over too much :D.
Plus, I have no idea how to work this whole fanfiction website. I've never experienced it from the author's side. It's exciting!
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the wonderful characters created by JK Rowling or JRR Tolkien. Any characters not recognized as theirs are mine :).
Chapter One
"Myths and Half-truths"
The library was cool and quiet, with little pockets of students sitting at the tables scattered throughout. It was a Saturday evening in mid-September and while tests had not yet started, the more studious students of the school had already begun studying. It goes without saying that many of the students were Ravenclaws, eager to once again be able to absorb all the knowledge the Hogwarts library could offer them.
In a far back table, Arianna sat with her head on her hand and an open book in front of her. Anyone glancing over would think that the Ravenclaw was showing a lack of attention to her work but in actuality, she had just acquired a few characteristics from her best friend, Isabella. Isabella was a Gryffindor, who displayed such surprising (or not-so-surprising) distaste for studying and book work that she would always study with her head on her hand, to best enable a quick nap (if an assignment took longer than 10 minutes to complete). When it was pointed out to Arianna that she was close to becoming like her friend in matters of study, she glanced up and stated that she was "only holding my head in case it became too full and heavy with knowledge for me to keep it on my shoulders, but thank you for your un-solicited concern" and then resumed reading in peace. The first year had been quite taken aback, thinking themselves to have been witty, and had to be dragged away by their silently laughing friends.
The two girls were completely different. While Isabella was tall and willowy, with straight jet black hair and an eye for trouble, Arianna was shorter and while no one would call her chubby, they probably wouldn't call her skinny either. She liked to refer to herself as "proportionate" and that seemed to sum her up nicely. Her hair was a beautiful copper red with waves and less-defined curls that she normally had pulled back in a bun or a ponytail to keep it out of her face. Where Isabella was mischievous, excitable and hyper, Arianna was calm, sarcastic, and steadfast. Together they balanced each other out; Isabella refusing to let Arianna be serious all the time and Arianna making sure Isabella actually thought before acting. Or speaking.
Arianna sighed, and turned the page of the dusty textbook. She really wished that Professor Binns hadn't decided that this weekend was the one where the 7th years were to pick the topics for their final year papers. She also wished that it had been as easy for her to pick a topic as it had been for Isabella, who had decided that the best way to earn a good grade was to write about something near and dear to Professor Binns ghostly heart: Goblin Wars. More specifically, Isabella was writing a dramatic paper re-enactment of Snark the Vicious's fall from power during the 2nd Dynasty, due to him eating a funny mushroom that caused him run around naked while firing daisies at the goblin nobles as if they were arrows. Apparently, while no harm had been done to the nobles, they got the jist of what ol' Snarky was doing and plotted his demise. After his death, the nobles attempted to change his name from "the Vicious" to "the Vivacious", due to his lack of clothing for the better part of a week (and including his death). Apparently, it takes goblins several hundred years to decide on name changes, as there is still a movement for "Snark the Vivacious" in present times. Isabella planned to turn the conclusion of her paper into a debate, in favor of the name change and in hopes of adding some "spice" as she called it, to the paper.
The dilemma for Arianna was that she could not find something that she didn't want to write about. Well, besides the Goblin Wars. She was interested in the Witch Hunts and Inquisition, the Great Battle of 1273, the research of Nobbin the Awkward on fairy genes influencing present goblin lineage (she wasn't completely clear on the details of his discovery but, it interested her all the same) and several other treasures her textbooks held. Barely concealing another sigh of disgust, Arianna resisted the urge to flip madly throughout the book in front of her and play "Eenie Meenie Miny Moe" to pick a topic. Standing up, she closed her book and carried it back over to the shelf from where she had found it. Scanning the book titles, her eyes settled on a binding that she must have skipped over before. Grabbing the book and searching for the title, she finally found one on the first page. It simply read "Myths and Half-Truths". Intrigued and hoping that it might have something for her to write her paper about, she flipped to a random page and began to read:
"While little has actually been proven of the existence of other worlds, in however similar or dissimilar fashion to our own, it has been noted that wizards and witches have turned up missing, only to reappear years later with fantastical stories of other lands. Skeptics believe them to only have been victims of a crime, such as slave trading, and then of an extreme memory charm. However, some of the stories seem to take place in similar worlds, as if they had visited the same exact place, just at different times. Many of the "victims", as they have become referred as, state that they remember an archway being the last thing they saw before waking up in the strange lands. Again, it has been noted that many notorious and dangerous wizards live in uniquely styled castles and mansions, with plenty of archways abound, thus making the kidnapping theories seem more likely than inter-world travels."
"There you are! I should have known you'd be in the library. I gotta show you something that I just found!"
Arianna's head snapped up in surprise and looked at the person that just interrupted her. Isabella stood in front of her, her ebony hair in a high pony tail and her face flushed, as if she had been running around outside. Actually, Arianna thought, she probably was running away from whatever trouble she had just managed to get into. She would never claim that her best friend didn't have a mischievous streak that most of the professors took for foolishness, specifically Professor Snape. He had given Isabella so many detentions in their past 7 years here that only the Weasley twins could boast to having a greater amount, which they did, quite loudly and frequently in the Great Hall, only to land themselves in detention again.
"Seriously, come on!" Isabella said, rushing forward to grab her friend's arm and start dragging her over to her stuff. "You have got to come see what I found when I was running away from Filch!" "And why were you running away from Filch this time? We've only been in school for 3 weeks… do you really want your first detention of the year to be with him?" Arianna asked as she started to grab her bag, still holding on to the book she had just found. She wanted to read it some more later, to determine if it might actually be something she wanted to write her paper about.
"Well…' Isabella took a deep breath, 'Apparently Filch has a soft spot for the suits of armor; he probably imagines himself wearing them or something, I don't know. So, I thought it would be fitting to make them more… appealing. We now have a suit of armor that can cook eggs, one that wears a red polka dot dress and sings "I feel pretty" whenever Filch walks by, and several others that I thought would want to look anatomically correct. And female." Arianna just looked at her friend, wondering how long she worked on that pretty bit of charm work, before bursting out laughing. She immediately received a glare from Madam Pince for disturbing the peace and quiet and tried her best to stifle her giggles. "I cannot believe you did that! Well, actually, I can believe it. But seriously, Filch will skin you if he finds out it was you!" Arianna scolded, after getting control over herself. "He can't prove that it was me, I bribed Peeves to start shouting about the 5th year Slytherins being up to no good in that corridor" Isabella countered. "But still, I ran away and hid for a while, just in case. And while I was hiding I found something so come on!"
Checking out her book (and avoiding Madam Pince's eyes), Arianna allowed herself to be dragged towards whatever treasure Isabella thought she had found, hoping beyond hope that it wasn't another damp forgotten dungeon classroom that Isabella thought could be turned into a secret meeting room for plotting pranks.
I hope everyone likes it so far!