Sirius quickly pushed his trolley through the crowd of witches and wizards milling about platform nine and three quarters without looking back, as though not looking would make whatever was behind him disappear. This tactic hadn't worked in the past, but as he was leaving for Hogwarts soon anyway, perhaps his parents would get the hint and leave him in peace early. Something collided with his back that jogged Sirius out of his dour revire.
"Sorry!" a kid with messy black hair and wire rimmed glasses who looked to be about Sirius' age called over his shoulder as he brushed by.
"That's what happens when you consort with muggles" an all too smooth and unfortunately familiar voice said, Sirius tensed as his father stepped up beside him. Although Sirius still doggedly avoided looking at him, he knew exactly how his father looked right now. Dressed in robes as black as his name, and fine boned face framed by immaculate hair, Sirius supposed he could be considered handsome if he ever took the sneer that obviously said that he believed he was better than anyone else off his face. "Although that boy is pureblooded I want you to be wary of him. His parents have long been a disgrace to all purebloods, discarding our sacred ways in favor of filthy muggles, and no doubt their son is no better."
"Yes, father," Sirius said through gritted teeth.
"Very good, now be off with you, your mother and I have more business to attend to."
Sirius took off, needing no other prompting. He cast his gaze around for the boy who had run into him. If his father didn't want him near that boy it naturally became Sirius' priority to become extremely close.
"Did you put the fire out?" Sirius called when he spotted the boy talking to an older couple. "You seemed to be going somewhere in a hurry," Sirius added at the confused look on the other boys face.
"Oh," the boy said, his expression clearing, "I just realized I forgot my bag where we had stopped to grab some lunch back in the muggle part of the station."
"And you were worried you wouldn't have anything to read on the train ride?" Sirius hedged, hoping he had guessed correctly and that he hadn't just insulted the boy.
"Nah, Quidditch supplies," he said, taking the bag from his shoulder and flipping the top flap open to reveal an assortment of Quidditch equipment including a pair of keeper's gloves and a beater's bat.
"What position do you play? All of them?"
"Well not at the same time, but I can hold my own wherever I'm needed, what about you?"
"I prefer beating myself; something really fun about being encouraged to smack something around as hard as you can."
The boy laughed, "yeah, especially if you've been having a horrible day, I'm James by the way,"
"Sirius."
"And these are my parents," James motioned to the older couple he had been talking to.
Sirius was slightly surprised, he had assumed they were his grandparents, but having been raised to respect adults, he kept this to himself. "It is very nice to meet both of you," Sirius said, extending his hand to James' father. The man raised his eyebrows, faint surprise showing on his face, but he took Sirius' proffered hand and shook it firmly.
"Harold Potter, and it's a pleasure to meet a boy with some manors," James' father said.
"Helen Potter," James' mother said with a smile.
The sound of a train whistle made them all jump.
"Guess it's time to go," Sirius said, looking around and noticing the platform was largely devoid of students, "let's go find a compartment."
"Okay, bye Mum, bye Dad," James hugged each of his parents in turn.
"Goodbye James, be good."
"And write at least once a week,"
James faked a grimace and gave an overdramatic sigh "Yes Mother," then his smile returned, "See you at Christmas!" He and Sirius gathered their belongings and hurried onto the train.
"Anyone you want to find to sit with?" Sirius asked as they made their way down the train, looking into the compartment windows for a suitable place.
"Nah, do you know anyone?"
Sirius thought of the other pureblooded children his mother would invite over for 'little play dates' and suppressed a shudder, "nobody I'd want to sit with."
"How about here?" James asked, pausing at a compartment mostly filled with boys, the oldest of whom couldn't be more than third years.
"Kind of crowded, especially cause we don't know any of them, let's see if there's anything else."
The pair moved further down the train, and Sirius began to think that perhaps they ought to go back to the compartment with all the boys when they found one whose only occupant was a small girl with long straight brown hair whose forehead was resting on the window. The two boys looked at each other and shrugged. James shoved the door open and stepped in.
"Mind if we sit here?"
The girl turned, and Sirius would have taken a step back if there had been anywhere for him to go. She had slightly large amazingly green eyes that seemed to hold something more than most eyes do, and for a moment Sirius found himself unable to look away from them. Almost as an afterthought he noticed that she was fairly pale and had a scar on the right side of her face, running beneath her eye and almost to the top of her ear.
"Of course," she said, although it sounded slightly strained to Sirius' well trained ears, "sit," and she motioned to the benches around her as if they were hers but she didn't mind anyone sitting on them.
James seemed to be at as much of a loss as Sirius, and they both sat down rather hesitantly, Sirius' joyous mood broken by this odd girl. But never baffled for long, Sirius thought to play the host as he had seen so many do before. "I'm Sirius, and this is James."
"Aribeth."
"Are you a first year?"
Aribeth only nodded. While she didn't avoid looking at Sirius or James, Aribeth's eyes didn't seem to focus on anything. Perhaps she couldn't see very well? But then why wouldn't she get glasses?
"What house do you want to be in?" James asked from beside Sirius, "I want to be in Gryffindor, just like my father."
"Me too," Sirius supplied promptly, "well, the wanting to be in Gryffindor thing." His entire family had been in Slytherin, and Sirius knew that if he made it into Gryffindor his mother would hopefuly die from shock.
"I don't remember the houses." Aribeth spoke as if it was painful.
"Well," James began, apparently eager to show off his knowledge, "there's Ravenclaw, where all of the brain-iacs go – Hufflepuff, apparently their kind and honest but I've heard a lot of them are pushovers – Slytherin, which is pretty much just evil – and Gryffindor. Gryffindor is the best, it's where everyone brave goes, and their animal is the lion."
The three continued to talk as the Hogwarts Express sped it's way to Hogwarts. Well, mostly just Sirius and James talked, with Aribeth occasionally adding a thing or two. The more Aribeth talked the more Sirius became sure there was an odd ring to her voice, besides the fact that she seemed hesitant to talk. Perhaps she was foreign? And once she started at something and closed her eyes muttering under her breath before throwing herself into the conversation as though it was desperately important. Then she slowly sank back into her usual if strange state. What was with her?
The train slowed as it pulled into Hogsmeade station. "Come on, let's go," James said, standing and pulling on Sirius' arm to make him follow him. "I can't wait to see Hogwarts, plus my dad says that there is an opening feast and I'm starving." Sirius laughed, he and James had bought a pile of sweets when a lady with a trolley had come by. James had eaten over half of them.
James and Sirius stepped out of their compartment and into the throng of black clad students making their way off the train. Aribeth came out behind them, but she got swept away by the crowd. Sirius didn't really mind, he had found her presence unnerving.
xXxXx
Aribeth let the sea of robed students move her along, not really noticing any of their faces. She considered trying to catch up with the two boys, James and Sirius, but she didn't want to force her presence upon them, she knew she likely wasn't good company. And she was tired. It had taken a lot of energy to keep up with the boy's lively conversation, and even more to add her own comments to it. It had been so long since she had concentrated on anything happening in the present, and she had even slipped once. Now Aribeth fought to keep herself in the haze that she had become so familiar with. Although not connecting to anything around her, at least it kept the past out, for the most part.
AN: And I'm back for another stab at writing. This time goes out to Tsu-Ze Haitsuchi who wrote me a lovely review that somehow managed to spark my long dead interest.
This story is basically Another Marauder for any of you who have read it, however in the three year hiatus that I took, Aribeth has developed and I have more of her pinned down (a large task if you have ever asked for one). For the most part the details are the same, just more concrete. At first I was just going to go to Another Marauder and tweak some of the things that have changed, but rereading it made me want to bang my head on the keyboard. I do hope that my writing has improved somewhat since then. At any rate I decided to throw it out and start anew. I make no promises on how often I will update or if I will even finish this story either but I will do my best, and would be encouraged by reviews (hint hint)
And most chapters will be longer then this but I am going out of town soon and my computer time may be limited, and I wanted to get this out for Tsu-Ze Haitsuchi.
One more thing (I will also work on not making the AN's as long as the chapters) Ari is extremely down in the dumps right now, but that is far from permanent, it just needs to start out that way. She should be the marauder of Another Marauder well before Christmas (story time).