Chapter One-

First Days

Ebony Thompson lived a normal life, with a normal family that loved her, and she had amazing friends. Well, it was all normal except for the fact that she was a witch, and her parents were completely fine with it. In fact, they loved it. Oh... It was also not very normal that she went to a boarding school for witches and wizards in training called Hogwarts. Even though she was Muggle-born, she'd found out about Harry Potter soon after entering the Wizarding World. He was also known by other titles like "The boy who lived" and such. Ebony, despite not always wanting to, heard rumors and some of them were extraordinary. In fact, some of the things she heard were not rumors at all, but the truth. He had survived the killing curse, Avada Kedavra as an infant and did so much amazing things so far in his years at Hogwarts. The boy was a legend! Only last year, he had won the Triwizard Cup. Of course, him coming out with the Cedric Diggory's dead body did put a bit of a dampener on the achievement.

Okay, so maybe her life wasn't so normal after all. But she liked to think of it as one.

"Bye mum! Bye dad!" Ebony kissed them each good bye on the cheek, and clambered up the door to the scarlet train labeled with "Hogwarts Express" on its side. She didn't look back, so she missed the look her parents shared.

As she passed all the compartments she saw Ron and Hermione, Harry's best mates, pass by her with prefect's badges gleaming on their chests. How Ron, Harry's lesser-known friend, had become a prefect was beyond her. She wasn't even in their year, but even she knew of some of the ridiculous things he did or said. Most of what she knew, she knew from her friend, Ginny - Ron's sister

After a couple minutes of walking past compartments, she finally found the one that occupied two girls and walked in and started to put her luggage up. She smiled and greeted her friends, Holly and Jamie.

"Hey where's Ginny?" Ebony wondered aloud.

Jamie snickered, "She's sitting in a compartment with Harry Potter!" When she saw Ebony's mouth drop she added, "Luna, better known as 'loony', Lovegood and Neville Longbottom are in that compartment too."

Ebony knew who Luna was, and she was a little annoyed about her being called loony. The girl was a bit odd, but she was great because of it. She also knew that Neville was in their House, but she'd never really met him. All she knew about him was that he was dreadfully clumsy and forgetful, but a very nice bloke.

"I thought Ginny got over her insane crush for Harry a long time ago?" Ebony asked.

"Oh she did. Jamie just likes making everything into something that sounds juicy or scandalous," Holly said dryly.

It wasn't hard to imagine why she was slightly irritated. It wasn't a rare thing to hear Jamie annoying the living hell out of Holly. Ebony could symphathize with Holly and Ginny, for she was often teased too.

Jamie pouted and Ebony laughed.

"Hey! You can laugh, but I have something on you". Ebony instantly became cautious and Jamie added with a vindictive pleasure, "You have a crush on Fred...or George!"

Ebony flushed, "No I don't! I mean, yeah, they're good-looking, but I don't fancy either one!" Jamie snickered and even Holly cracked a grin. "What? I don't" They laughed even more. "You guys are unbelievable!" Ebony got up from her seat and meant to exit the compartment, but it was opened by Ginny with Luna in tow.

Ginny looked at Ebony's distressed face and Jamie and Holly laughing, but decided against asking why. After all, with friends like Jamie and Holly it was best to not ask.

"We should probably change into our robes. Oh, I brought Luna because-"

"-We already know... you had to leave the compartment you were sitting in with Harry Potter and his crew." Jamie interrupted.

Ginny raised an eyebrow, "Were you spying on me again trying to find ammo?"

Jamie looked horrified, "No! I learned my lesson that time... Besides, I did that once." Ginny rolled her eyes and brought Luna in.

They all already knew each other, so they just got their robes from their trunks. Luna and Ginny had brought out robes from their trunks and come to that compartment just to change.

"Hey, have you guys read the Daily Prophet lately? You know, about how the whole Harry and Dumbledore thing?" Holly asked after they had all changed and Luna had gone to do whatever Luna did.

Of course, they all knew what was happening except for Ebony. "I'm a Muggle-born. I don't know anything about the Wizarding World when I'm there, except for when you send me letters."

"Well, they're saying that Harry is lying about You-Know-Who coming back, and that Dumbledore is some kind of fool-"

"- Ugh! Please tell me you don't believe that rubbish!" Ginny cried out.

Holly's eyes widened, but she didn't shrink back. "Of course I don't! I barely know either person to be able to judge them! Jeez... Bite my head off while you're at it..." Holly muttered something along the lines of "redheads" and "tempers", but the rest of it was unintelligable.

"I'm sorry for snapping at you. It's just hearing about the nasty lies the Prophet and Ministry are spouting ...it riles me up." Ginny managed to say after she calmed down a bit.

Ebony and Jamie were still silent. They had, on several occasions, been subjected to Ginny's redhead temper and it wasn't something to be trifled with.

Ebony was still curious as to what was happening with Harry and Dumbledore with the Prophet, but decided it wouldn't be a good idea to bring it up again. "So, who do you reckon will be the new Defense Against the Dark Arts professor? Does anyone know why Professor Moody left? He was so ... sturdy."

Ginny didn't know that exact details of why Moody had left, but it wasn't her business anyway.

"I don't know... Let's just hope the new teacher isn't insane or incompetent."

Holly and Jamie laughed. Ebony wasn't very amused, more often than not;the person who got the job had some type of problem. When she was in first year the D.A.D.A teacher disappeared, and some speculated he was in the wizard hospital 's. In her second year he was plagued with lycanthropy and turned into a werewolf once a month, and last year's had just left and no one really knew why. Out of the D.A.D.A professors, the werewolf had definitely been the best, but all-in-all Hogwarts didn't have much luck finding a permanent D.A.D.A professor. At this point, Ebony wouldn't be too surprised if she found out the new professor was insane.

When the train stopped the girls all brought down their trunks and made to get out. They clambered down the train door and looked for a carriage. "I found one!" Jamie cried out.

They all climbed into it and sat in a comfortable silence.

When the carriages stopped, the girls climbed out and advanced towards the castle in quick, brisk steps. Their luggage had already disappeared and was probably already up in their dormitories. Ginny, Ebony, Jamie, and Holly walked into the Great Hall and went to their table. As they walked they saw a long line of terrified first-years follow professor McGonagall to the front of the Great Hall. The girls sat down at their spot, closer to the Golden Trio than usual, near the middle of the long table.

After everyone had been situated, professor Dumbledore got up and started his speech. As usual, Ebony tuned out everything around her and just stared unblinkingly at the table that sat all of Hogwart's professors. Her attention wasn't brought back to reality until she looked around and saw that everyone was looking at a toad-like witch wearing everything pink. She turned her ears on again and was appalled. That lady, toad, witch thing had interrupted Dumbledore's speech - Something that never happened.Ever. She had a terribly annoying voice that was much too high-pitched and clashed terribly with her appearance. Correction: That voice clashed terribly with anyone, it was the type of voice that no one could successfully pull off.

Ebony turned to her left. Not too far away, Harry and his best friends were staring, dumbstruck, at the toad-like person. She saw Harry mutter something under his breath to them and she thought she heard something about him seeing her before. She also noticed something was off about Harry. He was different, more distant, bitter even and it chilled her down to the core.

After the lady's never-ending speech, Dumbledore was the only person to clap. By the time everyone realized they should clap as well, he had risen to say the rest of his speech, silencing them all. Apparently, this lady was going to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts. She heard the shocked gasps and mutters instantly cease when he clapped once and had the sorting begin.

By the end of sorting, they had about eight or nine new Gryffindors. The food then materialized in front of them, the excitement of the new professor forgotten. She watched in amusement as the first-years gawked at everything -from the amazing variety of foods in front of them, to the enchanted ceiling. Ebony remembered her first year and how it hadn't really sunk in that she was a witch until she was at Hogwarts. Even for a school of magic, Hogwarts was magical. Ebony smiled absentmindedly and Jamie raised an eyebrow at her, but said nothing.

"Can you guys remember your first day here?" Ebony asked on a whim.

They just looked at her for a second until Holly answered first, "Yeah. I'm pureblood though, so I was used to weird magic stuff, but even then... It was pretty amazing".

Jamie thought for a while, "Well, you know I have a terrible memory... You can't expect me to remember our first day four years ago. That's just madness..." The girls giggled at their friend and kept eating, for no one had noticed the hard edge to her words.

Ebony was about to pick up a cupcake when all the food disappeared, "Hey!" Then, she looked up and noticed Dumbledore stood up to do his normal "end-of-feast" speech thing. Ebony was a little miffed at not being able to eat her cupcake, and after a couple seconds she zoned out again.

"... your nice warm beds are waiting for you..."Ebony heard that and was in the process of returning to the "real world" before they were dismissed. She absently followed Ginny and the others up to their common room.

Holly yawned, "I'm exhausted".

Ebony grumbled, "Touche".

Jamie just grunted in a very non lady-like way, while Ginny nodded in agreement.

They were all very tired and all wanted nothing more than to sleep a good night's sleep. If anything, Ebony was probably the only one who worried about the next day. She wouldn't admit it, but she was actually pretty scared and she didn't know why.

They clambered up into the Portrait Hole, after Holly said the password, and went towards the girl's staircase. The girls passed a couple other Gryffindors who were daft enough to stay in the common room. On the way to the staircase, they passed Ebony's least-favorite person, Lavender Brown. Lavender sneered at her and then she and her friend Parvati Patil giggled at an inside joke.

Ebony rolled her eyes in annoyance, "Idiots. I wonder what it really was that made her hate me".

Holly shot her a confused look, "What?"

Ebony shook her head, "Nothing...nothing of importance".

None of Ebony's friends knew of the animosity between her and the two fifth-year girls. She didn't find it important enough to worry about, and especially not worrisome enough to mention. Besides, she already knew the advice they would give her. Holly would be the mature one and say Ebony should ignore it. Jamie would say something stupid like, "Maybe she doesn't hate you, but secretly loves you? There are a lot of lesbians in this school, more than you'd normally think." Ginny would look at Jamie like she had sprouted a second head, and then say she would help Ebony get revenge if they actually did something. Ebony giggled to herself, earning another confused look from her friends. I love my friends she thought to herself.

They walked wordlessly into their dorm, all to fatigued to start a conversation, and changed into their sleeping gowns. As soon as she finished changing, Ebony climbed into her warm bed and closed the curtains. She liked sleeping in total darkness. It was one of her many odd quirks.

" G'night..." She murmured, receiving several "goodnight's," and drifted into a dreamless sleep.

(A/N: DISCLAIMER: I don't own ANYTHING other then my characters :] ) Oh my! I was reading over my story and I've found a lot of mistakes so I'll be sure to fix that! Sorry!

VaneBEAR(:

Hello, people whom are reading this (I congratulate you on your patience). I have a poll about favorite pairings, and types of stories. Its to help me out for what type of story I should write once I finish this story. Thanks.

I'd like to thank my amazing BETA Smile Life Away for helping me make this chapter suck less ;D. Thank you!)