A little recap of what happened in the first Peculiar Pair . . .

Stephanie is a half blood and Emma is a muggle born. They were friends before they found out they were witches and they were excited when they learned they each received a letter from Hogwarts. Their first year, they were mortal enemies with the Weasley twins, a pair of trouble making second years, when after a traumatic incident, the four became partners in crime. The their second year came around, they both meet the Golden Trio and take it upon themselves to watch out for them while causing mischief and making friends with students from other houses.

Due to a rushed (and poorly thought out) decision, we have decided to pick up right where we left off with The Peculiar Pair so if you're new to this, it might be best to read the first one if you want to understand the current situation.

We hope you enjoy and, for those of you who read the first Peculiar Pair, continued to follow.

- Aloof Avengers

After we left the bookstore we headed to Fortescue's for ice cream per Emma's request and I watched worried as she sat quietly with her treat. I didn't want her to slip back into the depression that had haunted her since Dmytro left this summer. Luckily the boys are experts at cheering people up, and with a few highly over dramatized re-enactments of Mr. Weasley attacking Mr. Malfoy she was smiling again. She even joined me in flipping through Lockhart's books and pointing out how stupid he sounded. We both agreed that the things he says in this book couldn't be accurate.

"Hey what about this one, Gadding with Ghouls, aren't Ghouls mostly peaceful creatures?" Emma asked and I nodded,
"Mhmm, at worst they growl at people invading their territory, unless he is talking about Chameleon Ghouls who are a bit more aggressive but he doesn't mention type so its safe to assume he's just over exaggerating in this entire book." The boys snort and Fred leans over the table to flip to a certain page in Emma's book.

"Exaggerating is an understatement-"

"Look at this page, he claims-"

"To have caught the last Ghoul-"

"With a tea-strainer!"

Emma suddenly started choking on her ice cream and I nearly fell of my chair laughing. "A-a tea-strainer? Pfff that's ridiculous and y-your mother actually listens to this guy?!"

Fred and George nod solemnly sigh dramatically,

"Might as well be Merlin himself-"

"With the way she carries on-"

"About him, brings shame"

"To the whole family, really it does".

The first day of school couldn't have come sooner after that trip to the Alley. Emma had already gotten a letter from Hagrid confirming the fact that Dmytro was waiting for her in the forest. Hagrid said he would take her into the woods to see him the first weekend after we got back, though I suspected she would drag me into the forest as her guide the very first night, not that I minded.

I was almost as excited as she was to return, after last year's hiatus from the Forbidden Forest I was looking forward to being able to go in whenever I wanted again. I had missed wandering among the trees in the wee hours of the morning trying to out riddle the centaurs (which I always lost at), or swimming with the water sprites when it was warm enough.

Not to mention Archer was always happier in the forest where he could hunt down lizards or birds to eat and act as he would if he was in his natural habitat. My little snake familiar wasn't exactly little anymore, having grown to almost five and a half feet in length, although still slim. I didn't actually know how long he would get, the non-magical version of his breed grew to about six feet at most, but considering he was the magical breed and my familiar he had already proven to be more intelligent and venomous then he usually would be I wasn't going to trust that six foot limit. At the prompting of my father I had even mailed the school and explained the fact that I had a big, and still growing, highly venomous snake as a familiar.

I got a hesitant go ahead to bring him to school, though its not like they could have stopped me. As my familiar he was allowed anywhere in the magical world. But just like Dmytro he was still considered a dangerous animal they didn't want at their school. But their standards are a bit off if you think about it, I mean they did have a giant Cerberus there last year. Probably not legal.

The train ride to school was fun, Emma and I sat in a corner of the compartment and plotted about how often we should go out to the forest this year and how often she would need me to guide her to Dmytro so Dumbledore could say she was being 'safe'. The others were entirely annoyed by our scheming though they just seemed to think we were planning a prank. Which seemed to bother Fred and George even more, probably because whenever Emma and I planned a prank they were always the victim. When I mentioned this to Emma as we watched the twins stared suspiciously at us, we both cackled and decided to give them what they expected of us. We spent the rest of the ride planning a prank that would hit Lockhart, the twit.

The self-pulled carriages picked us up at the station and I had to admit I felt a bit sorry for the first years, it was a wet night, and the boat ride wouldn't be very fun now. Even with the gorgeous view of the castle from the lake. I smiled as I saw a tiny head of ginger hair in the crowd and waved, the Weasleys had already introduced me to their youngest sibling. Ginny seemed very nice, didn't talk much though, but that was probably just nerves about school. Her smile and brilliant hair-matching-blush whenever Harry was brought up in conversation was interesting though, and I couldn't decide if 'fangirl' or 'childhood crush' would be the better term. It would be interesting to see how he interacts with her though . . . Probably awkwardly knowing him.

As we pulled into the school I heard some screams and looked over to see Archer sliding between peoples legs and smirked. I had sent him ahead to the school at the teachers request, apparently they didn't want a big snake on a train full of hyper school children. No matter how many bad puns or references/quotes I could make about a muggle movie none of them seemed to care about. Despite my protests about how funny and awesome they would be. Which was just rude really.

I frowned when several of the older years whipped out their wands and pointed them at my baby causing him to coil and hiss, showing off long and needle thin fangs that dripped with a neurotoxic venom. Growling I stalked forward, ignoring the shouts for me to "stop" and "get back". When I finally shoved past the last person and into the empty circle surrounding my brightly colored snake Archer quickly uncoiled and tried to move towards me.

A Gryffindor prefect quickly started to say a spell and I growled again, throwing off his concentration long enough to draw my own wand and point it at the boy's crotch. I blocked out the suddenly loud whispers of the crowd who had finally identified me as the 'crazy girl who talked to the sorting hat'.

"Finish it I dare you~" I was more than a little proud that my tone matched Snape's when he was in mid-lecture. The prefect paled and watched in confusion and mild horror along with a good portion of the school's population as I knelt on one knee in front of the snake. I stretched out the arm that wasn't silently threatening castration on the boy towards Archer, who easily slipped up to my shoulder after years of practice.

"Who's a good boy" I said and smiled, nuzzling a cheek against his cold scaled head as he curled around my neck, and tucked his nose under my cloak in an attempt to get warm.

"Oh you should have stayed inside, Archer, it's much too cold for your breed! You'll catch a cold, silly baby!"

I lowered my wand and stood, adjusting my cloak so that it covered most of the cold snake, and wishing I hadn't packed all of my warm thing away, still ignoring the twitching crowd. To be fair I had kept Archers existence a secret to most people in the school, save a select few like Emma, who looked to be on the verge of howling laughter at the twins expressions, and Blaise who had found out on his own and was now wandering over to my side as I exited the circle.

"Lovely entrance Stephanie, how is Archer fairing?" He smirked and walked towards the hall with me by his side, still cooing to my baby. We both realized that most everyone was listening but if I knew the sneaky little Slytherin he was just using this conversation to show alliances.

"I try, though I think the entrance could have used more pyrotechnics. Archer is fine, no thanks to the prefects, bit cold though." I paused and glared over my shoulder at the people who had raised their wands, and the Gryffindor boy in particular.

"Still at least an eight for the entire thing. Well that won't do, we can't let your snake familiar get cold now can we, would you like my scarf?" I raised an eyebrow at the offered green and silver scarf, trust Blaise to be prepared for the UK's freezing year round weather no matter what the forecast said about sunny skies. I noticed his emphasis on snake familiar though and sighed as I nodded and took the thick scarf.

Familiars were highly respected in the magical world and the legend was that whatever animal your familiar was reflected you as a person. By pointing out that Archer was my familiar to the people who didn't know and a snake, a very dangerous snake no less, was basically saying that I was actually more Slytherin than I was Ravenclaw.

Which was also why he probably offered the scarf that would state an alliance. God I hated talking to Slytherins sometimes. It was never just a conversation always had more to it than that. Not to mention it was now known that Blaise had information before almost anyone else and that was a position of power for him with the other students. Ah well, at least Archer would be warmer. I put on the scarf and tucked it around archer like a blanket.

"Oi! Stephanie and-"

"Slytherin kid wait up!"

By this point we were in the entrance hall and a still giggling Emma and the twins ran up behind us, thankfully restraining from glomping me and pissing off the snake around my neck. Blaise stood smugly I flicked his arm and rolled my eyes as the boys spoke in loud and fast rounds about how betrayed they were that they were the last to find out and that a 'slimy snake knew about your slimy snake first' which technically Emma knew first and also that is a really bad term, Archer is not slimy! And well, Blaise isn't either, though his personality is sometimes. . . Still a bad way to say that.

Eventually most of my friends caught up with us, all wanting to know about my familiar. I laughed when Fred and George suddenly took up spots on either side of Blaise, and threw their arms over his shoulders proclaiming him not as bad as other snakes without even really talking to him. Generally he looked uncomfortable and Emma even pinched his cheeks. I really think they were just trying to fuck with him. We wandered into the hall and Dumbledore twinkled at me and glanced at my shoulders knowingly and then at the still staring student body. Dammit how does he know everything!

The feast started off well enough, Ginny was sorted into Gryffindor to the thunderous applause of her brothers, Percy dragged her into sitting next to him, and she blushed again at all the amused glances she was getting. A very pale girl name Luna Lovegood was sorted into my house, and she completely bypassed the usual spot for first years and squeezed in between Michael and Kim, sitting directly across from me. I smiled at her and thought about how apt her name was, Luna the moon. Her hair was almost silvery and she had large pale blue eyes that seemed to stare through you and into things a normal person couldn't see.

"You have a snake on your shoulders, did you know?" I blinked and smiled again.

"Indeed I do, his name is Archer, he's my familiar."

"Oh, that's lovely. Though I think I would prefer a familiar that could float." I ignored Kim's incredulous glance at the girl and tilted my head thoughtfully nodding. She spoke again before I could answer

"Oswyn told me to come sit with the girl who had a snake." Michael mouthed 'Oswyn'? over Luna's shoulder and my eyes widened, why had the Sorting Hat told her to come to me. But- hmm maybe. I glanced up and down the table at the other first years who had been avoiding Luna even when they were in line to get sorted, or at least thats what I had observed.

Had Oswyn seen something in this girls head that he realized would make her have issues making friends? Would she be bullied and he sent her to me for protection? Last year I had asked him to direct any first year Raven's who would have troubles fitting in to me so I could help but I hadn't known if he had taken me seriously. I scanned the girl and gave a slight smile at her eccentric jewelry that peaked from under her robes. Whether or not I was right she seemed like someone I could be friends with and I held my hand out to shake hers, watching as she didn't even flinch at Archer whose head was laying dangerously close to our joined hands and matched her smile.

"Yep, I'm the girl Oswyn was talking about. Name's Stephanie, nice to meet you Luna!" We talked for a good portion of dinner after that and I was relieved to see that my friends, once they got past their initial confusion, were quick to let the little first year into our fold.

Near the end of dinner Emma waved her hand and grabbed my attention, she pointed over to the empty spots next to a highly worried Hermione and I blinked. Where were Ron and Harry? I scanned the hall and they were nowhere in sight, though the teachers seemed to have noticed they were missing too and Dumbledore looked confused. When I thought back I hadn't even seen them in passing on the train, and they hadn't been in the crowd when Archer came out to meet me. I felt a pit grow in my stomach and twitched. Harry was such a magnet for bad luck, what could have happened?

Suddenly Dumbledore straightened up in his chair and sent a loaded glance at Professor Snape who stalked out of the hall, looking a bit more gleeful than usual. I met the eyes of my other three partners in crime across the hall, their faces were filled with dread and I sighed.

As much as I respected Professor Snape I know he never looks gleeful unless Harry Potter just fucked up and he was going to get to punish Gryffindor. Emma whispered something to her group of Gryffindor friends and I was a bit amused to see several face palms and slumped shoulders. Looked like I wasn't the only one to come to the conclusion that their house might start out a little behind this year in points.