I don't own any thing- except the darkthorn twins, the thornwood, and the plot.
The Unforgiven
The two girls stared morosely at the interior of the train compartment. The one closest to the door ran her fingers through her long, silver-blonde hair.
"Sophie, maybe we should have just picked Beauxbatons. Grandmother would have like it if…"
"Grandmother doesn't care about us or whatever we do, provided we don't embarrass our families, any of them." We could have gone to Salem Witches' Academy, though. Think it's really to late to change, Phelie? The other girl didn't look away from the window as she tucked a stray lock of long black hair behind her ear. Under their feet, the train shuddered, then jerked forward, and the view of Platform 9 ¾ began to slide past them.
"Yes, Sophie, I think it's too late to change our minds about Hogwarts."
A moment later, a freckled face with a shock of red hair poked around the door. "Um, is there any room in this one," she shyly asked.
Phelie looked over at Sophie, who shrugged noncommittally. "Sure, can't see any reason why not."
"Thanks," the red-head sat down across from them. "I'm Ginny, Ginny Weasley. If you couldn't tell by the hair."
"Cygnus Ophelia Darkthorn, and this is my"
"Sister, Cassiopeia M. Darkthorn. Is Ginny short for Ginger, or something?"
Ginny grinned. "Ginevra, actually, but no one actually calls me by it."
Phelie and Sophie sighed. "Wish we could say the same thing"
"About our full names, but"
"Our friends just call us"
"Sophie, and"
"Phelie." Phelie shrugged. "Back home in the Thornwood, our closest friends"
"Are our O'Malley foster sibs, and their"
"Mother named them, of all things"
"Paprika, Cinnamon, Nutmeg"
"And Curry. They all have red hair, not quite-"
"AS bright as yours, but still," they look at each other. "We're sorry, we're really-"
"Don't mean to talk-"
"Like this, but"
"It's okay, there's a set of twins in my family, too. Where's the Thornwood?", Ginny asked, curious.
Phelie took a deep breath, as Sophie returned to staring out the window. "It's one of those old, all magic communities out in the middle of nowhere." She winked at Ginny. " It's easier to keep track of our place in a conversation if only one of us is actively participating. We can talk separately, sometimes it's just"
"Easier not to", Sophie joined in again. "It drives aunt Rosana insane when we talk together, did you know there's a toad under this seat?"
Just as she scooped it up for a better look, a mousy-haired older boy with a worried look on his round face, peeked in. "Trevor!", he spotted the AWOL amphibian.
Sophie smiled a bright little smile and offered up the toad. "It's nice to know he belongs to someone. I'm Sophie."
"I'm Neville. Thanks for finding him, he's always going missing.
After Neville had returned, with pet in hand, to his own compartment, Sophie looked back out the window, a dreamy smile on her face. "You know, Hogwarts might not be that bad." Phelie gave her a sharp look, but didn't say anything.
_____________________________________________________________
"Creevey, Colin!"
Gryffindor!"
Ginny cheered from her place at the end of the line of first years. Right by the hat, she saw the Darkthorn twins huddled nervously together.
"Darkthorn, Cassiopeia." the darker girl stepped up, and the big, tattered hat fell over her worried, wide eyes.
The twins had shared the boat with her and a dreamy-eyed girl almost as blonde as Phelie, Luna Something, and Creevey, who had bounced nervously the entire time.
Ginny wondered why the Sorting Hat was taking so long with Sophie. She hoped that Sophie wasn't going to be a Slytherin. She liked both the girls, and the way they didn't take being pureblood seriously.
"Means you have a meddling family, dignity to uphold, and sometimes a stupid name and money. That's all really."
"One brother has it worse. He got named Belteguise.(1) At least most of the foster sibs have normal names.
"Not counting the O'Malleys."
Ginny blinked. "How many siblings do you have?"
They looked at each other, then at her. "Counting foster sibs, and us, there's a baker's dozen."
"13, wow, we just have7."
The sound of the hat clearing its metaphysical throat brought her out of her thoughts. Finally…RAVENCLAW!!
"Darkthorn, Cygnus."
"RAVENCLAW"
That one was fast, Ginny thought, as they waved at her from their new table.
_____________________________________________________________
Ginny kept her new friendhip with them, especially as the classes got harder and the Ravenclaws organized study meetings. They stuck with her, even when her brother's best friend was rumored to be the heir of Slytherin.
Then one day, coming around the corner, she heard them arguing.
"Phelie, I don't know, but if I would think of doing it, I wouldn't do it now, this year. Do you think I'm stupid?"
"I know, but Sophie…" Phelie turned around. "Oh, hi ginny, how's life?"
"Good, I guess", wondering what they had been talking about. Sophie smiled. "Still got that weird journal?"
"Phelie grinned. "Does it have any weird old gossip? Spill!"
Ginny stopped smiling, and held her bag tighter. "Um, no it was blank, so I um, chucked it."
"Oh, ah, well. Wanna go watch the Hufflepuffs practice Quidditch?"
"We hear Diggory's trying new plays."
"Um, no thanks. Maybe later. See you guys."
They looked back at each other then shrugged. "Okay, then we'll be in the"
"Library. See you Ginny."
They walked off together round the next hallway. Phelie glanced at Sophie. "Did she seem, I dunno, off, to you?"
"Yeah, she loves watching new quidditch plays."
"Maybe she's gotten ahead of us on the puberty thing."
"Maybe."
_____________________________________________________________
Ginny was beginning to get sick of the whole "Recuperating from near death" thing.
"We brought you your homework."
"And extensive notes on, well, everything."
"We didn't even finish"
"More than half of it for you."
Ginny smiled. "You two are great friends."
They looked at each other, then Sophie laughed. "Want to hear how weird our family is? The Darkthorn house is entertaining if nothing else."
"Sure. I need entertainment. You try staying in bed for this long."
"Well, there's Justin, he's like, 15. Then Belteguise, he's a little younger. He's the one I'm blood related to", Phelie started.
"Damion's always around somewhere. He's 13, like Ricki, um, Paprika."
"Then there's Cinny and Meg, they're barely 12. Then Curry, the only O'Malley boy, prefers using his middle name, Max. and he's a little younger than us."
"Danny's almost 9, then Ollie-Oleander, that's a poisonous flower- he's what?"
"7 ½ . Then there's Sugar Doll, the only blonde O'Malley, she turned 4 last month."
"And, of course, Baby Leo, almost 2."
"Phelie, you said "the one I'm," not we're with your brother?" Ginny asked.
"Cause we're blood-oath twins, not birth. Our birth mothers were best-friends, and we were a day apart." Sophie sniffed. " But we both had the last name Darkthorn. Her father was Regulus Black, my mother was a Black."
"We're really cousins, and yes, my mother was a Malfoy, hence the hair.."
Ginny started to open her mouth, but shut it again. It's not like they were Slytherins, after all. They had been friends all year. " Your names are still Sophie and Phelie, right?"
"Yeah, why?", Phelie blinked.
"Your not going to freak out?" Sophie smiled at her. "Cool."
"We've wanted to tell someone for so long."
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Beta Note: Duckie here. I'm officiall the unofficial beta. I'll do my best to type quickly, both for my fic, and hers.
: Beetle, juice. if you can't pronounce that, wtf are you reading english for?! AND HERES...........ARGENT LUPE!!!!
yes, my thing means silver wolf. if you didn't already know that. this is the first story i ever tried to publish. thanks to my sister-miss count duckula, for typing, betaing, and generally putting up with me and my idiosyncracies. read