Ariana hugged her mother. "Goodbye, Mum."

Her mother pushed her back a bit and looked her up and down. "Your shirt's untucked," she noted. "And you may want to put your tie around your neck instead of your head."

Ariana smiled and laughed. "You were going around like this not two days ago!"

Nikola smirked at her daughter. "Just making sure they would fit. It would be a pain for you to not have anything to wear."


Nikola pranced around the house in Ariana's school uniform.

"You know, Mum, you could go in my place. No one would be able to tell the difference." Indeed, Ariana's young mother was ofter mistaken as her sister or evern as her twin. They often borrowed each other's clothes since they were around the same size. Nikola would raid Ariana's closet when she wanted something casual and Ariana would do likewise when she needed to dress up.

"I'm too blonde," her mother laughed. "Those guys you hang out with would figure out. They seem the clever sort."

Ariana snorted. "The Marauders, you mean? I can see where you could get that idea from Remus, but the others aren't."

"Don't be too harsh on them," Nikola warned. "It's hard to come by good friends these days."

Ariana shrugged this off. "No worries, they'll always be there for me and I'll always be there for them. And if anything does happen, I'll still have you."

This made Nikola smile and she asked, "What do you want for lunch, dear?"

"Eh, nothing much. I'm not too hungry. Perhaps a bit of toast."

"A bit of toast it is then!" Nikola left for the kitchen, leaving Ariana alone in the living room. She quietly walked around, looking at the pictures on the walls. They mostly consisted of her and her mother at different places they had traveled to, one or two of Nikola when she was at school, and a few of Ariana when she was small. The reason there wasn't much of a variety of people in the pictures was because Ariana and her mother usually kept to themselves. Sure, they'd travel a lot, but they never made good friends to keep in touch with. There was also no other family in Ariana's life. Her mother was pretty much disowned by her parents when she broke the 'Pureblood Rules' by being sorted into Gryffindor when she went to Hogwarts. And Ariana had no idea who her father was; her mother would refuse to talk about him.

Nikola came back into the room with two plates of toast. "Here you go!"

Ariana took a plate before looking at Nikola strangely. "Why is my tie around your head?"

Nikola grinned and shrugged sitting down on the couch. "It makes a rather good headband. Why? Jealous?"

Ariana laughed.

"You just wanted to relive your glory days," Ariana teased her mother. She paused as she heard someone call her name. "Well, I've got to go, Mum. School awaits. See you for Christmas!"

"Don't forget to study for your O.W.L.s!" Nikola shouted to her as she went to catch up with her friends.

"Will do! Ariana shouted over her shoulder before running into someone. "Oomph!"

"Why if it isn't little Ari!"

"Shut up, Sirius," Ariana groaned as she got back up. "I'm not that much shorter than you!"

"Oh, but you are. And you're much lighter, too." With this Sirius Black picked her up and threw her over his shoulder.

"Sirius! Put me down!" Ariana demanded, pounding him on the back.

"Not until you apologize," Sirius muttered as he tried to figure out how to carry both of their trunks without putting her down.

"Apologize? For what!"

"Well, for one thing, you didn't come to James's party the other week. And then , when I do see you again, it's you running into me." Sirius had decided to just levitate the trunks behind him. "Hey, is that your mom?"

Ariana sighed as Sirius took her back over to where her mother was standing. "Okay, Sirius, I'm sorry. You can put me down now."

"Nooo, I think I like you like this." Ariana rolled her eyes. "Ah, Mrs. Noxum! I must say you look lovely."

Ariana rolled her eyes again and hit Sirius on the back. "She's not a Mrs!" she hissed.

Nikola heard and smiled. "Hello Sirius. It's nice to see you again. I trust you're doing well?"

"I'm excellent, as usual. And yourself?"

"Excuse me," Ariana interrupted, trying to twist around to face them, which was a bit difficult, as Sirius hadn't put her down yet. "This is a very interesting conversation but the train won't wait for you to finish. Come on, let's go!"

"Well, goodbye then, Sirius, Ariana. I do hope you'll come to out Christmas party over the holidays," Nikola said.

"Will do, Mrs- Ariana's Mum! Now, please excuse us, we have a train to catch."

"Bye Mum!" Ariana called as they left.

The two friends go on the train. More than a few people stared at them; Ariana waved at them.

They entered a compartment that held a messy haired boy and a small, pudgy boy.

"Hello Sirius and… is that Ariana?" the messy haired boy asked.

"Hi James. Yes, it's me. Sirius won't put me down! Where's Remus?"

"He's at the Prefect meeting," the small boy, Peter, answered.

"Here, you take her, mate," Sirius said, dropping Ariana on James ignoring, her squeak. "So, our little bookworm as a Prefect now?"

The train stared, the sudden movement forward throwing Ariana on the floor. The boys looked at her, amused.

"Don't say anything," she muttered, glaring at them.

Sirius laughed as he helped her up before sitting down. "Graceful as ever, Ari."

"Shut up." Ariana took a seat next to James and leaned against him. "So, how was your guys' summer?"

The boys all shrugged. James answered, "They all came over to my house for a couple of weeks."

"And you didn't invite me?" Ariana asked, pretending to be offended.

Peter spoke up, "We did send you an owl."

Ariana thought. "Ooooooh, that must've been what we heard before we went to-" She was interrupted by the opening of the compartment door. A tall, sandy-haired boy stood there. Ariana noted the fresh scars on his face. "Remmie!" she shouted, patted the spot beside her. "How's our favourite prefect?"

"Yeah, what benefits do we get?" asked Sirius.

"We?" answered Remus, taking the seat next to Ariana. "I do believe that I am the prefect and the benefits are just for me."

"Aw, come on, mate! We're the Marauders! One for all and all for one!" James complained.

"You won't give us detentions, will you?" Peter asked.

Remus smiled slightly. "Of course I won't. And prefects don't get too many benefits. There's a bathroom just for us, which I've heard is really nice. And we get to stay out past curfew, but that's just when we're patrolling. And it's not like you guys obey that rule."

"That's all?" said Ariana. "Just a big bathroom? All I can say is better you than me, mate."

James moved and took a seat next to Sirius. They started planning and finding ways to use Remus's prefect abilities to their advantages. Peter listened in intently but Ariana rolled her eyes and rested her head on Remus's shoulder.

"So," she said. "How was the other night? You look awful. Well, you don't. The scars look a bit painful."

Remus shrugged, trying to look nonchalant. "It wasn't too bad."

Ariana felt terrible for her werewolf friend and started to grow angry. "It's not fair!" she exclaimed. "You don't deserve all this junk. You're a better person than most, why do you have to go through this?"

Remus shrugged again. "It's life, Ari. We play the roles we're given the best we can."

"See?" She threw her arms into the air. "Look how well you deal with it! I wouldn't be able to handle being a werewolf. You, my friend, are my rolemodel."

Remus smirked. "Does that mean you won't wait to do your homework until last minute?"

"Psh," she replied. "Like I'd ever do something as crazy as that."

They continued their conversation before the snack lady arrived.

"Oi, James! You paying this year?" Ariana asked, interrupting his and Sirus's plotting.

"Huh? Oh yeah!" He pulled out a bag of galleons and bought most of the contents of the snack cart before it left.

"Thanks, mate!" Ariana said as she was tossed a couple chocolate frogs. "It's Sirius's turn next year, right?" Sirius nodded. She continued, "Good. And I get 7th year."

They ate in silence for a while. Suddenly some teenagers, with green and silver ties showing from under their black robes, opened the door.

Ariana swalled the food in her mouth and said, "Bugger off."

The black haired girl in the front wrinkled her nose in disgust of being addressed by her. "Don't talk to me, mudblood."

Ariana stiffened while her friends took out their wands. "I'm not a mudblood, thank you, and I'll talk to you if I want to, which I don't, which is why I told you to leave, Black."

"Ah, yes, that's right. You're not a mudblood," Bellatrix Black said, pretending to have thought of something. "You're a bastard, aren't you?" She smirked as Ariana gripped her wand tightly before continuing. "How old was your mother when she had you? Seventeen? Sixteen?"

Ariana exploded. "Don't you talk about my mum!" She sent several curses at the Slytherin girl, who had her own wand pointed at her. Sirius, who was the closest to the door, quickly pushed Bellatrix and her fellow Slytherins out of the compartment and locked the door.

"Sorry about that," he apologized. "She was probably looking to verbally abuse me. Don't listen to anything my cousin said."

Ariana lowered her arm and realized she was standing. She shakily sat back down and started to mutter to herself about all the ways she could kill Bellatrix.

"Well, Marauders, our first target has been chosen," James announced to the group.