Author's Note: I don't own any of the characters, except Elise, she's allllll mine! All the rest belong to JK Rowling and the song at the beginning is from Jane Eyre the Musical and the title... from Les Mis... It's been a while since I've written anything, so enjoy and R&R!

"A flood of memory washes over me
A lonely girl, betrayed and battered
Contrives affection from a doll she cradles so
Thinking it will be the only love she'll ever know

Her spirit is in pieces
Her heart has broken at the seams
She craves one drop of kindness
But all she has are shattered dreams
She curses the injustice
And begs to know the reason why
She suffers in this prison

When all she wants to do is fly
Over mountains
Over oceans
How her restlessness stirs
For she longs for her liberty
When will liberty be hers?"

"Elise Worthington." Shaking, she approached the stool where the sorting hat lay; everyone's eyes were upon her, boring into her, as if they were trying to see her very soul. Don't be nervous she told herself over and over as she tried to get comfortable on the stool. The stern looking Professor McGonagall gently placed the sorting hat on her head, and Elsie found herself concentrating on what her aunt had told her just that morning. "There is no need to worry Ellie" she had said "our family has been in Slytherin for six generations, you will be too…" But she was worried, what if she was placed in Hufflepuff? Her family would disown her for sure, imagine! A Worthington, in Hufflepuff, or worse, Gryffindor! To have to interact with those mudbloods, it made Elise's blood boil. And it was at that moment that the strange hat shouted "Slytherin!" and all the other students in her new house cheered. Relieved she took her seat as the sorting continued.

Suddenly massive amounts of food began to appear on the table, and Elise smiled at the feast that lay before her. Chicken, fish and chip, sausage, potatoes, green beans, just about every food imaginable lay before her and her fellow Slytherins. Eagerly, she began to eat, consuming the delights before her. Desert appeared not too long after, and as Elise sipped daintily from her glass, she noticed a young boy with an unusually large nose and dark hair glaring at her from across the table. Angered by his demeanor, she glared right back at him; two can play this game, she thought, temporarily distracted from her desert. After a few moments, Elise had had enough of the bizarre little game she was playing with the boy. Brushing her dark red hair out of her brown eyes, she spoke to him.

"Are you going to sit there staring at me all night? Or do you have something to say to me?" For eleven years old, Elise was incredibly outspoken, arrogant, and over confident. No adult intimidated her, or so she liked to tell herself, so there was no way this little boy with the ugly nose was going to.

"No." he replied tersely.

"No what?" she replied equally brusque in her response.

"I am not going to stare at you, nor do I have anything to say to you."

"Then why were you looking at me?"

"I know you."

"Do you? How interesting." She was rapidly getting annoyed by this little snip of a boy.

"Do you have a cousin here?"

"At Hogwarts?"

"Where else?" She glared at him, angered by the fact that his arrogance outweighed her own.

"Yes, I do." She responded as he looked down the table at a handsome blond boy.

"Are you a Malfoy?" he inquired.

"Why is that any of your business?"

"Because I am your cousin's friend."

"Slytherin's don't make friends, we only make rivals." She repeated what her mother had told her over and over when she had received her letter to attend Hogwarts.

"In that case…" he was interrupted by the blond boy who put his hands on Elise's shoulders.

"Elise! You're finally at Hogwarts! How splendid." His joy at seeing her was obliviously false; they had always loathed each other as younger children, and there was no reason that the hatred between them should dissipate, at least that was how Elise felt. "I see Snape here was introducing you to Hogwarts."

"Lucius." Elise gritted her teeth as she greeted him. After all, she thought, how can one possibly be amicable to a cousin who tried to turn her into a rodent on more than one occasion?