I'm in the middle of a rather pleasant nap when the little blighter starts complaining about his inventory of brothers. Again. Forever griping about Bill the Head Boy and Charlie the Seeker and now Percy the Prefect; bemoaning the twins their marks and popularity. I daresay, if he studies half as hard as he whines, he'll become the most accomplished Weasley in a century.

I'm always tempted to bite him when he gets going about how horrible it is being the youngest of six boys, or the indignity of his second-hand belongings. I don't, usually, though I have left droppings in his shoes more than once. It just infuriates me that he grouses about people who actually enjoy his company; people who don't accuse him of being a demonic abomination when he moves things without touching them; people who don't lock him in a rancid basement with roaches and spiders and rats the size of badgers.

Of course, those rats probably saved my life, once I learned how to talk to them.

Any chance I have of dipping back into my dreams is gone when Ronnie Icklekins pulls me out of his jacket. The Hogwarts Express looks just the same as it has since my own first day twenty years ago, and that's a monumental comfort. It means I'll be back within the walls of Hogwarts Castle within the day, and almost certainly back in Gryffindor Tower by tonight.

A bespectacled kid sits across the compartment. The redhead introduces me by the name his brother gave me all those years ago, and tells him just how useless I am. Which is fine. The less he expects from me, the better. I feign sleep as the two boys trade woeful tales of hand-me-down wardrobes and unsatisfactory birthday gifts, and I groan to myself that of course Ron would find another demoralized child to commiserate with. Misery, I've heard, loves company.

But then the kid with the glasses says something that shocks Ron and wakes me all the way up in an instant. Voldemort. The kid actually says the Dark Lord's name, like they're old friends. My curiosity gets the better of me; I give up the ruse and take a look at the kid, who's claiming that he's not trying to be brave or anything, and if a rat could scream, I certainly would have. As it is, I think I still squeak like a rusty gate, but it's drowned out by the clatter of the train.

The scar on his forehead is more than enough. But he has the same unruly brown hair and even the same eyeglasses as his father, and for one absurd moment, I might be looking at James through a rip in time. The resemblance is uncanny, except for his eyes; those are a green so startling that I think I can actually smell Lily's shampoo in the compartment.

The train speeds past fields full of cows and sheep, and I wonder at this sickening irony.