Platform 9 ¾ was bustling with families of all backgrounds bidding their children or siblings goodbye. Some of the farewells were tearful, with wailing and sobbing mothers while others were cool and impersonal as they said goodbye to their children.
In the midst of all this chaos stood a tall, thin girl with pale skin, white-blonde hair and intense blue-green eyes. Her body was trembling slightly while her long and bony hands, covered by elbow length gloves that once were as white as her hair but was now dark grey with age, shook violently. Her eyes darted around the platform nervously, her lips moving but no words could be heard from them. To an observer she didn't seem to notice when a girl shoved past her to get onto the large red train, the girl's dark hair smacking the thin girl in the face, but the barely perceptible tensing of her shoulders and the way her eyes glazed over suggested otherwise. The girl began to gasp silently for breath, her hand was clutching her chest as her glossy eyes saw something those surrounding her couldn't.
Large, callused hands ran up and down the girl's sides, causing her to moan softly and throw her head in pleasure. The girl traced the chiseled chest of the boy beneath her and earned a grunt of approval from him. Soon, the rest of the two lovers' clothes were discarded and the only sounds that filled the room were those of ecstasy.
"Oh, yes Si-"
The pale girl nearly screamed in relief when a sudden sharp pain in her arm ripped her from the vision. During the vision the girl that crouched down, her arms wrapped around her abdomen, and her eyes clenched shut. Now that her eyes were open, she could see that people had begun to stare and whisper and feeling her face flush she quickly stood, grabbed her trunk, and dragged it onto the train. The girl kept her head down so her pale blonde hair covered her face as she searched for an empty compartment.
Finally finding a compartment that was completely empty at the pack of the train, the girl pulled her wand from the pocked of her coat.
"Wingardium Leviosa." The girl whispered in a hoarse, raspy voice and flicked her wand, levitating her trunk onto the luggage rack.
After her trunk was settled, the girl pointed her wand at the seat, "Erado Preteritus." The seat glowed white momentarily before fading back the original dull checkered blue. She gave a satisfied nod, before reaching into her coat and pulling out a small brown and tan marten, then sat down in the seat next to the window. The marten chittered softly and nuzzled his mistress's covered hand before curling up into a tight ball on the seat next to her while she pulled off her gloves and gave a soft relieved sigh.
The obnoxiously loud train whistle which signaled that the train would be leaving in fifteen minutes caused the girl to jump and clutch her chest, just above her heart. The girl stared at the families still saying goodbye to each other as she stroked her familiar's fur. A pang of heartache hit the girl as she watched a mother fuss over her daughter, who could be no older than a first year. Her eyes glazed over as she gazed the mother and daughter longingly, wishing that her own mother would fuss over her that way. She shook her blonde head quickly, causing her hair to fly every which way as she tried to get rid of her self-pitying thoughts. Unconsciously, the girl's fingers began to twitch against her thighs as she continued to stare out the window, making sure to avoid staring at the families that were being left on the platform as the Hogwarts Express began to pull way.
She stared out the window, her eyes glazing over again as she was assaulted by her own memories of having visions of other people's past.
A thin, pale girl stood in front of a tall glass cabinet, staring in awe at a large black vase. The girl, who couldn't be any older than eight, opened that cabinet doors and stood on the tip of her toes. Her long fingers barely grazed the edge of vase, but that was enough contact for the young girl to start reliving the object's horrible past. With a piercing scream the girl dropped the vase, which shattered, and fell to her knees. Her thin hands clutched her head, pulling on her hair as she watched the deaths that had been caused because of her mother's vase.
"IZORA! WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING?" A tall, regal woman screamed when she saw her daughter curled up on the floor, whimpering in pain as memories that weren't hers assaulter her brain. The woman opened her mouth to scr-
The sudden sound of the compartment door being thrown open jerked the girl out of her reminiscing and to whirl around in her seat, her blue-green eyes stricken with anxiety.
"I'm telling you Padfoot, this year Ev- Oh." A loud, masculine voice stopped mid-sentence.
"What was that Prongs? I didn't- Why hello there." Another masculine voice, this one huskier than the first, said.
The pale girl shifted so that her hair covered her face, her blue-green eyes staring at the two boys that were standing in the doorway of her compartment.
"Why in Merlin's pants are you two standing in the bloody doorway?" A slightly raspy and husky voice asked in annoyance.
"There's a girl in our compartment, Moony." The boy that had spoken first answered, still sounding flabbergasted and openly staring at the girl and the thing on her lap.
The girl flinched when the second boy let out a loud bark of laughter before shoving the first boy into the compartment then following after him. He was soon followed by two more boys, the girl assumed the boy that came into the compartment right after the second boy was the owner of the raspy voice.
She stared at the four boys warily through her hair. She only had two friends but even then she knew that these four were the infamous, self-proclaimed Marauders, but she had never bothered to learn the individual names of the boys. Her hands began to twitch and jerk more noticeably as the four boys finished settling into her compartment and she bit the inside of her cheek roughly in an attempt at distracting herself from the inevitable social interaction she was going to be forced to deal with. Sadly, it only left a throbbing pain and the coppery taste of blood in her mouth.
The first boy that had been shoved into the compartment was about six feet two inches tall, he wasn't very broad but he was still obviously muscular. He had bespectacled hazel eyes and black hair that looked like a nest of Cornish pixies lived in it. The girl briefly wondered what would happen if someone tried to brush his hair, before she turned her attention to the second boy. He was probably only an inch or so taller than the first boy and much broader, with very noticeable muscular definition. His hair was straight and black, reaching just above his shoulders and it fell into his stormy gray eyes. The girl had to keep herself from visible recoiling when she felt the boy's lust wash over her as her empathic abilities began to pick up all the emotions in the compartment. The girl took a deep breath through her nose in an attempt to control her ability before gazing at the third boy.
He was easily the tallest of the group, standing at least six foot five inches. He looked lanky, but the girl's blue-green eyes could effortlessly see the muscles that rippled beneath his uniform shirt. Compassionate golden brown eyes stared out of a handsomely scarred face and a mop of sandy brown-blonde hair. The fourth boy was shorter than the rest, probably standing at five foot ten inches. His hair was light brown and curly while his eyes were a water baby blue and he was a little pudgy.
The boy with straight black hair cleared his throat, startling the girl from her observations. She jerked her eyes away from the short boy and turned to stare at him, still keeping her hair in her face.
"There's no need to be nervous, love. We won't bite, unless you're into that kind of thing." He said, reaching over and grasping her hands.
The girl wrenched her hands away quickly, stifling her cry of anguish as she was sucked into one of this boy's memories.
"You are a disgrace to our family! You do not deserve to bare the last name of the most Noble and Ancient House of Black! You filthy blood traitor!" A disgustingly thin woman screeched at a young boy with shaggy black hair. The boy flinched slightly and ducked his head but the woman would have none of this and grasped his hair, yanking his head up so that she could look him in the eye.
"What do you have to say for yourself?" She demanded, tightening her grip on his hair.
"I'm glad I was Sorted into Gryffindor! I don't want to be a miserable bitch like you!" The boy yelled and slapped the woman's hand away from his head.
"Why you insufferable-" She didn't bother to finish her insult, instead she backhanded hi-
She was snapped back to the present when the back of her head collided with seat's headrest from being shaken roughly. She groaned and opened her eyes, pain-filled blue-green meeting concerned golden brown.
"Are you okay?" The boy asked worriedly.
The girl shrunk away from him, grateful that his hands weren't touching the bare skin on her shoulders but her coat.
"I-I'm fine." She stuttered in her hoarse voice.
The boy nodded and sat back in his seat across from her. A few minutes of silence passed, the four boys exchanging glances and the girl keeping her eyes focused intently on her lap and shaking hands.
"Who the hell are you?" The boy wearing glasses blurted out when he couldn't take the silence anymore.
"Ow! Bloody hell Moony!" The boy yelped a few minutes later after the tallest boy had smacked him over the head.
"Forgive him. He tends to speak before he thinks. I'm Remus, Remus Lupin." The boy that had shaken the girl introduced.
The girl looked up at the boys through her hair nervously before replying, "I-Izora H-H-Hallowell."
"It's a pleasure to meet you Izora. That's James Potter, Sirius Black, and Peter Pettigrew." Remus introduced his friends, first gesturing to the bespectacled boy, the one who touched her hands, and then the pudgy boy. Izora nodded and gave the boys a small, nervous smile before turning her head to stare out at the passing scenery while the boys amused themselves for the remainder of the trip or at least until one redheaded Prefect came around to collect Remus.
Remus had pulled out a book shortly after he had introduced his friends to the girl sitting across from him. He had thought it was quite odd the way she had reacted to Sirius's touch but he understood the need for privacy so he didn't ask. Remus had also made it clear to his friends that they shouldn't ask either.
He glanced at Izora over the top of "The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection" by Quinten Trimble. She was fidgeting with the cuff of her coat, long fingers shaking slightly as she tugged on a loose thread. Remus watched her for a few more seconds before returning his attention back to his book.
"So... Izora, was it? What house are you in?" Sirius asked, flashing the poor girl his most charming smile.
"G-g-gry-" She stuttered out before taking a deep breath, "Gryffindor."
Remus sighed quietly, feeling nothing but sympathy for the stuttering girl. He had lost count of the girls that had become stuttering messes when Sirius talked to them.
Sirius smiled at the girl, already thinking how easy this was going to be, "We are too. You're a fifth year right?"
Surprisingly, the girl snorted and lifted her head up to stare Sirius straight in the eye, "I'm a sixth year, same as you four."
Remus looked up from his book in surprise; the girl's tone was sharp and challenging. Sirius was even more surprised than Remus by this seemingly shy girl tone and that she was in his year.
"It's not too surprising that you didn't know that. After all, your head is too far up your arse for you to notice someone as insignificant as me." Izora mused as she absent-mindedly stroked the ball of fur lying beside her.
Sirius, James, Remus, and Peter's jaws dropped collectively at what the girl had said. Izora looked at the four with a victorious gleam in her blue-green eyes and a small smile playing at her pale lips. Remus was the first to recover from his initial shock and when he did he fell in raucous laughter. Soon James and Peter joined him, while Sirius looked affronted by her remark.
"Th-that was bloody brilliant!" James exclaimed, gasping for breath after his laughing fit had subsided.
Izora simply raised an eyebrow at the three giggling boys curiously, she hadn't known what she said would receive such a reaction.
Sirius grumbled something unintelligible, crossing his arms and leaning back into his seat.
"Oh come off it Padfoot." James said and clapped his friend on the shoulder, still chuckling.
Remus and Peter nodded in agreement, still smiling.
Izora's brows furrowed in confusion at the nickname, "Padfoot?"
All four boys tensed and turned to look at her guardedly, which caused her frown to deepen.
"Just a nickname, forget about it." James said coolly.
Izora stared at them for a few more minutes and opened her mouth to comment, but the door was thrown open.
"Remus, the Prefects meeting starting in ten minutes." A petite redhead with bright green eyes said brusquely from her position in the doorway.
"Oh, hello Izora." Lily greeted when she saw her dorm mate.
"Hello Lily. How was your summer?" Izora asked politely, she and Lily weren't close but Izora liked the girl well enough.
"Yes, my dear Lilyflower, how was your summer?" James asked eagerly.
Lily sniffed snootily and glared at James, "Don't talk to me Potter."
James looked disappointed, but he opened his mouth to say something anyway, "Come on Li-"
"Izora, Galen was wondering where you were." Lily cut James off in favor of talking to Izora.
Izora smiled softly, "Do you know what compartment he's in?"
Lily nodded, "Third car, fourth compartment on the right." and with that Lily spun on her heel and left.
"I'll be back later." Remus said and followed after his fellow Prefect, leaving his three friends with Izora.
Sirius looked at Izora curiously, "Boyfriend?" He asked casually.
Izora's eyebrows shot up in confusion, "Pardon?"
"My Lilyflower mentioned someone named Galen was looking for you. Is he your boyfriend?" James asked, he wanted to make sure his Lily wasn't seeing anyone.
"Galen? He's my best friend, nothing more." Izora explained quietly.
"Oh. Are he and Lily..." James trailed off.
"No, Galen is a Prefect."
"So you two aren't together?" Sirius asked, butting in.
Izora shook her head and turned to stare out the window after picking up her marten and setting him on her lap. Sirius and James looked at each other before shrugging and turning to Peter. The three began to play Exploding Snap until the trolley came and they order practically everything off of it, much to Izora's amusement and disgust.
Author's Note: Big thanks to FleurSuoh for her encouraging review. I'm glad that you like the story so far.
Also if anyone sees any grammar mistakes that I didn't catch please tell me. I don't like when my stories aren't grammatical correct.
Edited 4/24/12