Chapter 3 – Friends?

Harry admitted that the trip to Hogwarts was being less fun than he'd expected. There wasn't anything magical about the train, and not much to do. Maybe he should have picked a compartment that wasn't empty, at least he would have someone to talk to. It would be cool if he found someone who knew about magic and wanted to chat.

"Hello," a dark haired girl said, opening the door. "May I come in?"

Harry nodded.

"I am honestly a bit disappointed, you know. We are basically travelling like muggles - my aunt says it's a tradition to take the train, but I don't care. Apparating close to Hogwarts would have been much faster. I can't wait to arrive there, you know."

Yes, the train was not the most fascinating way of transport, but the boy wasn't sure if he would prefer apparition. The girl continued to say something, but Harry wasn't paying much attention. From her way to talk about muggles, he guessed he was talking to a pureblood.

"I can't wait to be sorted… which house do you think you will be in?" she asked.

"I don't know."

And neither did he understand why sorting was such an important thing. He had read about the four houses, but separating the students wasn't something that made a lot of sense to Harry. Why couldn't someone be ambitious and brave, for example? He remembered watching a movie growing up in which a gangster had desired and gained a lot of power through risky crimes that demanded a lot of courage to even think about.

"Well. I know which house I will be in," she said. "What is your name?"

"Harry."

"Nice to meet you," she said, and changed the place where she was sitting, to come and stay in front of Harry, by the window. "I am Cassiopeia Lestrange." she paused and assessed the boy. "Are you, by any chance, Harry Potter?"

"Yes."

"Oh. That's wonderful, then. I sort of… heard about you at home. My uncle and aunt know your parents. Well, with all the war things, it is likely that my parents know yours, too."

"What do you mean?" Harry asked.

"Well. My parents are in Azkaban too. The Lestranges, you ought to know them."

"I don't know about that."

"But what about your godfather? I am sure he has said something about my mother, at least."

Harry stared blankly at the girl. What was she talking about?

"Godfather?"

"Are you slow, Potter? I am talking about Sirius Black, shame of the family, your godfather, who raised you."

Harry grimaced. Was it serious that name calling would already begin? Even without Dudley to fuel it, reality was already being the same old thing. He decided not to answer the question. What the hell was the girl talking about?

Cassiopeia bit her lower lip and lowered her eyes. They remained in silence for some minutes, until she broke it.

"Look, Potter. My aunt is always saying how I should behave like a proper witch, and think about all those useless things such as marriage - can you believe that? I was just… not being what she wants me to be, I guess. It wasn't personal."

"You don't like your aunt," Harry said.

The girl gave an exaggerated sigh.

"It's not that. I mean, she's good enough, I suppose, but she's not my mother. She's so content to look all prim and proper beside uncle Lucius and… Well, again, she is not my mother. My mother was powerful and feared, and that's what I want to be. Which means that I will speak to people in the way I see fit, and I will not bow to other children just because my aunt thinks that I could marry them one day. Pureblood witch or not."

Oh. Harry hadn't liked the way the girl spoke to him before, but he didn't think it was that bad, now that she'd explained. He too had, sometimes, done things only to spite his relatives.

"My aunt is kind of like that too," he said, and immediately regretted. Now she would want to know more about aunt Petunia, and his relatives were a topic he preferred to avoid.

"Which aunt? Wait, you were raised by a Potter?"

It looked like his family was known… could it be that these people knew even the Dursleys? Harry felt a little ashamed at the possibility.

"I lived with the Dursleys," he resigned to say. Soon or later it would be found out anyway.

Cassiopeia tilted her head and looked away, narrowing her eyes.

"I don't know the name. Certainly not people that meet with Aunt for tea… Half-bloods?"

"They aren't magical, so maybe you don't know them," Harry said. He remembered what McGonagall had said about pureblood folk - which he guessed Cassiopeia was part of - and wondered if she was going to leave now that she knew he had been raised by muggles. "My aunt is my mother's sister," he elaborated.

"That's…" Cassiopeia opened her mouth but didn't say anything for long seconds. "Horrible," she finished.

Harry shrugged. The Dursleys weren't horrible for being muggles, if that's what she meant. There were plenty of non magical people that treated children - even their nephews - decently.

"So that's why you didn't know about Sirius - er, your godfather. I mean, for all I know he is the closest thing of a relative you have alive. A magical one at least. I thought he'd raised you. That's a pity, really, and now that I know you I am thinking that it could have been me to be left living with mu-"

The voices of other children shouting outside of their cabin interrupted the conversation. It seemed to Harry that there was a fight going on. Cassiopeia stopped talking.

"...obviously a Weasley…"

"... up, Malfoy."

Harry looked at Cassiopeia, wondering if she knew more about that.

"One of them is my cousin, Draco Malfoy, I'd guess. He got the worst from both the Blacks and Malfoys - or that's the gossip I've heard from other people, behind Aunt Narcissa's back, of course. A spoiled git who always loses to me in fights - if anyone cared to notice that…"

The fight continued, and Harry decided to go and take a look. He opened the door of the cabin and saw two boys - one blonde and the other redheaded. He wondered which one was Cassiopeia's cousin.

"And who are you?" the blonde boy asked Harry, eyeing his clothes and shoes. He sneered before adding, "From these clothes I can see you're a mudblood."

The other boy flushed, and his face was almost as red as his hair.

"You can't call people that!" he said.

Harry had the impression that he had just been offended, even though he didn't know what a mudblood was.

"I am a Malfoy, I can do what I want," the blonde boy replied, and Harry finally saw who was the girl's cousin.

Spoiled git. Right. The boy certainly made a good Dudley impression.

Cassiopeia came to stand beside Harry, and when Draco Malfoy saw her he pursed his lips and chuckled.

"And you! Cassiopeia, you can bet my father will hear about you mixing with mudbloods."

"Harry is not a mudblood, Draco. And you know, write whatever you want to your father. I am not his daughter."

Draco narrowed his eyes and didn't say anything. He just looked at Harry, Cassiopeia and the redheaded boy with distaste and turned around, leaving them.

"Like a said, he's a spoiled git. Imagine having to live with that every day," the girl said.

The redhead scratched his neck, and stared at Harry and Cassiopeia.

"Who are you?" he asked, eyeing Cassiopeia as if she would jump on him at any time.

"Cassiopeia and Harry," the girl replied before Harry could say anything. "You're a Weasley, right?"

"Yeah. Ron Weasley."

"Do you want to sit with us?" she asked, opening the door wider.

Ron shrugged and nodded, entering the cabin.

Harry returned to the place where he was sitting before, by the window. Cassiopeia let Ron sit in front of Harry, and sat beside him, close to the door.

"So… are you a muggleborn?" Ron asked Harry. "My father loves muggle stuff", be complemented before Harry could answer.

"I was raised by my aunt and uncle - they are muggles. My parents are magical."

"Oh. Is that a muggle thing? Leaving your children to the relatives? My father would find it interesting, but mom would abhor it… or did your parents die in the war?"

"My parents are in prison."

That made Ron stop talking for a few seconds. He looked at the table and then made a grimace and turned to face Cassiopeia.

"You said you lived with Malfoy every day. Why?"

"He's my cousin."

Ron flushed again, and his eyes widened. He looked panicked.

"You! You're a Malfoy!"

Cassiopeia rolled her eyes.

"I am a Lestrange. My mother is a Black by birth, as is my au-"

"Black… Lestrange," Ron choked. "I have to get out of here," and then he tried to pass through Cassiopeia, but she didn't move to clear the way. Harry watched the exchange with curiosity. What was it with these people, did they all care about relatives and things like that? He would be seriously screwed if people wanted to judge him based on the Dursleys.

"Merlin, Weasley! I am not about to curse you." Cassiopeia said.

Ron turned his panicked eyes to Harry, as if asking for help.

"You can't be here with Lestrange!" he said. "She wants to kill all non purebloods."

Harry frowned, remembering what McGonagall had said about the war and the blood thing. Cassiopeia was a pureblood, but she'd seemed friendly.

"If I recall it correctly, you are a pureblood too, Weasley."

"Yeah, but my parents did not try to kill everyone who is not a bigoted pureblood."

"Well. The Dark Lord died, so it's not like er… I mean, not even if he were alive, I wouldn't want to follow him if he wanted to kill everyone. I do think muggles are useless, but it's not like I would want to kill all magical people… I am sure they are stupid enough to not last much."

"That's not true! Dad says muggles are smart in their own way," Ron protested.

Harry snorted. It was just his luck, that the first person who was nice to him also would have wanted to kill people raised by non-magical folk. Sure, Cassiopeia had been friendly, but something in her didn't make sense.

"I am getting out of here," Weasley said, but the girl did not relent, and stayed in the way.

"You'd asked of Harry lived with muggles, right?" She gave a brief glance on Harry's direction. "Tell him more about the muggles," she said.

Deciding it wouldn't do any harm, Harry began to talk.

"So… I was raised by my aunt - my mother's sister - and her husband."

Ron still kept looking at the girl, but he relaxed and paid attention to what the other boy was saying.

"There isn't a lot more to say, really. My aunt is always worried with making sure that everything is in place and stuff like that…"

Ron nodded.

"What happened to your parents?"

Harry looked down and picked at the hem of his shirt. Given how the redhead had reacted to Cassiopeia, nothing good would come off of saying his parents had served the dark wizard during the war.

"They are in prison," Harry repeated. He guessed that the commotion with Cassiopeia had made Weasley forget what he'd said about his parents.

"Muggle prison? Can they keep wizards in?" Ron asked, gaping.

"No. The magical one."

"Azkaban?" Weasley shouted. "Are they Death Eaters too?"

"I guess so…" Harry replied. That's what little he knew, at least. "That's what people told me. I grew up thinking they died in a car crash, I just discovered they are alive… and in prison."

Ron looked at Harry with same expression he'd used earlier, as if he would be jumped at any moment.

"I really need to get out of here," he said. "Get out of the way, Lestrange."

"No."

"Fine," Weasley said and climbed on the table. Cassiopeia snorted and crossed her arms, but made nothing to stop him.

"And to think that this is what will end up in Gryffindor - house of the brave," she muttered. "Just remember that if you need anyone to kick dear Draco's ass you have an ally here," Cassiopeia finished loudly as Ron opened the door and left.

"How do you know he will end up in Gryffindor?" Harry asked.

"Well… All Weasleys are Gryffindors," he replied, shrugging.

Harry figured that in Cassiopeia's head that made sense. In his it didn't, but he wouldn't discuss that now. Actually, he didn't know if he should to the girl at all.

M**-**-**-**M

[A/N: In which we discover what else is different in this AU, and Harry gains friends. Maybe.

Stay tuned for the sorting in next chapter. To which house do you think Harry, Ron and Cassiopeia are going to be sorted? The answer may not be that obvious ;)

The next update will happen within two weeks. I didn't intend to post 2 until next week, and 3 until 3 weeks from now, but since their revision was complete - why not? I also finished writing all chapters, and "Mirror" will be 33 chapters long.]