Chapter 9
Harry, Ron, and Hermione were all seated at the Gryffindor table, enjoying a delicious meal of toast coated in jam, and pumpkin juice. They had only just begun eating, when a certain bleached blond joined them. The trio looked at each other with disgusted expressions.
"What do you want Maylfoy," Harry groaned in annoyance. "Is your table finally getting too slimy for you?"
Malfoy scowled. "I was just wondering, Potter, when this school stooped so low as to let the mentally insane into the school. I mean, mud bloods is one thing but…"
Ron slammed the end of his fork into the table, interrupting Malfoy. "Shut up Malfoy," he growled.
"Oh I'm so scared, what will you do? Barf slugs on me?" Malfoy laughed, Ron's face turning bright red.
"What do you mean?" Asked Harry, narrowing his eyes and wishing Malfoy would leave, but if he knew one thing about Draco it was he was going to speak his mind no matter what they said.
"Oh you know of course," Malfoy grinned, picking up a sausage off of Harry's plate and taking a bite before Harry could yell at him. "That weirdo that hangs out with you, everyone wants to know about how someone…" Malfoy paused for a moment as he swallowed. "Someone like them got into the school. I guess Dumbledore must be getting really soft, I wonder how much the poor boys must have payed him to get in…"
"Payed who what?" Harry heard the familiar voice and jumped in his seat, swiveling around to see just who he expected, Edward Elric, arms crossed across his chest and… Owl feather? Strewn across his hair and the front of his coat and thin scratches lined his arms and face. It was getting kind of creepy how the kid always somehow showed up every time he was being talked about… Maybe it was magic.
He frowned at Malfoy. "Aren't you the little brat that we saw at the sports game?"
Malfoy's face turned bright red and he stood up from where he was sitting. While Ed was… Shorter, his arms were still lined with slightly intimidating looking muscles. Harry didn't doubt he could easily take on Crab and Goyle if he wanted too, though he wasn't as beefy as the two giants, who Harry noticed, were nowhere to be seen.
"I don't know what you're talking about," Malfoy stuttered. "I've never seen you before," he muttered, slinking back to his table muttering something under his breath about not wanting to soil himself with the likes of them.
"What was that about?" Alphonse asked, appearing from behind his brother. Ed sighed and slumped into a set next to Harry, stealing the boy's other sausage and eating it quickly.
"Probably just some bratty kid, right Harry?"
The eldest Elric asked, this time taking a plate that hadn't belonged to anybody currently. Winry came up to the table as well, and sat down next to her fiancé.
"Ya don't listen to anything Malfoy says. He's a foul git," Ron said through a mouthful of his own breakfast.
"As much as it pains me to say it, I agree with Ron. Malfoy is annoying," Hermione commented, eating her food far more gracefully than her ginger friend.
"He's thinks he's better than everyone else," Harry elaborated. "Only cause he's filthy rich and his family is full of purebloods,"
Ed frowned, he was all too familiar with these type of people. The ones who shoved you into a little box, slapped a label on you and thought they were better than you for it. He thought of Envy, the homunculus that thought he was better than all of mankind, but Edward and the rest had proven him wrong.
He frowned again, taking another bite of food and ignoring the full goblet of milk sitting next to his plate. "I heard him say mud blood," Ed commented, and noticed Hermione's face turned a light shade of pink. "What the heck does that mean?"
"It's a filthy name for someone who was born in a muggle family," she said, swirling her spoon around in her cereal and avoiding Edward's eyes. "There are lots of pure blood families who believe that half bloods are inferior to them, because they have corrupt blood,"
She looked up and stared right into Edward's eyes then, "There was a whole predicament two years ago about how the chamber of secrets was opened, and how certain people are trying to kill those who are not pure bloods,"
Ed choked on the pancake he had half swallowed. "Kill them? Just cause they aren't purely magical? Doesn't that seem a bit over the top?"
Hermione nodded. "Exactly, they believe that muggles are weak and stupid and we should have no part with them,"
Edwards growing frown deepened into a scowl. "Well, up until about a week ago I was a muggle. Then, a week ago I learned I was a mixed blood, and today, I learned my piece of crap of a father was a wizard."
Harry looked at Edward closely. "I thought I was a normal person until I was twelve. My aunt and uncle kept the fact that I was wizard from me because they hate magic." Ed let out a long whistle.
"They sound like a nice lot," he said sarcastically, dipping a price of bacon in maple syrup before stuffing it in his mouth. Both Winry and Hermione gave him disgusted looks.
"Ya you have no idea," Harry said darkly into his cup of pumpkin juice. The Dursleys had made the better part of his childhood hell.
"So, on to less depressing things," Al butted into the conversation.
"When do classes start?"
"Well right after breakfast, the teachers should be handing schedules out any minute actually," Hermione answered, glancing around.
"Here come Miss Mcgonagall right now,"
Sure enough, a skinny, strict looking woman with her hair in a tight bun came up to the group of waiting Gryffindors and handed each one a piece of paper. They immediately began to compare their schedules.
"Why, Al and Ed, you have all the same classes as Hermione!" Ron exclaimed.
"Ya so," Ed asked rolling his eyes and taking another bite of breakfast. He didn't really care if he had the same classes as anyone.
"You must be brilliant!" Ron exclaimed even further, waving his arms about.
"Well I am a certified genius," Ed bragged.
"You're not a certified genius," Al commented, rolling his eyes. "You're a certified state alchemist, military, not genius,"
"Same difference," Ed yawned, ignoring his brother and waving his hand dramatically.
"You're just jealous," he added a second later, sticking his tongue out at his younger brother. Al rolled his eyes at his older brother's childishness.
"Whatever Ed,"
"So what's herbology?" Ed asked, crinkling his nose and looking at the first class on his schedule. Harry sighed, wondering how on earth the Amestrians would survive in the fourth year of a school where they didn't even know the basic principles of the lessons. He hoped for their sake they were fast learners.
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Herbology was uneventful thankfully, seeing as the class was only introduced to the plants that they would be working with that year. The next class that the Amestrians and golden trio had was Care of Magical creatures, which was the class Harry was most excited for, despite the fact that the period was shared with the Slytherins. He was practically skipping his way down to Hagrid's, much to the confusion of the Amestrians.
It was safe to say that the Care of Magical Creatures class was much more eventful than Herbology. The class had been introduced to Blast-Ended-Skrewts. The creatures, Hagrid announced proudly he had bred them himself, were almost 3 feet long armored crablike scorpions, with occasionally shot sparks out of their ends, propelling themselves backward.
Hagrid lead the students up to a large fence, inside waffling around we're around ten of the creatures.
"What the hell is that!" Edward exclaimed, Harry forgot he was there, and watched as he shoved his brother aside and rushed up to the fence, leaning over to get a better look.
"Eh, get away from there Edward those may jus be baby's but ther mighty dangerous," Hagrid grumbled, grabbing Edward by the folds of his robe and jerking him backwards, just before one of the blast ended skrewts blasted a fountain of sparks at him, missing him narrowly.
"Wow!" Al exclaimed, and along with every other student, rushed up to the fence as Ed had just done, already forgetting the danger. "What kind of chimera is that?"
"Eh! Everyone get back!" Hagrid thundered, pushing them all away, but now before he heard a scream, and someone with distinct bleached blond slicked back hair jumped away from the crowd, waving his arms madly as the smoldering end of his robe burst full into flame.
"Help! Help!" Malfoy screeched, running toward the other students, who graciously jumped out of his way, not wanting to catch flame either.
"I'll get it!" Al offered cheerfully, grabbing Malfoy by the arm as he ran past, forcing him to stop as he ripped off the flaming piece of cloth, which happened to be half of Malfoy's robe, and threw in on the ground, stomping on the flames.
"Good job Al!" Edward praised him as he ran over too. "You okay Malfoy?" He asked, turning to the boy, but in surprise he saw his face right red in anger and mortification. "How dare you!" He shouted at Al, who blinked in surprise.
"You tore my robe in half you brute!" He shouted again. "Of course you would never understand just how expensive this was, not that it matters, just looking at what you're wearing!"
Both Ed and Al looked at Al's Gryffindor robes in surprise, too shocked to respond to Malfoy's outburst. As they did that Malfoy then turned his anger on Hagrid. "My father will hear about this!" He shouted his infamous phrase. "How dare you keep such dangerous creatures here! I've been burned!" He shouted again, moving his robes to show that his leg had turned a slight pink color, nothing more than a blush, hardly a burn.
"I told ya to stay away from the fence," Hagrid grumbled. Then he turned to one of the older slytherins and motioned to Malfoy with a vast hand.
"Take him ter madame pomfrey, and we'll finish the class," Hagrid commanded. Malfoy turned indignantly, trailing behind the other slytherin, obviously angry he hadn't caused as much drama as he would have liked. Ed and Al blinked at his retreating back.
"What the hell was that," Ed grumbled, curling his hands into indignant fists. How dare that little pipsqueak jerk treat his brother like trash! If it hadn't have been for Al, maybe the bastard would have actually been burned.
"That was Draco Malfoy," Harry spit in disgust. "I believe you were acquainted with him this morning?"
"Unfortunately," Ed grumbled, deflating. He also distinctly remembered meeting the snot-nosed boy at the Quidditch match. He decided then that it would be best if he and Al avoided the Malfoy's as much as possible from then on out.
The only mishaps for the rest of class were some minor burns and singed eyebrows, the students keeping a wide berth from the skrewts after Malfoy's incident.
The rest of the day went along as uneventfully as herbology did, for which Edward was glad, albeit a bit uncomfortable. It felt so strange to actually be going to a school, (regardless of the abnormality of the school), to be conversing to other human beings his age. In the military, Ed was used to speaking with adults all day, well if you could consider Mustang's team adults.
The blond had been keeping a sharp eye out all day for any signs of danger, and he haf practically been glued to Potter's side, waiting for the inevitable dark wizard to leap out of the shadows and kill Harry on the spot. Fortunately, the only thing Ed had to face was a few odd glares and whispers about his proximity to Harry, and he elected to ignore those in favor of keeping his charge safe.
One thing Edward had forgotten about kids was gossip. He heard enough of it throughout the day to make his ears bleed, though, he was still thankful for the extra bits of information on the wizarding world. All the talk seemed to be centered on one thing.
The Triwizard Tournament.
Edward still wasn't really sure what it was exactly. He had heard rumors ranging from it being a really big sporting event, to it being a human sacrifice to the god of pumpkins to bring in a good haul of juice that year, though Edward severely doubted the latter.